Especially during the last decade populations of modern affluent societies are warned by scientist, politicians, media and interest groups that there is an obesity epidemic. Being overweight is now not only culturally condemned, but also medically and politically defined as a major public health threat. This article presents three lines of critique which is offered against this dominant public perception. Some argue that we need to change our attitude to fat irrespective of the medical truth. Others agree there is a problem, but they disagree with the analysis and therefore offer other solutions. Most fundamental is the kind of critique that starts with the question ‘But is it true?’ This question leads to three major conclusions. First, it turns out that the medical science is flawed, one‐sided and contradicted. Second, because there are no effective therapies, present policies produce major negative side‐effects. And third, these policies produce and legitimize discriminatory practices. A general conclusion which can be drawn from this critical literature is that the present risk discourse on fat has much more to do with social and cultural issues like power, blame and control than with health problems.

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SummaryBeck and others have proposed that in late modernity Western industrial sodeties are undergoing a process of tranformation into risk sodeties. The author of this article tends to agree, hut would like to draw attention to a concomitant cultural change. Whereas industrial society was no stranger to a risk culture, in risk society we are witnessing the development of a precautionaty culture. This article first outlines some major aspeds of this cultural transformation, providing the basis for a conceptual scheme of ideal types which distinguish between three types of public reacrions to damage and disgrace. Central in these ideal types are the (legal) concepts of guilt, risk and precaution. Second, the article offers a critique of the precautionary prindple, the legal concept of such crudal importance in the precautionary culture. A major conclusion is that if the precautionary principle can no longer be removed from the present day legal and political culture, it should at least be radically revised in order to remove some of its major shortcomings.

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