My Visit to Fat Central
Confession time. I am a fattist. I find obese people unappealing in almost every regard. They are physically unattractive, they lead unhealthy lives, they take up too much space on public transport, and (most of all) they are a strain not only on their clothing but on NHS (National Health Service) resources.
The secret of their size? Their outsized appetites are matched by a lack of self-control and even less self-respect.
There, I've said it. Just as I have said it many times in my column for this paper. And each time I do so, it's greeted by the same howls of outrage.
COMMENTS
Why is it that these people who purport to be so concerned about the "health" of overweight people feel like they need to attack overweight people themselves for their assumed lack of will power instead of, oh, say, the consumer goods companies shoving saturated fat and sugar and preservatives into everything on the supermarket shelves? Or maybe the FDA whose regulations are so lax as to allow this shit because they're led and staffed by the former leaders of the food producers? The giant corporations that create monopolies over the farmers, making sure they're fattening up their livestock with as much hormone as possible? Aren't these the bad guys?
It'd be a lovely world indeed where we could all pluck fresh produce from trees and plants in our backyard, but it ain't the world we live in lady. So shut your damn pie hole and quit trying to mask your simple aesthetic disgust with some sort of global concern for health.
Fat shaming does not work. If these people really cared about obesity, they would take a different track.
There's more at work here than socio-economics. There's also attitude, both hers and of the obese. Hers is unhelpful at best but some of the obese take pride in their size and eating habits I'm sorry to say.
I've gotten flamed for dressing down some Mom online for feeding her 9 month old chocolate formula. Then there was the Mom that bragged about her 10 month old being able to scarf (her word, not mine) down an entire slice of pepperoni pizza. We're not talking the economically depressed here, we're taking about soccer Mom's that have full access to fruits/veggies.
Look don't get me wrong my kids get french fries etc. But not all the time and not at the expense of real food.
I hate the authors attitude here. I agree w/pp that Jamie Oliver does a muuuch better job.
Jamie Oliver's response to the fat epidemic was to go to a provincial city in England and use it as the start of an incentive to get people in non-posh areas more aware of eating healthy. THAT'S how you do it, miss.
You don't need to shop at Whole Foods to get healthy food. I shop at Fry's because I'm a poor college student, and I'm able to find a pretty good selection of produce. Not the best, admittedly, but adequate. Also, frozen fruits and veggies are both cheaper and more convenient. For me the temptation to buy junk and ready made food comes more from convenience than price because the cost difference in making a good, healthy home-cooked meal and buying something from McDonald's is small. One just takes a lot more planning and effort.
There's a lot of misdirected anger and hatred in her article... Makes me wonder why this is so personal to her. Perhaps she or some close family members have dealt with weight issues. (Or maybe she's just an asshole.)
Yeah, because every person who isn't a fatty must be a super health-nut, right? I work with models and actresses that are so skinny and most of the time they fall into two categories:
a) genetically blessed mutants who can (and do) eat anything and everything and rarely exercise.
b) adhering to incredibly unhealthy "activities" to maintain their size- drugs, extreme dieting, eating disorders.
It really frosts my cupcake that thin people get a free-pass when it comes to prejudice. It is also completely insensitive to the people who have a medical condition (because, you know, those things do exist) or those of us (myself included) who are trying to change our habits and maintain a healthier lifestyle.
It upsets me to no end the amount of insecurity that is placed on the shoulders of those of us that are trying to get healthier. Everybody likes to watch and make fun of the "fatties" no matter what. Human beings have this interesting paradox of wanting to be accepted and to exclude simultaneously.
I've heard stories of women running and exercising in graveyards or at odd hours of the day- because they don't want to get hassled. You can't imagine the looks I get, when I go out to eat with my best-friend (one of those previously mentioned genetic mutants).
In the grand scheme of sizes, I'm not even that big (I'm a 14) compared to the national average.
Note to Platell- you catch more flies with honey, than you do with vinegar. Don't complain about a problem that doesn't concern or affect you, unless you've actually come up with a plan of action that is supportive, comprehensive and not based solely on the "otherness" of people who don't look like you.
Amanda Plattell is concerned with nothing more than the greater enrichment of Amanda Plattell.
She's an Australian hack for hire who will write anything for a buck and who has no real strong opinions on anything.
In contrast to MeMe Roth she almost certainly doesn't believe any of this but considers it 'good copy' in much the same way that she considers repeatedly attacking female celebrities in print 'good copy'.
Whether her complete amorality makes this piece worse I leave up to everyone else to decide.
Honestly, it's days like this that make me silently, painfully want to stop existing. If I could be smaller, I would. I generally like the way I look, with a curvy bum and wide hips and yes, even bits that jiggle. I'm a big woman, but not, I hope, a repulsive one. But the visceral loathing that comes pouring off this woman and her intellectual comrades really jab sharply at my sense of self-worth. It makes me quietly relieved that it's actually rather difficult to commit suicide, for I would have done it many, many times over if only to escape such vituperative loathing. Today is one of the tough days.
I hear you. I used to be small; now I'm not.
Even though I'm mobile, active, strong, work out with a trainer three times a week, take care of my own house, have a job I'm good at, animals that love me...the only thing people like her (and most other people, frankly) see is that I'm fat. Most of the time, I'm either ignored or pitied; once in a while, though, I run into this sort of loathing.
And it surprises me *every time.* I guess it shouldn't; God knows it's out there in plain sight for us to be bugged by. But it does.
I ran a mile today in ten minutes, then lifted weights for an hour. I felt great about myself until I read this article. Now I wonder if I ought to just give in, be less mobile, be less active, and just sit the hell down and become invisible. It's hard to keep getting out and doing in the face of people like her.
Ten years ago I would have laughed at the idea of an addiction to food. Now I'm not so sure. There are many people out there (including my own parents) who are highly educated, have access to good food, live in areas where they can safely exercise, know what they should eat, know that if they keep eating crap and remain sedentary it will kill them, and yet they cannot stop. They cannot change the way they are eating or the way they are living. And these are not people with a death wish or generally self-destructive people.
I'm an ignorant-assholist. Everywhere I go, there are these obnoxious, ignorant assholes. I can't escape them. Women and men, spouting diarrhea of the mouth and brain, trying to pass it off as concerned journalism.
I went to a therapist about my level of disgust with these offensive people, but she advised that I continue my current theraputic regime of mockery and alcohol.
The Daily Mail has one use: identifying the bigots before I have to find out in the course of conversation.
Do I think to myself "hmmm, 5 people could sit there instead of 2" sometimes on the subway when I have nowhere to sit with my heavy laptop bag? Yes. I don't think that makes me a bad person. I don't think it's fair, personally. And I know it's going to get me in trouble. But just like I don't think it's fair for someone to put a bunch of bags on the seat next to them so no one can sit...it's kinda unfair for someone to take up more than their share of room on a subway seat with their body. But I would never be mean to someone about their weight. My sister is obese and I would freak out if someone was mean to her about it.
Do you feel the same way about tall people, too? Because they often take up more than one seat just from sheer size. Or bigger boned people. Or conjoined twins- one set of legs, one seat, I say.
Seriously, though, seats are based on biometrics that make assumptions about "average" size. These averages are based on one particular archetypal shape, which is generally slender and white and perfectly proportioned and of a very specific height, all things which many people are not. It's simply...weird to resent someone for not fitting this particular and ever changing type.
The thing that drives me crazy is this recent trend where it's like, as long as you admit that you discriminate against people, then it's ok. Imagine if instead of "I am a fattist" she wrote "I am a racist" or "I hate Jews," "I hate gays," or any other ridiculous discriminatory sentiment. She would lose her job. Why is this OK? Discriminating against people for any reason, in such a public forum, should not be applauded in this "oh, you just tell the truth!" sort of way, the way it has been recently.
Disgust is inextricably linked to moral taboos. Her morality is such that she sees the very existence of fat as fundamentally wrong. An example: some people oppose gay marriage because it disgusts them, so they just KNOW it must be wrong. The same arguments were made in support of sodomy laws. Also, disgust is tied to the idea of pollution. It is clear from her remark about people wanting to be fat to fit in that she thinks obesity is a pollution, a plague on society. It's not just about seeing other fat people, it's seeing fat as actually taking over.
The thing about morality is that it's taught--in ancient Greece, people were disgusted by eating in public and now that is one of the most common activities I can think of. So many restaurants! Our culture has taught her that this kind of disgust is appropriate and that the accompanying hatred is equally okay.
Speaking as a former impoverished student who lived in London for several months on a food budget of about 10 pounds a week, I can tell you that it's MUCH much cheaper to buy packets of crisps and knock of Jaffa Cakes than it is to buy proper food. On the weeks where I nannied and had extra spending money, I could afford to buy fruits, vegetables, Innocent smoothies and meat. But to get the most caloric bang for my buck, it was sadly all about sweets. Oddly enough, I didn't gain any weight during those months (I had no Oyster Card so I had to walk everywhere), but if I drove/bussed it, I'm sure I would've packed on a few pounds.
I'm tall, I'm a drinker, and I'm a smoker. I take up space, and am a strain on health care. But I guess because I'm slim I'm not a problem. Good to know.
That's funny. As a smoker, you contribute second- and third- hand smoke, which actually DOES affect the health of those around you.
Last I checked, you can't catch fat on the subway.
And on the other hand, you have people who will die out of their efforts to be thin. It's all about a happy medium, and I hate to say this, but doesn't it seem that she has major issues about her own body, if she has to hate on others?
Why do you hate to say it? You don't enjoy being right?
Amanda knows which side her bread is buttered. Nothing pays the big London mortgage better than a bit of bitchery in the Daily Mail.
[jezebel.com]
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Trainer Struggles to Lose Weight
It's actually a lot more expensive to be overweight than it is to be in shape.
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