Ugh, The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance

Obesity is largely, although not entirely, a moral issue. Gluttony isn't looked upon favorably in most cultures. ETA: My point in my previous post was that once we start accepting the behaviors that cause people to be obese, it's a slippery slope. There's a HUGE difference between being tolerant of people for something they cannot control (i.e. race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, etc.), but for the overwhelming majority of people obesity is caused by poor behavioral choices. People who make poor choices should NOT be considered a protected group in the same category as race, gender, etc. It blows my mind.

i got to thinking about this some more and had to come back and comment. i can go with the gluttony/moral thing, and i definitely agree that this is a societal thing - i feel that our whole culture in the u.s. is savage gluttony when it comes to most things - food, money, technology, you name it. but sticking with the food thing, how would you factor in the 'skinny' gluttons into this? not all gluttonous people wear it on their bellies.

your post got me thinking about my cooperating teacher during my student teacher practicum. she was model thin - size zero. but do you know what she ate for lunch everyday? two footlong chili hotdogs with all the fixings and a double order of cheese fries. no joke. everyday from january until may. and she wasn't on a high calorie diet for anything - that's just what she eats. she feeds her daughters in the same way, but apparently, but they weren't so lucky with the size zero thing and seemed to get larger everytime i saw them (only about three or four times).

i asked her for dinner and she told me to make sure i didnt' serve any veggies, because she didn't eat any. and she came in every morning with a fast food combo for breakfast. and she had snacks for the students (right) in her room, which she noshed on all day. and she was not athletic by any means, and didn't drink any water that i ever saw - only mountain dew or sweet tea.

she was by far the most disgusting eater i have ever seen in my entire life, but she looked like a beauty queen. i can't help but feel that there would be discrimination against her and her eating habits vs. an obese person who had the same eating habits. i'm not sure the best way to get what i'm thinking across, but i think the majority of people who participate on this site would have some kind of similar experience and think to themselves, 'what the hell?!' which is pretty much how i felt eating my salad and yogurt for lunch watching her gorge on fast food everyday.

in a nutshell: i mostly agree with you on most counts, but i do think those gray areas you mentioned and are not too fond of are legitamately there in many cases - not all, but too many to be completely discounted.

And since we CAN'T pick out gluttons by sight, why is it okay to shame people, especially children, on the basis of appearance?

unbelievable, fat acceptance. Are we supposed to pretend that being overweight and obese isn't unhealthy. After having 3 kids I found myself 20 lbs into the obese category. I'm ashamed of myself for letting it get this bad. I speak openly with my almost 5 and 3 year old about my weightloss and exercise. I want them to know that my weight and lack of exercise was unhealthy. I feel very fortunate that my children are healthy and active and that I'm getting my weight under control while they are still young.

I think it's not about pretending that obesity is healthy, it's about not belittling fat people or making them feel like second class citizens because of their weight.

Obesity is largely, although not entirely, a moral issue. Gluttony isn't looked upon favorably in most cultures. ETA: My point in my previous post was that once we start accepting the behaviors that cause people to be obese, it's a slippery slope. There's a HUGE difference between being tolerant of people for something they cannot control (i.e. race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, etc.), but for the overwhelming majority of people obesity is caused by poor behavioral choices. People who make poor choices should NOT be considered a protected group in the same category as race, gender, etc. It blows my mind.

i got to thinking about this some more and had to come back and comment. i can go with the gluttony/moral thing, and i definitely agree that this is a societal thing - i feel that our whole culture in the u.s. is savage gluttony when it comes to most things - food, money, technology, you name it. but sticking with the food thing, how would you factor in the 'skinny' gluttons into this? not all gluttonous people wear it on their bellies.

your post got me thinking about my cooperating teacher during my student teacher practicum. she was model thin - size zero. but do you know what she ate for lunch everyday? two footlong chili hotdogs with all the fixings and a double order of cheese fries. no joke. everyday from january until may. and she wasn't on a high calorie diet for anything - that's just what she eats. she feeds her daughters in the same way, but apparently, but they weren't so lucky with the size zero thing and seemed to get larger everytime i saw them (only about three or four times).

i asked her for dinner and she told me to make sure i didnt' serve any veggies, because she didn't eat any. and she came in every morning with a fast food combo for breakfast. and she had snacks for the students (right) in her room, which she noshed on all day. and she was not athletic by any means, and didn't drink any water that i ever saw - only mountain dew or sweet tea.

she was by far the most disgusting eater i have ever seen in my entire life, but she looked like a beauty queen. i can't help but feel that there would be discrimination against her and her eating habits vs. an obese person who had the same eating habits. i'm not sure the best way to get what i'm thinking across, but i think the majority of people who participate on this site would have some kind of similar experience and think to themselves, 'what the hell?!' which is pretty much how i felt eating my salad and yogurt for lunch watching her gorge on fast food everyday.

in a nutshell: i mostly agree with you on most counts, but i do think those gray areas you mentioned and are not too fond of are legitamately there in many cases - not all, but too many to be completely discounted.

And since we CAN'T pick out gluttons by sight, why is it okay to shame people, especially children, on the basis of appearance?

huh?
:noway:

not sure where you caught me saying it was okay to shame anyone - i think might have mixed me up with someone else...

Funny how people are up in arms about body shaming fat people,but its totally ok when someone posts one of those hotter than pics totally shaming thin people and people fill pages an pages with comments like "LOVE" and ewwwww look at the skeletons

Yes overweight kids get teased but you know what ALL kids get teased weather it be for weight,glasses ,clothes ect ect.
Maybe we need to stop shoving this polticly correct acceptance *kitten* down everyones throats because you know what EVERYONE judges and everyone gets judged. We need to teach our kids not to base their self worth on what others think of them.

seriously how many of you have looked at someone and said"oh she needs to eat a sandwhich"
how many of you have judged peoples clothes,spelling,grocery carts,food diaries,what they logg as exercise ect ect .world acceptance for weight or anything is something that will NEVER happen,just like world peace

I was an overweight teenager who was teased relentlessly about my weight. I was obese by the time I was 16, and I used to have people throw food at me. There were periods in my life where I had literally 0 friends, and I tried to take my own life because I was so depressed. When I was at my biggest I honestly didn't think I'd make it past the age of 30, and I didn't care.

I've never made fun of an underweight or slim person. I don't think it's appropriate to tease people at all. Don't justify fat bashing by saying 'well sometimes they make fun of thin people' - it's bad either way and shouldn't happen.

I didnt justify it,also my very best friend in junior high was very tall and very thin,she also had food thrown at her called skeletor,teased relentlessly she commited suicide its not exclusive to fat people. I was teased relentlessy about my speech problem (think elmer fudd meets the priest from the princess bride) i was also teased relentlessly about my very old messed up clothes the fact that my parents had no money,the diffrence between me and my friend i didnt give a ****.she was my ONLY friend BTW

once again i never justified fat bashing i think you might be reading more into what i said than what was there and seriously if you have NEVER judged someone for how they look you are lying EVERYONE does its basic human nature

It's not human nature, and not everyone does it. You can't excuse bigotry by saying "everyone does it" and "it's human nature." Psychology has proved conclusively that they don't and it isn't.

I didnt excuse it so stop putting words in my mouth I SAID everyone has judged someone else based on apperance and if they said they havent they are lying. The point I was making is that everyone gets picked on everyone gets judged its not exclusive to overweight people. I personally got way more crap from people when I weighed 110 versus 230. everyone has it tough,it has always been this way show me a time in history when it hasnt. earliest recorded history shows bigotry and people being judged for religion,race,body,sexual orientation,rich or poor,and on and on funny for something that psycholgoy has proven isnt normal. me saying it is not excusing it just pointing it out. we can not change the world reacacts to us only the way we react to the worlds reaction

And I still call bullsh!t. The world HAS demonstrably changed, and it can and will keep changing as long as we refuse to accept intolerance.

We have become entirely too tolerant as a society. Everybody has a bullsh*t excuse for everything and it's politically incorrect to call anyone out because we have to be "tolerant" of everything. Where do we draw the line? Do we start tolerating criminal activity because most people who commit crimes have mental health issues? I know that *seems* like a huge jump, but there ARE people out there who feel that way. It seems like there's no right and wrong anymore, only a huge gray area.

That can't be good.

obese people are not criminals. it's weird to me that you are tying this discussion into moral issues. perhaps the line could be drawn at keeping to your own personal endeavors and butting out of everyone else's.

This news does not surprise me at all. I have met people from that organization and I was criticized by a couple of their members for wanting to get into shape and for thinking that changing my diet had anything to do with good health. I didn't criticize anyone for wanting to stay fat or for eating a high calorie diet without exercising (and this is exactly what they described to me as their preference). I have no problem with people loving themselves no matter where they are at, but maybe some of us have a genuine desire to be able to look down and actually see our genitals without a mirror.

Can we please consider if the exhibit would actually effect positive change in the children that went to it?

People are going to get offended by all kinds of things, it happens.

Based on what I was able to find looking up the exhibit online, I think the exhibit would do a pretty crummy job of getting children to change negative habits for more positive ones, and as such was a failure. I feel it reinforces negative stereotypes, and relate it to the parent who harasses their child daily about diet and exercise and causes the kid to develop an unhealthy relationship with food and sneak junk for comfort and such.

Whether it made people happy, to me, is irrelevant. What matters is if it was any good at what it set out to do.

He/She wasn't saying obese people are criminals. You know exactly what that post meant. And obesity is everyone's business because it's a major factor in health care/insurance costs, which affects EVERYONE!! So unless they start making different prices for obese and the non-obese I'll continue to make it my business.

Obesity has nothing to do with our health crisis. It's a symptom of the real issue - UNHEALTHY LIFESTYLES (and only in some cases - obesity can be a symptom of hormone issues, medicines, etc. as well). Not exercising, eating only junk food, smoking, drugs, etc. are all going to result in poor health and extra health care costs regardless of your level of fatness and weight. You can be fat and healthy and you can be skinny and unhealthy. So what I eat is not any more of your business unless you are policing everyone's diet and exercise/fitness routines regardless of weight. Stop judging people only by weight and look at their behaviors. That's what's important. Are they eating whole food with lots of veggies and fruit? Are they exercising? Are they sleeping? Are they dealing with stress effectively? That's what really matters. Not their body fat percentage. You can say in general that potentially that people with high body fat percentages do not lead healthy lifestyles, but that's not always the case. And I promise that there are skinny people who have heart attacks and also have diabetes, who have made poor lifestyle choices. Look at the lifestyle choices and not just the outside appearance of someone. Until you get to extremes (anorexia or super obesity) and stress the body so much, weight in general doesn't cause death. For everyone in the middle, it's generally an issue of healthy lifestyles that relates to biological deaths from disease.

And healthy lifestyle isn't a guarantee of health, long life, or that you won't have health problems that increase health care costs. Jim Fixx, author of the 1977 bestseller "The Complete Book of Running," has been credited with starting the fitness movement in America. He wrote books and articles about exercise and healthy eating, appeared on talk shows to promote exercise and healthy eating, and lived by what he wrote. He also died of a heart attack at the age of 52, in 1984, while out on his daily run. His autopsy showed three coronary arteries were blocked, one by 95%. Can we conclude that running is detrimental to health? Or should we conclude that health is more complicated than food and exercise? There are plenty of fat and skinny but unhealthy celebrities and average people who live well past 52, some well past 82 or 92, with few, if any, health problems. Health isn't as simple as food and exercise, and you can't know much about a person just by looking, especially about their health, so it's never okay to judge based on appearance--even fat.

He/She wasn't saying obese people are criminals. You know exactly what that post meant. And obesity is everyone's business because it's a major factor in health care/insurance costs, which affects EVERYONE!! So unless they start making different prices for obese and the non-obese I'll continue to make it my business.

Obesity has nothing to do with our health crisis. It's a symptom of the real issue - UNHEALTHY LIFESTYLES (and only in some cases - obesity can be a symptom of hormone issues, medicines, etc. as well). Not exercising, eating only junk food, smoking, drugs, etc. are all going to result in poor health and extra health care costs regardless of your level of fatness and weight. You can be fat and healthy and you can be skinny and unhealthy. So what I eat is not any more of your business unless you are policing everyone's diet and exercise/fitness routines regardless of weight. Stop judging people only by weight and look at their behaviors. That's what's important. Are they eating whole food with lots of veggies and fruit? Are they exercising? Are they sleeping? Are they dealing with stress effectively? That's what really matters. Not their body fat percentage. You can say in general that potentially that people with high body fat percentages do not lead healthy lifestyles, but that's not always the case. And I promise that there are skinny people who have heart attacks and also have diabetes, who have made poor lifestyle choices. Look at the lifestyle choices and not just the outside appearance of someone. Until you get to extremes (anorexia or super obesity) and stress the body so much, weight in general doesn't cause death. For everyone in the middle, it's generally an issue of healthy lifestyles that relates to biological deaths from disease.

And healthy lifestyle isn't a guarantee of health, long life, or that you won't have health problems that increase health care costs. Jim Fixx, author of the 1977 bestseller "The Complete Book of Running," has been credited with starting the fitness movement in America. He wrote books and articles about exercise and healthy eating, appeared on talk shows to promote exercise and healthy eating, and lived by what he wrote. He also died of a heart attack at the age of 52, in 1984, while out on his daily run. His autopsy showed three coronary arteries were blocked, one by 95%. Can we conclude that running is detrimental to health? Or should we conclude that health is more complicated than food and exercise? There are plenty of fat and skinny but unhealthy celebrities and average people who live well past 52, some well past 82 or 92, with few, if any, health problems. Health isn't as simple as food and exercise, and you can't know much about a person just by looking, especially about their health, so it's never okay to judge based on appearance--even fat.

He/She wasn't saying obese people are criminals. You know exactly what that post meant. And obesity is everyone's business because it's a major factor in health care/insurance costs, which affects EVERYONE!! So unless they start making different prices for obese and the non-obese I'll continue to make it my business.

Obesity has nothing to do with our health crisis. It's a symptom of the real issue - UNHEALTHY LIFESTYLES (and only in some cases - obesity can be a symptom of hormone issues, medicines, etc. as well). Not exercising, eating only junk food, smoking, drugs, etc. are all going to result in poor health and extra health care costs regardless of your level of fatness and weight. You can be fat and healthy and you can be skinny and unhealthy. So what I eat is not any more of your business unless you are policing everyone's diet and exercise/fitness routines regardless of weight. Stop judging people only by weight and look at their behaviors. That's what's important. Are they eating whole food with lots of veggies and fruit? Are they exercising? Are they sleeping? Are they dealing with stress effectively? That's what really matters. Not their body fat percentage. You can say in general that potentially that people with high body fat percentages do not lead healthy lifestyles, but that's not always the case. And I promise that there are skinny people who have heart attacks and also have diabetes, who have made poor lifestyle choices. Look at the lifestyle choices and not just the outside appearance of someone. Until you get to extremes (anorexia or super obesity) and stress the body so much, weight in general doesn't cause death. For everyone in the middle, it's generally an issue of healthy lifestyles that relates to biological deaths from disease.

Obesity has nothing to do with our health crisis? You really have your head in the sand. How exactly am I in your business? Am I going into your home and rummaging through your cupboards? I really don't understand your point. What exactly are you trying to get me to agree to? Your statement that you have to be SUPER OBESE to have health issues is so wrong. Just go speak to a cardiologist. Thanks for proving my point that the general population needs more education on a heathy lifestyle.

people need to stop avoiding the issue of child obesity. ignoring it doesnt make it go away. and fighting disney for encouraging an active lifestyle as opposed to an unhealthy one is not going to make anything better