re: #291 FemNaziBitch

Ok, well that was just plain strange.

I’ve learned I have little control over my own weight. For some reason my body does what it wants.

When I am overweight, I can’t lose. When I am underweight, I can’t gain.

It seems to be some mixture of anxiety and hormones.

I quit trying to change things and I’m much happier as a result.

I know a family whose girls are athletic and have PERFECT bodies until they hit 25. Married with children or not, they all start gaining and gaining and gaining-. By the time they hit 40 they are the traditional Polish ‘sturdy” women archetype. Still active, eating perfectly wonderfully healthy diets, no alcohol.

(although I do think the empty calories in alcohol accompanied by the lethargy that seems to come from habitual drinking, accounts for a lot of obesity—it doesn’t account for most of it)

No good comes from applying moral standards to body weight.

I read through that page and what I found reminded me of many discussions with absolutists and zealots of every persuasion. It was clear to me that the individual had a personal experience that led to a personal weight loss and attempted to extrapolate based on that personal experience. For the writer, obesity was a choice. As it certainly is for many but is not for many others. The general principle of burning more calories than taking does in fact lead to weight loss. However, the efficiency by which a person burns calories differs greatly among people. Some, as was discussed, burn energy lying down while others would have to work out 3 hours a day to achieve the same metabolic rate.
There are many things contributing to the epidemic of obesity. Some of those things are poor choices. Changes in lifestyle. Changes in the production of food (genetically modified wheat and high fructose corn syrup as staples of the diet). Government farm subsidies which make processed fatty foods cheaper than fresh vegetables.
Urban planners than design lifestyle around cars rather than communities navigable by bike or foot. TV / offices / video games, school budgets for athletics slashed. There are plenty of explanations.

The odds are stacked against us. So thin people will be one of two categories. Either they are people with naturally high metabolic rates that are able to burn more energy than others with the same life choices, or those that work harder at burning energy or consuming fewer calories and less fat.

People on the whole should be guilted in to ceasing the poor lifestyle choices that can lead to obesity. I have no problem with that as it is necessary to counter all the messages and realities that are pushing in the opposite direction. But that does not mean that all obese people are weak willed and simply incapable of making the tough decisions. Such a conclusion reminds me of fundamentalists that seek to argue that one must accept Jesus for salvation and that it is the only way.

Absolutism is rarely effective as a debating skill.