How do you know libertarians are motivated to make people feel bad? Disagreeing with somebody and therefore assuming they’re working from bad motives isn’t logical.
Pffffttt! You can get 90% of that recommended allotment in a damn snack, no need to gorge on all those huge monstrosities. For the “fullness-conscious” among us, a little package of those six mini-doughnuts gives you just about all you need. They’re fried in lard, I do believe. 
Leaves room for cheeseburger-stuffed crust deep dish pepperoni pizza for lunch! MMM…more is better.
If you become a fat projectile heading for my car after you get in an accident while not wearing a seatbelt, it’s kind of my business when you dent my car landing on it. I’ll care about the size of the dent too.
I agree with you completely. It isn’t so much what people are eating but how much they are eating and how inactive they are. However, in the old days, we didn’t eat as much processed food. Eating out was not a daily thing, take away and delivery hardly existed. People cooked dinner most nights and, like your mom says, didn’t eat seconds or huge portions, typically.
We made fun of big fat people who stuffed themselves at all you can eat buffets. Fat acceptance didn’t exist. Peoples’ attitides have changed: that’s the big problem, not so much this: “People blame HFCS, sugar, carbs, fat” or fast food and junk food.
Lazy people who think being fat and out of shape is normal.
I know I’m late to this thread, but let’s all hold on a minute about how our parents practiced more restraint. Most of those parents are still around, and they’re the fattest of all of us. The 45-65 age group is hands down the fattest. Millenials are downright svelte by comparison. I don’t know how old the OP’s mom is but it’s awfully fresh of her to be bitching about the younger generations when her peers are the ones everyone’s talking about.
I notice that too.
Yeah I’m pretty fat and I love getting out and walking, even hiking if it’s slow paced. Maybe that particular group just doesn’t get in to hiking? Neither of my daughters would be interested and they’re of average weight. They’d rather do a treadmill with a giant screen in front of them to distract them from the exertion.
Even though many of the responses here are saying that OP is being overly judgmental and that maybe he co-workers simply don’t like hiking, I can identify with her annoyance and frustration a bit.
Firstly, a lot of people keep saying that she’s assuming that the girls simply don’t like hiking and probably exercise some other way. The OP says that when she proposed the hiking suggestion, she got a sarcastic response of “does it LOOK like I hike?” If someone said that me, I would interpret that as the person thinking it was silly of me to think that the person is interested in physical activity of any kind.
The part where I can identify with the OP is that I work pretty hard to keep my weight down, and have had to do so my whole life. I’ve never been the sort of person who can eat whatever she wants and not gain weight. And in more than one place I’ve worked, I’ve been treated as an oddball for it, to the point where I try to hide the fact that I’m health-conscious.
At my old job, I used to walk two miles to work each way. I could have taken a bus, but I preferred to walk- I enjoyed the walk, it was meditative alone-time. I mentioned that offhandedly one day and I never heard the end of it. They acted like I had said I climbed the Himalayas before work every morning. Until the day I left that job, people would periodically ask “Do you still walk all the way to work every day?”
At this new job, the people notice that I never eat the doughnuts at the morning meeting, and I don’t eat cake and other snacks people bring in all the time. And guess what? Someone, predictably, half-jokingly accused me of having an eating disorder.
My work requires us to park far away from the actual workplace- most people take a shuttle from the parking garage. But I prefer the 15-minute walk. And yet I’ve never told my coworkers that I do this. I already know they’ll make a big deal out of it. What they don’t know, and what I will never tell them, is that I get up at 5:30am every morning and go for a long run before work. It would make their heads explode.
I think people who eat doughnuts every morning and/or don’t exercise feel defensive around people who are trying to live a healthier lifestyle. I do everything I can to not rub it in (to the point of concealing it the best I can), but I still know that people are a little hostile about it nonetheless. And the funny thing is, I don’t really blame them- I feel hostile towards CrossFit douches who eat only overpriced vegan algae bars and paleo-broth.
My parents are of the Mad Men era, so everyone drank like fish and smoked like chimneys.
It explains quite a bit, really.
I get the frustration in the OP and my own thoughts and feelings are pretty similar. But I’ve resolved myself to the fact that a huge factor that plays in on this is how the mindset has changed. We view obesity as more of a ‘disease’ now and make a hundred excuses as to why it’s not the person’s fault for being obese. They’re not responsible. …Le wut? …I get that there are some people who have legitimate issues that cause them to gain a lot of weight and makes it very difficult for them to shed that weight and keep it off. I get that and I’m not speaking about them…I’m speaking about the majority here. And the majority have the ability to do something, anything, no matter how small, to begin changing their health/weight for the better.
But anyway, I view the ‘obesity problem’ as a loss cause for those who try to fight it. Ultimately it’s every individual’s personal business and responsibility. So if they want fast food every meal of the day, 7 days a week…then whatever. Just don’t cry your eyes out at me when your health plummets.
2/3 of the population is “overweight” just because the Diet Industry paid off the National Institutes of Health task force to change the numbers. It’s completely bogus.
Not that there arent a lot of fat kids today, but until we can get a decent and scientific measurement of ‘fat’ “overweight” and “obese” we won’t know how many.
If your weight in no way affects your health, just the current social fashion mode, why not accept it?
Is bulimia and anorexia the way to go? Young girls today already have issues with the way they look, leading to unhealthy measures and even suicide.
This is correct. Mind you , of course if you weigh twice or half the “normal” you likely do have some health issues. But many dudes can be 10% "overweight " and be perfectly healthy.
Yup. Yup. Yup. (and the “heavier after” part is really key…)
Bless you.
Yup.
And if we can’t stop making blanket and generally untrue assertions about diet and weight, can we at least stop making the untrue assertion that exercise is a good way to lose weight? That’s been pretty solidly debunked. Exercise is absolutely crucial for good health, both mental and physical…but weight loss? Not so much.
Don’t believe it? Google away.
I don’t think we are talking about people who are currently in their 40s to 60s. We are talking about past generations. For example, if you go to second had shops that sell antique clothing, you will find that most of the clothing is simply not big enough for most Americans today, because most Americans today are so much bigger than Americans used to be. People were more slender because they ate less processed food, less junk food, and were more physically active on a daily basis.
You may be very young and think that it is only young people today this discussion is directed at, but you are wrong. You need a broader understanding and perspective of this issue.
This is totally BS as far as Greece and Italy go. I have spent a lot of time in both countries and see no great amount of childhood obesity, quite the opposite. And clearly not at all to the extent it exists in the US.
You are wrong, very wrong about fat acceptance. It is a movement, look it up. But also, it is simply a PC type of thinking that has infiltrated our society. I am old enough to remember what things were like before being fat or obese was an acceptable thing. Far, far fewer people were overweight. Most women that had let their figures go were grandmothers, and that was acceptable because they were grannies and everyone knew that metabolism slows down after a certain age. But even then, when we thought those ladies were ‘fat’ or plump, looking back now, it is obvious they were nowhere near the kind of fat middle aged and younger women are today. Think Aunt Bee. She was plump and that was accepted because she was middle aged. But she was not obese like women are today. And children back then were definitely rarely over weight.
It was just not acceptable in those days to be fat unless you were an over the hill granny or grandpa.
Whoever told you that exercise does not help you to lose weight is absolutely crazy.
Nobody “told” me that exercise does not help weight loss, but multiple people, the sort who favor white coats, hanging out in laboratories and playing with numbers, generally known as scientists, have examined the question of the usefulness of exercise in weight loss and have concluded that… nah. Not really. The things they’ve learned suggest that exercise might actually make it more difficult to lose weight! :eek: Whoda thunk, right?
This is particularly disheartening:
That’s fromthis article in the NY times.
That’s just one. Go ahead and google it. Something like “exercise doesn’t promote weight loss controlled studies” should give you a good assortment.
As I said originally, exercise is a great thing for your health, maybe the greatest. But not because it helps you lose weight, because it doesn’t.
Eh…I’ve seen an awful lot of fat libertarian types on scooters.
It’s fun to be judgmental! We can feel better about ourselves! Yay!