Fat Bashing and Sizeism

The BBQ Pit
1

Inspired by the obvious thread

Here’s my stance

Morbidly obese people are not normal, healthy, or sympathy cases. With the exception of those with the odd medical condition no one is predestined to obesity regardless of their diet or exercise level. There were no 300 lbers in Nazi camps, nor are there many in impoverished third world countries. We all learned in first grade that our bodies are like engines, they need fuel to run. Either that fuel is coming from your diet or your cells will burn whatever’s already in the body, and the fat stores are the first to go. Even if you have the slowest metabolism on the planet you still have a metabolism.

That said, if you are just moderately overweight, you know stocky, big boned, broad shouldered, sporting a spare tire, etc. there is a good chance you are perfectly healthy. But, if your body is 40 percent fat or more and you require an airplane seat for each butt cheek there are better than good chances that you aren’t.

People trying to lose weight don’t get to each as much as normal people? They can’t eat what they really want to? What a freaking shock man. And guess what in the new, fatter America overweight people just might be the “normal” people.

Guess what Belrix not every skinny person was born that way, I wasn’t, much of my family is overweight, I spent my childhood overweight, but I decided to make a change. If you don’t want to make the sacrifice it takes to change your body don’t bitch about it. Do you think I liked six months of rice cakes, broccoli, and treadmills? Or still depriving myself of some of the foods I like except on special occasions? Or simply denying my hunger on a daily basis? The fact is what I want to eat is not what I should eat. Shit, I’d eat three meals of buffalo wings and root beer floats a day if I could.

Wake up call: Alcohol, nicotine, and cocaine are physically addictive substances. Everyone who abuses them will eventually get hooked. Not everyone who has the occasional Oreo binge becomes a cookie fiend.

If fatty can’t stop eating cookies it’s not because his body is physically dependent on them – shit he may have enough cookies saved up in his left ass cheek to survive three weeks with nothing but water, melbatoast, and multivitamins. He is psychologically addicted, he likes things that taste good, he doesn’t like feeling hungry, and he lacks the will power to overpower those desires. Those gastric bypasses they do these days are tailor made for this problem.

Using genes and glands as excuse is a dead end. Like just about everything with your body, weight and body fat is the result of an interplay of genetics and environment. The American environment just happens to have 49 cent cheeseburgers and burritos the size of a football for a buck. Obesity in America is a growing problem. It’s not okay that more and more of our kids are fat, and I don’t think its okay to tell people it’s not their fault that they are obese. And it certainly isn’t constructive or even truthful to let people think they will be fat no matter what they do.

2

Actually, as a piece of totally anicdotal evidence:

In a previous thread I mentioned that my mom had gained about 40 lbs since X-mas ans was diagnosed with hypothyroidism.

I’m pleased to report that since the beginning of this month, mom has started taking medication, exercising more and has cut down her diet quite a bit. She’s lost 9 lbs! Horray mom!

3

Since you ignored my later comment, I’ll repost part of it again here:

I submit that many “officially handicapped” people are handicapped through some avoidable situation. They, indirectly, are handicapped through choice - although certainly not by intent. Do they deserve the same consideration as the biologically handicapped?

I’ll answer my own question. The person who is confined to a wheelchair is deserving of accomodation. I don’t care if you fell from your polo horse on a sunny day, were caught it a drug deal gone bad, or were born with neurological damage.

A blind person is deserving of accomodation whether it’s from diabetic retinopathy complicated by lack of diet control or whether it’s congenital.

The origin of a handicap is not significant to its need for accomodation.

So, the question morphs thus: Is obesity deserving of accomodation?

I’ll make a mark in the “No” column for you.

4

Blindness and paralysis can not be cured by exercising self control.

Obesity can.

If you weigh 400 pounds you HAVE to have some muscle mass under there to be able to move at all. Cut back the calories and the fat should melt right off.

Self control and personal responsibility won’t re-attach retinas or heal spinal cords, but they will make you thin.

5

If you’re obese, then you need to plan for your own accomodation. Just because you are overweight, you do not have the right to infringe on the rights of others as was done in MOL’s situation.

To my knowledge, most people in wheelchairs, blind people, etc. do have to make special arrangements for travel. Why should it be any different for an obese person?

If I suffer from alcoholism, and I get drunk and puke on you on a plane is it ok? After all, it is my disease and you should accomodate it. That scenario is no more outlandish than the story of the lady on the plane.

6

I don’t buy your argument. Diabetes and paralysis are irreversible, obesity isn’t.

7

Doh, didn’t reload the page, late simulpost

8

If self-inflicted, it kinda is.

Here’s the crux of the OP’s argument. For the overwhelming majority of fat people, change is very possible. They will have to work at it, there’s no denying that. So it’s true that they chose the condition (through their action, not their intent), but they continue to choose the condition, unlike your other examples.

No one is saying we should be mean to them, but to make special and possibly very costly accomodations for something totally under their own control is, I don’t know, wrong.

9

For the drug addicted & the alcoholics, change is possible. My company insurance plan covers treatment & the corporate assistance policy supports the treatment.

I cannot, however, get weight control programs or drugs covered by insurance. I could be healthier - I could do it easier with external help. Getting it off in the first place makes it much easier to keep it off. Weight is its own impediment to its removal.

It’s practically illegal to be fat in this country - despite it’s prevalence.

10

>If you don’t want to make the sacrifice it takes to change your body don’t bitch about it.<

That’s the bottom line. If you maintain your body like a finely tuned machine, it will serve you like one. If you let it go to hell…

If fat advocates put half the energy they expend justifying their condition into a daily workout, the issue would be moot.

11

Care to expand on this comment? I’ve never read about cops harrassing 300 lbs people just because they were 300 lbs.

12

Agree with much of the OP. I am sick to fucking death of fat folks making excuses for themselves. And I am sick to fucking death of people telling me, “Well, it’s easy for you, you’re thin.” The last part is sorta true: in stocking feet, I’m 6’ 1" and weigh about 170 - a normal weight, since I have small bones.

But no, sweethearts, it ain’t easy. Or rather, to the extent it’s easy, it’s because it’s habit. I do think about what I eat. I do have to watch it, because if I don’t, I blow up just the same as anyone else. But I’ve been thinking about what I eat, in a sort of low-key way, for all of my adult life, and when I start feeling my trousers get a little tight I lay off.

Most importantly, I move my ass. I can’t tell you how many people I know personally who continually whinge about how “diets never work” - and yet they never get any real exercise, or credit themselves five times over for what little they actually do. Sorry, kiddo, but the research seems to be indicating that it doesn’t do much unless you sweat, hard, for a good long while - high cardio rate for 20 minutes. That means a workout of at least 30 minutes total. And you should be doing that damn close to daily if you want to lose serious weight.

Yes, it’s uncomfortable, of course it’s uncomfortable. That’s the point, you ninny. If people could sit on their fat asses all day long and lose weight strictly by focusing on the “in-come” rather than the “out-go,” we’d be a pretty damn thin country, wouldn’t we?

The success stories I’ve seen are those who do move their butts. My grandfather, for example - a stockily-built, 5’7" guy (I favor my other grandfather). At age 65, he weighed 290 pounds, took all kinds of high blood pressure medication, and could barely move. But his buddies got together and gave him a gym membership as a retirement gift. Working with a trainer, walking an hour today on an outdoor course and doing some weight training, he lost 70 pounds in about a year and a half. He never got truly “skinny” - that’s genetics - but man did he get a new life. He was able to stop most of the meds, eat modest amounts of pretty much anything, and enjoy himself.

And he’s kept the pounds off: at 88, he’s alive today to tell the tale. He lived the longest of anyone in his family, going back several generations. He’s seen his grandchildren graduate from college, get married, and have children of their own.

So until you tell me that you’re watching what you eat AND undertaking exercise as rigorously as my 65-year-old, obese, medicated grandfather did, I have no interest in hearing you whine. And yes, it’s easier if you join a gym. But, a) there are lots of gyms out there that are affordable. B) You don’t even need a gym. Just space to move and the determination to do so.

13

It’s easier to stop smoking with medication and counseling, too, Belrix, but somehow people have managed to do it without, as well.

Regarding your “medical condition” argument, according to this link it would seem that a significant portion of obese people suffer from health problems as a result of their obesity, not the other way around.

Yes, some people have medical conditions that contribute to their obesity. However, this is a small percentage of those people determined to be “obese” by the Officer of the Surgeon General.

From here :

None of the websites I’ve seen have claimed that there has been an increase in obesity causing diseases. However, very nearly all of them, have noted a large increase in diseases as a result of obesity in the last ~30yrs.

So, to reiterate yet again, while some people are obese due to a medical condition, this small percentage of the overweight population do not serve as an excuse for the rest of those people who do not have such a condition.

Now, am I a “fat-basher”, because I am of the opinion that people who are obese due to improper diet and an unwillingness to get off their asses and partake in some regular physical exercise, don’t deserve access to the handicapped spaces at the mall?

14

Obesity runs rampant in my family. I’m not talking 50 pounds or so. For two examples, my cousin W. is a 50 year old man who weighs 400 pounds and can’t even get off the couch anymore. I won’t even get into all the cardiac and pulmonary problems he’s brought on himself by worshipping at the golden arches. His wife is by comparison a svelte 250 pounds. He’ll be dead by next year. His mother died at 60 heart disease, 150 pounds overweight. Dad at 52, same deal

My 16 year old niece tips the scales at about 275. She’s 5 feet tall. She collects disability. The kid waddles when she walks. Her dad had a quadruple bypass by 45. As you can probably guess, he’s no health freak himself.

I could go on and on.

Yea, we’ve probably got “fat” genes. Lord knows I’ve fought with my weight my whole frigging life. Most of my family prefers to lay the blame on genetics and eat another donut.

We’re not big on family football games.

A few of my female cousins who are "heavy, say maybe 25-50 pounds overweight, always ask me how I manage to stay so “skinny” (I guess relatively speaking 5’4 130 pounds is skinny). I tell 'em I just eat half of what I’d like to and move my ass four times as much as I’d be inclined to.

No,no,no,no they say, it can’t be that simple, what about Weight Watchers, Atkins diet, Jenny Craig blah, blah, blah.

Eat less.

And move your big ass.

You’ll lose weight.

They never want to believe it’s that simple, and won’t cost you a dime.

15

You made a similar comment in the other thread but I’m going to answer it here. Your logic has failed. Here is why:

Activitiy----------Likely outcome---------Unlikely outcome
Playing polo-----------A fun day--------------------Broken Neck
Skiing ------------------A fun day--------------------Broken Neck
Going for a walk------A nice day-------------------Shot in the spine
Smoking----------------Lung cancer ----------------Healthy as a horse
Eat too much ---------Become overweight------- Stay thin
Not exercising---------Become overweight-------Stay healthy

Do you see the difference? Just because somebody does something - by choice - that ends in a handicap, doesn’t mean they should be discriminated, as you suggest. BUT, if somebody does something (like smoking), then screw them when they suffer the consequences.

16

I can sort of see your point fin_man but I see it like this…

First off, food is NOT addictive in the way nicotine is addictive…it may be addictive psychologicaly but it certainly doesn’t have the chemical addictive properties that nicotine has. So there’s one difference.

The other difference is in this day and age I, your average smoker, cannot annoy, affect your comfort, or risk your health by indulging my habit in public places. In other words,* my smoke isn’t going to spill over into your airplane seat*.

17

No no no. Witch, I am on the side of the fence that feels large people have no right to infringe on those next to them in an airplane. In the other thread, Belrix was saying that society needs to treat large people the same way they treat others with handicaps (like not be mad if their wheelchair pokes them on the airplane). After some poster said that obesity is a choice, Belrix went off about to follow that logic, society shouldn’t be “nice” to people with handicaps if they “choose” to become handicaped (like Christopher Reeves who became handicaped by “choice”). That is the point of my last post.

18

I’ve had a good chunk of my gym membership paid for by my health insurance. I know of at least three insurance plans that do. Once you get a membership, you can have a staff member be sort of a personal trainer. They’ll help teach you how to use the machines, help you figure out goals and workout plans and tell you which machines you should use and how much cardio you should do. Both gyms I’ve gone to have done this happily for no cost.

My new gym even has a nutritionist on staff to help you work out a plan engineered to meet your personal needs and goals. I don’t know the cost, but I don’t think it’s much.

Quit being jealous of smokers and alcoholics and drug addicts and read the pamphlet that came with your insurance plan. They want you to be healthy, it’s cheaper for them.

19

Gee.

You people have had the PERFECT solution the entire time.

Wow.

I am stunned.

I am more stunned by the hostility and vitriol thrown at fat people.

“Move your big ass.”

More than hyperthyroidism, there are other disorders which lead to either weight gain or massive difficulty in weight loss.

Cutting calories, working out… sure, that works for some.

Then there are some of us who have a limited ability to move around, exercise as much as possible, but are also diabetic and need to have a certain amount of calories which makes cutting down far more limited than it would be for most.

The hostility, surety of “knowing” that most of the people who are fat, and those fat people who are disabled are just not eating right and exercising enough is repulsive.

The simpleminded perspective some of you have on what it takes to change weight for these people is blind and narrowminded.

There is a reason groups like Weight Watchers and Overeater’s Anonymous are necessary.

Being a country of plenty, food is not seen as the luxury item it often is. Pizza, rich foods, fast food… these are all luxury items that are taken for granted.

Often, food is love. If you scrape your knee, Mom gives you a cookie. If you either win or lose at your goal, dinner at McDonald’s. You get stood up for a date, a big bowl of ice cream.

If it i0sn’t just that, we often eat in very unhealthy ways in this country. An often lack of vegetables with meals and an overabundance of carbohydrates. If you aren’t carboloading for an athletic reason, generally that mound of mashed potatoes that looks like something from Close Encounters of the Third Kind is going right to your thighs.

Groups like OA and WW allow people to learn healthy ways to eat and to seperate their emotions from their eating. To deal with pain, loss, disappointment without using food to anesthetize so they can bury it.

Yes, the obese need to do something about it no matter what. To assume that it is because of laziness is not helpful, and only reinforces the shame and guilt that many of these people are under.

Don’t assume that because of the knowledge you have that might come from one or two obese people that you know why everyone is fat, or that you have the perfect answer in your Jack LaLanne mindset.

It ain’t necessarily so.

20

My apologies fin-man, i misconstrued your point, as my eyes started to glaze over in the other post after a certain point(can you guess when/ I bet you can!) so I retreated over here.

I can see we are in total agreement.

My health insurance offers the same DeskMonkey. Insurers, as notoriously tight-fisted as they are, have come to the relaization that helping their members stay IN SHAPE is to their benefit, as it means lower costs to them in the long run.