To ask what you think when you see a young, fat person?

If it's a male I have no interest. If it's a woman I look to see if she has lipoedema like me.

I don't judge or think anything negative but I do comment to myself and sometimes my (old) peer group that young people are on the whole overweight or fat these days and then we talk about poverty and the evil
food industry

I don’t really think anything. I see so many overweight people nowadays, I think I’ve tuned out.

The only time recently that i’ve judged, was in a Pret in a big city.
2 morbidly obese girls, I’d say early 20s, were obviously meeting up. They looked like they wore their size like a badge of honour. They must’ve been size 30+.
That shocks and horrifies me that anyone can tell themselves that that size is somehow a good positive thing. I worry for them.

It’s also what we’re eating, though. I remember eating meat or fish, potatoes and veg most nights. This was basically quite plain food and unless the meat was very fatty it was probably quite low in calories. Then came the freezer meals - frozen breaded chicken etc, and then the pour over/stir in sauces full of fat and sugar, and the cake treat was no longer a fairy cake with a bit of icing on but a huge cupcake with a ton of butter cream or a triple chocolate muffin. Pizzas, lasagnes etc - all high in calories.

Sliced bread has stuff added to it to make it last longer than eg a French baguette - fattening.

And then there’s what people are drinking. Not an ordinary tea or coffee but a coffee shop experience with additional cream or caramel or mini marshmallows on top.

And wine at home several times a week.

Add that to the ‘sit on your bum all day’ jobs and we’re in huge trouble.

We’ve got to consciously look at what we’re eating as well as portion control. Our dinner plates are massive compared to what they were in the 60s. All parents need to get their heads round the problem when they start weaning children. No child needs juice, for example. My HV drilled that into me, and I’m glad she did. I never bought it until DS1 was at school, and then it was limited. Others are buying it for 6 month old babies - why?

You'd have to be exceptionally obese for me to really notice, as normal levels of overweight are so common that it's the slim people that stand out.
My own brother died at 44 from obesity, so my reactions are very much affected by that.

You asked for honesty. For me it is a cumulative thing, not based on seeing one person. I am not judging you individually but do tend to wonder why there are so many more fat people around these days. Then decide it is about all sorts of complex factors and that it is none of my business, really.

How overweight are you?

Tbh 26 is not that young. I feel very sad when I see children and teens who are very overweight, as if you're overweight at this age it's going to be really difficult to lose it moving forward.

I was 'chubby' in my teens and a few stone overweight in my 20's but I lost it in my early 30's and have been able to maintain that for over 10 years. Life is so much easier when you're slimmer.

Honestly?

I don't think anything about another person's weight. Their body is absolutely their business. I don't judge, we have one overweight person in my immediate family (of about 30 people). It annoys me that she moans about it and does nothing in terms of lifestyle change.

If she didn't go on about it constantly, It wouldn't even register.

It's the moaning and inaction that irks.

I'm not interested!

I don't notice when my friends put on weight. I've seen a couple of friends over the Summer that I've not seen for a while and they've both been at pains to tell me that they've piled on weight, both a couple of stone apparently. Once they made a point of telling me, yes, I see it, I wouldn't have noticed if they hadn't told me though.

I don't judge people by their weight.

And I speak as a life-long 'skinny' person that's never particularly thought about my weight.

Maybe people that do think about their weight notice more.

I see me as a younger person. The one who went on a crazy diet once with a friend, but who failed, passing out after day one and being scolded by her mum for thinking that eating 100 calories a day was a proper diet. The one whose friend “succeeded” to the point where we nearly lost her to Anorexia. The one who eventually found a sport that she loved, and lost weight naturally through training, who put loads of weight back on when she stopped, and who finally became comfortable in her own body in her mid- thirties.
I see others as people who haven’t yet got their confidence, and wish them the best with their own journey.

I was telling my adult kids this weekend how when I grew up in the 70s and 80s, we just didn’t snack between meals. We would never have had snacks as we were going round a museum or in the car. And it isn’t just that there is more processed food now. In the 70s we ate Smash and Angel Delight And other very processed food. But there was very little obesity. In my entire school I honestly only remember one overweight girl.

These days we all snack too much. My family and I included although we are all slim as we are pretty fit and active.

I’m obese so I know it is hard. I also know it usually takes problems to get here. I’d feel sorry for an obese young adult because I would suspect they have issues they are trying to deal with. Nothing more than sympathy though.

I also find myself wondering why we seem to have so many more overweight people of all ages in this country compared with other countries with similar economies.
The obvious exception being the USA of course which is even worse.

Honestly? Very obese and I do judge them a bit. I appreciate that makes me sound like a monster, but I wonder how they allowed themself to get like that.

If they were obese, I would feel sympathy. Food addiction is awful to live with and tough to beat.

If they were just overweight, I probably wouldn't think about their body shape at all.

Re the 'govt' bit...
Home economics and cooking/nutrition used to be taught in schools, both practical and theory lessons
But someone noted that this was mainly for 'girls', and decided 'equal opportunities' and all that, so dropped it from the curriculum, along with selling sports fields
So no wonder we are now a country of fat/obese people, normalised as evidenced by the responses here

I’m another who wouldn’t view someone mid-to-late 20s as “young person” - sorry!!! You are well settled in the adult category. And as such, I wouldn’t think anything about your parents or upbringing because I’d assume (correctly) you’d had a long enough time as an adult that this was your choice. (and choosing to do nothing is still a choice.)

But beyond that, I don’t think I’d notice you unless you were incredibly overweight. Then it would be to feel sorry for you as if doesn’t look a nice way to live once weight starts getting to the level it restricts you.

It depends. Overweight I don't notice or think anything of it. If I see an obese person, yes, I think about it and generally I judge (knowing that some can have medical issues that prevent them from losing weight, but let's be honest, that won't be the majority). It baffles me that someone reaches the obese stage without doing something about it before, because you reach obese stage slowly, being overweight first and then adding more weight little by little. I wonder why they haven't done anything about it earlier, when they were just overweight.

Clearly overweight kids, yes, I judge parents!. As a parent you have full control of what your kids eat (at least yonger kids), I've seen so many very overweight kids drinking Coke or any soft drinks full of sugar with their parents, why??

This is my view as well. I’m overweight now - need to lose two stone - but I was not overweight until the menopause. In my late 20s I weighed 9 stone- so I do wonder about how the young person was fed as a child. My two both eat cake, biscuits and chocolate - they’re not on a perfect diet. But my 16 year old drinks no fizzy stuff at all and both of them are thin - very athletic build - and neither of their parents are. I did not give them very much processed food - chicken nuggets etc was once a week, not every night. McDs was an occasional treat - once every several weeks or even more. They ate some veg and fruit every day, although not a huge amount.

When I see very fat children or young people - especially girls and women - I am concerned for their future as it is hard to lose weight post menopause. Childbirth when significantly overweight is also more risky.

The only time a fat person, whatever age, whatever sex, comes to my attention (said as a fat person myself!) is if they're wearing something that doesn't flatter them. I also think that about young women who wear skirts so short that you can see their ass cheeks, tbh.

However, I also admire their fuck it attitude and wish I was the same.

Seriously in the 70s and 80s very few fat people.
You aren't trying to tell me that people now have more health issues than people in the 70s and 80s.

People ate less and moved more. Simple.
Even turning the telly over involved getting steps across the living room.
Getting a file at worked involved going to a filing cabinet. Now searching on a virtual file at a desk.

The RolliePollies were funny because they were bigger but really look at them and they were now average sized.

I’m afraid I would be judging your parents for not teaching you healthy eating habits or presumably setting a good example.
And the government a bit for their role - this stuff should be learned in schools.
However well done to you for deciding to tackle it now while you are young and it is much easier to lose weight and learn a different approach to food and exercise.