I’m one of the skinnies, and I’m hungry all the time (well, except when I overeat at Thanksgiving), I have both good and bad genes (which doesn’t really help, my Dad was never obese and just gained the extra few pounds of a guy in late middle age, and is a type II diabetic who now needs to really watch his weight). I’m a huge fan of chocolate, have a huge sweet tooth.
Maybe when I was fourteen I could eat whatever I wanted and not gain weight. Now I keep the candy in the basement and have “rules” around when I get to have a piece.
My experience is that skinnies have the same issues.
Hogwash! I’m getting married in the spring. As far as I’m concerned the THE moral imperative governing my life is to be there for my wife — i.e. my number one responsibility is life is “to not die”.
Being overweight would dramatically increase my risk of everything from hemorrhoids to heart failure. Damn straight I’m gong to take my weight seriously. It’s my health and my life and I have pledged it to my wife. And as my mother’s son, I owe it to her to protect the life she gave me.
So yeah, losing weight/maintaining a healthy weight is locked in as a moral imperative wrapped up in the shiny wrapping paper of “good health”.
No man is an island. The choices you make in life will affects your family, your friends, the people around you, and even the greater community. And yes, that includes your healthy choices.
If you let yourself get fat, then your choice will affect your immediate family, especially if you die early or develop an obesity-related illness. This will also affect people who care about you and don’t want to see you get hurt. It can affect your co-workers, since one’s health will impact productivity and company working conditions. Being unhealthy also places an unnecessary burden on the health care system at large.
What’s more, whenever we say, “It’s okay to be fat!” we are sending a message to other people who struggle with obesity. Our bold declarations, while containing a kernel of truth, will help other people make excuses for their own obesity. Heck, even if we don’t say a word, people naturally tend to follow the crowd. The more obese a country gets, the more people will think that it’s okay to let those extra pounds pile up.
It may not be a politically correct thing to say, but being obese also creates inconveniences and annoyances for strangers around us. For an obvious example, one need only look at the various threads we’ve had about sitting next to an obese person on a plane or in a movie theatre. Does this necessarily make watching one’s waistline a moral imperative? I’d hesitate to say that, but it does show that being fat is more than just a personal concern.
I think there is however a key distinction to be made between saying “it’s okay to be fat” and “it is wrong to discriminate against fat people.” Fat acceptance ought to be mostly about the latter. It is not okay to be a douchebag to someone because they are overweight.
But I think the “don’t be a douchebag” message loses its poignancy in the kind of rant displayed in the OP.
Agreed. That’s why I say that there’s a kernel of truth to that statement. However, any blanket claim that it’s okay to be fat (with all the vagaries that the word “okay” entails) will doubtlessly be taken as tacit approval of obesity. That’s just the way people are.
In previous postings, I tried to emphasize that fat acceptance should be about promoting fair treatment toward the significantly overweight. I think that if the fat acceptance movement were to limit itself to that, they’d be taken a lot more seriously.
Yeah. I get lumped in with the skinnies too, because although I used to find 36 waist loose-fit pants too tight, I’ve been down to a 32 waist speedo for a decade.
But I’ve got all the same issues with food and exercise, so it’s a bit insulting to get dismissed with “you couldn’t possibly understand”. (not that anyone has, here)
I was in the same health spiral, so please continue to encourage him. My chloresterol, incipent diabetes, and tiredness were my big motivators. But as it turned out my sex life was the biggest benefit. Yowza. It was like recapturing my teens, except that I knew what to do this time.
It’s a partnership thing for us, fortunately. He wants to eat better and I’m “the cook”, so I’ve been working to not cave in to laziness on my part and cravings on his. He got some awesome ceramic knives for Christmas that he’s using to make his own breakfast/lunch/occasional dinner - one of his favorites is to make some kind of relatively healthy homemade soup, lots of freshly-chopped-up veggies and a small amount of meat.
Me, I’m the lazy, poorly-conditioned one, so he’s been helping to encourage me to get more fit. It’s a work in progress for both of us.
And yeah, that “encouragement” method is a helpful one for us.
Ah, body issues. I am firmly in the camp of folks who believe that MOST obesity is caused by overeating and under-exercising. I’m sure there are a bunch of people out there who are genetically predisposed to obesity, but statistically, they’re probably a minor fraction of obese folks.
As for myself, I’m a big guy. I’m 6’2", 235. I have wide shoulders, large arms, large, muscular legs. And no matter how much I exercise, my waist will not shrink. when I ran every day, I would average about 30 miles a week, and my waist NEVER shrank. I wear a 42" waist, so you’d think I have a big gut. But I don’t. I have no “overhang” at all, and even after the holidays, when I’m relatively sedentary for the winter, I don’t have much in the way of love handles. I just have a massive trunk. Weird.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m overweight. I know this. I can, however, like most people correct it. I’ve done it before.
Depends on what you mean by “genetically predisposed”. I’m from a line of enormous Scotsmen. Not obese, I mean big guys who could knock Paul Bunyan on his scrawny little ass. My great grand dad was a big, broad shouldered, barrel chested man who could fit my cranium in the palm of his hand and lift me up by my head. Thin dude, but big! For generations our big dudes farmed fields behind horse draw plows, my great grand dad was a blacksmith who swung iron all day and my grandpa had a job mowing the lawn of entire cemetery… with a push mower! I shit you not! So no one had the opportunity to get fat, no one sat still long enough.
It’s my dad’s generation and mine that has turned squishy — once they all got office jobs and life started revolving around television. You should see the size of my extended family now. All those big strapping frames created a legion of Humpty Dumpty lookalikes.
Granted those of us who kept moving are still slender. But I was SO short-changed on the big strapping frame gene! Bah! Puny little man, am I.
You can be fat or thin AND be either a gourmand or a carboard-eater (:p)
But compare me to my boss. He can appreciate good food, as can I. But for him, food is just fuel. Sure, if it’s really good, he’ll enjoy it. But he never eats more than he needs - once he’s full, he’s full. Period. No reason to eat until he’s hungry again. Put his favorite food in front of him, and if he’s full he’ll just shrug. “Not hungry right now.”
For me - well, food is kind of like a drug. I love good food; I hate bad food. But if good food is available, I’ll eat more than I need. Even knowing that I’m eating more than I need. It goes far beyond an intellectual decision - Hell, I know it’s bad for me. But if a food pushes my triggers (for me it’s meat, cheese, bread, salt) I’m compelled to eat far more than I need. The whole time, I know it’s bad for me. I rationally understand I’m making a bad decision with regards to my health. Sometimes I am able to restrain. But other times the compulsion is stronger and I override my intellect and say “to hell with it”.
This strikes me as addictive behavior. Yes, I’m guilty. But there are good reasons for why some people would be wired for this behavior from an evolutionary standpoint (if food is never guaranteed, gorge when you have the chance). It just happens that in a current affluent Western lifestyle, this wiring is harmful.
I’m not grossly obese or anything. But for most of my life I’ve been maybe 25 lbs overweight (~6’ male, large frame). When I was heavily active in high school (soccer, basketball, weight lifting) I was in great health. My cardiovascualr is still pretty good. I have a moderately active job. I’m still decently healthy, aside from the weight. But I’ll probably always carry extra fat, because, fuck it, I just need to eat.
With regard to the “excessive anger”: it’s very easy to declare someone’s anger “excessive” when one isn’t in their position. It has happened ever so frequently to me as a queer person – straight people who don’t understand why something upsets me have told me that I’m being too angry and alienating possible supporters in the BBQ Pit, for heaven’s sake.
I don’t really think it is about what you eat- it is about how much. Appetite control and satiety seems to be the issue. The stomach is elastic- if it gets used to being overfull it will stretch to accommodate more, and over time bigger portions will be required in order to feel full.
If I want pizza, I eat pizza- but a 6" personal pizza and a 6" garlic bread will last me for two meals (dinner and breakfast).
If I want icecream I’ll eat icecream- but if I eat half a tub of Ben and Jerry’s before bed I won’t feel like breakfast or lunch the next day.
If I make a big roast dinner for Sunday Lunch I won’t eat dinner.
That’s not amazing self-control on my part- I just can’t eat more without feeling ill.
Obviously no-one wakes up one day and decides to eat vast portions- but if you add a little to your plate everyday in a year you’ll be eating double what you used and still not feeling full.
On the acceptance thing. I was well overweight for most of my life. Then my boyfriend, who is slim and goodlooking (i.e. the kind of person who I had thought to be well out of my league) fell passionately in love with me, excess weight and all. Curiously, it was only then that I managed to lose weight and I am now within normal BMI range, if still too fat for fashion.
This seems counter-intuitive, as you might expect the contrary: “He loves me just the way I am, so why bother changing?” but I think someone loving me and finding me beautiful raised my confidence whereas previously I had put “beautiful people” in one category and myself in another and this had closed the door on change. In other words, I had subconsciously set a low limit on what I thought I could be. My boyfriend’s love blew that lid off and I started to take more care of myself, including losing the weight. Nice clothes and good haircuts, previously the domain of “the beautiful” soon followed.
I agree that actively discouraging people from losing weight or saying that fat is somehow good is one step too far. But I can actually see where acceptance of someone’s whole person can be a good thing and even lead to eventual weight loss.
That argument cuts both ways. One could just as easily say that being in that position blinds someone to the fact that one’s anger is excessive.
So who’s right? When somebody starts making wild exaggerations (e.g. “You just have a different environmental and genetic legacy than they do. You’re not superior. You’re just somewhat thinner.”), then I think that’s a pretty good indicator.
I’m not eager to give a pass for poor behaviors just because they might be derived from our evolutionary heritage.
Our evolutionary heritage includes being eaten by lions. And serial infidelity. And maybe having the males expire soon after they’ve contributed their DNA to the next generation.
If people are going to argue that there is no way they can overcome their evolutionary heritage, they may as well stuff themselves full and go wait out on the savannah to be eaten by the lions.
I found this to be the case at the pub. I’d drink a pint and then end up only picking at my food. Once draft beer started disagreeing with my stomach and I switched to bottled beer only (smaller serving) - Hey! I can eat my chow! I didn’t realize how filling a pint of beer was until then.
:: end hijack ::
IIRC, a good standard for portion size is that you put your two fists together and that should be the total size of your meal if you were to roll your supper into a ball. I can’t remember if that includes liquids though, like soup or beer.
One nice thing about your stomach is that it WILL shrink/adjust if you start eating less. If you switch from a lunch of a large sub down to a normal sandwich, in a couple of weeks you will feel just as full after lunch.
When my husband and I first lived together, I got into the habit of eating the same meal as he did—as in, the same size. When I started cutting back my poriton sizes again—figuring, correctly, that I don’t need as much food as a man who is 8" taller than I am—it didn’t take long to my stomach to readjust. Now I would pop if I ate the same meal as he does.
I haven’t tried it with cheese sauce though.
Depends on what you mean by “genetically predisposed”. I’m from a line of enormous Scotsmen. Not obese, I mean big guys who could knock Paul Bunyan on his scrawny little ass. My great grand dad was a big, broad shouldered, barrel chested man who could fit my cranium in the palm of his hand and lift me up by my head. Thin dude, but big! For generations our big dudes farmed fields behind horse draw plows, my great grand dad was a blacksmith who swung iron all day and my grandpa had a job mowing the lawn of entire cemetery… with a push mower! I shit you not! So no one had the opportunity to get fat, no one sat still long enough.