Why do people think they are fatter than they are? Are women more likely to do this than men? Why do we label ourselves as fat at a point much lower than doctors or insurance companies do? Is it really because of the actresses we see in movies and TV? Or is it something else? Was it our mothers doing it to us when we were young? And are we doing it to our daughters now? Do we insult women on TV for being too skinny, or too fat? Do we do the same for the men?
Is there anything we can do differently so that our children have a healthier attitude toward weight issues? We know there is an obesity epidemic, but how does that affect the children who aren’t obese? Do they know they aren’t?
I think you have hit a lot of the high points, as reasons go. And there is definitely a double standard for men and women. For women, the media images, the social messages, have had a terrible impact. Just as in the east a woman’s greatest value is as a producer of sons, in the west her greatest value is as an object of sexual allure, and this allure must conform very closely to a particular standard, which includes a body type that very few women, even women of the American mainstream demographic, have. And when you add in women of color, even fewer will meet this idea of beauty.
This has resulted in thousands, millions, of young girls who do actual physical harm to themselves in an effort to comply with this standard, and the mental harm, the lack of self-esteem if they do not believe themselves to be sexually attractive to the general public is even more prevalent. And they begin this ideation and these actions sometimes even before puberty, before they even understand what they are aspiring to!
While boys are encouraged to be muscular and “buff,” and this may be increasing, it is still more acceptable for gentlemen to be plump than ladies. It is comparable, I think, to the gray hair situation. A gentleman with a bit of gray, or a lot, or only gray hair, is considered to be handsome and distinguished, while a lady with that bit of gray is considered to be either negligent of her grooming or simply stating that she is “old.” Since many people begin to lose pigment in their hair even before they are forty, this can mean that a lady is expected to spend over half her life coloring her hair every few weeks!
And as with the weight issue, it is all about sexual attractiveness. The sociologists will tell us this is primitive but natural human behavior, that a lady is more likely to be attracted to the gray hair on a gentleman because that indicates he has survived for a while, accumulated many coconuts and will therefore be able to provide for offspring. And for his part, the gentleman will prefer the slender lady with no gray hair, since that indicates she is young enough to provide him with many sons – a little east meets west, I suppose, when one goes all anthropological on it.
All this though I think is different from the obesity epidemic issue. People have different body types and different metabolisms and can be what modern western society considers too plump, (especially ladies, who are expected to be reed-thin but with ample bosoms and derrieres) without being obese in the sense that the overall health is affected and risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and other problems is increased.
The obesity epidemic has to do with the poor diet of cheap empty calories which is all that many Americans, especially the less affluent, consume, and the combination of the sedentary lifestyle, both of which have been discussed at length here, but I’m not sure which links!
It’s ironic that the less affluent end up getting the bad diet — especially when pre-processed foods cost more than the ingredients. For example, you can make a loaf of bread for about fifty cents, and it will have less sodium and more fiber (and taste better) than the stuff you get at the store “on sale” for $1.19.
It’s ironic that in this age of microwave ovens, bread machines, and other so-called labor-saving kitchen devices, we have even less time to fix a decent meal, and thus feel constrained to buy pre-packaged meals at the grocery or eat out at the fast-food joint. (Not that cooking your own chow is a panacea — I gained about 30 pounds eating my own cooking.)
It’s ironic that we spend so much time trying to buy a lifestyle that the TV insists we should have, we end up not having any time to enjoy it even if we get it — let alone not having time to spend with friends or family. Forget about exercising; who has time for that when the latest reality show is on?
Irony is like sodium; we all need a little but end up getting ‘way too much.
Yes you are right about the bread, but for a dollar you can get a double cheeseburger, which provides also protein. One has to have something to eat with the bread, and the fast food does end up being cheaper than the wholesome meal, and in the case of the poor, the stores they have access to are less likely to have a lot of quality fresh produce, etc.
And time is as you say, a factor, for both affluent and poor alike. The affluent because they wish to stay affluent, and the poor because they wish to stay in housing, have very little time for anything but work, the poor may spend 5 or 6 hours a day just riding buses to their various low paying jobs, and both poor and affluent are generally sleep deprived as well. Every so often Sanjay Gupta or some TV health head will report studies that show that most American adults survive on some alarming amount like 4.8 hours of sleep a night, almost half of what they should have.
Ah, well I can only talk about my own weight issues and history of obesity, and those questions had everything to with it. It seems to me that if you think you are fat, you will become fat.
And we adults understand what is meant by the ‘obesity epidemic’, but do the young girls struggling with self-image issues understand it?
How many 5’3″ girls weighing maybe 125 or 130 pounds (which is more than a teen wants to weigh, but is not overweight) think they are nearing obesity? And is it clear (to them) that the national conversation about the obesity doesn’t include them?
And (remember these are questions without answers) at what point do we worry about them? How do we teach our children to watch their weight without teaching them to obsess about it? Especially if we are openly worried about our own weight?
Ductape, you wrote a good article about tricking children into better eating habits. But, you can’t just conduct the obesity war with subterfuge, can you? Sooner or later we have to talk to the kids about it.
And how do you know if you’re going to inspire you child to live a life of health, anorexia nervosa, or obesity?
kbird I think you nailed it. These young girls DO think that the obesity epidemic is about them, even if they don’t say or think it in those terms, they do believe that if their body does not resemble Paris Hilton’s they are fat.
And unless they are ectomorphs, they are not going to have that kind of body no matter how much they starve themselves, and the fact that most of the world does not even find that kind of figure nearly as attractive as a naturally rounded lady, they do not know and do not care.
I do think that parents should talk to their kids about it, especially their daughters, but to be honest, I don’t know if it will do any good. If you take an average teenage girl, even though she may appreciate that mom and dad think she is just right, that is just not going to have the same impact as what her peers think, and how she compares herself to the celebrities she sees on TV, and all the advertisements that tell her that if she will just take this pill, or purchase that piece of exercise equipment, go on this new diet, then she too can have a body like the model in the ad.
Like so many issues, it is a cultural problem, and cultural change is the slowest kind, it takes time, and even if we talk to our descendants now, and try to counter, as best we can, the harmful messages of the media, I am sad to say that it may be a couple of generations before a girl like the heroine of Real Women Have Curves is considered as beautiful as Jessica Alba.
And then there is still the whole underlying problem of young girls accepting that they are valued on their looks to begin with, that what they should most aspire to is to appear sexually desirable to a public to which she is obliged to display herself daily.
I was thinking and talking about this at work today. And one of the women I work with said that she once read a celebrity autobiography where the (female) star said that a doctor told her that her skeleton — just her bones — weighed 120 pounds & that she was never going to weigh less than that. Sadly, she couldn’t remember which star it was, but I’m guessing it’s one of the ones with a weight problem.
I had never thought of that! As you imply, though, I wonder if it would help or hurt them, if they were told what their bones weigh. Some would determine that the rest of them would never weigh more than 5 pounds or something.
Well, maybe if you were talking to someone with a capacity for logic you could say:
Your bones weigh: 120 pounds
muscles weigh:
breasts weigh:
organs weigh:
skin weighs:
whatever-else weighs:
But I suspect that the shock of being told that they can’t weigh less than 150 would destroy some girls.
you would think that the 1 or 2 pound brain would help, but alas, it does not seem to.
Where are all of our other exercisers and ponderers of unanswerable questions tonight?
I’ve been here reading both of your very wise words.
I completely forgot to mention the brain weight! Which just goes to show what my opinion is worth.
edited to add: Hi! Olivia, good to see you.
I suppose that technically there is an answer to this, but I bought some bitter melon yesterday and I’m not sure what I’m going to do with it.
Did you buy it as a vegetable or as capsules? If as a vegetable, show mister the recipe for vegetables that do not suck, and have him cut it up and add it to vegetables that you like. I haven’t gotten any yet.
Hi olivia! Feel free to share your own wise words. Or exrecises. Or product recommendations. I just had 2 south beach diet peanut butter cookies, 100 calories, 3 grams sugar, and they did not suck.
I bought it as a vegetable, we’ve got a couple of Asian Super Grocery Stores. One is just a couple blocks from my house, but they had just sold out. And the other is just across the river from where I work. And that’s where I got it.
I remember your recipe, I’ll print that for mister. We don’t eat meat on Friday these days, so it might be a good time to try it.
Let us know if it lowers your blood sugar. I don’t think it is instant though, didn’t FARfetched say you have to eat 3 or 4 of them a week? I don’t know how long you have to do that though before you see results…
I wrote a paragraph of total babble and erased it (so it’s bed for me soon after this.)
I wonder if it will just level all spikes in blood sugar?
Because things are pretty controlled by the medication. But sometimes it goes up to 140 or 160 for an hour or so.
Oh, and I’ll tell everyone all about it (especially if it’s really ‘bitter’)
Get some rest katiebird. One day I hope to have meter readings like yours! I sinned today, a donut. Yes, I know. And the meter hissed an outraged 177 2 hours later. Sigh. Back on the camel.
Sweet dreams!
You will have good sugars soon, I know — especially if this bitter melon thing works out!
No camels for me, I’m for bed! Goodnight.
I think that the images that wea reserved up everyday in the media, sets a benchmark that is not realistic or natural for most people.