Is the "obesity crisis" affecting the societal standard of "normal" weight?

Great Debates
41

IMO, everyone is on a “permanent diet”. A diet is what you eat–regardless of what it is. A diet is not something you “go on” (i.e.: a “Diet”). Yes, I understand that that is one meaning of the word, it’s just that I don’t think that that usage of the word is conducive to good weight/health management.)

I believe if more people considered a diet as their day-to-day food consumption rather than thinking of the idea of a “Diet” e.g.: sudden alteration in one’s diet to meet short or medium-term body and/or other health goals.

I think people’s mental excitement, anxiety and build-up to the start of yet one more episodic “Diet” sets them up many times for disappointment; sometimes even for failure.

I look at it like this: Don’t go on a “Diet”. Instead, if need be, change your diet so that is healthy and you can live with it.

It’s not a regimen, it’s just life.™ * 
Full Disclosure: My weight fluctuates greatly. Yes, I know that is not healthy. Currently I am about 40 lbs. overweight. My diet is pretty damn unhealthy.

  • Rats. I’ve given away the entire core idea of my new “Diet” book.
42

I think this is true as well, though I don’t know for sure. I’m basing it on my own experiences and those of my friends and family, so it should be taken with that in mind.

At my heaviest, I was just barely overweight (BMI = 25.5). At my set point weight, I was on the high side of normal (BMI = 24.7). At my lowest stable* weight, which incidentally is right now just by moving to a city where I have no car at all and walk a puppy daily, I’m right smack in the middle of normal (BMI = 22.5).

When I visit my old grad school or head back home, people immediately comment on my lost weight, and how much better I look now than I did whenever. I am grateful that no one ever commented on my heaviest weight, though they may not have seen it, as my heaviest weight was only 5lbs above my set point weight.

All of that said, though, I used to get very concerned when I’d hit a size 12 in women’s clothing. As a youngster, I was “not allowed” to get any heavier than that, and that mentality stuck for a long time. Considering how women’s sizes fluctuate, trying to never be larger than anyone’s size 12 can really do a number on someone’s head. These days I’m with the women who say, “Can’t we just do it sensibly like men’s clothing?”

Furthermore, my set point weight has been disparaged as far too much for a woman of my height, even though if you plug the numbers into a BMI calculator, it’s fine. There’s just not a lot of give to gain.

Despite being 12lbs lighter than my set point right now (and solidly normal), my thighs still touch. In a long ago pit thread about Marilyn Monroe, that was what some dopers were using to demonstrate that she was overweight. Women who were underweight or at the lowest possible “normal” weight for my height were adamant that they were normal and any woman as heavy as I was at the time (high normal) was pretty overweight.

I can’t do a damn thing about my body shape, and it would take a lot to ever make my thighs not touch, if that were my goal. I’m glad I’ve never faced direct harassment for being fat when I was/am normal, but that pit thread in particular was something of an eye opener for how people feel privately.

In public (school/grad office type situations), women of all shapes and sizes would say they couldn’t imagine where in the world I could lose 10lbs from (when I was “heavy” and decided to not only try to get rid of the 5lb gain, but also get a little bit of a buffer that I didn’t have before). I’ve no doubt some of them were being totally honest, but I also have no doubt some were just saying it to be polite, and were mentally saying, “Her freaking thighs and ass would be a good start!” I’ll never know which women were which, thankfully. Though everyone who said that and has seen me in a visit has commented on my weight loss and subsequent better looks.
*I have been about 3lbs lighter than I am now, when I went on Weight Watchers to ditch the 10lbs, and it turned into 20lbs. That weight may have been fine for me, but the program was no longer working for me as it was introducing me to bad habits I’d never had and I found myself feeling utterly famished every day at the end (prior to that, I’d been fine with the consumption amount I was allowed). I’m still not sure what the deal was, but I ditched the plan when I turned into a psycho. I’m not a nice person when I’m really hungry.

43

I notice this too. Especially in offices, where male workers generally wear their shirts tucked in, almost everyone seems to have bellies. On the street it’s harder to notice this, due to the prevailing trend of wearing shirttails out. In fact, the trend to obesity may be one reason this style is becoming so ubiquitous. I can understand why fat guys favor it, but it seems that about 90% of all guys are following along. They all look like they’re in the fourth grade.

44

I’m sure it has. I’m shocked every time I go back to the US to visit family by two things: 1) How very many incredibly fat people there are, 2) How huge food portions are.

Granted, Japanese food sizes are skimpy, so I end up over-ordering for the first day or two that I’m back, but really each portion is often big enough for two or three people to share without going hungry. I take home half the meal in a doggie bag virtually every time I go out to eat, if I don’t just leave it there.

Societal expectations do shape perceptions and behavior. From people’s reactions on this board when it comes to defending fatness, I’d have to say that there is a lot of delusional or wishful thinking. Just as bad as buying into advertising hype about the ideal body is buying into the thinking that being overweight or obese is a good or “normal” thing.

And no, that twisted article referenced above doesn’t convince me that men have an easier time with body image. The issues dealt with are almost entirely in the head of the woman writing it. Men get bombarded with ideals about their bodies too, but they listen to them a lot less than women do. I mean, take a look at some men’s fitness magazines sometime. Those are the more attainable ideals, in that they aren’t extreme cases of possibly steroid-enhanced gym monsters that you see in body-building magazines. It still takes a high level of commitment to get a body like that, even if you start with great genes.

Even so, almost no one is “genetically fat.” I say this as a high school and college athlete weighing in at about 155 at age 18, when I was in good shape but without my full adult build and muscle mass, who got up to nearly 200 lbs. at 5’10" a few years ago when I spent a few years being sendentary and feeling sorry for myself. Anyone is capable of getting fat, but virtually everyone is capable of getting and maintaining a good healthy body if they care enough to put in a few hours of exercise a week and pay at least a little attention to what they eat.

I’m back down to 79 kg (about 175 lbs.) now, at a muscular build. That puts me at the top of the Normal end of the BMI or low Overweight category even though my body fat is in the low teens; low enough to see stomach muscles with a bit of padding over the top. I got there through a lot of hard work, and every time I slack too much I gain a bit of weight back that I have to get rid of. Fitness is a lifestyle, or it’s nothing.

Every single hot model or actor/actress of either sex you see — though they are undoubtedly enhanced by lighting, good camera work, and airbrushing — has to work at it to maintain the bodies they have. Genetics only get you so far. The guy who played Superman in the Superman Returns was helped by some slight padding under the suit, but he really is almost that ripped all on his own. He worked out 4–6 days a week for close to a year to get that way, and he started from what most people would consider to be darn good shape. Take any other notable body out there: Brad Pitt, Jason Statham, Daniel Craig, whoever, they work out regularly, and have to watch what they eat.

Women are no different. Adriana Lima doesn’t just jog in commercials. Jessica Alba had to work out a couple of hours a day a few times a week to keep in the kind of shape she needed to be to play the character in Dark Angel. Any woman you see in the Sport’s Illustrated Swimsuit issue has to be more like a fitness model than a runway model, and that means they have to eat and exercise; just starving themselves doesn’t make them look sexy when they’re next to naked.

45

Actually, I’d dispute this. In my case, the fact that I have good genes and am fairly young pretty much is enough. I weigh a hundred pounds and am about 5’2, and have never been on a diet in my life. I started working out a few years ago (23 now) because I like the way it feels, know it’ll be easier than starting in about ten or fifteen years when I “have” to, and do like the fact that I have slightly more tone…but at this point it’s more about maintaining what a really good metabolism has netted me.

ETA: And am well aware that the metabolism is going to at some point slow down and that I have to be ready for that…hence the fact that I regularly work out. And I will be prying the kitkats from my cold dead hands, at some point.

46

That’s pretty much my point, though. You can have good genes and a high metabolism, but just that isn’t good enough for the long term. I’d bet that your diet right now, without you even thinking about it, is pretty decent and that you’re also more active than you think you are. For people whose physical appearance is their livelihood, they can’t leave it to chance. They watch their diet and they work out, because if they don’t the job offers get thin on the ground.

I didn’t really have to work at it to stay thin and I ate enormous amounts of food when I was younger, but even in my off season I did a lot more physically than I do in my day to day life now. Around the same time I started getting my adult bulk was when I first had to take care not to get fat. That was partially due to a slightly slower metabolism, but had more to do with a much lower level of physical activity than in the past. I went from loading trucks for a living while doing school part-time to being a full-time student for close to a year. When I noticed that I was actually starting to see chunk around my gut, I started making a conscious effort to eat a bit less and do more active things in my free time.

I’d still say that lifestyle is way more important than internal changes. Your metabolism creeps up on you, but your activity levels can change drastically in a short time.