Are older people obsessed with commenting on other peoples weight?

I've worked in the NHS for 45 years and I'm 63, I'm bloody sick of the personal comments. I used to be really fat and I'd get comments daily about my size. You'd be so pretty if you lost all that fat etc.
I lost 5 stone recently and now I'm gaunt with ozempic face apparently.
I now just change the subject Immediately.
All this from people who are no oil painting themselves.

Do I always think people mean what they say, you mean? I apologise, I will in future assume that you don't mean anything you say, and are only saying it to provoke a reaction. I hope that will calm you down, as you are clearly really quite upset that people are reading what you say, and thinking you mean it.

Not older people but certainly some people.
My mother in law and sister in law always commented and they seem to have passed it onto my husband who is much better now after years of me saying it is inappropriate.

I think it’s true of the much older people, not 60s they’re middle aged these days. I’m late 40s and never thought about it but do recall comments of such like being made freely among my grandparents. War rations, rarity of obesity is their day etc likely cause.

My dad did this a lot towards the end of his life. He was in a care home mainly because of his physical limitations, had quite mild vascular dementia (he forgot words sometimes or forgot that he'd told us something before, but always knew who he was, where he was and why, and who everybody else was). But he seemed to have a bit of an obsession with how overweight everybody else was, and also with watching his own weight (he wasn't obsessive or starving himself, but completely gave up biscuits, for example, and nearly always chose the "lightest" option at mealtimes). He'd say things like "I don't know how that carer manages to do her job, she's so enormous" when the person in question was probably a size 20 at most, perfectly able- bodied, and my mum had been bigger than that for most of her adult life. I have since heard from a friend who worked in care homes that this is quite a common obsession!

My theory is that people of his generation grew up with rationing and in a time when there were very few fat people. Even when they're not obviously living in the past, those old values and norms may have entered their subconscious again - and the other thing is that people with any kind of dementia often have no filter. In my dad's case, we suspect he might have been autistic too- he certainly had some of the characteristics.

This is fairly accurate for my mother unfortunately. She only speaks criticism.

@ByZanyRubyOrca if you knew how awful an eating disorder can be you would show a great deal of compassion. I am firmly convinced thatt some of these oldies who are getting knocked on here have had lifetimes of restricted eating themselves, brought on my the societal norms they were subjected to.

I'm 59, and friend of mine had a mother who took amphetamines to remain slim throughout her life. She may well have commented on others' weights. I have no idea. But if she did, it would have come from a place where she was even more hemmed in by anxiety about weight and shape. Hence why compassion rather than condemnation would be appropriate.

The body positive movement (whether or not one believes it is a good thing on a population health level) has at least given people in younger generations permission to be the shape they wish to be or can't help being - a break if you like. I don't believe this was afforded to the generation above me.

Oh, and separately, I've caught a couple of posters who've moaned about older people's attitudes using phrases like 'stick thin'. Also not nice when you think about it.

As the mother of a daughter with an ED I am super sensitive to peoples' descriptors of shape and weight. But I do believe there were pressures on women in all generations. And of course EDs are rarely about weight or appearance. They are about control. a chance moment about being a bit rounded is not what sparked my DD's problems. Intense therapy has shown this.

My ex husband's mother was like this , always commenting on weight. She had one daughter thin as a rake and one short and fat,and another an average size, the short and fat one was better looking, but she was still mightily jealous of the thin one cos the mother revered her the most. Fucking hilarious well rid of them all weird fuckers 🤣

I think it depends on the person 's frame of reference. I am 61 but have been blessed with a good education including higher education plus seen plenty of wealth both in the affluent of South East where I grew up plus in London lived there many years learned loads about the world. I do observe plenty of overweight and obese people but I only care for their health plus the massive strain that is on the NHS from this. I have the manners not to open my mouth over this.

I'm 79 and I certainly wouldn't ever comment on people's weight. I think young people are far more judgemental about things like that.

I do think there has been something of a generational shift in the acceptability of commenting on weight/appearance in general. My parents, and other relatives of similar age, would definitely comment that someone had put on/lost weight, or was looking 'quite mumsy these days' or similar comments like that (not to the people concerned, only in the third person). Younger people don't seem to make these comments generally. Anecdotally, it's much more common to hear comments on weight in some other countries too, so the shift perhaps hasn't happened to the same extent across cultures.

Mumsnet really loves the opportunity to “bash” older people. Which usually means “over 50.” I suppose the admins have tightened up a bit on the abuse other groups used to get, so the oldies are all that’s left.

My mum is 74 and is like this. Has been all her life. She would comment on people in the street, people she knew, anyone really. She’ll comment to me about my brother ‘putting on the beef’ and I know she’ll do the same about me.

‘Scroll on if you don’t like the thread, love’. !!

Seems to be your reaction to anyone who does not concur with your opinion.
Is read and disagree no longer an option on MN? Maybe you should make it clear, love, that only those who admire your wisdom are invited to respond.

Other way round surely? On face value, the OP is talking about all older people, by saying "older people". No modifier means we're talking about everyone in that group. The OP could quite easily have avoided this, chose not to, and then doubled down on "you should understand that I didn't mean that"

There's a lot of push back in the replies and I think it's because people now know it's not acceptable to comment on people's weight/size/whatever.
I'm in my 60s and my parents' generation wouldn't have hesitated to comment. A friend and I laugh now about comments from our mothers indicating we were too fat/likely to get fat/whatever. I think it was just more the norm. Both mothers were on a semi-permanent diet.
My mum was 94 a couple of months ago as an indicator of age band. They didn't worry about offending people, just said what they thought.
I'm not saying it's ok, just what was, I think, the norm for a lot of people. To make a horrible generalisation, those people are generally over 80 now, I think.