So, a social justice issue I've noticed gaining a lot of traction over the past year or so is the Fat Acceptance Movement - mostly due to calling fit women "skinny bitches", running campaigns like "f*** your beauty standards", that sort of thing. I'm not entirely sure if it has a codified manifesto, since like many other movements it's exact beliefs seem to change depending on who you ask. So I'll focus primarily on the tenants I've seen argued most. Feel free to add or discuss more aspects of it as we go on. Also, based on photos and the people backing it, "fat" for the purpose of the movement seems to mean "severely overweight/obese", not "chubby."
The statements I see frequently:
1) Obese people should not be discriminated against
This is something I agree with for the most part. There are some exceptions, though. There are many jobs (military, firefighter, rescue diver, personal trainer, etc.) that obese people either cannot do at all, or will severely under-perform at due to their weight. I don't think it's wrong for a company to deny employment to or fire someone for being obese if it negatively effects work performance.
Also, in the case of airlines, if you're too big to fit into one seat, then you should pay for two seats rather than forcing the airline to lose money by flying you around. That seems pretty fair.
That being said, in general I think social and legal discrimination of people based on weight is wrong.
2) Heathlism/being obese is healthy
This is where I start disagreeing pretty strongly. Two concurrent claims by the FAM are:
A) The idea that one should eat healthy, exercise regularly, and maintain a healthy, well balanced and well proportioned diet is "healthism", a discriminatory practice by which thin people, scientists and medical professionals oppress obese people. They believe it's a sort of equivalent to racial Darwinism, and is used by fit, healthy people to propagate the bigoted notion that they are "ideal" and superior. And,
B) That obese people are actually healthier than non-obese people.
Now B is usually supported by means of a false dichotomy. It's absolutely true that an obese person who eats a somewhat healthy (though over-proportioned) diet is healthier than a severely anorexic person, and likely to live longer. But a fit person who eats healthily and exercises regularly is much, much healthier than either.
Moreover, there's an idea that one can have a "healthy body weight" at 350 lbs, or that being overweight alone is not harmful. This is demonstrably false. There are numerous health problems related to being overweight, from joint issues and back problems to heart disease, intestinal problems, blood pressure, etc... not to mention all the ancillary problems associated with the sort of diet and lack of exercise necessary to become obese.
3) That Teaching/Encouraging Physical Fitness and Nutrition in School is Oppressive or Abusive
Since being fat is "healthier" or at least just as healthy, the logic follows that teaching the importance of exercise and proper nutrition in school is oppressive, and that PE teachers are child abusers.
This is a particularly insidious one IMO, simply because of the evil that is childhood obesity. It's one thing to choose to become obese as an adult, but when you're fat from the get go, there are so many things you're unable to do, so many careers you can't pursue, and you've had your options and possibilities curtailed without your choice. Which is why I can never support obesity as an "ideal" body type.
4) If you're not attracted to fat people, you're an oppressor, or at least very shallow
This is one that gets brought up a lot, and I personally find rather annoying. It goes that if you choose not to date someone because they're obese, then you're an awful human being.
It's generally made out to be that you're buying into a system of oppression and discrimination, even if the simple truth is that you just don't find yourself sexually attracted to fat people.
For me, as someone who's personally been attacked by a fat woman who I turned down, it's about incompatible lifestyles as well as complete lack of attraction.
I'm a very physically active guy, and a lot of my hobbies include doing physically active things. Today my wife and I took her parents dogs on a 5 mile hike on a mountain trail. We go to the gym together, bike together, go kayaking, go paddleboarding, go snorkeling, go surfing, go rock climbing, horseback riding, etc. We also cook almost every night and go grocery shopping together and have the same priorities as far as eating a healthy diet.
Choosing to date an obese woman would mean giving all of that up, or at least not being able to do any of my favorite activities with her. It means we'd have to shop separately, eat separately, and more or less live separately. In other words, there wouldn't be much of a chance for a good or healthy marriage, because of radically different lifestyles.
There's more to it than that, but those are the big 4 I see frequently being discussed.
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
Missing from your list: Being large isn't indicative of a personal failing; thin or fit people aren't better because of that.
It's not to say that personal choices don't play into whether one is large or not. But how those choices get made, the weight of different factors, the role of willpower vs. inclination: it's not simple and it largely isn't about worth or success, mostly just luck.
(Let's exclude fitness enthusiast pursuits - having extremely low body fat or bulky muscles can take a lot of specifically directed work. I'm talking about the average person who may naturally tend toward gaining fat or may not.)
Quick comments on your list:
1) Ability to do the job! Not size! 2) Weight isn't health. Obesity correlates with many health problems but isn't the cause. 3) Sounds good, but there's probably room to examine whether status quo methods are ideal or if there's a way to be more effective for more people. 4) Compatibility is obviously important, but let's not deny that not skinny=not attractive is pretty much shallow and an artifact of our culture
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by scifibum: Missing from your list: Being large isn't indicative of a personal failing; thin or fit people aren't better because of that.
Sure.
quote:It's not to say that personal choices don't play into whether one is large or not. But how those choices get made, the weight of different factors, the role of willpower vs. inclination: it's not simple and it largely isn't about worth or success, mostly just luck.
Again, no disagreement here.
quote:(Let's exclude fitness enthusiast pursuits - having extremely low body fat or bulky muscles can take a lot of specifically directed work. I'm talking about the average person who may naturally tend toward gaining fat or may not.)
Yes, it's a lot of work. As far as "naturally tending" towards gaining fat, it mostly depends on how you eat, how much you eat, and how much you exercise. People store different amounts of fat and in different places, so while some healthy people may be very skinny and others more bulky or husky, they won't be obese. Also, genetics plays a big role here - my brother in law eats absolute crap all the time and is skinny as a rail with a perfect 6 pack. He's pretty far from healthy, though, and is sick pretty often. Probably from all the garbage he eats.
quote:Quick comments on your list:
1) Ability to do the job! Not size!
In a lot of those jobs, size determines how able you are to do the job.
quote:2) Weight isn't health. Obesity correlates with many health problems but isn't the cause.
Now this is just completely, demonstrably incorrect. Obesity *is* the direct cause of numerous health problems. The added pressure the fat puts on the organs causes numerous problems, there's sleep apnea, heart disease, blood pressure, arthritis, spinal issues, bone deformities, blood pooling and clotting issues, etc. Your body isn't meant to carry that much fat, and doing so causes major health issues.
quote:3) Sounds good, but there's probably room to examine whether status quo methods are ideal or if there's a way to be more effective for more people.
100% agree.
quote:4) Compatibility is obviously important, but let's not deny that not skinny=not attractive is pretty much shallow and an artifact of our culture
I would say I'm more along the lines of not fit = not attractive, I don't necessarily find underweight women very attractive either. I think desiring a virile, healthy mate is pretty standard across all human cultures, and while there are exceptions (our culture's recent obsession with women who look like walking clothes hangers and men who look like boys, renaissance era conflating fat = wealthy = attractive, etc.), calling it strictly an artifact of our culture is a little dismissive of every other human culture.
As far as being shallow - the simple fact is that I'm attracted to women who look a certain way, have a certain personality type, and have certain interests. Which isn't to say I don't appreciate variety or trying new things, but the fact of the matter is I don't find fat women attractive. At all. You wouldn't call me shallow for not being attracted to men, nor would you say that my heterosexuality is simply a cultural artifact (despite the fact that there are fewer gay people than fat people in the world), but fat women are as attractive to me as men, which is to say, not at all.
I don't go around broadcasting that, I don't make fun of fat women, I treat them with respect and friendship. But I don't feel like my non-interest in them or the fact that I chose to marry a non-fat woman should be ridiculed. Yet that's exactly what has happened, and my wife has on several occasions been called a "skinny bitch" or just outright ignored by (now former) female friends of mine for no reason other than she has a different lifestyle than them. And that really sucks.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
To be clear, I have no problem with (adult) people who are obese. Whether by choice, environment, or disease/disability, it doesn't matter, it's their body and I have no interest in shaming or discriminating against anyone. Nor do I have a problem with obese people considering themselves to be beautiful or desirable.
I absolutely have a problem with portraying obesity as a healthy or preferable lifestyle. It's demonstrably not, and it requires a viewpoint that's willingly and terrifyingly disconnected from reality to believe that. The FAM's accusations of bigotry against medical professionals who tell the truth is disturbing and immoral, as is any group that considers reality to be offensive. (Like smokers who get angry at lung cancer statistics)
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
How much I agree with you depends on where you draw the line on "obese." BMI charts put obese for a 5'6" woman at 190 lbs. Health and activity level is going to be much different for someone weighing190 lbs and someone weighing 350 lbs.
And I think you're being a little hyperbolic on the "separate shopping, eating, separate lives" thing. If the person is opposed to healthy eating and has no interest in hiking, etc., then yes, you would not be at all compatible. If they just hadn't made it a priority, maybe because they work long hours and the people they hang out with on weekends tend to go to movies rather than outdoor activities, then you could invite them to go hiking with you on a Saturday and see what happens. (Could have, if you'd met such a person when you were single, obviously.)
Which is not to say that you (were you single) have to date someone you don't find attractive or be a bigot. Dating relationships are absolutely based on personal choice, and no reasons need to be given. But the reasons you are giving seem to be consigning any woman over an ideal weight into couch potato territory.
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
This is an interesting topic. It's one that is more complex than appears on the surface in all kinds of ways.
For example, the research on overweight:
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath: ... or that being overweight alone is not harmful. This is demonstrably false. There are numerous health problems related to being overweight, from joint issues and back problems to heart disease, intestinal problems, blood pressure, etc...
If you actually look at the data, what sounds intuitively true does not seem to be supported -- at least not in terms of mortality, or longevity of lifespan, which probably the most key single indicator. [Added: this point can be debated. But there is definite complexity here, and there is something that needs to be examined.] There was a huge meta-analysis of international studies done by a senior CDC scientist which found the following:
quote: The somewhat surprising conclusion comes from an enormous, detailed review of over 100 previously published research papers connecting body weight and mortality risk among 2.88 million study participants living around the world. ... The new research confirms that obese people, and particularly those who are extremely obese, tend to die earlier than those of normal weight. But the findings also suggest that people who are overweight (but not obese) may live longer than people with clinically normal body weight. ... “We published an article in 2005 that showed, among other things, that overweight was associated with lower mortality — and we got an awful lot of negative feedback from that,” says the current study’s lead author, Katherine Flegal, a senior research scientist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Since that study, however, dozens of others have reached the same conclusion — even if it was hard for researchers and the public to accept. [italics added]
1. Does this mean everyone should lay around and eat junk food?
No.
2. Does this mean there is conclusive proof without potentially important confounding effects that overweight people (by the WHO definition) are healthier?
No.
But, importantly,
3. Does this mean that the situation is more complicated than it would seem on first glance, and that we probably need to be careful about making pronouncements in this gray area until this is sorted out more thoroughly?
Yeah, probably.
This is just one of the ways in which discussion of weight categories is, well, complicated. I do feel fine as a physician with encouraging people to stay active, eat a wide variety of fruits and vegetables if tolerated, ensure good lean protein sources (especially if undergoing strenous exercise, as protein needs increase), and keeping plenty of fiber in their diets.
I don't believe supplements are as healthy as whole foods, which tend to come with natural brakes against overconsumption. Plus, thank you John Oliver for the excellent takedown on the hazards of supplements in an essentially unregulated context. But that's another rant for another day.
PS: It is also interesting how much visceral anger these results seem to provoke when presented at medical conferences, grand rounds, etc. As the author of the study notes, the backlash was tremendous. But this shouldn't be an emotionally charged topic for scientists or health professionals, at least not in terms of analyzing data. Yet it would seem to be. Interesting. I'm not sure what to make of that, but I think there are perhaps larger cultural forces at play, including cultural definitions of virtue and health, and the cultural connections drawn between the two.
[ February 01, 2015, 10:58 AM: Message edited by: CT ]
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:It means we'd have to shop separately, eat separately, and more or less live separately.
Just a quick quibble: you may be surprised. While it's true that you're unlikely to find many obese women who'll accompany you on a rock-climbing trip, five-mile hikes aren't out of the question. I think you may also be surprised to discover that obese people might well shop and eat in very much the same way you do. You're not assuming that a fat lady sits down to meals of bon-bons and gravy, right?
Now, you probably both won't be able to go shopping for clothes in the same store. But that's a small price to pay for love.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
The HAES movement is generally unscientific, and neurotically anti-medicine, and spends a lot of time engaged in what it considers its sacrosanct right to be total jerks to fit or standard or underweight people because it's punching up as a socially marginalized person. A lot of their defining work is medically insane and denialist. They're a perfect example of the spirally radicalizing end of fat acceptance and its a shame to see them get so vocal for their size (pun intended)
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by dkw: How much I agree with you depends on where you draw the line on "obese." BMI charts put obese for a 5'6" woman at 190 lbs. Health and activity level is going to be much different for someone weighing190 lbs and someone weighing 350 lbs.
And I think you're being a little hyperbolic on the "separate shopping, eating, separate lives" thing. If the person is opposed to healthy eating and has no interest in hiking, etc., then yes, you would not be at all compatible. If they just hadn't made it a priority, maybe because they work long hours and the people they hang out with on weekends tend to go to movies rather than outdoor activities, then you could invite them to go hiking with you on a Saturday and see what happens. (Could have, if you'd met such a person when you were single, obviously.)
Which is not to say that you (were you single) have to date someone you don't find attractive or be a bigot. Dating relationships are absolutely based on personal choice, and no reasons need to be given. But the reasons you are giving seem to be consigning any woman over an ideal weight into couch potato territory.
You're right (as is Tom Davidson), it is hyperbolic. I was actually specifically thinking of one person who I had a bad experience with. It doesn't apply universally.
Obese for me is a large amount of excess fat. I don't consider a healthy woman who is active and carries some "extra weight" to be obese or even unattractive, and indeed I find the "if you're not 8% body fat as a women you're fat" thing to be annoying and stupid. The sort of musculature and frame necessary to carry a 100 lb pack 20 miles meant that a lot of female Marines I worked with were very stocky, usually 150-160 at 5' 6" to use your example.
But the FAM isn't comprised of people like that, though they might express their frustration with supermodels or the "Justin Bieber look" and so on. (Luckily for us guys, we're allowed to have stocky/muscular role models as well. Though I was annoyed to read articles about how "chubby" Bradley Cooper got for American Sniper - when by "chubby" they mean "put on 40 lbs of muscle") It's comprised of obese people who consider healthy eating, diet and exercise to be "healthism".
I guess my whole point is I have is that I'm all for ending discrimination, but I don't believe that me believing what my doctor and medical consensus tells me - that I should eat healthily, exercise regularly, and maintain a reasonable level of body fat - makes me a bigot or part of a system of oppression.
[ February 01, 2015, 02:41 PM: Message edited by: Dogbreath ]
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
I'm 6'2", 300...there is a lot of me...both muscle and fat.
I have type two diabetes. ..as do my normal size father and grandmother.
Could I be skinnier? Hells yea. Do I have an active lifestyle? Oh hells yea I do, although I haven't gone rock climbing in years.
I got teased a lot (likely due more to social awkwardness than any actual size issue)...
What's my take away?
Assholes shop for skinny jeans AND in the husky section.
Skinny assholes make chunky people feel uncomfortable intentionally...fat assholes think the world should change because reality hurts their feelings.
Moral of the story...don't be a dick.
[ February 02, 2015, 03:11 AM: Message edited by: Stone_Wolf_ ]
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
That's a pretty great moral to live by, actually.
I've always hated the "two wrongs makes it right" mentality you find at the fringes of any social group, since it involves a level of intentional evil. By which I mean, it's plausible that some skinny people who belittle or shame or tease fat people do so with little understanding of how much hurt they're causing, or even think "it's for their own good." (That doesn't justify it or make it even remotely better, mind you) Whereas someone part of the FAM who bullies a skinny person almost certainly knows how much it hurts, but does it anyway because "they started it!" Even if the person being bullied had *nothing* to do with it. It just seems so counterintuitive and destructive and evil.
You see this a lot in nerd culture with #gamergate and doxxing and posting naked pictures online and so forth, where people who were bullied or rejected at some point in their life believe they're in a culture of "oppresion", and they're just fighting back or defending themselves. It's pretty sad.
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
quote:Whereas someone part of the FAM who bullies a skinny person almost certainly knows how much it hurts, but does it anyway because "they started it!" Even if the person being bullied had *nothing* to do with it. It just seems so counterintuitive and destructive and evil.
At least sometimes even if they SHOULD know exactly how much it hurts, they have assigned the target into some kind of unfeeling oppressor or EEEVUL category or even just fail to translate from pixels-and-words-on-a-screen to "human being" - I think that last is most often the case with trolls and bullies online (I lack objective evidence that this is the case, but I've seen a few cases where one is slowly coaxed into seeing the error and makes a full reversal).
Posted by Traceria (Member # 11820) on :
quote:Originally posted by dkw: How much I agree with you depends on where you draw the line on "obese." BMI charts put obese for a 5'6" woman at 190 lbs. Health and activity level is going to be much different for someone weighing190 lbs and someone weighing 350 lbs.
I don't always chime into conversations on hatrack, but this hit me in a personal spot. I'm a woman, and I'll admit I'm currently sitting at 190 lbs and am 5'6". I've been exercising 3-5 days a week since the beginning of the summer of 2014 (and before that I was more sporadic of an exerciser but never completely inactive), have been keeping track of my food intake both calorically and quality-wise, and yet I can't seem to drop weight. I'm waiting on results of a thyroid panel to see if that's my issue. I just want to raise awareness that there is going to be a subset of people who are legitimately trying to eat healthy and be active and yet come up against a wall when it comes to losing weight in order to get themselves in a visually healthy place as well as in internally healthy one. This isn't meant to be anything more than that.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
I find the idea that a skinny person and an obese person couldn't food shop together ridiculous to the point that it made that entire part of your argument seem petty. And I've told an obese man I wouldn't date him because he couldn't do the sorts of things you're talking about with me. (Kayaking, biking, hiking, etc.)
I am also a woman who is near that obese line, and am married to a man who is thin. I cook for both of us, we eat the same things quality wise, and he eats more than me quantity wise. I am 9 inches shorter than he is and weigh 30ish pounds more. I am also healthier than him in all the measurements you listed. A lot of that is just genetics. Would I like to lose weight? Sure. But I trained for and ran a marathon last summer without losing a pound. So am I going to beat myself up over it? Nah.
But I definitely agree with you about encouraging kids to develop healthy habits when they're young. It's a lot easier to do it then, and the vast majority of overweight people would probably tell you they wish they had.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by Traceria:
quote:Originally posted by dkw: How much I agree with you depends on where you draw the line on "obese." BMI charts put obese for a 5'6" woman at 190 lbs. Health and activity level is going to be much different for someone weighing190 lbs and someone weighing 350 lbs.
I don't always chime into conversations on hatrack, but this hit me in a personal spot. I'm a woman, and I'll admit I'm currently sitting at 190 lbs and am 5'6". I've been exercising 3-5 days a week since the beginning of the summer of 2014 (and before that I was more sporadic of an exerciser but never completely inactive), have been keeping track of my food intake both calorically and quality-wise, and yet I can't seem to drop weight. I'm waiting on results of a thyroid panel to see if that's my issue. I just want to raise awareness that there is going to be a subset of people who are legitimately trying to eat healthy and be active and yet come up against a wall when it comes to losing weight in order to get themselves in a visually healthy place as well as in internally healthy one. This isn't meant to be anything more than that.
Hey, what's up!
I know from my own experience with strength training that one of the most annoying things in the world is having someone come up and say "hey, what if you just try this?" as if it's not something you've already heard of, researched, and tried. Which is to say, take everything I say with a grain of salt, and the most important thing to do if you want to lose weight is talk to a doctor, meet with a personal trainer, and do what's healthy and works for you.
That being said: the "wall" you describe (or "plateau" as a lot of weightlifters call it) is a well known phenomenon, and very real. The human body resists change, and will try it's hardest to maintain your current body weight and composition. This has a lot to do with the ice age screwing us over metabolically speaking - your body will exert as little energy as possible while exercising while also retaining as much fat as possible, and only building as much muscle as is necessary to perform the tasks you're doing. Why? Because fat is necessary to survival when faced with going a month or two without food and costs almost no energy to maintain, whereas retaining muscle burns an alarming amount of energy. This can make long term weight loss (or in my case, gain) very difficult - you'll see short term results for a few months, and then plateau and stay at one weight. It's immensely frustrating.
What you need to do to break through that wall is to shock your body.
Long distance running, or going on the elliptical, while good for your cardiovascular health, aren't going to help you lose weight. (though they'll help keep you from gaining weight once it's lost) Running is what humans do best, and we're incredibly efficient at it. A fit human being can chase a horse until it dies of exhaustion and still be ok, and the reason for this is because our bodies are incredibly efficient at running, and it require very little energy to do so.
When you first start running you don't have the appropriate muscle memory or coordination to do it efficiently so you burn a lot of calories and lose weight quickly at first, which is why a lot of overweight people trying to lose weight fall into the running trap - it works at first, and then right about the time you lose your first 20 lbs or so, it seemingly stops working. That's because your body has reached a point where it runs so efficiently that running takes very little energy to do.
What you need to sustain long term weight loss is high intensity workouts. The one that got me absolutely shredded in about 2 months time and that I continue to do 3 times a week is the Spartacus workout - it supposedly burns roughly 800 calories in 42 minutes. I'm not sure if that's entirely accurate (again, muscle memory, etc.) but it certainly works. You can read about it here and there's a youtube video that actually times it for you too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJb9dyY8tKY . (I feel like I'm now a spammer... ) I do it in my living room on my wife's yoga mat.
There are hundreds of similar workouts you can find, I know Women's Health has a ton, and you could get like 5,000 tips from the ladies at the bodybuilding.com forums. I think the most important thing again is to talk to a doctor and a physical trainer first and find out what's best for you, and what you're least likely to injure yourself doing.
Once you're at your ideal weight (whatever that i for you), you can transition into more low intensity, comfortable workouts to maintain it. Best of luck! And again, I realize you probably didn't want or need any advice, so feel free to ignore me. I just get excited for people who are making that step towards physical fitness and wanted to offer some encouragement. Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Running is what humans do best
There are many, many things I do better than running.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by ElJay: I find the idea that a skinny person and an obese person couldn't food shop together ridiculous to the point that it made that entire part of your argument seem petty. And I've told an obese man I wouldn't date him because he couldn't do the sorts of things you're talking about with me. (Kayaking, biking, hiking, etc.)
*nods* Again, I was thinking of one person who definitely did have entirely different eating and cooking habits than I did, and I apologize for the generalization. I didn't mean it as "all these apply in every circumstance."
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote:Running is what humans do best
There are many, many things I do better than running.
Well, cognition, tool use, speech, etc. are important too I guess. I meant, "as far as physical activity goes, humans are outstanding long distance runners." Especially in terms of calories spent when compared to weight and speed, I think we're either the best or close to it.
Posted by Heisenberg (Member # 13004) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote:Running is what humans do best
There are many, many things I do better than running.
Well, cognition, tool use, speech, etc. are important too I guess. I meant, "as far as physical activity goes, humans are outstanding long distance runners." Especially in terms of calories spent when compared to weight and speed, I think we're either the best or close to it.
Human beings are absolutely the best in the animal kingdom when it comes to long distance running. We're pretty well evolved for it.
There's a theory that the reason the species adapted in such a way was to run down prey animals when we had to get within "stabbing them with pointy sticks" distance.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
I don't run marathons and having done any formal distance training in a while, though I still greatly enjoy trail running. I did an 8 mile run on a trail in the Redwood Forest in northern California 2 summers ago and it was one of the most surreal, breathtakingly beautiful experiences of my life.
But back when I was in my A-School we had a staff sergeant who was training for a marathon, and every Monday he'd wake us up around 3:30 and we'd run 11-16 miles. "Runner's high" is pretty powerful, maybe like an anti-drunk feeling. After a few miles I'd fall into a sort of mental trance and feel a lucidity and mental clarity and do a lot of deep thinking. Actually, I used to do that all the time in college - I've always been much better at thinking when I run or hike or work out, so I'd run with a notebook and periodically stop and write stuff down. The evolutionary reasons behind that sensation - increased mental focus to track and hunt - are pretty cool.
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
quote: Human beings are absolutely the best in the animal kingdom when it comes to long distance running.
Horses?
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick:
quote: Human beings are absolutely the best in the animal kingdom when it comes to long distance running.
Horses?
From the link in the post above you that answers exactly that question:
quote:Our "sustainable distance" is also hard to beat. African hunting dogs typically travel an average of 10 kilometers a day. Wolves and hyenas tend to go about 14 and 19 kilometers, respectively. In repeated distance runs, horses can cover about 20 kilometers a day. Vast throngs of human runners, by comparison, routinely run 42.2-kilometer marathons in just a few hours, and each year tens of thousands of people complete ultra-marathons of 100 kilometers and longer. (A few animals can match that under special circumstances. Huskies can trot up to 100 kilometers in Arctic conditions when forced to by people. But in warmer climes—no way.)
Also, top shape humans have distance speed of 6.5 m/s, as opposed to horses 5.8 m/s. But it's really the fact that we can go much, much further than horses before being exhausted that makes us "faster" in the long run.
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
quote: That being said: the "wall" you describe (or "plateau" as a lot of weightlifters call it) is a well known phenomenon, and very real. The human body resists change, and will try it's hardest to maintain your current body weight and composition. This has a lot to do with the ice age screwing us over metabolically speaking - your body will exert as little energy as possible while exercising while also retaining as much fat as possible, and only building as much muscle as is necessary to perform the tasks you're doing. Why? Because fat is necessary to survival when faced with going a month or two without food and costs almost no energy to maintain, whereas retaining muscle burns an alarming amount of energy. This can make long term weight loss (or in my case, gain) very difficult - you'll see short term results for a few months, and then plateau and stay at one weight. It's immensely frustrating.
What you need to do to break through that wall is to shock your body.
Long distance running, or going on the elliptical, while good for your cardiovascular health, aren't going to help you lose weight. (though they'll help keep you from gaining weight once it's lost) Running is what humans do best, and we're incredibly efficient at it. A fit human being can chase a horse until it dies of exhaustion and still be ok, and the reason for this is because our bodies are incredibly efficient at running, and it require very little energy to do so.
When you first start running you don't have the appropriate muscle memory or coordination to do it efficiently so you burn a lot of calories and lose weight quickly at first, which is why a lot of overweight people trying to lose weight fall into the running trap - it works at first, and then right about the time you lose your first 20 lbs or so, it seemingly stops working. That's because your body has reached a point where it runs so efficiently that running takes very little energy to do.
The body loses weight when it burns more calories than it consumes. If you do long-distance running and consume a low-calorie diet you'll keep losing weight as long as you keep adding distance to your runs as your conditioning level rises. If you burn more calories than you consumed in a day, you're going to lose weight that day; that's inescapable.
That said, I do agree that high intensity training is a better weight-loss program than simple long-distance running. Not only will you burn calories but you'll develop muscles and coordination and other cool stuff.
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick:
quote: Human beings are absolutely the best in the animal kingdom when it comes to long distance running.
Horses?
From the link in the post above you that answers exactly that question:
quote:Our "sustainable distance" is also hard to beat. African hunting dogs typically travel an average of 10 kilometers a day. Wolves and hyenas tend to go about 14 and 19 kilometers, respectively. In repeated distance runs, horses can cover about 20 kilometers a day. Vast throngs of human runners, by comparison, routinely run 42.2-kilometer marathons in just a few hours, and each year tens of thousands of people complete ultra-marathons of 100 kilometers and longer. (A few animals can match that under special circumstances. Huskies can trot up to 100 kilometers in Arctic conditions when forced to by people. But in warmer climes—no way.)
Also, top shape humans have distance speed of 6.5 m/s, as opposed to horses 5.8 m/s. But it's really the fact that we can go much, much further than horses before being exhausted that makes us "faster" in the long run.
What do they mean by repeated distance runs? It seems like they're comparing an average horse vs. a trained human runner. Has a horse ever been trained to run long-distance with the level of sports science we use to train ourselves in getting into optimum conditioning for running?
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick: The body loses weight when it burns more calories than it consumes. If you do long-distance running and consume a low-calorie diet you'll keep losing weight as long as you keep adding distance to your runs as your conditioning level rises. If you burn more calories than you consumed in a day, you're going to lose weight that day; that's inescapable.
While this is absolutely, undeniably, observably true, there are some aspects of it that make it difficult for people to lose weight doing. Admittedly those parts are more related to psychology and a misunderstanding (on the part of many people trying to lose weight, not you) of how the body works. One part is physiological, which I will cover.
1) You have to continue adding distance, which means unless you're dramatically increasing speed (unlikely) you need to continue adding time as well.
So Joe Schmoe has 45 minutes every day to work out. He starts by stretching for 5 minutes (hopefully dynamic stretches not static), then runs 3 miles in 30 minutes, and then cools down and does static stretches. He burns about 300 calories above his BMR doing this and also increases his metabolism. Assuming he wasn't gaining weight on the diet he currently eats, and assuming he doesn't start eating/snacking more or drinking sugary "recovery" drinks or other crap (Gatorade has something like 200 calories in a bottle), he'll start losing about a pound a week.
After a while, though, Joe becomes better and better at running, his slow twitch muscles develop, he becomes more coordinated, his lungs process oxygen far more efficiently, his heartbeat slows, and he stops burning as much. He goes from losing a pound a week to half a pound, then a third of a pound, and because he doesn't have more than 45 minutes, he can't increase distance much to compensate. Even top shape Marathon runners can't do much better than 5 miles in 30. Then this happens:
2) As he runs and diets and starts losing weight, along with burning fat his body will start burning muscle too. Why? Because he's taking in fewer calories than he burns, and his body is going to try to go back to the status quo as quickly as possible. Since muscle greatly increases your BMR, reducing muscle mass is it's best way of retaining his fat. (which, evolutionarily speaking, is a "good thing") There are ways around this - taking branch chain amino acids and eating carbs for a glycogen spike shortly before running (why a lot of bodybuilders recommend eating a pop-tart before lifting, strangely enough), doing weight training as well as running to convince the body that retaining muscle mass is more important than retaining fat, etc. But this again requires more time and education that Joe is really willing to put in.
So eventually Joe reaches a point where his body compensates for the increase in caloric burn that 3 miles a day of running causes, and he reaches equilibrium and stops losing weight. If he's lucky, that's at his target weight. If he's more than 15 or 20 lbs overweight, this is highly unlikely.
3) After several months of no further weight loss and tired of feeling hungry all the time, Joe falls off the wagon and either stops running or increases his caloric intake. And we're back to square 1.
Whereas if he had used those 45 minutes for a high intensity workout (like, say, doing a series of timed sprints, or anything else except running) and varied the workouts routinely to keep his body from reaching a plateau, he actually has a good chance of reaching his goal. And once you're in shape, it's easier to keep off weight than it is to lose it.
None of this is to actually disagree with you in any way, just to say that distance running can be a huge mind-screw if you're not adequately educated and prepared. It's also very high impact and can cause a lot of injuries, again, mostly for people who are overweight and haven't been trained to run properly.
Edit:
Just so it's absolutely clear, by "compensate" above I mean "lower BMR by reducing muscle mass and optimize running to a level of efficiency that calories in = calories out." I by no means am denying thermodynamics or making the assumption that there's no limit to human efficiency. If Joe were to continue to increase distance or continue to reduce intake, he would be able to sustain weight loss right up to the point of starvation, actually. The body is awfully crafty at avoiding this, though. (seeing as how everybody who starved before they mated isn't part of our gene pool) It'll make him more lethargic at other tasks, make him hungrier (and increase the temptation to snack more), he'll eat larger portions, etc. It requires a very high level of discipline in exchange for very low level of improvement, which seems stupid when there are much better options out there.
[ February 02, 2015, 09:46 PM: Message edited by: Dogbreath ]
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick: What do they mean by repeated distance runs? It seems like they're comparing an average horse vs. a trained human runner. Has a horse ever been trained to run long-distance with the level of sports science we use to train ourselves in getting into optimum conditioning for running?
Read the article. They race top-shape horses against top-shape humans. The humans win some times, and do better and better the longer the course and the hotter the day. I don't know much about horse racing, but I assume just based on the huge amounts of money involved there's quite a bit of sports science that goes into it.
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick: What do they mean by repeated distance runs? It seems like they're comparing an average horse vs. a trained human runner. Has a horse ever been trained to run long-distance with the level of sports science we use to train ourselves in getting into optimum conditioning for running?
Read the article. They race top-shape horses against top-shape humans. The humans win some times, and do better and better the longer the course and the hotter the day. I don't know much about horse racing, but I assume just based on the huge amounts of money involved there's quite a bit of sports science that goes into it.
Meh, I just finished reading all the front page articles on The Atlantic, I don't feel like reading another.
Just to nit-pick, horse racing seems more like sprinting. I don't think the horses actually pace themselves. I've never heard of a horse being trained for a marathon.
Also, great post before that one. I especially like the part about dynamic stretching before and static after!
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
It'd be interesting to see what would happen if the horse was trying to win, and riderless.
Another angle on it: how many marathon runners can go run down a wild mustang in the desert?
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by scifibum: It'd be interesting to see what would happen if the horse was trying to win, and riderless.
Another angle on it: how many marathon runners can go run down a wild mustang in the desert?
Almost any of them. There are tribes that still hunt this way. (they don't hunt horses, mind you...)
Horses will sprint to get away from the person chasing them (instinctual predator reflex) and overheat pretty quickly. The rider actually helps the horse in this case - he keeps it moving at a steady pace.
Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
Regarding horses and distance racing - you're talking about endurance racing. And most races are 50 or 100 miles. And it's as much a test of the rider's endurance as it is of the horse's (and without a rider or other human direction, there's pretty much no way a horse would voluntarily travel that far in such a short time).
My stepfather was an ultramarathoner and he used to frequent a 100 miler in Vermont that was paired with a 100 mile endurance ride. Horses and riders had 24 hours to finish, runners had 30 hours. There have also been relay variations where you've got a team that takes turns running and riding.
From the article:
quote:Horses' average distance-running speed is 5.8 meters per second—a canter.
Believe it or not, the most efficient gait for a horse is trotting - which is often slower than cantering (a good endurance horse will have a good ground-eating trot, though). The problem with a trot is that it's the bounciest and generally most difficult gait for a rider.
Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
I don't know. I'm sure most horses would trot the majority of a long distance, but I also know the speed of a trot and a canter overlap.
But even for an endurance race, the majority of it's still going to be done at a trot because a canter and gallop use up too much energy.
Um... there was a post here that I was responding to.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Ah, ok. Sorry I deleted the post, I figured you had answered the question with your first one. I didn't think anyone would see it for the 3 seconds it was up. Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
The problems of a quiet forum and not wanting to go to bed. Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
In Ancient societies being overweight implied success and wealth and you were highly sought after.
I think there's also a trope in Asian societies that an overweight husband is a sign that his wife is a great cook, while a skinny husband implies the opposite; ironically my friends (His parents are from Hong Kong and Vietnam) mom who *IS* a great cook but his dad has such a high metabolism that he's skinny.
I've been working on losing weight on and off for years, but nothing really worked until recently due to a multitude of factors. Currently my plan is judo once a week (time factors) and calorie counting. Myfitnesspal puts my limit in order to lose weight at 1850 per day, I'm aiming more at the 1600-1700 since I'm not physically active on most days; while slowly trying to wake up at 6:30 to do exercises for about a half hour each morning; but that's extremely difficult.
Posted by Heisenberg (Member # 13004) on :
Thanks for the article Dogbreath, I enjoyed it.
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
quote:Originally posted by scifibum: It'd be interesting to see what would happen if the horse was trying to win, and riderless.
Another angle on it: how many marathon runners can go run down a wild mustang in the desert?
Animorphs addressed this. Horse wins!
Posted by Heisenberg (Member # 13004) on :
If the marathon runners were good trackers, most of them could. That's kind of the point.
Animals can be faster in the short term, sure. A horse can and will run very far away from a human that is trying to catch or kill it. But, if the human can track the horse, the human will catch up. The horse will run away again, and so on, until the horse overheats or exhausts itself, something which will most certainly happen before the physically fit marathon runner experiences the same thing.
This would happen even faster in the desert, as homo sapiens is also able to shed excess body heat faster and more efficiently then any other large mammal.
Posted by Traceria (Member # 11820) on :
It's always amusing to see where the thread wanders...
Dogbreath, thanks for all the info/suggestions. If I'd been able to lose more than three pounds over the past six months, I'd say it was hitting a wall. As it is, I'm not sure what's going on. I switched apps to myfitnesspal for tracking. It seems to have a little more information on offer, and maybe that's what I need to help keep me honest. I like the tips and goals in the app. Need to schedule a time to meet with the trainer at they gym, too.
I was reading the article about the New York time machine from What If? Serious Scientific Answers..., and there was mention of the American Antelope (if memory serves) and its ability to run 55 mph for at least short distances. I wonder how they'd do in a race of endurance?
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by Traceria: It's always amusing to see where the thread wanders...
Dogbreath, thanks for all the info/suggestions. If I'd been able to lose more than three pounds over the past six months, I'd say it was hitting a wall. As it is, I'm not sure what's going on. I switched apps to myfitnesspal for tracking. It seems to have a little more information on offer, and maybe that's what I need to help keep me honest. I like the tips and goals in the app. Need to schedule a time to meet with the trainer at they gym, too.
You're welcome!
Myfitnesspal is great and has given me pretty awesome results. I recommend getting a kitchen scale if you don't have one already to help measure portions. Measuring out food and planning every meal can be a pain in the butt, but we actually started for budget reasons (we were wasting too much money and food not planning meals) and found it only takes a couple hours at the beginning of every month. And My Fitness Pal helps you track any changes pretty easily.
As for your weight, I would recommend keeping a log (I just use an excel spreadsheet) of your weight every day. Weigh yourself at the same time in the beginning of the morning before you've eaten or drank anything, and then average out your weight over each week's period of time to track your actual gain/loss. I tried weighing myself in the morning yesterday then again in the evening after dinner, and found I had gained 5 lbs. So if you weigh yourself at different times of day and aren't consistent, you may get inaccurate results.
Once you have an exact pattern down - your daily caloric intake as well as your average weight loss - you can establish a baseline of how many calories your body actually burns and start tweaking the numbers.
quote:I was reading the article about the New York time machine from What If? Serious Scientific Answers..., and there was mention of the American Antelope (if memory serves) and its ability to run 55 mph for at least short distances. I wonder how they'd do in a race of endurance?
I researched pronghorns for a while and apparently they've some of the best distance runners in the world, as their "distance speed" is still ~25 mph. I'm not sure how long they can sustain that, but for miles at least.
That being said, Native Americans used to run them down. Probably by making them sprint repeatedly and wearing them out. (55 mph is sustainable for only short distances)
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Through the whole measles anti vax thing, I've often been tempted to bring up fat acceptance and anti-vax. Maybe because I used to be both. I find the efforts to shame anti-vax folks so counterproductive, however delicious it appears to the majority.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
to shame anti-vax people and the anti-vax movement is never going to pull over the stubborn deniers, which is a movement that sort of self-selects to being stubbornly impervious to medical and scientific truths (and if they weren't, and were thus conceivably able to have their minds changed on the issue, they are most likely to have left the movement by now) but the shame is important to deny the movement any sort of legitimacy to breed and grow.
Let people die on that hill if they want to, but make them seem so shamelessly idiotic that few people are going to be pulled in to join them.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: Let people die on that hill if they want to, but make them seem so shamelessly idiotic that few people are going to be pulled in to join them.
This is my belief as well.
With the Fat Acceptance movement, the greatest danger is to children brought up in an environment where it's believed that obesity is healthy or desirable. The sheer number of medical problems, pain, shortened lifespan, and limited lifestyle caused by obesity is sad and difficult enough to deal with in adults. When the person literally has never been given a chance at living a normal lifestyle (for reasons discussed here, losing that much weight is very difficult to accomplish) because his parents/teachers decided that being obese is "healthy" because they didn't want to hurt someone's feelings, it's that much worse. And arguably, seeing the sheer number of people in the U.S. dying of obesity-related diseases, I think it's extremely important to stop.
Curiously, I don't think anyone here has recommended shaming as a method of doing so. I think firmly and vocally denying the anti-scientific claims of fat acceptance people (as well global warming deniers, young earth creationists, anti-vaxxers, etc.) and refusing to entertain the notion of teaching their garbage in school is enough.
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
Well, with fat acceptance there do exists disorders on the other side that it is feared we would push people into. Though I think the attitudes that actually give rise to anorexia have less to do with fat shaming per se as with overalll perfectionism.
I do think there could be an overlap between anti vax, fat acceptance, and other conspiracy theoriests and borderline personality disorder. So is shaming still the right tool in that case? The whole crux of personality disorder is where a maladaptive response is perceived by the individual as integral to self. Distrust, selfishness, isolation, jealousy, greed, manipulation and even loyalty become overemphasized.
I just don't think attacking people is the right way. It's answering fear with fear. The fear is real. But a doctor advocating for the truly unimmunizable is different from shaming. How does the mob decide which cases their doctor should be turning away?
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
Well, if you are fat enough, you don't fit on the examining table....
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
quote:Originally posted by pooka: Well, with fat acceptance there do exists disorders on the other side that it is feared we would push people into. Though I think the attitudes that actually give rise to anorexia have less to do with fat shaming per se as with overalll perfectionism.
The attitude that thin=perfect didn't come from just anywhere.
I'm a size 0 thanks to curvy pants, vanity sizing and genetics. My sisters, who are more or less my height and but not much above me in weight are upset that they are "fatter" than me. Their weights are so far into the realm of "shouldn't care at all" based on what they weigh, fortunately do not have disordered eating, but *it still bothers them*.
There's this pervasive attitude that anything over a size 0-2 is unhealthy, that thin is part of being perfect.
As CT points out, it's OK, medically speaking to be overweight. Obese, not really. Morbidly obese not at all, but our society is full of people who are shamed and harassed for being perfectly healthy.
Our society is so screwed up, we have no idea what healthy is anymore. Anorexia isn't healthy (and it kills harder than obesity) and nor is morbid obesity, but as long as you're well away from either extreme, and your lifestyles includes healthy food and exercise, than you should be fine.
There's also this horrible hate toward fat people that's just inexplicable. My fat friend gets unsolicited hate messages for simply having her picture on the internet in ways that normal people display their pictures. Her health (which admittedly is terrible) does not warrant nasty comments from strangers telling her to kill herself. Countless fat people who have lost weight can testify the difference in attitude they receive from everyone after becoming skinnier.
I read this fascinating book on Project Gutenberg, How to Analyze People On Sight (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30601/30601-h/30601-h.htm)
The book is filled with old-timey pseudo-science ("highly accurate science" according to the book), explains a lot of where our stereotypes come from, but it also describes how fat people were viewed before being fat was this shameful thing. They were lazy, owned comfortable furniture, ate too much food, were the best of business sharks, destined to die young from heart problems, popular and the life of every party-- all at once!
I don't know, if the people of the 1920s, with all their specialness that would not be tolerated today, could deal with the fact that fat people were unhealthy but treat them as part of society, we should be able to too.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by theamazeeaz: but as long as you're well away from either extreme, and your lifestyles includes healthy food and exercise, than you should be fine.
Unfortunately, this idea that you should maintain a healthy body weight, eat healthy food and exercise regularly makes you a "healthist" and an oppressor.
I wonder of the HAES/FAM people realize how much they have in common with Pro-Ana groups, or realize just how damaging shaming people (especially young women) for their body can be.
Posted by Shanna (Member # 7900) on :
I read alot about body positivism and follow alot of body positive and fat acceptance bloggers and yet I've never seen anyone discouraging a healthy diet or exercise. Most of the bloggers I follow are super into yoga and are working to dispel the notion that yoga is only for thin, white girls. I got some of my best clean recipes from these blogs.
The only negativity I've seen happens when one of those "real women have curves" or similar images go around. About half the women talk about how body positivism should mean teaching all women to love all bodies. The other half defend the ability of marginalized women to express frustration with images of thin women (much along the lines of letting women complain men when they're angry at the patriarchy, or for people of color to rail against white people when they're frustrated by a institutionalized racism.) Its the whole argument that you should only be offended by "skinny b*tches" if you are a "b*tch" otherwise calm down because they're not complaining about you.
I've never seen "healthist" equated with a healthy lifestyle, but mostly with the pervasive behavior of some health care providers who blame every complaint on weight issues rather than investigate and treat their patient the same as someone who weighed 50 pounds less. I've heard so many first-hand accounts of women who have gotten sick or nearly died because a doctor didn't take their aches and pains seriously. Some healthists also sell the lie that body size equates to general health and well-being. Or that being a smaller size will make a person happier.
There are plenty of people who eat well, exercise, but are perfectly happy to maintain at their current size even if its larger than what society deems desirable. From my experiences, the Fat Acceptance Movement is about letting girls and women know that being fat is okay. They are allowed to look in the mirror, say "I am fat" and feel no more or less negative about the statement than if they had said "I am blonde" or "I am short." They may not always be short, they may dye their hair, they may lose the weight at some point in their life. But in a moment, they are allowed and encouraged to accept and love themselves for who they are without any qualifiers or negative connotations.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by Shanna: Some healthists also sell the lie that body size equates to general health and well-being.
quote:The estimated number of annual deaths attributable to obesity among US adults is approximately 280,000 based on HRs from all subjects and 325,000 based on HRs from only nonsmokers and never-smokers.
I highly encourage you to read the study above, as well as the wikipedia article on obesity and it's citations. Simply put, this is not a "lie" that doctors and the healthcare industry conspired to start telling people to make them feel bad about their weight, it is the truth. Obesity being an extremly unhealthy condition that kills hundreds of thousands of people every year is factual. While I completely respect your choices as far as what you want to do with your own body, trying to push dangerous lies on other people for a political agenda or because the truth *hurts your feelings* is immoral and, in the cases where children are involved, abuse. Telling people not to listen to medical professionals because you don't like what they have to say, or accusing doctors who choose to practice medicine with integrity and honesty "healthists", is also immoral and evil.
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
Dogbreath, what's your take on the research in the intervening 15 years since that article was published? *interested
--- Edited to add: I've been interested in following the ongoing conversations in the literature about outcomes. As I mentioned before, my read is that it is more complicated than often portrayed, especially given large meta-analyses coming out in the last decade or so.
--- Edited Part 2: Also, just to be clear, I'm not recommending obesity as a goal for anyone. I'm not recommending becoming overweight as a goal for anyone, either. I am professionally interested in being clear for myself and in broader discourse about what we do and do not know. The issue is, I think, more complicated in many ways -- not just what we know, but also in how to support change in personal choices, if that is the goal. From the research, it looks like intuitively appealing approaches are not necessarily helpful, and I think that's critical to understand and acknowledge in broader discourse.
If the way we try to motivate people to change does not in general work -- and especially if it tends to lead to more negative outcomes -- then I think we need to change our discourse, if changing the outcomes is the goal. There is indeed research on this. These issues are not settled by any means, but there has been more and and more data gathered as dialogue in the research communities goes on, and the interpretations of that data become better informed as the years go by, too.
[ February 08, 2015, 10:57 AM: Message edited by: CT ]
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by CT: Dogbreath, what's your take on the research in the intervening 15 years since that article was published? *interested
I've read some on survival paradox, which seems to be a relatively new field of research on the subject. I'd say the most recent research I've read is from 2010, an article doing meta-analysis on the correlation between overweight/obese mothers and underweight babies. Unfortunately, most of my reading on the matter is summaries rather than original research for two reasons: 1) a lot of the original research is behind pay walls and 2) I'm not a medical professional/scientist, so my interest in the subject and the time/money I'm willing to invest isn't high enough. (Also, since I lack the education to neccesarily understand or appreciate the research meaningfully, I'm not sure how much good it would do me as opposed to listening to professionals/scientific consensus)
(I read the article above, for example, since my sister is a medical professional who works neonatal and sometimes with expectant mothers and deals with obesity amoung other diseases that can cause complications)
quote:--- Edited to add: I've been interested in following the ongoing conversations in the literature about outcomes. As I mentioned before, my read is that it is more complicated than often portrayed, especially given large meta-analyses coming out in the last decade or so.
*nods* If you're talking about survival paradox then I'm somewhat familiar with this, though I'm interested in your take on what it means and what the ramifications are. I was kind of hoping you would weigh in on the discussion more since I believe you've got the most experience with the subject. Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
Oh god, mostly I've learned how much I don't know. Let me get my head together, and I'll try to come up with something.
First, though, is noting that part of the problem has to do with varying definitions. The WHO definitions of overweight and obese can vary more or less from the CDC definitions (depending on the timeframe), and that has very little to do with how the words are used in popular culture. I mean, nobody is calling Naomi Campbell obese (I think!), but some people would be called overweight in much popular discourse in some areas, but not others. So discussion of research is problematic, much less discusison of popular culture.
And then (as you rightly pointed out) the Fat Acceptance/healthy At Every Size movement isn't so much a movement as a loosely affiliated cacophony of voices with varying agendas and styles, speaking broadly to the same topic but sometimes with very different perspectives. So critique of the movement (such as it is) is probably going to end up being critiques of subgroups or threads of the discourse, rather than the entire discussion, because the rubric can embrace so much.
And then there is just general people-with-jerk-status, which it seems you and your sweetheart have had the pleasure of encountering in memorable ways. None of which, by the way, would I ever support. What you and she went through sounds decidedly unpleasant, and it would have angered me to experience it.
But how do I take all of that, distill it for myself, and make sense of how to discuss weight and outcomes? How do I interact with my teenagers and their parents (and, sadly, with preteens and even younger) in a way that promotes health instead of driving it away? That's a huge task. In a patient population of about 1600 (ranging from newborn to 17 years old), I have 7 kids with diagnosed eating disorders, 4 of which have been hospitalized for critical status. I have concerns about 5 or 6 others, given remarks they have made. And I have about 2 dozen families who are concerned about weight gain in their kids and are seeking ways to address it.
Help.
I was trained at 2 sites with specific interests in obesity treatment and prevention. I'm trying to stay on top of things, but I don't feel okay about using any one source (including people who trained me and that I respect) to tackle this. Nonetheless, this very conversation we are having will be really helpful in making me clarify my thoughts. I'll do my best.
It's not coming from a position of authority, though. just so's we're clear on that.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by CT: Oh god, mostly I've learned how much I don't know. Let me get my head together, and I'll try to come up with something.
First, though, is noting that part of the problem has to do with varying definitions. The WHO definitions of overweight and obese can vary more or less from the CDC definitions (depending on the timeframe), and that has very little to do with how the words are used in popular culture. I mean, nobody is calling Naomi Campbell obese (I think!), but some people would be called overweight in much popular discourse in some areas, but not others. So discussion of research is problematic, much less discusison of popular culture.
*nods* The BMI scale is particularly problematic in it's oversimplification. At 6' 2" and 220 lbs I have a BMI of 28.2 which is "overweight" and near obese, but am 8% body fat and have been, on occasion, called "painfully thin." Mostly because I have a very large frame, wide shoulders, wide chest, long arms, etc. Other guys my same height and weight and body fat but with smaller frames look considerably more muscular, and non-athletic guys of my height and weight look noticeably fat. If I was actually at the low end of normal weight according to BMI (145 lbs) I would be dangerously underweight.
Which is why I'm hesitant to believe figures stating that 1/3rd of the US is obese and 2/3rds are overweight. I would be curious to see similar studies done using, say, body fat percentage calculated with skin calipers or bioelectrical impedance analysis as weighing and even taping aren't necessarily accurate measurements of how fat you are. Let alone how fat you should be.
quote:And then (as you rightly pointed out) the Fat Acceptance/healthy At Every Size movement isn't so much a movement as a loosely affiliated cacophony of voices with varying agendas and styles, speaking broadly to the same topic but sometimes with very different perspectives. So critique of the movement (such as it is) is probably going to end up being critiques of subgroups or threads of the discourse, rather than the entire discussion, because the rubric can embrace so much.
And then there is just general people-with-jerk-status, which it seems you and your sweetheart have had the pleasure of encountering in memorable ways. None of which, by the way, would I ever support. What you and she went through sounds decidedly unpleasant, and it would have angered me to experience it.
One of the most curious and saddest things about these movements is how centered they are on women and women's bodies. I've seen everything from wonderful things like "you're beautiful just the way you are" and the body positivity groups, which I support whole-heartedly, to openly shaming and ridiculing skinny women saying "they're not real women" or "they're all bitches" or talking about their lack of sexual appeal, etc. This seems like a particularly shameful thing to do to young women, who already have enough problems at it is with body image and eating disorders.
Last year my wife and I went to a baby shower for my friend's wife. A lot of my buddies and their S/Os were there and she was fairly nervous because it was her first time meeting these people. She wore a nice, modest dress and walked in and was extremely friendly, introduced herself to everyone, brought cookies, and we brought a very nice gift.
All but 1 of the women at the shower completely ignored her. Every time she tried to join a conversation, they all stopped talking and glared at her. Eventually after trying for an hour and a half she just came over and watched football with me and my buddies in the living room. I went to use the bathroom and heard the women talking amongst themselves "skinny little bitch, thinks she's so much better than us." "Ugly little haole bitch." We left shortly thereafter.
It may be partly a cultural thing, but her appearance is constantly a matter of criticism from women around her. Women glare at her in the gym (where she teaches a group fitness class), when we go out I notice other women looking at her hatefully, and they can be quite brutal. Which admittedly made me extremely frustrated with Shanna's comment about how "they're just expressing frustration with the image of thin women" and how "if she's not a bitch she should calm down because it doesn't apply to you." (I've heard similar justifications for using the 'n' word mind you...) Yeah, bullcrap.
I don't think any good comes from replacing one arbitrary beauty standard with another, or that hate is any better depending on who the target is.
But the sad part is that, as a guy, my body has never been the subject of ridicule or discussion. Nor have I felt especially pressured to embrace one beauty standard or another. My friends range from toothpick thin to obese, and I can't think of a time when I've ever felt self-conscious about my weight or like I shouldn't socialize with people of other weights.
quote:But how do I take all of that, distill it for myself, and make sense of how to discuss weight and outcomes? How do I interact with my teenagers and their parents (and, sadly, with preteens and even younger) in a way that promotes health instead of driving it away? That's a huge task. In a patient population of about 1600 (ranging from newborn to 17 years old), I have 7 kids with diagnosed eating disorders, 4 of which have been hospitalized for critical status. I have concerns about 5 or 6 others, given remarks they have made. And I have about 2 dozen families who are concerned about weight gain in their kids and are seeking ways to address it.
Help.
I don't envy you whatsoever. Especially with teenagers, shame and the desire to be accepted play such crucial roles and they're incredibly sensitive and receptive to criticism. I.e, just suggesting or talking about a healthy diet and exercise to a teenager (over, under, or normal weight) might give them the impression you think they're not ok. OTOH, that sort of education is absolutely vital - I knew a lot of kids in high school who would "diet" by systematically skipping meals for a day or two and then binging on junk food, or eat very unhealthily in general - and maybe a doctor talking to them about nutrition and health would have really helped. School education about nutrition and exercise is already woefully lacking (and what is there is under attack by a lot of fat acceptance groups for being "discriminatory"), and I think a lot of parents are very lacking in their understanding as well. I.e, when Napoleon Dynamite came out it made me think of a guy I knew whose parents would regularly pack him a tupperware full of just tater tots or french fries for lunch. I went over to his house occasionally and they would eat TV dinners, or hot pockets, or snack food for meals. He ended up getting sick a lot.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Jezebel has a pretty good article about "All About That Bass" and the rather anti-feminist nature of the FAM in general. (As does the NY Post)
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
What are the take-home points for you from the Jezebel article? I think I might be seeing a different message there, and I'm interested in your take on it.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
That promoting body positivity by saying "look, boys like the way I look better!" or generally basing your self esteem on your percieved sexual desirability/what other people think of how you look is a step backwards, not forwards.
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
Yeah, I think we're on the same page for that.
I'm a bit muddled about this, though -- has that been a focus yet in the conversation here, or is it a new but related concern you wanted to bring up?
I am a bit afraid this will sound challenging, and I don't mean it to. I'm having trouble following this conversation, and I know at least part of that has to do with some of the vagueness about it in my own mind. [see my long digression above]
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
Argh, maybe this will help -- I read the article and wasn't clear on how it linked to the concerns already raised in this thread. I wonder if your experience of FA is much more heavily tinged with the flavor of sexual self-objectification because of the experience you relate early on in the thread?
It may be that the connection isn't there for me because it is not the context in which I experience the FA movement (such as it is, and such as I do).
--- Edited to add: that is, maybe it is an aspect not visible to me but obvious to others.
Posted by Shanna (Member # 7900) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:Originally posted by Shanna: Some healthists also sell the lie that body size equates to general health and well-being.
quote:The estimated number of annual deaths attributable to obesity among US adults is approximately 280,000 based on HRs from all subjects and 325,000 based on HRs from only nonsmokers and never-smokers.
I highly encourage you to read the study above, as well as the wikipedia article on obesity and it's citations. Simply put, this is not a "lie" that doctors and the healthcare industry conspired to start telling people to make them feel bad about their weight, it is the truth. Obesity being an extremly unhealthy condition that kills hundreds of thousands of people every year is factual. While I completely respect your choices as far as what you want to do with your own body, trying to push dangerous lies on other people for a political agenda or because the truth *hurts your feelings* is immoral and, in the cases where children are involved, abuse. Telling people not to listen to medical professionals because you don't like what they have to say, or accusing doctors who choose to practice medicine with integrity and honesty "healthists", is also immoral and evil.
I'd counter by saying healthy people are healthy, and unhealthy people are unhealthy. Simple as that.
There are thin people who get winded climbing stairs and there are heavy people who run marathons. There are medical conditions that equally affect thin and heavy people but when a medical professional refuses to approach them equally, then we have a problem. When a heavy person has medical concerns that are ignored and improperly treated because a doctor is fixated on their weight when it may or may not have any bearing on their symptoms, then we have a problem.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:There are thin people who get winded climbing stairs and there are heavy people who run marathons.
Yes, and there are unvaccinated people who are healthy and vaccinated people with autism, there are non-smokers with lung cancer and smokers who live 100+ years, etc, etc, ad ad nauseam. This argument is nothing new. Do you think a doctor ought to tell a smoker to keep smoking because, hey, nonsmokers get sick too?
quote: There are thin people who get winded climbing stairs and there are heavy people who run marathons. There are medical conditions that equally affect thin and heavy people but when a medical professional refuses to approach them equally, then we have a problem. When a heavy person has medical concerns that are ignored and improperly treated because a doctor is fixated on their weight when it may or may not have any bearing on their symptoms, then we have a problem.
Pretending weight isn't an issue isn't going to solve the problem of incompetent doctors. It'll only exacerbate it. Which isn't to say this argument - that we should pretend a serious medical problem (perhaps *the* most serious medical problem in the developed world) doesn't exist because doctors might fixate on it too much - makes any sense.
But also, in all my reading, I've yet to encounter any evidence of doctors systematically ignoring problems that heavy people have because of their weight. In the case of misdiagnosis - which is a problem across the board in medicine - it could probably be because weight so commonly causes those problems that it's the most likely culprit. I.e, if 95% of the time a problem is caused by being overweight and my patient is severely overweight, I'll be inclined to assume that's the cause. If I'm a competent doctor I'll run a few extra tests and try and see if anything else is wrong, but in many cases it's difficult to pin down the exact cause of an illness if there's more than one possible cause so I'll try and address the most probable (and fixable) one first.
For example, if a doctor has a patient with emphysema and he knows the patient smokes 2 packs a day, his first response will be to tell the patient to stop smoking. It's possible that something else actually caused it and a good doctor will ask enough questions to rule out anything else, but he's going to focus on the most probable cause first. Plus, stopping smoking will both alleviate some of the symptoms and help make it easier to figure out what other causes there might be.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
For years my doctor assumed that my fatigue was caused by my being overweight. All he would suggest was that I should lose weight. I am pretty sure that if I came in with a stab wound, he would tell me to lose weight before he stopped the bleeding. Which, of course, I should. However, turns out that my fatigue was caused by being dangerous anemic. It got to the point of muscle cramps and heart palpitations before it was diagnosed - and then only because I donate blood regularly and it was noted then. I also probably gained 40 pounds due to the anemia because of the fatigue. If the doctor hadn't been so sure that my symptoms were indicative of a moral failing, I would be healthier now.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
*nods* It sounds like your doctor failed to even order a blood test, which is something I get every year during a physical exam. It baffles me that he would fail to notice it after years of annual physicals. I'm not a doctor but any of the symptoms you mention - fatigue where it wasn't present before, sudden weight gain, muscle cramps, etc. - would make me suspect anemia. The question is if he was being a bigot or merely incompetent - I've had doctors more or less ignore or brush off medical concerns I've had as well. (I.e, while dealing with severe fatigue and anxiety being told "you should probably sleep more")
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Or he just could see past the fat. My Dad was obese - he had gall stones, they assumed heart attack first. When he did have heart trouble, it took them awhile to diagnose the mitral valve damage because they were so sure that he had blocked arteries even though angiogram after angiogram showed clear arteries.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
By "see past the fat" do you mean consider diagnoses other than the most likely one (being thorough) or simply ignoring fat as a likely cause of certain diseases?
Like with your dad, I'm going to go out on a limb and guess they assumed a heart attack because most of the symptoms indicated that to be the case and the wanted to treat the most serious possible problem first. After they ruled that out (and possibly other things) they were able to diagnose the gallstones correctly. That's generally how diagnosis works - they start with the most likely thing that the most evidence supports, and move down from there. Not because the most likely thing is always true, or even almost always true, simply most likely to be true. I think ignoring obesity will have a pretty deleterious effect on diagnosis, much like ignoring smoking in cases involving lung disease (even though there are many other things that cause it) would also be unethical.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
I am not sure that the relationships between those things are as clear-cut as you assume. Dad's heart issue was, in all likelihood congenital. The weight exacerbated it, but didn't cause it. My heart, despite being considerably overweight, is in great shape. My blood pressure is low-normal as is my heart rate. I have COPD despite never having smoked. Go figure.
I don't have a problem with checking most liklies first; I do have a problem with the dogged insistence that a lack of will power is the cause of every problem to the point of not looking for other possibilities until the patient loses weight.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
It seems like there's some strange crossover going on here. Are there many scenarios in which obesity will be misidentified as the pressing health problem in a given individual? Well sure, that seems like it should go without saying. Is this likely because many people turn off the analytical parts of their thinking when faced with something they can judge a moral failing, or something that is generally accepted? Also true, I have no doubt.
None of that seems to have any bearing on what seems clear, that while being overweight or even being outright obese may on a case by case basis not be a significant health problem, it's not going to ever be the ideal 'setting' so to speak for one's body. However, that can seem a lot harsher than it really is I think. 'Not ideal' could describe many people who are active and will live to be ninety in good health who are also overweight. However, it will also describe the person who is carrying an extra hundred pounds and will not.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: I don't have a problem with checking most liklies first; I do have a problem with the dogged insistence that a lack of will power is the cause of every problem to the point of not looking for other possibilities until the patient loses weight.
I think we're mostly in agreement here, then.
quote: None of that seems to have any bearing on what seems clear, that while being overweight or even being outright obese may on a case by case basis not be a significant health problem, it's not going to ever be the ideal 'setting' so to speak for one's body. However, that can seem a lot harsher than it really is I think. 'Not ideal' could describe many people who are active and will live to be ninety in good health who are also overweight. However, it will also describe the person who is carrying an extra hundred pounds and will not.
Yeah, it's a matter of science and statistics, which makes dealing with people who rely on anecdote to inform their life choices incredibly frustrating. I.e, with the smoking, I bring that up because I know several people who when confronted about how dangerous it is will claim "my aunt Ruth lived to 102 and she smoked 2 packs a day" and use that to completely dismiss what science and medicine have to tell them.
Likewise, I'm sure there are thousands of anecdotal stories of obese people who live well into old age, don't experience heart problems, respiratory problems, or any of the other problems associated with having your internal organs compressed by large amounts of fat. Just like there are people who have had kids start showing signs of autism or die of SIDS or whatnot right after vaccination. And of course there are nonsmokers who die of lung disease, skinny people who have heart attacks, and vaccinated people who catch the measles.
But when you actually look at the physiology of the human body and look at hundreds of years of medical research tell you, as well as exhaustive statistical analysis, you find an overwhelming amount of proof that being severely overweight is bad for you and drastically reduces average lifespan while increasing the risk of various diseases. And I'm immediately distrustful of anyone who tries to advance a cause that challenges or attempts to refute science as we know it by using anecdotes, feelings, "instinct" ("parent's instinct" or otherwise), or guilt. (or religion for that matter)
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
I think direct opposition to science and rationality are a bad thing. However, I'm curious about whether self-acceptance might be a (minimally qualified) good, when it comes to outcomes. That is, what if "fat acceptance" helps position people, emotionally and cognitively, to adopt more self-caring and health-improving behaviors? (Relative to "being fat is bad, don't be fat" messaging?) This seems rather plausible to me, although I have not looked into it.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Yep. My emotional response to visit to this doctor is to go get a hamburger.
Posted by Traceria (Member # 11820) on :
There is something to be said for how loving yourself as you are can be a positive motivator.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
quote:But when you actually look at the physiology of the human body and look at hundreds of years of medical research tell you, as well as exhaustive statistical analysis, you find an overwhelming amount of proof that being severely overweight is bad for you and drastically reduces average lifespan while increasing the risk of various diseases.
Dogbreath, CT has repeatedly and politely told you that you are wrong about this, and it is not a currently accepted fact in the medical field. Yet you keep repeating it, like some sort of zealot not interested in listening to facts. Go re-read her first post in the thread, and then please stop saying it's a matter of science and statistics, when it's really not that clear-cut.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Hmmm. Having read her post again just now, I'm not sure she would disagree since he qualified it with 'severely' and unless I am mistaken the key point of her post was that it's neither statistically or medically clear that being slightly overweight is actually detrimental to one's health.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Yes, if I understood CT correctly, her point is that there is some meta-analysis that indicates being slightly overweight might be good for you. That's what prompted our discussion of the inaccuracy of BMI earlier on this page, for example. But even the link she posted clearly states being obese is bad for you and shortens one's lifetime. At no time did she say I was wrong or actually disagree with me on that point.
Reading almost any journal on the subject, asking any doctor, or simply perusing the wikipedia article on the subject will show you that it *is* an accepted fact in the medical field, indeed one of the most clear cut and agreed upon ones.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
I would characterize her position as that there is a bit more than just meta analysis that being slightly overweight etc, but that's just my take on her post.
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:Originally posted by theamazeeaz: but as long as you're well away from either extreme, and your lifestyles includes healthy food and exercise, than you should be fine.
Unfortunately, this idea that you should maintain a healthy body weight, eat healthy food and exercise regularly makes you a "healthist" and an oppressor.
I wonder of the HAES/FAM people realize how much they have in common with Pro-Ana groups, or realize just how damaging shaming people (especially young women) for their body can be.
Those people are nuts. I haven't really encountered HAES/FAM people in the wild. Are people like this the norm or the extremists in the movement?
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
As with any movement, the most extreme ones tend to be the loudest, so hopefully they're not the norm. I have a few friends on Facebook who fall more towards the extreme end of this movement, and it gets into some fairly whacky territory. (mostly by attempting to translate concepts and phrases from other social justice movements in a way that doesn't really make sense.)
On Healthism: http://****nohealthism.tumblr.com/ (slightly NSFW, you have to substitute the ****s for the 'f' word) is an excellent compilation of quotes that outline anti-healthist beliefs pretty clearly.
This video turns into a debate between several HAES/FAM and physicians/fitness trainers about several of their claims. (starts about the 5 minute mark. Goes several experts talking about increased risk for disease, the fact obesity costs Australia $60bn/year along with some of the HAES/anti-healthists expressing their views)
Edit: Actually, really recommend this video for everyone looking for a better understanding of the subject and some of the claims being made by the HAES movement. It's a very civil discussion with none of the yelling or grandstanding we see so often on American TV, which is nice. It also covers some of the horrific diseases caused by excess weight. (including a girl who got bariatric surgery because her size was damaging her ovaries to the point of possibly making her infertile)
Those are a few examples, and as can be expected some of them are fairly reasonable and understandable, or even things I agree with. (nobody should be bullied or singled out or treated like crap due to their size, period) There has, however, been an alarming uptick in anti-healthist articles and activists as of late, which is what has made me start to worry about the general direction the movement is heading in.
Mostly I'm worried about using sociological or psychological concepts in an attempt to refute or ignore medical science. I.e, a thin man arrogantly saying "I don't know why you're so fat, losing weight is *easy*" is definitely an asshole and also probably benefiting from "thin privilege" (if such concept can be said to exist in our society where the majority of persons are overweight...). A medical doctor telling you it would be healthy for you to exercise more and eat less until you lose 50 lbs is definitely *not* thinsplaining, or exercising thin privilege, or enforcing an system of endemic oppression.
Whether he is wrong or right to do so is another matter, but it should be decided by science, and as CT and I have discussed there's quite a bit of research and debate on the very subject. When you start telling people to ignore their doctors for social justice reasons, or make science and medicine the boogieman of your movement, I become very wary of it.
Actually, I generally find any movement that relies mainly on appeals to emotion and empathy rather than fact and logic inherently distrustful. For example, with the recent anti-cry it out movement, I knew absolutely nothing about it (I have no children) until reading this article: http://www.phillyvoice.com/screaming-sleep/
The first page or two is all anecdotal purple prose, and where science is involved at all, it's neither clearly stated nor systematic and consists mostly of various doctors "saying" things.
So I googled the subject and sure enough, it's been proven again and again to be safe and effective. Not that I really care about the subject, but I can't think of a "pop" science debate I've seen yet where the group mostly relying on emotion, anecdote or outrage to press their point has been remotely right.
[ February 11, 2015, 01:51 AM: Message edited by: Dogbreath ]
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Do you really want to bring in another oversimplification of a complicated topic to illustrate your oversimplification of a completely unrelated complicated topic?
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
You know, since literally the first post in this thread I've discussed the movement and the science behind it in detail. I've discussed the nuances of different beliefs they hold, the implications of various research and concepts like BMI, and the kinesiology and physiology of the human body. I've also been willing to discuss this topic in good faith with anyone interested in doing the same.
So I don't think accusing me of oversimplifying the subject with a one sentence post is very fair or accurate.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Here's where I think I'm feeling disconnect with your thread: Health issues are between a person and their doctor. They're not really anyone else's business. Weight is one of the few health risk factors that is very public; any other risk factor, even something like smoking that is directly behavioral, can be hidden. Yes, the science that being overweight is associated with negative health outcomes is clear. But so is the science that shows negative health outcomes associated with depression.
If there were a movement to help people with cancer feel better about themselves would you feel the need to point out that cancer really is unhealthy?
I think you're looking at a few wackos who go too far and extrapolating it into a huge risk of people aspiring to get or stay overweight. The science that being massively overweight is not healthy is clear. The science on what is causing the obesity epidemic is not. I would bet quite a lot, though, that fat-acceptance extremists are not a significant factor.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by dkw: Here's where I think I'm feeling disconnect with your thread: Health issues are between a person and their doctor. They're not really anyone else's business.
Yes, absolutely. And this is what I've argued throughout the entire thread. Which is why I think a movement that openly tells people to ignore their doctors, or even ridicules doctors as "healthists" is so dangerous.
Likewise, the public shaming of skinny women with calling them "skinny bitches" being socially acceptable. I have never made any assumptions or judgements about an overweight person, or made derogatory comments about them, or in any way treated them with anything but respect for their body. Neither has my wife, actually, yet she's been repeatedly attacked by these people just because of how she looks and the career field she's in.
quote:Weight is one of the few health risk factors that is very public; any other risk factor, even something like smoking that is directly behavioral, can be hidden. Yes, the science that being overweight is associated with negative health outcomes is clear. But so is the science that shows negative health outcomes associated with depression.
Yes, which is why it's probably not good to shame people. Or make them feel bad about their size.
quote:If there were a movement to help people with cancer feel better about themselves would you feel the need to point out that cancer really is unhealthy?
In this analogy if they were claiming cancer was perfectly healthy, or telling people to ignore their doctor about the dangers of cancer and how to treat it (because doctors who treat cancer are part of a system of oppression), then I would absolutely, vociferously, 100% do so.
I think there's a vast difference between feeling good about oneself despite having a disease and attacking anyone who claims that it *is* a disease. For a somewhat ludicrous (and yes, oversimplified) analogy: I have a buddy who got his leg blown off in 2010 and wears a prosthetic leg. He's very active and healthy, competes in paralympics, and is part of a support group for amputee athletes. I can't imagine that support group (which does a lot to raise awareness of some of the challenges facing amputees, and some of the bigotry against them) ever claiming that losing a limb is a desirable or healthy thing to have happen or that doctors who operate to save people's limbs after accidents are bigots. (though again, it's an imperfect analogy)
quote:I think you're looking at a few wackos who go too far and extrapolating it into a huge risk of people aspiring to get or stay overweight. The science that being massively overweight is not healthy is clear. The science on what is causing the obesity epidemic is not. I would bet quite a lot, though, that fat-acceptance extremists are not a significant factor.
I absolutely agree they're not a significant factor in the cause right now. The movement (especially the extreme edge) is growing at the moment though, and I'm worried about what impact this profoundly anti-science movement will have on future generations. Specifically, the danger of anti-vaxxers isn't in the people who believe it, it's because those people have children they don't vaccinate. Likewise, a belief that obesity isn't dangerous might lead one to raise obese children, or even deemphasize PE and nutrition in school. (Whatever still remains of it)
But my main concern isn't with the movement causing obesity, it's with how it impacts our society is a whole. Specifically, attacking and shaming girls and young women about their bodies can lead to eating disorders. Also, I think encouraging people to ignore the deleterious effects obesity has on their health, or what their doctors recommend to treat it, is dangerous and definitely will lead to more sick or dead people.
In the video I posted above, for example, a HAES woman berates a 20 year old woman for choosing to have bariatric surgery in order to treat several dangerous, possibly life-threatening diseases that were greatly exacerbated by her obesity. Which isn't to say I think bariatric surgery should be commonplace or that I think it's very safe or desirable in most cases, but I don't think it's ok to attack people for choosing to undergo it, especially if the alternatives are worse. Which is really my entire beef with the FAM - it has less to do with making people feel good about themselves (which I totally support) and more to do with attacking anyone who believes obesity is unhealthy.
Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
Dogbreath - I think you and I have completely different experiences of the "fat acceptance movement" (also, disclosure, I am fat and am pretty solidly in the "morbidly obese" category).
Most of what I have seen is people essentially saying that just because you are fat, it doesn't mean you are unhealthy. Yes, you are more likely to have health issues due to your weight, but not necessarily. Most of the people I see talking about these issues aren't advocating for people to go ahead and get fat (or saying that fat is better than skinny), they're just saying that you can't know how healthy someone is by looking at them. There are plenty of skinny people who eat crappily and don't work out and there are lots of fat people who are active and eat healthily.
And as I've said, I'm morbidly obese (I'm trying to work on that). But there often seems to be an assumption that someone who is as heavy as I am is unhealthy in every way, or every issue they have is weight related. But, that's not true - I have genetically low blood pressure (like scary low, which is the opposite of what you'd expect of someone my weight) and cholesterol.
Basically, to my mind, weight is a risk factor. Like smoking is a risk factor. But neither is a simple causative. Ideally, lower weight is better, but not every skinny person is healthier than a heavier person (and FYI - despite my genetic blessings, I don't assume I'm healthy, I just figure it's a couple of things I don't have to worry about for now)
It sounds like you've dealt with a lot of crappy people who purport to be part of the FAM. I'm sorry you've had to deal with them or other wise crappy people, but they're also not representative of everyone.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Risuena: I actually more or less completely agree with you, and I think you and I are on the same page here. You'll notice I address weight as only one factor affecting health - in my own life I consider it to be far less important than diet, exercise, mental health, respiratory and cardiovascular health, even dental health. If I gain or lose fat I don't consider it a big deal... I would start to worry about it more if I approached 25% or more body fat, I think. Which is sort of a point we may or may not disagree with - the further overweight one becomes, the more negative effects it has and the further up the list of health concerns it goes. I don't think it goes past certain things, though - eating disorders are far more likely to kill you if you engage in them then almost any level of obesity. So is smoking (something people occassionally try to lose weight), albiet more more slowly.
The difference in experience is something I have tried to account for in this thread, though maybe I haven't done a good enough job.
Generally the perception one gets from outside or fringe of a culture or group is entirely different from what one gets on the inside. The image the FAM projects to those outside of it comes mostly from it's most vocal and confrontational elements, which unfortunately happen to be it's most extreme ones.
This is more or less a ubiquitous problem, though: as a male I rarely, if ever see the sort of horrible things some guys say to women, nor get the full context. Though thanks to the internet it's easier to see this due to the fact that anybody can read what anyone says, and while my initial reaction to being confronted about men being sexist may be to be defensive (because *I* don't experience it very frequently), I've come to understand and value the outside perspective about the group I belong to.
Likewise for being white, or for being part of the military, or for belonging to a certain faith, or political party. As an insider and not an extreme one, I'm often uniformed or underinformed about some of the things members of my groups do or say.
My post was never intended as a attack on everyone in the movement, but rather certain aspects of it that I've encountered increasingly frequently, and in some cases, reather personally and painfully. If I didn't make that clear enough then I apologize for any offense given.
Posted by Nato (Member # 1448) on :
quote:Running is what humans do best
There's a lot of harmful thinking in this thread. To me, fat acceptance is simply accepting people of all shapes as people, recognizing that they have equal potential of being valuable humans. 'People' is a much broader category than 'people for whom running is their top talent', and this kind of language is harmful to people whose concentration of talent isn't in athletics. Fat people are people too.
As a taxpayer, I support all people's right to get a share of tax dollars for the medical care they need, even if they're a smoker or overweight or addicted to drugs. All these health issues are risk factors and part of the human experience. I'm not going to begrudge anyone the basic respect that I think all humans deserve because they've got one or the other. People who are fat have plenty of opportunities to be lectured about this risk factor.
There are a lot of nice people in the fat acceptance movement, I can assure you.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Are you aware of the context of that quote, Nato? Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
Dogbreath - I realized I never came back to this.
We do agree more than not. I think my biggest issue was that you started off speaking about the fringes of the FAM as if their beliefs were the core of the movement and then later you clarified that you were talking about the fringes, even if they are an exceptionally vocal fringe.
I can't say that I'm part of the FAM - although I fit the demographic and am sympathetic to many of their positions. They can also piss me off with some of the "real women have curves"* or other things that can come off as shaming. Women (and men) come in all sorts of shapes and no one should be doing any judging or shaming of different body types (Yes, I am an idealist, why do you ask?).
*When did curves become associated with weight? Skinny women can be curvy, fat women can be straight. Curves aren't weight dependent.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by Risuena: Dogbreath - I realized I never came back to this.
We do agree more than not. I think my biggest issue was that you started off speaking about the fringes of the FAM as if their beliefs were the core of the movement and then later you clarified that you were talking about the fringes, even if they are an exceptionally vocal fringe.
Yes, I did do that. Frankly, it was a mixture of ignorance about the scope of the FAM (I rather ignorantly assumed that the parts we had experienced represented the majority view of the group) as well as some level of naivete about how the post would be received. Could I go back and rewrite it, I would probably be somewhat less cavalier in my approach and couch my terms more carefully.
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
I can't help but suspect that OSC is overstating a few of his facts in support of his thesis, but I agree with his main points.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Reading it mostly made me wonder who these horrible friends of OSC's are who keep making fun of him for being fat and laughing when he breaks chairs or falls down.
Like, I've only ever seen a single chair break from having an overweight person sit in it (I don't suspect it's a very common occurance) and as soon as it happened several of us rushed over and helped her up, made sure she was ok. Are his friends seriously that cruel?
Other than that, of course fat shaming in any form is stupid and hurtful. I do like how he managed to throw this into the mix:
quote:The very people who are so understanding about other people’s irresistible sexual desires (“men will be men,” “the heart wants what the heart wants”), are often brutally judgmental about other hungers.
So yeah, if you're a supporter of gay marriage or are just more permissive or less judgemental of people's sexual choices you're most likely also a bigot towards overweight or obese people! Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
I respect my father so much that it's difficult to really explain how much I love him in text. I can hardly really put my endorsements of his character into words sufficient enough, blah blah, whatever. If he got fat and then as a result literally broke a chair by sitting on it because he was fat, both myself and my mother (who is similar in our complete respect for the guy, our reverance and love, so on) would be laughing so hard we could probably not breathe or stand up, which is really rather tragic as it would make us easier targets
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:The very people who are so understanding about other people’s irresistible sexual desires (“men will be men,” “the heart wants what the heart wants”), are often brutally judgmental about other hungers.
So yeah, if you're a supporter of gay marriage or are just more permissive or less judgemental of people's sexual choices you're most likely also a bigot towards overweight or obese people!
I haven't read the article, but from the context of your quote it doesn't sound like he's referring to gay marriage supporters. It sounds like he's referring to people who defend overly forward men.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
that said where the hell do you find a chair these days that will break under anything shy of 500 pounds, do people regularly sit in flimsy wicker recliners somewhere I just don't know about or what
i mean i'm in a 20 dollar ikea chair right now. i could be so fat that i would have to sit my butt over both the armrests just to be technically sitting on it, and it still wouldn't break
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick:
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath:
quote:The very people who are so understanding about other people’s irresistible sexual desires (“men will be men,” “the heart wants what the heart wants”), are often brutally judgmental about other hungers.
So yeah, if you're a supporter of gay marriage or are just more permissive or less judgemental of people's sexual choices you're most likely also a bigot towards overweight or obese people!
I haven't read the article, but from the context of your quote it doesn't sound like he's referring to gay marriage supporters. It sounds like he's referring to people who defend overly forward men.
Since I can't really think of anybody who defends "overly forward men" as a demographic, I think it's more plausible that he means the following:
*"men will be men" is a (sloppy to be sure) caricature of a position that having multiple sexual partners before/instead of monogamous intra-marital sex can be a healthy expression of sexuality
*"the heart wants..." is a sloppy caricature of slogans in support of tolerance of homosexuality and same sex marriage, as well as justifications for divorce when you don't love the person you are married to any more.
IN OTHER WORDS he's referring to less restrictive sexual mores in general, in contrast to conservative religious views on sex.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Speaking as a 300 lb. man, there are indeed chairs that I will only gingerly and carefully use. If a chair has a wide wicker or cloth base with no wooden seat, or has thin legs and no crossbraces, or is old and brittle, or has started to loosen over the years and shifts under my weight, I will look for somewhere else to sit or, barring that option, will not allow my full weight to rest on the chair.
I have broken one chair in my life, back when I weighed another forty pounds or so. It was a stackable plastic patio chair and basically shattered into shards the instant I committed myself to it.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by GaalDornick: I haven't read the article, but from the context of your quote it doesn't sound like he's referring to gay marriage supporters. It sounds like he's referring to people who defend overly forward men.
scifibum beat me to the punch here, but based on articles and movie reviews OSC has written in the past, he's using those terms to characterize approval for sexual promiscuity and homosexuality respectively. I can't really see someone justifying overly forward men by saying "the heart wants what the heart wants"... that, and that also stretches the analogy to the breaking point here. (Not that it was a strong one to begin with)
The "men will be men" one is more dubious, but I think he's talking about the theory he's written about several times (see his review of "He's Just Not That Into You") that "alpha males" are naturally promiscuous and use that sort of "men will be men" attitude to flout social mores, civilization, and commitment.
It is an admittedly (possibly intentionally) vague line, but it falls in line with everything else he’s written.
(And yes, I realize I’m basically writing an exegesis of an article published in a small town paper written by an aging science fiction author. Which is probably not too high up there on write in responses to those "what is your hobby?" questionaires)
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: It was a stackable plastic patio chair and basically shattered into shards the instant I committed myself to it.
Oh my god I just lost it at this mental image of you detonating the fragmentation chair
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
It was pretty funny. I was holding a plate of watermelon, baked beans, and cole slaw at the time, which had the expected result. And only one of the shards actually drove itself any distance into my calf, meaning that there was much less blood than there could have been. *wry laugh*
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
See now, that sounds more "oh my God he's got a piece of chair sticking out of him call 911!"-horrifying than hilarious to me, but different strokes I guess.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Oh, there was no way in hell I was going to let anyone know that I'd impaled myself on a chair bit. I went to the bathroom under the pretext of cleaning off my clothes, patched the hole, and carried on.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
it's like the enemy had broken through the front lines and tom was like WE HAVE NO CHOICE. I MUST DETONATE THE CHAIR and he grabs his beans and coleslaw and lands right on that mofo and it immediately explodes into plastic chair shrapnel and eleven charging enemy troops do that japanese movie exxagerated flailing and screaming in pain thing before falling down dead
my god, tom, you've saved us all, here's your purple heart
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Yeah, that's pretty much how it went down, although you can't really do the event justice without attempting to describe the pained smile on my face as I ignominiously flopped around on the patio.
The best part, for me, was the host's reaction: "Oh my God, I'm so sorry! It's never done that before!" As if I thought maybe it had.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
they were just trying to be sure you knew that unlike in similar cases, they were expressly against refurbishing previously detonated chairs and these were all new
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: Oh, there was no way in hell I was going to let anyone know that I'd impaled myself on a chair bit. I went to the bathroom under the pretext of cleaning off my clothes, patched the hole, and carried on.
I think I overestimated the size of the chair peice in question. I was imagining a jagged shard about a foot long and a few inches wide gouged into your leg with blood spurting and people screaming and so forth.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
"It was a jagged shard about a foot long. I had to help land the chair, before grabbing a rifle and getting engaged in a sortie with the Taliban itself."
- Brian Williams
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
Those plastic patio chairs are terrible. They get weaker after a year or two of UV exposure.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
In all seriousness, it should be noted that most things intended for standing or sitting are generally rated for around 250 pounds, and with safety margins means that 300 pounds is the danger zone. A ladder rated for 300 pounds is much more expensive and much harder to find than a ladder rated for 250, and will probably hold a 300 pound man; fat people get to make that sort of financial decision all the time.
Rides at waterparks and amusement parks straddle the same "maaaaaaybe" scenario. Perhaps you can sit on this inner tube and not sink immediately into the murky depths. Perhaps the safety seat won't collapse the instant you start accelerating downward. It's always exciting to find out.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Climbin' up your ladder, Listen to her howl an' moan: Metal under tension, Beggin' you to go real slow.
Highway to the Danger Zone! Climb into the Danger Zone!
Steppin' onto plywood; Spreadin' out some shingles tonight. Odds got you crashing through the attic And barely finishing the job alive.
Highway to the Danger Zone! You weigh enough; you're Right there in the Danger Zone!
You never take a second step Until you're sure the first won't overload; You never know what you can't do Until you find a rotten spot where you can't go.
Out along the edge Is somehow always where you need to be -- But landing in the hedge Is getting kind of old, you see.
Highway to the Danger Zone! I'm gonna take you Roofing in the Danger Zone! Highway to the Danger Zone! Falling through the Danger Zone!
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
But there is definite complexity here, and there is something that needs to be examined.] There was a huge meta-analysis of international studies done by a senior CDC scientist which found the following: ![[Wave]](graemlins/wave.gif)
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)