why society looks down upon obese people ?

I'm not feeding thegerg ( Last time i got a splitting headache), NOPE . NEVER . NEVER EVER . LOL =P

Given the opportunity when a perceived and exploitable weakness exists that can potentially make someone feel "better" in any manner possible, like a dog chasing a rabbit it's a compulsive reaction. And actually in reality, that is a sign of weakness.

Even in this this thread, half the replies are objective or understanding, it's just bad attempts to appear "anti" to seem edgy. Predictable as ****.

Because for 95% of obese people, being overweight was their choice. No one is born fat. They choose to eat the unhealthy foods, to not exercise, and to generally live an unhealthy life style. If we can't judge people for their life choices, then what can we judge them for?

I was diagnosed with this. In theory, I should have every right to tell people I'm fat "because..." And I am fat, and I know it's because of that, but there's being fat and then there's just letting yourself go. Living the exact same life as a slim person would give me nothing but a triple chin, a buttload of cholesterol, and chances of being dead before entering my 60s, and I sure as hell wasn't going to let that happen.

Nowadays, I'm fat, sure, but I've effectively scared away that "double-chin/hasn't seen his own penis in years" fat and I actually feel withdrawal syndrome if I don't do 45 minutes of hard cardio every other day. And, more than that, stuff like fried food and pop soda actually grosses me out.

Not everyone has to be slim and some people simply can't be slim. Sure, put 100 people on the exact same "normal" diet and 15 will be on the chubby side. Understanding that is very important. However, if you've reached that triple-chin/can't walk 15 minutes without choking limit, then it's not an issue of aesthetics, but a real health problem, and it's your responsibility to do something about it.

Should they be made fun of? No. Should we encourage obesity? **** no.

Obese people are a drain on our healthcare. Unhealthy life styles shouldn't be encouraged. I'm all for charging obese people higher insurance rates the same as smokers. Obese people just overtook smokers the other day as being a bigger drain on health insurance, this isn't something that should be glossed over.

Because they're fat

When I go to Wal-Mart and I see an obese person driving around a motorized shopping cart with six 2-liter bottles of Coca-Cola, two 5-gallon buckets of chocolate ice cream, three bags of chips and three jars of queso dip, its not hard to discern what their problem is.

There are a good amount of people out their that have physiological problems but they don't make up the majority of obese people.

Don't tell me you have a thyroid problem while your sitting in line at McDonald's and ordering two big-mac meals.

@plageus900 said:

When I go to Wal-Mart and I see an obese person driving around a motorized shopping cart with six 2-liter bottles of Coca-Cola, two 5-gallon buckets of chocolate ice cream, three bags of chips and three jars of queso dip, its not hard to discern what their problem is.

There are a good amount of people out their that have physiological problems but they don't make up the majority of obese people.

Don't tell me you have a thyroid problem while your sitting in line at McDonald's and ordering two big-mac meals.

I'm pretty sure that thin people also drink Coca-Cola, and eat ice cream and Big Macs.

Because humans are the real monsters.

@MrGeezer:

Are you really going to make me spell it out?

What were you trying to avoid spelling out? The fact that nearly EVERYONE is biologically programmed to crave fattening foods, regardless of whether or not they are thin or fat? Yes, if thin people like ice cream and cheeseburgers, then chances are that fat people will usually also like ice cream and cheeseburgers.

You're missing the point completely.

Everything in moderation. If you eat some ice cream, have a McDonalds burger, or drink a Coke every once in a while, there's nothing wrong with that. If that's all your diet is made up of, then you're going to end up obese.

It's not rocket science. If your a fat pig and all you eat is shitty food and you don't exercise, that's where your problem is.

@MrGeezer said:

@plageus900 said:

When I go to Wal-Mart and I see an obese person driving around a motorized shopping cart with six 2-liter bottles of Coca-Cola, two 5-gallon buckets of chocolate ice cream, three bags of chips and three jars of queso dip, its not hard to discern what their problem is.

There are a good amount of people out their that have physiological problems but they don't make up the majority of obese people.

Don't tell me you have a thyroid problem while your sitting in line at McDonald's and ordering two big-mac meals.

I'm pretty sure that thin people also drink Coca-Cola, and eat ice cream and Big Macs.

Dude, NO. Even if you have the metabolism to eat like that and not gain weight, which some people do, putting your body through that kind of torture WILL have consequences.

I knew a girl who only ate junk food and drank coca cola. I mean ONLY, as in, EXCLUSIVELY, thinking it was ok because all the weight went to "the right places" (and, mind you, it did: she didn't look fat, but she had an impressive set of gazoongas and a nice ass) but what happened to her after years of putting her body through that wasn't pretty. I can't remember what it was exactly (some kind of digestive stroke or something) but she couldn't even leave her room for three months.

Again, forget aesthetics. Some people will be fat because of a bad diet, lack of exercise, genetics or glandular issues. Fine. But there's being fat and then there's needing one of those motorized shopping carts. Once you reach that point, you should be held responsible for your actions, and people around you SHOULD show some concern for your health. Watching a person eating (or drinking or snorting...) him/herself to an early grave and not saying anything is not love. If anything, it's the opposite.

:|

@LordQuorthon: There is a disgusting amount of apathy in the general population with regards to healthy eating habits and overall health. People like to write off their 'uncontrollable' urges to eat horrible food or claim its somehow not their fault.

one of my cousin morbidly obese .... and selfish .... sex maniac...narsasistic and always post about her selfies, food porn and daily activities on facebook

@plageus900: It's their fault, but not entirely. If you raise a kid on candy, coca cola and doritos, fruits and vegetables will taste bland to him/her. Kind of like how alcoholics gradually require more and more alcohol to get the buzz they are looking for.

Now, refusing to at least acknowledge this and being in denial all the time is their fault. Same thing happens with smokers, alcoholilcs and junkies. In that sense, you are absolutely right.

Then again, there's a difference between "lol, fatso" and "Let's admit you have a problem and do something about it."

Oh, and yes, this whole Instagram/food porn culture is not helping either.

Because they are physically inferior, which is a lot easier to judge than getting to know them.

because being fat is no longer a sign of wealth and power and social and economic affluence, now poor people can obtain morbid obesity through the Jack's value menu

Excuse me, but do you actually KNOW most of the lardasses in McDonalds who are riding around in motorized carts? No? Then how the hell are you in any position to state that they only eat shitty food and they don't exercise? You don't know, you're just making assumptions. And when even slim people give into their urges to eat junk food, how the hell do you expect obese people to avoid giving into their urges when their cravings are often MANY times more intense?

That's sort of my point. Thin people eat shit too but that's somehow considered a case of "well it's okay for me because I'm not fat". The reality is that that's how you develop habits and cravings that lead to being fat. Once you've become obese you've changed how your body works and there's usually no going back, so it's counterproductive to focus on appearance (being fat) than on the habits that lead to being fat. Realistically, once you get to that point it's too late. Aside from statistical anomalies, once you become that fat you're going to be obese your entire life and nothing short of surgery is gonna fix it.

But what the hell do you mean "they should be held responsible for their actions"? That's vague as hell, are you suggesting that they shouldn't be able to use motorized carts? Those carts are there for disabled people, and they ARE disabled.

Anyway, no one said that people shouldn't show concern for fat people's health, but fat shaming is NOT showing concern for fat peoples' health. Fat shaming is self-serving abuse designed to make the speaker feel better about not being fat.

I like laughing at fat people behind their backs because they cant turn around quick enough to catch me.

Honestly I don't care about obese people in less they show extreme behavior of laziness or gluttony.... Those being having your fat ass on a scooter in a grocery store because your too lazy to walk or your body simply can't take the weight any longer yet you don't want to do anything about it.. It's these extreme cases that really only bother me..

It makes me wonder...

What did obese do before motor scooters? Did they actually have to walk and shop or just choose to not do it at all?

Some people would just be forced to walk around and risk further damage to their bodies (again, many obese people are DISABLED, and normal activity is actually dangerous to them). Others just get someone else to do the chores for them.

Losing weight after you've become obese isn't easy. Changing your entire lifestyle is extremely difficult. Some people can't exercise because being obese has given them asthma, bad knees, etc etc. Not only that but trying to lose weight is a long term goal that takes dedication. People with demanding and/or frustrating jobs can't always just give up the things that comfort them and keep them from breaking down. Good for you that you aren't obese, but not everyone has a good metabolism or enjoy wasting time and money at a gym. Seriously, go run around the park.

@MrGeezer: When I was doing martial arts I'd have to eat a ton to keep my weight from dropping too much; when I stopped martial arts I didn't adjust my eating and so I spent over 10 years with 40 kg's over my "normal weight". I used every excuse you've mentioned in this thread and even came up with a few more...at a point I decided to use the time to get fit instead of making excuses and hating myself in the process.

Lost 10kg's the first month just by stopping eating like a slob. Lost the other 30kg's in 4 months just by adding sparse low-intensity exercise (sometimes just a 30 minute walk) 2 or 3 times a week. It's been over 5 years and the weight is still stable; sometimes I have a crazy busy week and I stuff my face with burgers and pizzas and gain a kg or 2, the next week I make sure I eat healthy and crank up on the exercise and lose it. I have a friend who lost 70kg's (70 f'ing kilos!) 20 years ago and he's still at his target weight. In fact, the only people I know who I saw lose a lot of weight and have not managed to stay at their target weight were people who said "screw this" and went back to eating enough for a small family, which is entirely their fault.

Do I have cravings? yeah, sometimes...Was it easier to be fat and just eat all day? Definitely. But I don't want to go back so I won't.

Yeah, some people have medical conditions, some people just don't mind being obese, I even met a few who profess being proud of it (whether it's true or not is not my problem) but for the sake of people working hard to lose weight stop with those comments that make it sound like losing weight is like battling cancer...

Umm...obese people go to the gym, too. Just sayin...

The fact of the matter is you don't need to waste time and money at a gym to avoid those massive levels of obesity.. Nor do you need a good metabolism.. We aren't talking about people who are considered overweight, we are talking about morbidly obese people..

http://weightology.net/weightologyweekly/?page_id=95

The kinds of numbers you're citing are incredibly rare. Fewer than 5% of people manage to maintain a 20% weight loss for even one year. The numbers are much better when we're talking about a loss of 10% or less, but look at how that works out: if you weigh 250 pounds, then losing 10% of your weight means a loss of 25 pounds. Even if you manage to keep that weight off, you're still 225 pounds which means you're still fat.

This is exactly what I was saying before. A realistic goal is more along the lines of losing 10% of your body weight and keeping it off. That is not going from fat to thin, that's going from fat to slightly-less-fat. Pull out as many personal anecdotes as you like, but they're either statistical anomalies or bullshit. Even a weight loss of 20% (while keeping it off for at least one year) is by far the exception. And this becomes incredibly rare once we start talking about HUGE losses (such as a 300 pound person losing 120 pounds and keeping it off). You're throwing around rare isolated cases in order to make conclusions about overall trends, but the cases that you're bringing up are the very rare exceptions.

@MrGeezer: Well, I'm not a US citizen, so that might be why most people I know lose the weight and don't regain it. Even if the numbers you refer to would have an equivalent in Europe (it's possible), I'm talking about my personal experience and what me and my friends accomplished, and that's worth more to me than statistics. I've seen them work hard, I've seen them achieving their goals and I've seen them sticking to it so regardless of what the statistics say I don't think saying "it's ok to be fat, losing weight is really hard, look at the statistics..." benefits anyone (not saying that's your stance in the subject, but that is how your posts are coming across)

@TC. because society can't look around them.

da-dum-tiss

it's pretty simple math/science

in order to maintain a certain weight, you have to intake a certain amount of food without burning it off.

in order to lose weight, you have to take in less and burn off more.

So barring rare medical issues, fat people are fat because they eat too much and don't exercise enough.

"how the hell do you expect obese people to avoid giving into their urges when their cravings are often MANY times more intense?" Who's the one making assumptions now? How exactly do you know that obese people have more intense cravings?

You're just making excuses for them, the fact is that they're too weak-willed to resist stuffing their faces and are either too lazy to exercise or they eat too much to be able to burn it all off.

Well good for you, I'm serious. If you managed to achieve that kind of long-term weight loss, then I'm happy for you. But those kinds of results are far from typical.

No one's saying that it's "okay" to be obese. But let's not ignore the facts. While different studies come up with slightly different numbers, virtually all of them reach essentially the same conclusion. Weight loss can be achieved and maintained, but the vast majority of successful cases involve relatively minor losses of like, less than 20%. Drastic weight loss, (like, 30% or up) almost always results in the person gaining it back (or becoming even fatter then they were before losing the weight). That doesn't mean that people shouldn't try to lose weight, it means that they should go into it with realistic expectations. And it doesn't do them a bit of good when people walk up to them telling them how easy it is to go back to being thin. In nearly all cases, they're not ever going to be thin again for any length of time. Their bodies have already been fucked up, and in nearly case their bodies are going to remain fucked up to some degree. We should be encouraging them for maintaining a realistic weight loss rather than ridiculing them for not maintaining the kinds of drastic weight loss that only happens in very rare cases. Holding them up to such a ridiculously high standard only discourages them when they do make reasonable progress. If someone has successfully lost 15% of their body weight, the last thing they need is people making them feel like failures for not having lost 40% of their weight.

Unless you know the person, you have no goddamn idea how much they eat or exercise. That 250 pound fatass in McDonalds might have lost 70 pounds in the last year. For all you know he might constantly exercise his ass off and practice extreme diligence in his diet, and he doesn't need some self-rightous stranger walking up to him and making assumptions about him. If you get to go have a hamburger, then you have no business criticizing him for shit when you don't know the first damn thing about him. Now, if you want to ridicule your friends and family, fine. At least you actually know them. But the stranger in McDonalds? You don't know him, you don't know how much weight he's lost or gained, you don't know the contents of his refrigerator, how often he eats, or how often he exercises.

And BTW, I know that obese people often have more intense cravings because it's a scientifically verified fact. Look it up.

@MrGeezer: I agree that we should encourage people to lose weight and make them feel like they've accomplished something whether they've lost 2 kg's or 20. But if my kid came to me and said "I want to be a professional football player" I wouldn't tell him "Well, go ahead, but only 5% of kids who play football ever get to be professionals". Instead I would encourage him/her to do their best regardless of results; I don't think it's a matter of realistic expectations, it's about not giving up on getting better, which I think it's why the percentage for people who can maintain their weight loss is so low.

I have a friend (in the US, not sure if it's related) who worked her ass off to lose an amazing amount of weight, no-carbs diets, 3 or 4 hours a day in the gym, all sorts of different stuff and she made it! What did she do when she got to her target weight? Since she was all slim and fit she decided she could eat junk food twice a day and started hauling shopping carts full of candy and chocolate every time she went shopping. In about 3 months she had regained half of the weight she had lost, so I told her "get back on track, you don't need to go back to no-carbs, exercising like a maniac...find a healthy middle you're comfortable with and stop the decline before you gain everything back, you're still halfway there". She just replied "**** it, I'll never stay thin..." and now she's heavier than she was before the diet. Now tell me there's anybody to blame but her. If she managed to go 11 months (I think) without eating bread, rice, pasta, potatoes, sauces of any kind, etc how can she not say "Now that I'm at my target weight I can eat what I want, in the smaller quantities I'm used to and have fun with food again", why did she have to go straight to "now I can have fast food every meal"?

She had a lot more going for her than me; I hate salads, I could never go on a no-carbs diet, and I'd shudder to think about trying...she could and she did! She had the advantage...why purposefully throw it all away the minute she finally manages to look the way she wanted?

I can't exercise because I suffer from something called exercise intolerance (google it up).

Every time I do strenuous physical exercise I start to feel nauseated and then I get the urge to vomit.

Exercise intolerance is usually a symptom of heart disease and sometimes can even point to heart failure.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_intolerance

@pariah3: That sucks. People in your situation will have to work extra hard on their eating habits.

I personally WOULD tell my kid that only 5% of athletes ever become professionals. Not for the purpose of discouraging him from trying, but for the purpose of letting him know just how hard he's gonna have to work his ass off if that's really what he wants to do. The ones who make it in a competitive field like that are the ones who don't half ass it. And if they've even got a chance of making it, then they need to know how much the odds are stacked against them so that they DON'T half-ass it.

With respect to losing weight and keeping it off, the hard part is the changes that one has to keep up for the rest of their lives. Regardless of how easy that was for you, those changes tend to come incredibly hard for most people and they need to know the ways that the odds are stacked against them if they're gonna have a chance of making it.

@MrGeezer: Who said anything about it being easy? I'd stay awake at night craving bad food, I was hungry all the time, my stomach made embarrassing noises non stop, I was always in a shitty mood because all I wanted to do was eat...easy has nothing to do with it, working on losing weight is something you either do or you don't.

After all these years it's still not easy; every time I pass by a fast food place I want to go in and order half the stuff they have...the key is indulging yourself sometimes and then making up for it. My disappointment is how people go from eating like there's no tomorrow to eating like they need to make that can of beans last for a year, to after losing all the weight they go back to eat an entire restaurant's worth...if they managed to go without for so long all the more rewarding it would be to have even a little, why go fully back to the habits that got them into the bad situation to begin with?

Like I said, it still sucks for me, and if I had been confronted with the odds when I was struggling, chances are it would have been enough for me to say "yeah, like I'd be part of those 5%...it's hopeless" and quit. Since I didn't think of the probabilities I actually became one of those 5%, because I was working with my own success and failures, not with the failures of everyone else.

Guess we all work differently =)

And to add to this conversation, a lot of obese people don't do enough research in the area of "healthy living". Most people that go on diets have this mentality that they HAVE to eat salads at every meal and only fruit in between, etc. They never take the time to learn what foods do what to their bodies, and plus everyone is different. What works for one may not work for the other. There's a lot of factors that contribute to that too - work life, if they have kids and not enough time to exercise, if money's tight, etc.

The hardest part about eating healthy is how much it costs to do so. Sure, you can lose weight on a tight budget, but it's tough. I think that's partly why many people resort to fast food diets - it's cheap and it's quick. And who knows? Maybe they're ordering off the healthy menu at McD's? I agree that it's terrible to assume that someone that eats at fast food restaurants is ONLY ordering the super-sized meals that are bad for you.

Now I think that's a very good point and it might be one of the reasons why Europeans differ from Americans.

Here a menu at Mc D's costs around 19€. With that money I can cook a 2 course dinner for my immediate family, invite my in-laws and my wife's brother =p

I'm saying once you reach a certain point, it IS your fault. Once my smoking got so bad I was going through two asthma inhalers per week, it was MY fault and I HAD to do something. Same with my weight. Yeah, I have a thyroid problem, I'll always be fat, but once I left the Jack Black zone and started stepping on Kyle Gass territory, I knew I HAD to something.

And yes, there are ways to turn things around. Granted, absurdly obese persons will never be slim, but they can, if they still have some kind of will to live left, go back to being... You know, fat; just fat. Like, normal fat. Like, can actually walk a couple of miles without dying fat.

And, again, people who have the metabolism to eat like that and still be slim and abuse it are killing themselves too, and they are being just as irresponsible if they don't change their eating habits.

What you seem to be suggesting is to just let them do whatever they want to do, which will inevitably lead them to an early grave. That's a valid option, sure, as long as that person UNDERSTANDS that what he/she is doing is basically suicide in slow motion. If they understand that and they choose to take that road, fine, I guess. If they don't understand how much they are hurting themselves, the least society (or their families, if you want to take the "libertarian" approach) should do is explain it to them.

@korvus:

Interesting. McDonald's is pretty cheap over here, well, if you order off the "dollar menu". I think regular meals range from $5-$10.

We used to have a burger joint in my city called '39 Cent Hamburger Stand'. You could literally get a hamburger for $.39! (US Dollars - don't know what the equivalent is over in Europe). You could bring home a family pack of 8 hamburgers, 4 fries, and drinks for about $6. Man, I miss that place.

@jasean79: $6 would be close to 4 and a half euros I believe. Holy crap, that's dirt cheap! =p Going to the mc d's and getting a sundae is a euro here XD or 3€ if you want the mc flurry stuff. You'd manage to get all that stuff for the amount of money I could buy a mc flurry...nice =p

@korvus:

Definitely not worth it then. :D

What other fast food restaurants do you have over there? Burger King, Wendy's, Taco Bell, Five Guys? Any of those?

@jasean79: I don't know all the fast food places you guys have but from the ones I know...

Back in Portugal (where I'm originally from) we have a bunch of McDonald's, lots of Pizza Hut, some Burger Kings and I think that's it.

In the Netherlands lots of Mc D's. quite a few Burger Kings, Subway, and a few spread out Pizza Hut and KFC.

Actually, their obesity gives me a pretty good idea of how much they eat/exercise. Of course, I could be wrong, but it's a safe bet.

Well good for him for losing 70 pounds, but that doesn't change that he allowed himself to become 320 pounds. Do you realize how much you have to eat to become that big? We're all responsible for our decisions and actions; being on the road to correcting a mistake doesn't change the fact that the mistake was made.

What does me eating a burger have to do with anything? Are you trying to equate one burger with all of the food he's eaten to become obese?

I don't see the difference.

True enough, I don't know anything about him, but I can make logical assumptions. I know you dislike assumptions, but really, they're all we have. it's impossible to know anything for certain, so at some point, we have to make an assumption based on what we have observed. If he's obese, I'll assume it's because at some point in his life he ate too much and didn't exercise. If he's obese and eating at McDonalds, I'll assume he's not trying to lose weight and become healthier. And yes, I'll judge him for that.

If people aren't judged for their bad decisions, society will sink into depravity and apathy.

Well I didn't know that; thanks for teaching me something new :)