Obesity is in fact a worldwide epidemic but insecurity is running rampant in this thread.

Eh I just took it as an honest question regarding whether you look down on obese people. My honest answer was probably yes, since I think it is most often a self-inflicted problem. That doesn't mean they are bad people or that I think it's ok to be mean to them.

I certainly would be friends with a fat person but I'd still be thinking they need to start eating less, if not for appearance then for their own long-term health.

Analogy to gay people is way off, better analogy might be heavy smokers who I probably look down on also, for many of the same reasons as obese people, mainly lack of self discipline.

That seems a bit high. Very, very few people have a condition that causes them to gain weight. The cause of fatness is calories in > calories out. And people don't have special slow metabolisms; everyone is more or less the same. Fat people are fat because of the choices they make. As a case study, see the YTF thread in Health and Fitness.

I meant more like genetics is 12% a contribution to a fat person being fat than it's the reason 12% of fat people are fat. Also I obviously just made up a number but I meant for it to be lowish.

they r disgusting, awkward, and its highly depressive just having to look at their sad existences.

this obv applies only for people under 50 or smth...., i mean, when ur old, your life is pretty much a waiting for an end so u might aswell enjoy everything it has to offer

I visited the Czech Republic once. Have you even heard of vegetables?

I'm at sixty, waiting for the end.

I wasn't comparing overweight people to gay people, i was saying that there is no reason why it is okay to make fun of fat people and it is not okay to make fun of any other type of person. gay people were just the example i pulled out of the air.

but i am curious if i was comparing fat people to gay people, why would that analogy be way off? I wasn't doing it then, but i will now, Being attracted to the opposite sex may not be a choice, but acting on that attraction is, just like eating isn't a choice, while eating to much is. Why is it socially acceptable to bash one, but not the other?

Before it starts i will squash it now, i have absolutely no problem with people who people chose to love and have sex with. Quite the opposite actually, i am saying that no group of people should be openly criticized and made fun of like what is going on in this thread.

you know a lot of overweight people overeat to deal with psychological problems. it's similar to cutting. it's pretty harsh to look at someone with disgust because of their psychological problems.

This is false.

The anti-vaccine crazies, for one.

How can being fat be a genetic predisposition when everyone seems to agree in this thread that there's a huge geographic element? As a European, I don't see that many fat people around. I didn't see that many in the US either, but that's because I've mostly spent time in places like NYC and DC. There definitely is a massive cultural aspect to obesity and likely that's also where the disgust comes from, it is associated with negative stereotypes of stupid hicks, etc.

I often get offended at the way poor white southerners are treated in the media, like they're all barefoot slackjawed toothless cretins. I take great pride in being from the Ozark Mountains myself and proudly self-identify as a hillbilly.

I've spent the majority of my life as a skinny person, but I've put on a few pounds in my middle age and find myself growing more tolerant of heavy people as I age.

My theory is that most fat people share a genetic inability to handle carbohydrates effectively.

To clarify, I don't think there's no genetic element to obesity, some people are obviously more susceptible to it than others. But when there's a trend in a population to become obese, there has to be a cultural element.

Obeseity epidemic is drastically overstated

I don't know, I see an awful lot of fat people even here in the nice middle class suburbs. And you see way more fat young people now than you did in the 60s and 70s.

Whatever choices they make, a gay person can't make themselves not gay.

A fat person, on the other hand, can actually be a not-fat person if they choose to.

Percentage? Are you saying that a fat person is likely to have psychological problems?

What if they're a serial killer?

There's a legit minority of obese people who have actual genetic causes and/or serious psychological issues.

The majority simply eat more calories than they expend on a daily basis. It's as simple as that, eating is fun and exercise isn't.

fyp

While you make a valid point with regards to the amount of obese people with psychological problems, your serial killer remark is one of the stupidest things a human being has ever articulated.

haha I'm getting up there too, John.

yes, but that trend could be the environment is such that food is now plentiful, exercise (particularly in terms of manual labour) is less common, and this coupled with genetic factors causes this rising trend. That is a possibility, surely? We all know one guy who eats like a horse and stays thin, and another guy who seems to eat the same but is fat, right?


There really is a feeling itt that fat people have only themselves to blame. Part of me thinks that's true, and part of me think that's the type of thinking that people who are naturally skinny indulge in cos they don't know what it feels like to have a big, almost insatiable appetite gnawing at them all the time, or don't understand what it might be like to lack the ability to achieve a sense of fullness when eating, or don't have emotional problems that are sated temporarily by eating, or don't have a sleeping dyfunction which causes constant low energy which seems only eating can counter, or have a high tension job that means relaxation/sleep is hard to get in healthy amounts etc etc etc.

I'm a little put off by whole 'fat people have themselves to blame' sentiment, but I get why it's around. But it has the convenience of scapegoatery about it.

Yeah I can see where you are coming from definitely. Everyone has weaknesses, and not all of them are as easily visible to strangers as obesity is. So in that sense they are an easy target because they can't hide it.

But on the flip side I think we need to also admit that most people who are obese simply eat too much. There is no deep psychological or genetic cause. It is not an "addiction' akin to alcoholism or drugs. So there has to be an attitude of personal responsibility where the obese person admits they have a problem with food, and that they have the power to change it.

As has been mentioned people in other countries are, by and large, less obese than Americans, and they theoretically would have to deal with all the issues you mentioned. They simply make different choices.

I think that the problem is a strange mix geographical that cultural.

Take for example, people who live in "food islands" compared to those who do not.

The food island people have very few choices, which are generally fast food or the dollar store. These food is all high in calories and carbs, very low in other nutrition, and unsatisfactory to eat. Even if this person eats the same as someone who buys all of her food from Whole Foods, the islander is going to be taking in much larger amounts of calories and, if you consider the dynamic interactions of food and the body, likely doesn't have enough other nutrients to offset or or properly incubate what little nutrition they are eating.

For example, compare the off-brand cereal you'd get from the dollar store and compare it to the off-brand you'd get from a reputable grocer. The stuff from the dollar store shows nothing but zeros all the way down the box. The off-brand from the grocer shows quite a few items.

Next, consider the type of food you can get from different areas. You can't find this thing in Los Angeles:



And good luck finding a buffet. There are a few, but nothing like other areas of the country. In Clevelend, there was at least 5 different buffet companies and lots of one-off restaurants and Chinese buffets around. Eating at a Chinese restaurant that wasn't a buffet was an absurd notion. Florida and even San Diego was similar. All of these places had plenty of fat people.

The size of the average dish in the South was huge. I could easily buy one dish and take it home and eat it for two to three days.

Ever seen a Po' Boy?