Oh, The Irony!!

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by Bilbo1967

How come (at least here in the UK) all men in adverts are portrayed as, well, basically, morons (whilst all women are, of course, intelligent, empowered and capable)?

Here in the US, a wag whose name I forget wrote fifty years ago that in all American television comedies, the wives are smarter than the husbands, the children are smarter than the parents, and the animals are smarter than the people.

Sixty years ago there was a radio show (later on television as well) called The Life of Riley which starred William Bendix. One of my high school teachers told us that his father refused to allow the family to watch that show because it portrayed the husband/father (the head of the family) as an idiot.

[Bilbo1967]

Originally Posted by GA Russell

Here in the US, a wag whose name I forget wrote fifty years ago that in all American television comedies, the wives are smarter than the husbands, the children are smarter than the parents, and the animals are smarter than the people.

Sixty years ago there was a radio show (later on television as well) called The Life of Riley which starred William Bendix. One of my high school teachers told us that his father refused to allow the family to watch that show because it portrayed the husband/father (the head of the family) as an idiot.

Ah, plus ca change!

[yvanleterrible]

I also am overweight by thirty pounds. I've had to deal with this all my life. I did lose most of it at some point, at the expense of my health. I later found out that for me it was necessary to have at least 10 pounds over.

In some regions of the world, populations had to face frequent shortages of food and their systems developped ways to conserve energy until it came back a plenty. Guess what, I have aboriginal genes!

To be honest, even with sports and a very physical job, I can't seem to lose much weight and I am getting there in age too...

[Amalthia]

Originally Posted by yvanleterrible

I also am overweight by thirty pounds. I've had to deal with this all my life. I did lose most of it at some point, at the expense of my health. I later found out that for me it was necessary to have at least 10 pounds over.

In some regions of the world, populations had to face frequent shortages of food and their systems developped ways to conserve energy until it came back a plenty. Guess what, I have aboriginal genes!

To be honest, even with sports and a very physical job, I can't seem to lose much weight and I am getting there in age too...

My sister had the same problem no matter how much she exercises she'd never been able to fit into my clothes. We just had different builds. But boy could she bench press a lot of weight!

[RWood]

PETA has just declared that overweight people are an object of scorn and mockery. It is PC to deride overweight people. It is but one step toward casting them from polite society. First they shamed and ridiculed smokers and then drinkers. Even drug users and child molesters are better protected than overweight people.

From time to time airlines have imposed aditional fees for overweight even if they fit in just one seat, the US Congress has introduced legislation that imposes taxes on "fat people's food" (news wire quote), and insurance companies are considering restricting coverage for overweight "lifestyle choice" problems. (Contracting AIDS is not considered a "lifestyle choice" problem and drug addition is a societal problem, not and individual's problem.)

[goldilocks]

Are they saying fat people are whales?

So, I’m a little chubby. I won’t say obese though. After having my son, I went down to 89lbs when I was normally around 125lbs. I was way too skinny and had other problems.

Turns out I had a hyperthyroid (aka: Graves Disease). I had radio-active iodine twice to kill the thyroid. Now I have Hypothyroidism. So I went from skinny to fat just like that. Of course, now I have to take medicine to replace my dead thyroid for the rest of my life. By the way Hypothyroidism can cause obesity, joint pain, infertility and heart disease. I worked with a woman who was losing her hair because of the disease.

Sure, I could probably lose some weight if I exercised and watched my calorie intake. But I am too worn out after working all day then taking care of things at home.

When I lost all my weight I had to put up with lots of comments like, “You’re too skinny. Or “You’re so skinny you could hide behind that light pole.” Now, being chubby I just get snickers or “When are you due?” Of course, as I’ve gotten older no one asks me that last question anymore! So fat or skinny you still get comments or snickers.

And fat people are discriminated against. Just read this article:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/ar...ne-months.html

[COLOR="Purple"][I]Goldilocks

[jgray]

Personally, I much prefer to poke fun at PETA. Some years ago, I saw a web site at www.peta.org. However, it was not the nut jobs at PETA. The web site stood for People Eating Tastey Animals. It was of course meant as satire.

The people at PETA were not amused (no sense of humor). They sued and eventually got the domain name transfered to them. You can still find archived copies of the old site if you Google.

[jgray]

Originally Posted by goldilocks

When I lost all my weight I had to put up with lots of comments like, “You’re too skinny. Or “You’re so skinny you could hide behind that light pole.”

When I was younger, I was very skinny. One of my brothers once said to me, "If you drank tomato juice and turned sideways, people would swear you were a thermometer."

I'm not so skinny any more. In fact, I recently noticed that I was in rather poor condition and had the start of a good spare tire around the middle. I didn't like this one bit, so I bought a used Bowflex and cut down on the calories. In the last month or so, I've dropped ten pounds. I still need to loose a few more and tone up with the Bowflex more.

[nekokami]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

It seems a lot of people who make that kind of joke just can't grasp the concept that it's not funny.

I was thinking about the nature of humor earlier today after overhearing a not-so-funny "comedy" routine someone else in the family was watching on the internet. Humor depends on surprise-- we laugh as a way of reacting to the unexpected. However, for some people, that surprise seems to be restricted to "shock," often at someone else's expense. I don't find this kind of "humor" funny at all.

Originally Posted by acidzebra

There are a small number of people who have glandular or other problems which cause their obesity, however, unless the genes causing these problems have magically spread like wildfire through specific parts of the western world like the US and the UK and to a lesser degree other prosperous countries, I can't really see obesity as anything else than poor lifestyle choices with regards to eating and exercise over a long period of time (and sometimes even over generations) for the vast majority of obese people. You can't change your skin color or sexual orientation, but you do have control over what you eat and the amount of exercise your body get.

If it were entirely a matter of choice, the problem would be evenly distributed across all prosperous countries. It's not. That suggests to me that there are some other issues at work here. Your remark about "over generations" bears closer examination. I don't believe we are entirely a product of our heredity or environment, but I don't believe we are ever truly free from influence by it, either.

I heard about a very interesting study recently that examined the way foods interact with brain chemistry. The author of the study claimed that eating foods high in sugar, fat, or salt triggers a reaction in the brain that prompts the person to crave more of the same. I suppose at one point these foods were rare enough that this was a reasonable way for bodies to work -- grab the rare nutrients while you can. Not such a good reaction in a prosperous environment, but again, obesity is not equally common in all populations.

Originally Posted by Amalthia

hate to say it but in America the food poor people can afford is VERY fattening, to buy fresh fruit and vegetables (which I've never seen coupons for) costs an arm and a leg.

On the other hand, I don't think this is really the issue, either. I've been poor. (Really, really poor. Eating on significantly less than a US dollar a day poor.) Healthy food can be had at a low cost, even ready-to-eat food. But it's not what is marketed in the US, and I presume not in the UK either. It doesn't have a "name brand" or a fancy label. It doesn't carry any prestige.

I suspect that most of the truly poor don't buy fried snacks and sugary colas. It's the "working poor" who get these for themselves as a "treat," because they've come to believe that they "deserve" these desirable things. How did that happen? (Let's look again at the marketing campaigns. Fresh vegetables don't get high-production ads on TV.)

Originally Posted by nomesque

Here's my oddball take on why everyone is nasty to obese people...

Because it's a visual reminder of the lack of control almost everyone has over some area of their life, be it eating, alcohol, drugs, anger, gambling, spending...

And it's hard to ignore. And something inside us feels the guilt when we see evidence of someone else's lack of control, and we snark.

I think this is very insightful. People react to this kind of unpleasant reminder in different ways. I know I tend to avoid these sorts of hints of human frailty myself, and I have to watch that. There are several people I work with who are very obese. One, at least, I know has numerous health issues that contribute. I don't know about the others. But it's hard to believe that anyone would want to live that way, so I presume there are factors that are making it very difficult for these people to achieve and maintain a more healthy weight.

My husband is obese now. He wasn't when we married. I'm not overweight, but I'm not in very good physical condition, either. I gave him a Wii Fit for our anniversary this year, and it's helping both of us pay a lot more attention to our physical conditions. I'm not saying it's the right answer for everyone. But I think most people with health issues like this need some kind of constructive help, not ridicule.

[nekokami]

Addendum: Piaget did some very interesting multigeneration studies with freshwater snails that showed that some environmental conditions cause adaptations in later generations, even if the environmental condition is no longer present. These are not mutations. They are sections of a species' genetic code that is "switched on" and that parameter is passed to offspring somehow, probably in extra-nucleic RNA or hormones or some other trigger mechanism. My point here is that there is some evidence that dietary patterns may persist in a similar way. It's not that these things can't be changed by an individual, but it may not be fair to assume that the effort required of each individual is comparable for the same degree of change.