was everyone slim in the 1950s/60s

[ambereeree]

I've been watching old films and it seems that everyone was slim in the 50s and 40s. Even women with quite a few children. Is this reality or just in films?

They smoked instead of snacking.
A lot of food really was grim, too.

I remember there were overweight middle aged people in the 50s and 60s but younger people were mostly slim.

but if you look at films now, most of the women are skeletal. So I don't think films are a particularly accurate reflection of real life.

But rationing was still in place well into the 50s, yes, everyone smoked, and there was also a culture of women being expected to look after themselves to please their man.

No but people were a lot slimmer. A while ago a Mumsnetter linked a scary public information film from the 70s featuring a lot of children (whole school's worth).

While the main point was 'Why did anyone think this was appropriate to show the children?' I couldn't help be transfixed by how incredibly skinny every single child was in the film. I think there was one slightly tubby child and that was it. By today's standards they looked emaciated.

Even in the seventies if you were out and about there was just less food in offer. Portions were much smaller too. A piece of cake in a cafe was delicate not vast.

And people walked more and didn’t have warm houses so burnt off calories.

I don’t think they looked skeletal at all - they looked GOOD! They weren’t eating muffins and pumpkin lattes every day as a ‘snack’ worth about 800 calories! I often think this when I see old TOTP episodes too - women in the 70s were really thin (look at ABBA - they were both very slim compared to women today) - but they looked great. Far better than the bunch of fatties we are as a nation nowadays.

People were bloody tiny as well, actually through poor nourishment. Smaller build and smaller height.

Shab I meant in contemporary films women look skeletal. Jessica Chastain is a good example, I actually think she looks like a POW or something, she is so gaunt.

@AnnaMagnani Was that 'The Finishing Line' by any chance?

No, not everyone

I remember as a kid in the 70s some very plump ladies . Cuddly soft ladies I recall them as but certainly not everyone was slim . Not at all

Food rationing ended I believe in 1952 in UK. You can look up how much food each person was allocated. Some people grew their own vegetable and kept chickens for eggs. People caught and ate rabbits.

I think people who are slim now though tend to look fitter and healthier than people who were slim then. I'm glad it's acceptable for women to be muscular now. In the 60s and 70s the ideal look was skinny and petite for women, with gazelle legs, would have been completely impossible for me. Though I can be tall, muscular and fit.

Probably - when I was at school in the 80's as a teen out of a year of 100 only one girl was overweight

People were generally slimmer, yes, due to the war probably, we certainly didn't have a lot of rubbish to eat, veg was home grown, meat on Sunday which was cold with bubble & squeak on Monday, and possibly with chips on Tuesday, made into soup on Wednesday.... no burgers or takeaways, cakes were home made mostly. Ready meals didn't really exist.

I noticed it once the 80's began, junk food/burgers/takeaways, pizzas, but even then not obesity like there is now.

We walked or cycled, walked to school, work or the bus stop, didn't sit around with screens or TV all the time.

People were smaller and generations have become bigger over the years, not just slimmer but shorter too.

People stopping smoking has a hell of a lot to do with the increase in obesity. Talk about unintended consequences.

Were you at my school and was that me? I was never a skinny teen like my ds is now. That said, there were a couple of truly fat girls in my year, I just wasn't skinny.

Daily life involved much more manual
labour and there were fewer cars so people walked more so many more calories were used.
Also, food wasn't as easily come by. My only involvement in the food we eat each week is clicking on a computer and then putting it in the cupboards. I am not walking to the stops, queuing, carrying heavy bags home, kneading bread, scrubbing vegetables... and actually, that's only if I'd bought the vegetables. Many would have had to dig the ground, plant the veg, weed them, water them, pick them.
Having said that, I was born in the 70s and remember some very fat older women but you knew they were strong too and would think nothing of striding across the fields or doing heavy work.

I don't think comparing actresses and singers is useful - I actually think stars nowadays are thinner than ever! Someone mentioned ABBA - they were tiny and yet look practically hefty compared to say, Ariana Grande.

There were fewer overweight children and young people in the 70s but plenty of overweight people over 25. I remember being amazed at all the obese people when I went to the States but we are probably similar now. I think that there is more of a spread in weight now though - there are more overweight but equally there are more with a low weight.

Many women were underfed, and smoked to reduce their appetite.

Yes pretty much everyone was slim. We had one plump girl in my primary school in the seventies. Occasionally middle aged people let themselves go a bit but not to the extent they do now.

And I don't think food was horrible, just different. Simpler, plainer meat and veg. The meat and veg was better quality and had more flavour than it does now though. Roast chicken when I was a kid was absolutely amazing.

I am 50 and remember people being a lot slimmer. I remember growing up in the 70s and it was a normal household, we did not have to disposable income like now but we weren't short of anything - but snacks were considered a luxury, mum made a cake every Sunday and we crisps and fizzy drinks only at birthdays and Christmas. No take aways in our house. I tbink a crappy vesta curry was rhe only ready meal back then. People did move around a lot more. Less cars, awful bus service. Less TV and no computers tablets. Kids played out more.

I know this sounds bad but there was a pressure to be slimmer. I remember, my cousin being a size 12 (no vanity sizing either so a lot slimmer than today's size 12) and my Aunt discussing what to do about her DD's weight problem - she was 13. Another elderly relative would call her fatty bom bom. I was about eight and I remember cringing. People commented and teased people about weight in a way that would be completely unacceptable these days.

ScreamingValenti Yes that was it!

Abra1de you are quite right. You had a small piece of cake, it was a Victoria sandwich and the filling was jam only, never buttercream as well. As a child, if I was hungry, well that was it as there wasn't any more food - no snacks. A treat was 10p of penny sweets when we went to the Post Office once a week to get the Child Benefit. And we walked the up a giant hill I'd never consider walking up now as an adult.

We walked bloody everywhere. And I was the fat child at school!

I mean, is it really news to anyone that we are loads fatter now than in the past? It’s all over the news every other day it seems!

I think yanbu. I wasn’t around then, but I don’t need to have been to know that your average bear was a lot slimmer. Some in a good way, some not so good I imagine. My gran always boasts about how light she was when she was pregnant with my auntie for example, but she smoked like a chimney and didn’t eat much, avoided fruit like the plague etc. Liked lard and white starch. My auntie was very, very tiny as a baby and is still very tiny height-wise.

Also, my dad was one of the emaciated children you’d see pictures of in the fifties and sixties and think “wow they look skinny”. He’s been obese or very overweight for the entirety of his adulthood over the age of about 35.

I was a chubby kid but have almost always been a normal weight as an adult, (except just after pregnancies).

So it isn’t inevitable that people have to be fatter these days.

The problem is we all consume too much. There are bigger issues for lots of people - I get that. But generally, we consume too much and it’s fucking our health and the planet.

My grandmother (born 1901) and aunt (born 1930) weren't slim. My mother was, and there was only one girl at my school who was on the large side. My aunt would only have been around a size 16 by today's standards, but her weight was seen almost as a family tragedy, and was much commented on after family gatherings (never to her face).