As you can see from his campaign sign, Braddock District Supervisor John Cook (Tea Party-supported Republican) is proudly running with Fairfax County School Board candidate Nell Hurley. Who is Nell Hurley, you ask? Well, in this morning’s Washington Post, she expressed some…er, unconventional viewpoints.
…one candidate says the next [Fairfax County schools] chief shouldn’t be too fat.
“He’ll have to make a lot of public appearances,” said Braddock District hopeful Nell Hurley. Beyond serving as an excellent manager, she said, a superintendent also should model healthy habits for children and parents. “Somebody who’s terribly obese might not be the best person for that particular job.”
Weight discrimination in hiring is legal in every state but Michigan, said Rebecca Puhl, director of Yale University’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. Puhl said a handful of cities, including the District, prohibit such discrimination.
“A person’s body weight says nothing about their abilities, their accomplishments or their contributions to society,” she said. “We would never see this if we were talking about race or sexual orientation or gender, but with weight this remains acceptable and people do it automatically.”
Perhaps that’s the case, but it shouldn’t be “acceptable” in Braddock District, and John Cook should immediately and forecefully condemn these discriminatory, even bigoted, remarks. Unless, that is, he agrees with his running mate that being overweight has anything whatsoever to do with being an effective schools chief, or any other elected official for that matter.
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