Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin have written a marketer’s dream with their book, Skinny Bitch. Write in as many curse words as you can and be offensive as possible, officially splitting your market in half – those who will love it and want to read it and those who will hate it and want to read it to see what you have to say so they can counter it. If you can get past the crassness of the authors, there is actually quite a bit of good information in the book, although I’d say there is a fair amount of misinformation, too.
American diets are horrible, and the authors have no qualms about pointing that out. Whether the information is enough to cause a person to take a deeper look at their diet or whether their in-your-face attitude is, changing our diets for the better – for health and not appearance – is never a bad thing.
It seems, however, that the authors then took hold of their marketer and went wild. While I found some of the recipes in the book appealing, there were plenty that called for processed crap – organic vegan processed crap, but crap nonetheless. It’s a bit of irony after their spiel against processed foods. However, we all know that the majority of America isn’t out to get healthy but to look skinny. So in that aspect, I’d say the authors hit their mark. Prey on the insecurities of a population and market as many products to them as possible. It just so happens that this time, they actually threw information into the mix. Take out the crassness and marketing, the idea that we should prematurely wean children, and the love of all things soy, and you’d have a good book that probably wouldn’t sell.
living peacefully with children 
i read the book when it first came out so it’s not fresh in my mind, but i agreevwuth everything you wrote, and your assessment also made me smilethis morning….the closing sentence is perfect. and sad but true!
the thing no marketer wants you to know is we would all be thinner and much healthier if westopped processing food–dont buy processed food, and dont process all the nutrients out of the food you buy! do this not to be a skinny bitch DESPITE YOUR KIDS but to grow healthy kids fed good fuel-including mama’s milk, and then by healthy eating for your whole family. one personal note: i always thought i was providing that, as we ate lots of vegetarian food, organic milk, tofu and soy milk, organic meat, etc. Realizing that this diet was better than coke and burgers, but not really GOOD, either, came as a big shock. much of my journey to healthy family eating (and i am taking off pounds without dieting), came from an amazing, well-educated skinny-nice-person friend and food guru (see kellibailey.com on web or on FB for more from her–she WAS that coke and hamburgervmom, and she transformed her family’s diet and health in partnership with them–no food control, forcing or disrespect. she inspired me to follow her path and it’s revolutionized food in my house. check her out (if u are ever looking for a guest columnist maybe?). and no, i am not her marketer or part of her company, thinking about the Skinny Bitch books and your take made me think of her approach esp as it includes the whole family with complete respect for all its members, big and small. take care, i enjoy being on your feed! osie
I completely agree with you. I used to make all of our dairy and whole wheat products, making most things we ate from scratch. And then I leanred that all of my health problems are deeply connected with food allergies – including allergies to dairy, wheat, soy, corn, etc. It was an eye opener for me and I’ve been learning more ever since.