That bears repeating.
I never said that ‘romanticise’ necessarily implied something appealing. I used that word in this context because that’s how you’ve been trying to twist my argument, to make it look as though I’m attempting to defend the nutritional content of Victorian food.
Please find a post where I mentioned carrots.
I’ve never seen it.
No, it’s not about being “politically-correct.” It’s about finding out what works for each person, because everyone is different, and a solution that works for one person may not work for another.
Willpower and discipline work for you-well, that’s great. Not everyone has that kind of strength, and it’s NOT EASY for them. I’m not saying it can’t be done, just that they have to work at it, and it doesn’t help to look down on them as “lazy.”
Yes, there are conditions where willpower won’t work though. They’re rare, but they exist. Praeder-Willis, for one. There’s no amount of willpower in the world to overcome that.
Because it is hard to permanently ignore billions of years of biochemistry in the name of a transient social fad. Hell, science barely understands the biochemistry of obesity, that is why there aren’t any cures that work for more than 5-10% of the population. Did you know a person has a better chance of surviving stage IV cancer for 5 years than of losing weight and keeping it off for 5 years? Are all those who die from cancer lazy and are those who try to point out other factors other than willpower looking for no fault/politically correct reasons? We are ignorant as of 2005 and many of the hormones you hear about in the news relating to obesity were only discovered 10-15 years ago (ghrelin wasn’t discovered until 1999 for example). People’s biochemistries are different and they end up at different weights as a result.
If obese people weren’t social pariahs who were on the recieving end of brutal double standards we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Obesity would be viewed as something like cancer, something you probably can by and large avoid if you try really, really, really hard but most people don’t have the time, effort or ability to do it.
It’s a social thing, too, I think. As I said above, I’m obese. But I dress well, don’t stink, and look like an active part of society. I get promotions and good jobs and have excellent relations with my management. I don’t get discriminated against at all. Well, if it’s behind my back, I don’t know and hence don’t care.
I work with other obese people, too. Detroit’s now the fattest city in the nation, so I guess I can’t avoid it. There are obese people that are just normal people and you don’t notice the obesity (I guess I’m one of these), and they don’t get discriminated against. Then there are “fat slobs.” They don’t necessarily have gravy stains all over them. No chicken bones in their beards. But they’re “fat slobs” nonetheless. I can’t say what makes someone a fat slob versus a non-noticable obese person – you just know them when you see them. I don’t mean to treat them differently, but I’m sure I do.
I guess in short, there’s something beyond obesity that invokes ire.
It just sucks because if you took the level of responsibility expected from the obese and applied it to other aspects of life there would be uproar. True if people really, really, really wanted to they could lose weight but people could do alot of things if they set their minds to it. Most crime victimization is due to not trying hard enough to stay safe (people living in the wrong area, acting wrong, pissing off the wrong people, not knowing how to handle bad situations, not learning self defense, etc) all of which are under the control of the individual. Most diseases are the fault of the person suffering from them. But I don’t want to live in a society where I denounce rape victims for not learning self defense or denounce cancer victims for not eating a healthy diet, and I don’t want to denounce obese people for not gently starving themselves.
That thing beyond obesity that invokes ire is probaby the fact that obesity is considered a sign of an inability to resist temptation and of excess gluttony and sloth.