To think 'celebrating your curves' is becoming a worrying trend?

[Freesunglasses]

So many of my overweight 'friends' on facebook are joining in the whole "I'm embracing my curves and loving this body, every inch"
The thing is they are Obese, not use a little overyweight but really fat. The more people see and read things like this the more it will become normalised.

Worrying times ahead I think. We're going to be a very fat country in the not too distant future.
I know it's hard to lose weight. I know lockdown has made lots put weight, I'm a little overweight myself but I will never say I'm happy with it because I'm not! I like being thin, I want to be thin.

For the love of God stop normalising and celebrating obesity.

@JaniieJones Not sure why you're incapable of posting anything that isn't nasty.

@Quincie I was told that statistic by Bowel Cancer UK some years ago and it appears it has improved slightly since then. Bowel Cancer UK's recent survey said 40% of people had to go their GP 3 or more times (but that's much higher in young people because GPs are regularly and incorrectly told that young people do not get bowel cancer, they're also told women very rarely get bowel cancer when actually 44% are women). Even after I was diagnosed, a GP I saw (not my usual GP) clearly hadn't read my notes and told me that people my age don't get bowel cancer.
www.bowelcanceruk.org.uk/campaigning/never-too-young/
However, it's still very common for people (especially women) to be sent away with symptoms of bowel cancer.
www.nationalworld.com/news/people/mum-of-three-with-inoperable-bowel-cancer-slams-doctors-who-misdiagnosed-it-for-three-years-as-the-menopause-3222766
www.neessexccg.nhs.uk/clinicians-warn-not-to-ignore-symptoms-of-bowel-cancer
inews.co.uk/news/health/bowel-cancer-referrals-gps-younger-people-symptoms-awareness-576161
www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-37493706

Here is why equating a person's worth with thinness is so dangerous & damaging:

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2021/may/05/tess-holliday-recovering-from-anorexia

I don’t think anyone is saying people’s worth as a person depends on their weight @SmiledWithTheRisingSun

Well, of course nobody is going to use the words "fat people have less worth", or believe that they think in those terms. But if you've got an issue with fat people doing things that seem positive when a thin person does them, that is pretty much what it amounts to.

Exactly.

@DrSbaitso

Well, of course nobody is going to use the words "fat people have less worth", or believe that they think in those terms. But if you've got an issue with fat people doing things that seem positive when a thin person does them, that is pretty much what it amounts to.

Spot on. OP saying that when she sees overweight people meeting up as friends it looks like a weightwatchers meeting is essentially saying "fat people are ONLY fat and have no other qualities". Like, being overweight is the entirety of who you are and, because being overweight is bad, you're entirely worthless. If you see an obese person and see "obese" before you see "person" then that's dangerous behaviour that you need to address - and clearly OP does.

If you see an obese person and see "obese" before you see "person" then that's dangerous behaviour that you need to address - and clearly OP does.

But how can you not notice that somebody is massive? To see the person underneath you usually need to get to know them, which you can't do just by looking at them. If you just mean recognising them as a human being then surely that's also pretty innate as you're not going to mistake them for a dog.

It's a futile quest IMO to try and make people stop seeing things that are undesirable, even if it would be nice. If a bloke is extremely short then you'll notice it immediately, even if you later don't care because he makes up for it in spades elsewhere. Same with fat porpoise.

People not porpoise, FFS.

It's not necessarily a case of seeing either "obese" or "person". You could see an "obese person".

I think for many celebrating the curves is an excuse not to do anything.

What is worrying is that the age gets lower and lower. Recently there was a discussion about teen's body image and embracing your body in the "parenting" section, and funnily enough it just happened that the thread was straight after another called "what does your 4 years old eat" and the amount of crap, specifically crisps every single day, in every single post was for me shocking, because if you start from infancy to give junk food, then a child will grow to have body issues in her teens to later get even worse and join the embrace curves as an adult.

I think suggesting teens be pulled up on their curves is a very dangerous thing. Anorexia and EDs have increased hugely, they are dangerous and very hard to get rid of. Teens aren’t known for their self confidence or rational thinking. It can be a very tricky time and they are bombarded with damaging airbrushed body images and diet/ fitness apps and products on SM.

It's indeed a tough one! We don't want to sow the seeds of eating disorders etc, but I think that losing weight gets harder with age once you're sat in a sedentary office job all day surrounded by snacks.

It somewhat infuriates me when overweight parents bestow their problems on their children, even if it may be caused by poor food knowledge etc. I was walking behind a fat family yesterday and both chubby sons were choffing back crisps. Even the bloody dog was fat!

Refraining from 'celebrating' isn't anywhere near teens (or anyone else) 'being pulled up on' being overweight

But depressed teens bombarded by unhealthy skinny body images and false SM do need to look positively at themselves and their bodies.

@Scr1bblyGum

But depressed teens bombarded by unhealthy skinny body images and false SM do need to look positively at themselves and their bodies.

I'm not disagreeing, but the fact remains that over 70% of the UK population is either overweight or obese.

No amount of feeing positive about being fat will protect you from heart disease and certain fat related cancers. More women die of heart disease than breast cancer. The idea that it is only older men who have heart attacks is one of the reasons women get less aggressive life saving treatment.

Nor will positive thinking protect your joints when they are deteriorating under the strain. The only health positive that I can think of is that fat people do have greater bone density than thin people because they stress their bones more. I see people so fat that they waddle and I can't quite understand how a human body has been distorted to such an extent. I just think they must be so uncomfortable and tired.

I suspect the obesity problem has something to do with having to have two incomes to survive as a family. That means people are more tired and less likely to exercise and cook from scratch. Parents are rushing from afterschool care to home in time to try to get dinner, homework and bath time done before bedtime. It is even harder for people who are single parents. Some people haven't learnt to cook while most females of my generation (and some boys) did have school cookery classes so we had some basic idea of cooking something even if it there was a bit of overemphasis on boiling. Then there is much more advertising of snack food as well. People of the 1960s were not a very genetically different population but obesity was rare - there was one overweight girl in my school of about 800 pupils. We weren't special - it was just that we had fewer cars and less busy roads so we biked more and walked more. The school run wasn't a thing. If we were little our mothers walked us and then we walked on our own or with the neighbours' kids. We sat down at a dining room table to dinners cooked by our largely stay at home mothers which probably involved some overcooked meat, vegetables and potatoes. We didn't eat dinner in front of the television which was black and white with one channel and, in our country, many episodes of Country Calendar getting into the nitty gritty of cattle and other livestock. Our fathers often grew the vegetables (though my mother was a trailblazer as a gardener coming from a more rural background than my father). Huge bottles of cheap soft drink weren't a thing. Shopping was done every fortnight apart from milk and bread and the concept of the back week when all the good stuff had been eaten was a thing for many families. Cask wine wasn't invented and wine was generally a special occasion thing. It wasn't that we were undernourished but we were thinner. I am not saying though that the 1960-1970s were some golden age because some of those mothers were pretty frustrated about being housewives and they had far fewer career opportunities. We also hadn't discovered garlic and ginger.

I think the idea that most mums were STHM in th 70s is a tad middle class

As first food, when babies can't even walk, they are given melty puffs (same ingredients as Doritos, corn flour and oil), then baby crisps, and we all know the crips are not only obesogenic but addictive as well, and later parents will happily give breakfast cereals, cereal bars and "treats", and a lot of fried food. Then later parents are desperate because their kids are fussy. They made them fussy, and developed their taste for industrial food.

There is a way of saying, no, I am not buying this food because it is not good for you, you don't need to say it makes you fat. If as a family you ban ultra-processed food for everyone and as a family embrace whole and fresh food, there is a healthy argument to be discussed.

Spot on. OP saying that when she sees overweight people meeting up as friends it looks like a weightwatchers meeting is essentially saying "fat people are ONLY fat and have no other qualities". Like, being overweight is the entirety of who you are and, because being overweight is bad, you're entirely worthless.
If you see an obese person and see "obese" before you see "person" then that's dangerous behaviour that you need to address - and clearly OP does.

I was talking about a friend on facebook when she gets together with her friends. They are all overweight, my point being that it has become the norm to be fat. Especially if the majority of your friends are.

@GordonPym

I think for many celebrating the curves is an excuse not to do anything.

What is worrying is that the age gets lower and lower. Recently there was a discussion about teen's body image and embracing your body in the "parenting" section, and funnily enough it just happened that the thread was straight after another called "what does your 4 years old eat" and the amount of crap, specifically crisps every single day, in every single post was for me shocking, because if you start from infancy to give junk food, then a child will grow to have body issues in her teens to later get even worse and join the embrace curves as an adult.

Yes it is basically saying I'm fat and can't be arsed to diet. Now dieting is hard so I'm not calling them for that at all. But let's not 'celebrate' the curves and rolls of fat.

By all means accept and love yourself but let's not start celebrating or everyone will be at it. And why would you celebrate anyway?

I'm fat. Always have been. It's a mental health issue, being fat. It's not stupidity or laziness. I constantly strive to be healthier. And in the meantime I love my flawed, beautiful, popular and talented self. I have very little respect for anyone who dehumanises people on the basis of their size. I also feel people (like you OP) who do this have less intelligence and humanity than me, so I really do pity you. Maybe you should focus less on the size of other people's arses and more on trying to be a better, kinder, more emotionally intelligent human.

If as a family you ban ultra-processed food for everyone and as a family embrace whole and fresh food, there is a healthy argument to be discussed.

Fair enough if that's what you want to do, but for me it's a tad extreme and unnecessary to boot. I think once you start banning foods you give them a higher profile than they deserve and risk causing problems down the line. Everything in moderation is a much better approach, to my mind.

@SkyDragon interestingly it seems that the connection between food and mental health is actually inverted. Many studies on the brain-gut axis have shown that it is the bacteria that thrives on junk in your gut that cause depression, so fixing the food might fix your species and help with mental health

@Puntastic In France, that's how they eat. Party food such as crisps are eaten at parties, there might be biscuit sin the house but you have two on a plate after school and nobody has all those wrapped food-like items in a lunchbox, or snacks in handbags, cars, snacks while walking, ...

UK has a very high processed food consumption. Of course everyone can do as they like, but on the long run, if a family builds the habit of real food and not something under plastic, your children will be healthier.
"Half of all the food bought by families in the UK is now “ultra-processed”, made in a factory with industrial ingredients and additives invented by food technologists and bearing little resemblance to the fruit, vegetables, meat or fish used to cook a fresh meal at home" www.theguardian.com/science/2018/feb/02/ultra-processed-products-now-half-of-all-uk-family-food-purchases

I don't think moderation applies to ultra-processed food. It is like smoking in moderation. And definitely shouldn't be offered to 6 months baby or daily in a lunch box. These highly engineered products have been manufactured to inhibit moderation. You can't just take 1 crips.

All this BS about the French paradox, French women eat cheese and don't get fat. They also don't eat processed food on a daily basis, and the cheese they eat is not an industrial square but real cheese.

Food choices have been manipulated and the children and adults pay the price, and instead of facing the origin of the problem , will dismiss the problem with "embrace your curves" at any age.

[quote GordonPym]@SkyDragon interestingly it seems that the connection between food and mental health is actually inverted. Many studies on the brain-gut axis have shown that it is the bacteria that thrives on junk in your gut that cause depression, so fixing the food might fix your species and help with mental health

@Puntastic In France, that's how they eat. Party food such as crisps are eaten at parties, there might be biscuit sin the house but you have two on a plate after school and nobody has all those wrapped food-like items in a lunchbox, or snacks in handbags, cars, snacks while walking, ...

UK has a very high processed food consumption. Of course everyone can do as they like, but on the long run, if a family builds the habit of real food and not something under plastic, your children will be healthier.
"Half of all the food bought by families in the UK is now “ultra-processed”, made in a factory with industrial ingredients and additives invented by food technologists and bearing little resemblance to the fruit, vegetables, meat or fish used to cook a fresh meal at home" www.theguardian.com/science/2018/feb/02/ultra-processed-products-now-half-of-all-uk-family-food-purchases

I don't think moderation applies to ultra-processed food. It is like smoking in moderation. And definitely shouldn't be offered to 6 months baby or daily in a lunch box. These highly engineered products have been manufactured to inhibit moderation. You can't just take 1 crips.

All this BS about the French paradox, French women eat cheese and don't get fat. They also don't eat processed food on a daily basis, and the cheese they eat is not an industrial square but real cheese.

Food choices have been manipulated and the children and adults pay the price, and instead of facing the origin of the problem , will dismiss the problem with "embrace your curves" at any age.[/quote]
Tbf, there is processed food in French supermarkets, but nowhere near the same proliferation. And less snacking. I honestly feel like snacking screws up the metabolism. I get that you might need an apple or a couple of crackers or even a bit of cake or chocolate, but some snacks are like whole meals!

Of course there is processed food in supermarkets but nobody eats crisps on a daily basis or would give melty puffs many crips as first foods to babies.