Glorifying obsesity

[Poppybob]

I find it bizarre that media and social platforms are glorifying obesity. Am not talking about people putting pictures of themselves on social media and living their lives in general, and am NOT saying overweight/obese people should be hiding.... but actual social media stars who are promoting obesity and how good/gorgeous they are etc etc. It's unhealthy!!! Takes 10-20years off your life! The Co - morbidities from being dangerously overweight alone can shorten your life. It's on par with smoking it's so bad for your health. And I worry about my kids looking at this and thinking that it will be OK for them to be very overweight.

So people who are obese are told they should exercise more but God forbid they are shown exercising.

Im just mentioning the ads that came to the front of my mind reading the thread, no one is criticising anyone for exercising, what on earth are you on about

I think as others have said, people get very defensive and triggered whenever weight is mentioned, its why we really cant as a nation have a proper conversation about how to solve the issue.

It's not glorifying obesity it's just people existing.

I'm on the fence really. I'm overweight and desperately trying to lose it as it makes my health shit.

I do think it's a good thing though that teenagers who might be overweight feel able to wear the clothes they want to nowadays and don't worry if a bit of cellulite is on show. In the 90s they would have been picked on relentlessly.

Obesity is just as complex, we know it’s not calories in, calories out, that like addiction it has complex psychosocial and physical factors and even more difficult that once you are obese it is a difficult road out.

For most people, calories in calories out will work very well if they stick to it.

There are usually other factors to consider too, but we shouldn’t dismiss “calories in calories out” at all.

This argument is nonsense. If we wanted to put the least strain on the NHS we'd encourage everyone to take up smoking, drinking and overeating so they died early, as old people are the biggest users of healthcare by far. Being slim and healthy is good because it allows you to live an easier life with less pain, not because of its effects on institutions.

Agree absolutely

Smokers/drinkers/addicts/the obese dont just drop dead though, they present with numerous health issues while they're still alive, bad for them and bad for the NHS

You’re right it shouldn’t be glorified. I was 24 stones some years back it came with many health issues. I’m now 11 stones still battling with keeping in low. I’m continuously helping my children whom are struggling with their weight also. It not easy 😩

This argument is nonsense. If we wanted to put the least strain on the NHS we'd encourage everyone to take up smoking, drinking and overeating so they died early, as old people are the biggest users of healthcare by far. Being slim and healthy is good because it allows you to live an easier life with less pain, not because of its effects on institutions.

My mums an alcoholic. She has costed the state a lot of money. She was signed off work in her late 50s and never worked again. She has probably spent about 4 months of the last year as an inpatient in hospital and has carers come 4x a day (social services funded).

She's only 70 and it's 100% down to alcohol. She doesn't drink now (she's too cognitively impaired to buy it) and could live like this for many years.

I agree. Obesity is life limiting and why would anyone want that? I went to the GP recently and he told me to lose weight. I haven’t eaten bread, cakes or sweets since and the weight is coming off. I don’t want to be burden to the NHS and being a middle-aged woman makes you invisible enough without throwing fat into the mix.

Driving a car is more dangerous, how is it still glorified and why aren't people ashamed of owning one?

It’s not dismissing calories in calories out to acknowledge that for many obese people there are psychological factors which make calories in calories out inaccessible.

Unless you have a medical condition like diabetes you can’t have regular support via your gp, and you have to rely on the likes of slimming world or weight watchers, who glorify disordered eating, which long term is not going to be helpful.

It’s quite obvious to me that obesity is a symptom of modern life, high pressure, along with cheap crappy food designed to be addictive being highly available, and designed to meet a deep seated emotional urge. That’s very difficult to overcome.

I don't see anyone glamorising or glorifying obesity (but I guess our SM algorithms are all different).

I do see lots of people promoting the idea of being happy even if you are fat. Buying nice clothes, feeling and looking good, enjoying nice food. I don't see anything wrong with that! Representation isn't the same as glorification.

They serve a purpose and are pretty much essential in rural areas. What purpose does obesity serve?

Is it a Sunday without someone deliberately and willfully misunderstanding a thread about obesity, just to shut women's opinions down?

It's such a construct in denial. The fat activists don't need to be given a platform, they just create their own followings.

Quite a long list of fat activists with a social media presence have died. So much for health at any weight.

About 20 years ago I went on holiday to Florida. I was told that they were experiencing an obesity crisis. They weren't wrong. People so enormous they were riding round on mobility scooters. Some even had breathing tubes and oxygen tanks.
No surprises really when you see size of the food portions. We went to Macdonalds and ordered for 4 of us. The server said if I pay 2 dollars extra I could double the order. I was confused to why we would buy double the amount we required. We asked for large cokes. They were the size of buckets, with free refills.
We went to a diner for lunch. Lovely display of cheesecakes and gateaux. I asked for a slice. I was asked if I wanted the whole cake. It was the size of a dustbin lid!!
I was told that the US obesity crisis was making its way over to the UK and they weren't wrong!!

Lizzo is described in the media as being stunning.

Shes obese. That's a fact. That's not shaming her, that's just stating a fact.

She's not a role model.

She is promoting gluttony

How does she promote gluttony? By existing are you saying she shouldn't be a star because she is fat. Does she encourage people to eat their weights worth in food?
Lizzos message is clear regardless of how you look, you are worthy and deserving of love? Love yourself regardless of how you look? How can that be negative.
She is also a kick ass performer to be able to dance and sing and play the flute how she does during her show takes real real effort. If you follow here you will she exercises loads, she has to to be able to perform and also eats a healthy vegan diet.

And I echo pp. The media call her stunning so that people run to the comment section to say how fat she is.

This isn't that though (or wasn't up to your post, I haven't read further)

It's not something to aspire to, being overweight. I'm overweight and want to be thinner, and I would say the majority of the overweight would like to be. Otherwise why are there so many diet clubs and snake oils out there?

It is worrying that obese people are being feted, "oh but they are healthier than the sticks out there" newsflash some larger people are healthy, some thin people are healthy and some are not

@NeverDropYourMooncup I feel like you might not be aware of what's out there on the internet.

I am diabetic. I now see a nurse every three months for a check up and support.

NHS standard diet advice that she has to share involves more carbs than diabetics can cope with. Her real advice is that diabetes patients do better on a low carb diet, and very often can reverse their diabetes. She has to be careful though as many of the surgeries she works from won’t tolerate this kind of new fangled thinking.

When we are bombarded with adverts of fast addictive food, and the NHS won’t adopt a diet plan that can actually reverse the disease that’s costing so much to treat, it makes you realise that whilst obesity is, in many people’s opinions, ugly, disgusting, it’s still making an awful lot of money for someone.

I’d rather see crappy food adverts banned than fat people in adverts banned.

Virgie Tovar is not that big though, Tess Holliday and many others are three times Virgie's size. She's demented in this video. Not wanting to eat cake can ONLY be processed as fat phobia in her understanding. Madness. Health just doesn't feature in the motivations she can understand or ''allow''. Any attempt to be healthy is moralising. Sigh.

Agreed. Women come in all shapes and sizes, it was good to see the move away from size 0 but we seem to have gone to complete opposite direction.

I agree.