No, but I’ve seen how such people are treated at the Y.
An overweight person who insists on walking on the inside edge of the 1/8 mile running track is going to get some abusive comments if they don’t move to the high side after a couple of suggestions. The same thing would happen to a skinny person. The skinny person would get a “move it, asshole.” The fat person might get a weight comment thrown in.
The person who shows up consistently and makes a dedicated effort will get the respect that they earn regardless of their weight at the outset.
Can we not do this, please? What if we just say that most sensible people understand the need for developing a “better package across the board” in order to compete for the best possible mate and to live the best possible life. Sometimes, that “package” includes determined and deliberate attention to health and appearance. Sometimes not. The presence or absence of this attention to health and appearance within the “package” does not indicate the presence or absence of any other qualities or abilities.
I really don’t think there are a lot of heavy people who decide they must be better lovers in order to compensate for their appearance. In order to get to that point, they would have to recognize their appearance as a considerable hindrance to their chosen ways of life. If people really thought that, they would not be heavy. I think the reason so many people are heavy is that there is no truly compelling reason to not be heavy. Thus, weight is not generally thought of as a hindrance and not a whole lot of thought is given to compensating for it.
This is completely untrue. The same people were rude to me every day when I showed up. I got the same rolled eyes, the same little snorts of condescension. Those people became friendlier at varying degrees of weight loss. I.e., some people mysteriously became friendly and polite after I’d lost only 50 pounds. Some weren’t kind to me until I lost more than 100.
Consequently, my ability had little to do with this treatment either. For example, the person who had to leave my kickboxing class half way through because she couldn’t hack it, while I hung on and sweated it out was STILL ignorant to me…simply because his or her weight was more appropriate than mine.
I don’t use an indoor track and I don’t know what your comments about people being idiots in their use of one have to do with mistreating the overweight. I DO know that your version of how you think overweight people are treated and on what basis doesn’t compare much to reality. Observances from the outside, particularly by a rather callous, unempathetic individual have nothing to do with what it feels like from the inside.
Yeah you’re right. Clearly as an overweight person you have a lot more insight into the inner workings of my local health club which I only attended every day, even though you’ve never been there.
I was of course lying in my earlier posts, but you were to clever and saw through my ruse. How can you blame me? Surely I will do anything to maintain the great “keep the fat people down” conspiracy.
The alternate possibility is that the people who you thought treated you badly simply didn’t like you.
Actually, I’m not overweight anymore. And I tend to think the fact that people were nicer to me the thinner I got as evidence that it wasn’t ME, it was my size.
i haven’t read the entire debate lately, but have health concerns already been debunked as a reason not to be overweight? or does the term ‘heavy’ not necessarily mean overweight.
Or maybe they were just assholes. But, SexyWriter, you said so yourself, most people just went about their own business and thought nothing of you. So…are you trying to make the point that some people are jerks? Yeah, we all can agree on that. But if, from a few isolated people you’re trying to prove that there is an epidemic of discrimination against fat people at gyms, you’re not succeeding.
Then, SexyWriter said:
I’m sorry, excuse me for beliving in free will. I think that earlier in this thread, we specifically exempted anyone with a physiological reason for their weight from the discussion. But someone “can’t find the strength” and therefore their not responsible for their actions? That’s ridiculous.
If I just “can’t find the strength” not to knife some of my cow-orkers one day, I’m still guilty. It’s still my fault. I CHOSE to do it. I’m sorry, but I don’t think your argument holds water.
Now someone’s going to accuse me of equating being fat with being homicidal, but whatever. :rolleyes:
Actually, I need to apologize. I recognize that I’m very hostile about this topic. And in my case, hostility tends to breed snap judgements and speech without thought. Let me try to clarify what I MEANT by my comments…and hope that I don’t contradict myself so much that I get flamed like crazy.
I agree with you, Necros, at least in some sense. For many of us, our weight IS a choice. And in fact, I made a choice to change mine and have done so very successfully (patting myself on the back). I lost enough weight to make up an entire other PERSON. A rather chubby person.
However, Scylla’s comments comparing someone’s messy home to their “unkempt body” triggered my hostility (no offense meant to Scylla). While there may be a choice involved, it’s not the same choice as deciding to pick up your bedroom. This particular choice involves difficult emotional decisions, such as forcing yourself to seek education on how to like yourself enough to take care of your body. It’s a complex issue that’s surrounded by your own desperation, self-hatred, desire to destroy your own happiness, and so on. In fact, I thought comparison with a compulsion to homicide was much more apt (if not a bit extreme) than comparison to picking up your socks.
The reason I said people don’t CHOOOSE to be overweight is because given a conscious choice, no one in their right mind would say, “Sure, I’d rather be fat!” Each person simply has to reach a point for themselves in which the status quo is more painful than making the necessary changes. Yes, they’re responsible for their own actions.
And this brings me to my comments about the gym. I was trying to point out that those “necessary changes” can make one quite miserable. That is why more people don’t make this decision to change. It’s a horrifying experience to be the heaviest person in an aerobics class by more than 100 pounds. Even if you LOVE to do aerobics and very much WANT to be there. I was trying to make some comment about the ways in which those stereotypes we still have in place make some people think it’s okay to treat the obese as less deserving than a normal sized person. I wanted only to point out that those attitudes (such as the one that cleaning and weight loss are comparable) make it infinitely more difficult for the person with a miserable self-image, who’s already humiliated by their own appearance, to take that responsibility.
I actually DON’T wish to make excuses for overweight people to remain that way. I frankly, find this quite annoying. I got my fat ass to the gym every day in spite of ridicule, humiliation, severe pain in my feet and knees, and true fatigue (try doing your every day work out with an extra 100 pounds on you and see how much more exhausted you get). So I don’t like to listen to someone else tell me why they CAN’T manage to workout because they don’t have time or some equally lame excuse.
But I DID want to point out that the people who you say may have simply been assholes in the gym probably weren’t. They were probably perfectly nice people who never would have treated someone with a DIFFERENT type of problem (anorexia, for example) the way they treated me. And there were PLENTY of them, who, as I mentioned earlier, became kinder and kinder to me the thinner I got. In fact, you’ve probably personally treated someone differently based upon their weight and weren’t even AWARE that you were doing so.
As a thin person, it’s easy for me to weed out assholes and ignore them. As someone with a devastatingly destroyed self-esteem and an inability to stand in front of a mirror without weeping it wasn’t such a simple matter. I struggled every day to avoid internalizing those asshole comments and believing that the assholes were correct about my worth. I suppose I was only trying to make a case for being understanding and empathetic and wiping out harmful stereotypes from the point of view of someone who’s been at both ends of the spectrum…which I still argue is a more valuable viewpoint than simply observing how YOU perceive that others are treated.
Obviously you were there and not I, but is it possible that those people who you perceived as only being nice to you as you lost weight were actually being nice to you because you’d proved you were serious and you’d earned their admiration and respect.
Also, the messy house is an analogy, and not a perfect one. Some pepople are anal about living in immaculate quarters. Others are total slobs. Most people fall in between.
It’s as you say, a question about what is personally acceptable to one. I don’t feel a lot of sympathy for people who choose not to do minimal common sense maintenace. I realize it might be tied up with a lot of other issues, but so might a messy house. The analogy works as long as you don’t push it too far or take it as an absolute.
Sure it is. It’s also possible that it was MY perception about how I’d be approached as an overweight person that changed…not the outside world at all. In some cases, that was true.
However, I don’t think when I show up for the first time at a new aerobics class that it’s excusable to be rude because I haven’t “earned respect.” That doesn’t happen to me NOW, so I see no reason for it to happen if I’m twice the size. There really ought to be an “innocent until proven guilty” type of law for this sort of thing. And this is where getting rid of those rude stereotypes comes in. One of the things I’ve learned from this is that “fitness freaks” actually DO come in all sizes. That fat person next to you on an exercise bike may have been 100 pounds heavier six months ago…perhaps they’re NOT slovenly and unkempt.
It’s almost like talking to greinspace about race. I spend 3 pages trying to explain that being fat is not a character flaw and how it is acceptable to treat fat people like steaming piles of dung because people assume fat people have a character flaw, the Scylla comes along and compares fat people to pigs and blames the fat people for the way they are treated.
It is exactly your attitude, Scylla, which is the most hurtful and demeaning. I can tell you from experience, people treat you as if you are beneath them because you are fat.
I don’t know Scylla, kinda like comparing a fat person’s body to a pig sty. Kinda like saying people choose to be fat. Of course we do, we like it when Scylla and people like him look down on us, sneer and call us names. We fat people choose to be made fun of, stereotyped and compared to gluttonous, lazy animals.
And then you wonder why fat people respond in anger and frustration.
I have to agree…who the hell raised you anyway Scylla…wolves!? You work out everyday, good for you, perhaps you’re just a vain asshole perhaps not, but how hard is it to be friendly and decent to anyone new that you meet regardless of their size? Why must a FAT PERSON prove anything to you at the gym, at the workplace or anywhere else for that matter. What do mean by sticking around to gain respect? Hell the way I see it they are fellow human beings and by virtue of that alone deserve a certain amount of respect until they do something adverse to prove otherwise.
Please tell me I’m not actually reading this…it’s positively sickening. It also demonstrates one reason why we have 10 year old girls, perfectly normal sized girls, going on diets. It’s also the reason why no matter what my weight I’ve always hated my own body, because it was average height and womanly rounded.
Guess…you’ve pretty much proved your point huh Biggirl! Geez, fighting ignorance my ass!
I had thought I made my distinctions clear. One inhabits one’s body just as one inhabits one’s house. The way one does either of those things is partially indicative of who they are.
One would be foolish to base an opinion on someone solely on the condition of their house or whether they take care of their body or not, but it is legitimate data when weighed with everything else you know of them.
I try not to look down on or stereotype anybody, but I don’t ignore valid data either.
From reading your posts, I doubt you live in a pig sty either bodily or by address.
Some people live in studio apartments, some live in Victorian houses. Both can be very nice.
Some people don’t care where they live and both their bodies and their property reflect this.
I think heroin chic is digusting and share the same disdain for that extreme, with the same caveat that it would be fallacious to make a judgement on that alone, and that some people who are excruciatingly thin due to medical circumstances don’t deserve to be judged either.
Taking care of your house is not anything like losing weight. There is no analogy to be drawn. If you sweep your living room floor, it does not try to hold on to all the dirt it can and force you to throw dirt on it. But if you reduce you calories too drastically your body will hold on to all the fat it can and instruct you to eat more. If you clean your house repeatedly, it does not get even dirtier the next time, but of the people who lose weight successfully, 95% of them will regain the weight and then some.
It is not a matter of mind over matter, as you seem to think. Do you really believe over 40,000 people and counting would opt to have their stomach stapled because they lack drive or will-power.
Or perhaps it was the disdain and lack of respect showered upon the fat people who, according to you, are so lacking in self-control.
And what of the people who decide that they will not feel guilty about every morsel of food they put in their mouths? The people who decide that their self-worth is not tied into how thin or fat they are? Well, Scylla you have told us what you feel about these people.
**.
The problem as I see it, is that you have made up your mind about fat people. You have used your own personal weight loss experience to indict all fat people who do not live up to your expectations. Fat people have done something wrong just because they are fat.
No, it’s not like that. Their actions have dictated who they are.
The fact that 40,000 people get their stomachs staple proves nothing. I’m sure that many choose to get their breasts enhanced as well. Both make a personal choice.
Are smokers personally responsible for smoking? I think they are. Does the failure rate of people who quit smoking mean that they are no longer responsible for their actions?
I don’t think so.
Quitting smoking is at least as tough as losing weight. Both processes reflect real commitment to lifestyle change, and discipline. There are consequences to both obesity and smoking in terms of health.
Somebody’s mom may have been a smoker while they were pregnant, and it may make that person prone to nicotine, just as some people may be more prone to gaining weight than others.
Both those people have crosses to bear. They can make excuses for their behavior or they can take responsibility. Both are still responsible for who they are, and suffer both the benefits and consequences of their actions.
Being overweight is a consequence of action.
Other actions can be chosen.
Is it hard to lose weight? Of course, and I wouldn’t take anything away from the people who do by pretending that it’s not a matter of choice and discipline.
Why are fat people worthy of disdain? Why is being fat a reason for you or anyone else to issue any kind of judgement?
I can understand disdain for the slovenly, lazy and gluttonous. What I don’t understand is disdain for fat people. Even if a fat person never excersizes a day in his life and would rather eat Ring Dings than rice, why in the hell does it matter to the public in general?
Fighting obesity is a lifetime struggle. It is a hard, and sometimes impossible, struggle to win. But so what? Like another poster said “Am I blocking your sun?”
It is not a crime to be fat. It is not a statement on a person’s character to be fat. The only failure in being fat is the failure to burn enough calories to ensure that you are thin. The only thing you can say about a fat person is that they are fat, nothing more.
Yet here, in this thread, are a number of posters ready to include a person’s weight in assesing their worth. It is the last remaining acceptable stereotype.
[quote]
Why are fat people worthy of disdain? Why is being fat a reason for you or anyone else to issue any kind of judgement?
[quote]
Are you finished with that cross yet?
I don’t beleive I said anything that could be interpreted to mean that fat=worthy of disdain.
One judges and forms opinions about people one meets as an inevitable consequence of human affairs. Sometimes those opinions are correct, sometimes they are not. One learns and does the best they can.
The last acceptable stereotype? Hardly. Smokers are stereotyped acceptably, as are the French (it’s almost fashionable to despise the french.) There’s quite a few left.
If I meet an overweight person, I assume that either they have a medical condition or that physical fitness is not an opverwhelming priority for them. I look for signs to understand why they made the choice they did.
If I meet a knockout girl in a skimpy expensive dress wearing lots of makeup and a fancy hairdo, I assume that this is someone who cares (perhaps to much) about their appearance. I look for signs to explain why they make the choice they did.
[quote]
Why are fat people worthy of disdain? Why is being fat a reason for you or anyone else to issue any kind of judgement?
Was I talking about myself? I know I’m not worthy of disdain.
Anyhoo. . .
And I’m saying that using a person’s weight as any indication about anything in his character is wrong. It indicates nothing except a person’s ability to burn calories.
Unfortunately that’s not factual either. The immutable laws of physics suggest that it takes exactly the same amount of energy for a skinny person to lift a given weight as it does for an overweight one. In fact an overweight one must burn more calories simply to maintain their mass all other things being equal.
And no, I never suggested you were worthy of disdain.