obesity as a disability is very damaging for the truely disabled

[twoopsie]

So now the EU says that obisity can be treated as a disability.

Sets a worrying precedence. Does anyone remember that episode of the Simpsons.

Before people start flaming me with genuine medical reasons for obesity, these are a very small minority but obviously do exist and the obesity is a side affect, not the aliment.

Hand-holding for Monday, ral...

aww thanks pausing.

It would seem so Rather, this makes interesting but depressing reading

I have a disabled son, he will need lifelong support, he did not inflict this to himself, nor did us his parents. If I could take his disability away, I would in a heart bit.
I do take issue with obese people being assessed as having disabilities.
I don't think employers should to change their environment to accommodate people that choose to overeat, this will perpetuate their problem, what obese people need is psychological help (as those who have eating disorders) to overcome the need to eat all the time.

I am currently studying a course at my local college, so I am surrounded by people of all ages. I am shocked to see how some 20 year olds in my course eat rubbish all the time, chocolate everyday, one girl is already extremely fat and she is only 20, by the time she is 40 she will be obese without a doubt. She is a happy person, about to get married, has a job, so I don't think her eating habits are due to mental health issues. Yet, to think that she could be classed as disabled in a few years due to her rubbish habits really upsets me.

There is another woman who is pregnant, she is drinking energy drinks every day, eating chocolate everyday, crisps, rubbish basically, so what chance is her baby going to have of getting a decent diet? I suspect none.

More education is need to stop this epidemic.

Really pisses me off. Not a day goes by without the Daily Mail reporting some guy who was on high rate mobility climbed Kilimanjaro or ran the London Marathon.

Fraudsters do exist but they make up 0.25% of claims which is tiny.

heart beat

eggman your points I'm sure are very interesting but not in relation to points I made and I find it a bit surprising that you can carry on making assumptions that mean you're not reading what I've actually written!

I'm going to leave it now as its all getting a bit silly and isn't very relevant, but one last time, please stop putting words into my mouth/ invisible writing into my post!

You seem to be focusing on the law to the exclusion of all else, and seem to have read my post through a lens of a purely legislative context.

I wonder why? I didn't even reference the law or legal context!

I don't personally feel that the latest whims and wording in legislation must be taken as the meaning of a word that's been around for a very long time! It may alter or extend a meaning, as law and government are part of culture, but it isn't The Authority on a word or concept.

Is disability as a concept not allowed to exist outside the pages of legal terms?

Are we not allowed to have a grasp of the wider cultural meaning of a term? Or the linguistic or sociological meaning of words? Or anthropological, semantic, semiotic whatever etc

Timetoask

"I don't think her eating habits are due to mental health issues."

So you don't actually know then?

One of things that I find most upsetting about the thread is that we really haven't moved on very far from those that used to say "ADHD, just give them a clip round the ear" etc. All the prejudice has done is jump from one thing to another.

latara I was on Epilim for two years.

I wasn't obese. I probably wouldn't be considered by most people on here to be overweight. But I was.

At 5ft 4in and 8st going to 10st almost overnight because of the drug was devastating.

I ditched Epliim because being so big depressed me so much. I'd also not suffered any fits ever and was fed up with doctors who smugly told me to keep taking the tablets.

I was also horrified to discover that Epilim is implicated in serious birth defects. Luckily I didn't get pregnant in that time, but no one warned me about that.

I have had valproate but am now on serohell which is crap for weight gain.

Although I am not clinically obese I have put weight on recently because I am a bit down in the dumps. Not proper clinical depression, but just down. It pisses me off that people like OP probably judge me on that like I am some glutton or something.

I wonder if my uncle who has been disabled by multiple strokes (which may or may not be due to drinking) is truly disabled.

I don't agree with the "it's their own fault" sentiment - so if you become paraplegic because of an accident that directly happened because you were drunk then your being described as disabled is wrong as it is "your fault".

Drags the thread kicking and screaming back to the point the that the EU were actually addressing

Should employers have to make adjustments for obese employees in the same way they do for deaf employees?

Who will bear the cost?

Where will that money come from?

There is a mindset at the moment that all 'disabled' people can work given the right support
So their benefits are predicated on them looking for work
But that is utter bullshit

some disabled people cannot ever, ever work even in the public sector who can afford stupidly low productivity
so should be supported to be as comfortable as possible

other disabled people could make minor lifestyle changes that would ameliorate their symptoms and allow them to work part / full time

BUT Obesity is calories in / calories out.
Those who deny such need to watch the pictures of Michael Buerk in I'm a Sleb as proof.
Thyroid , prader willi, metabolism, skeleton
yup, read the papers : overweight but not obese

so lets keep the money going to those who NEED it.

Yabu. Very fat people are unwell. Their health is in serious danger and they are unable to control their condition. I think they deserve sympathy, understanding and legal protection.

Well thanks for using me and my unable-to-work ilk as poster children for your reversion to the "deserving/undeserving" paradigm, Talkin.

But actually I agree completely with what Spork and others said above.

By setting up a Good Disabled / Bad Disabled narrative, you're creating a situation where we can all be designated Bad Disabled when convenient. So that ral's blind DH gets abuse yelled at him by strangers.

What's worse is that so much of it is couched in terms of "support". Posters can't quite help, when stating there should be psychological or other support available to help with obesity issues, adding the rider "and there must be no adaptations or it would facilitate the fatties."

Honestly? Someone with a major eating or other weight problem is going to change the habits of a lifetime because their workchair is uncomfortable?

Catty
so, should the employer or the health system bear that cost?

I don't know. A very overweight person is likely to have a mental health aspect related to their condition. Just like an anorexic. Both are killing themselves with food.

Addictions are not people's faults - including alcoholism, drugs and in many cases food/sugar. Clearly if your BMI is 40 you cannot do what someone who is 10 stone can do and that impedes you at work. Just as employers might provide help to an alcoholic worker rather than simply sacking them employers should help with obesity. They could start by ensuring no workplace in the land had sugar, chocolate, caffeine, diet drinks, colas, cakes, biscuits, fruit juice and loads of carbs in it.

I think it's so easy to say from your ivory castle.

Imagine dealing with I don't know - your last miscarriage. your parent dying of cancer over 18 months, their partner not being able to cope, your sibling being diagnosed with a terminal illness with two small dc, you having to move for work into a new area, you having health issues yourself.

How could all that happen to one person? It does every day.

It isn't about people sitting in their home saying do I choose the pizza or the salad.

But it has to come down to employers being free to be able to hire the people who will help them make profits and thus pay taxes to supply the benefits for the employees

clients I know

• blind member of staff - shit hot on the phone, wonderful skills
• MS member of staff, regularly off sick, but with a card index brain and clients love her
• MH/depression member of staff - role was changed to "hours per month" and it clicked

I (as an employer) cannot see how fitting around lard arse employees will be good for them or the business

Talkin I don't think many "lard arses" would want to for you tbh.

I have a progressive, genetic, neurological disability, dodder around with my stick, hold down a job, volunteer and raise four fantastic kids. I'm also pretty thin and work very hard to stay as healthy as possible. In short I'm the fucking poster girl for "nice, deserving, tragic" disabled people.

And I think it's an absolute disgrace all this deserving/undeserving nonsense. What is happening to society and people's sense of compassion? If people are disabled, then they are disabled.

Wow, lots of really wonderful comments from people who get it... while the people who don't get it are inclined to offensive comments. I could almost understand an argument about business needs if it didn't include phrases like 'lard arse'. Comments like that leave me with zero sympathy for businesses... and more determined to campaign for businesses to be forced to refrain from discriminating against overweight and obese people. Soon, Talkin, you will have little choice but to employ people bigger than you. Yippee!

Sorcha
The brutality is that this court ruling, until backtracked, will be as damaging for the employment rights of the overweight
as
the early cases about the pregnancy rights whacked the employment chances of young women

BUT
Women have no choice but to be young and fertile

99.9% of the obese would, with sole access to an appropriate diet, no longer be overweight within 2 years.

I used to take Epilim (Sodium Valporate) for epilepsy and I was hungry all the time... I confess I often ate the 'wrong things' when very hungry; ie lots of chocolate instead of lots of fruit 'n' veg, but that medication is well known for weight gain.
I used to actually get so hungry I would shake & start to feel faint. A sugary snack was the only thing that would stop me fainting.
Now I take Levetiracetam (Keppra) and the constant hunger has gone!

I mentioned Risperidone also because that's another medication I was put on for several months when I had Psychosis and I actually gained a stone in a month! I didn't even eat that much.
Now I take Aripiprazole & Venlafaxine instead and luckily it doesn't seem to cause weight gain so I lost that stone again quite quickly.

I was obese but now I've only got 2 stone to lose. My Psychiatrist says it will take me longer to lose it than it takes other people because of all the meds. So I accept that I will have to work hard at losing the weight.

But it just shows that obesity has many causes, not just overeating.