“You look amazing! Have you lost weight?” sounds like kindness when making small talk. It’s meant to flatter, to say you noticed. But compliments like this can hit harder than they land, especially in a culture that still treats body size as moral currency. Weight loss praise often feels harmless until you realize how much harm it actually carries.
According to researchers from Griffith University and Queensland University of Technology, positive comments about weight can reinforce body dissatisfaction, fuel disordered eating, and deepen stigma for anyone outside the narrow idea of “healthy.” It’s not that the intention behind it is bad. It’s the sneaky message hiding inside the compliment.
Here are five reasons to skip the weight talk entirely.
1. It reinforces weight stigma
Telling someone they “look great” because they’re smaller sends the message that thinner is better. Studies show this kind of feedback shapes how people are treated at work, school, and even in medical settings. Larger-bodied people, especially women, report being seen as less capable or disciplined. That judgment doesn’t disappear once the weight does.
2. It links worth with appearance
Complimenting weight loss keeps the focus on how a body looks instead of what a person does. It teaches everyone, including kids, that looking “fit” matters more than being kind, funny, or accomplished. Research from the Journal of Adolescent Health found that parental comments about dieting and weight were tied to higher psychological distress in teens.
3. It ignores natural body diversity
Bodies aren’t meant to fit one mold. Weight changes with genetics, medication, hormones, and stress. Praising thinness implies that every body should shrink, when in reality, variation is what’s normal.
4. It assumes the weight loss was intentional
Sometimes smaller bodies mean someone is sick, grieving, or under extreme stress. Complimenting that change risks celebrating illness, hardship, or trauma. “You look healthy” might land like “You look better broken.”
5. It can trigger disordered eating
For people in recovery from eating disorders, praise can reawaken old patterns. It can turn self-acceptance into a scoreboard. Studies show that weight-focused comments, even positive ones, are linked to relapse.
If you want to say something kind, pick anything that doesn’t involve a body. Bodies change. That’s the least interesting thing about them.
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