America's Fat Hatred

There is a new article in Newsweek this week called "America's Fat Hatred". I found it very interesting and if you get the chance to read it - please do. In particular it addresses America's prejudice against fat people - it digs into the question "Why do American's hate fat people so much?" Here is an excerpt from the article:

Fatness has always been seen as a slight on the American character. Ours is a
nation that values hard work and discipline, and it's hard for us to accept that
weight could be not just a struggle of will, even when the bulk of the
research—and often our own personal experience—shows that the factors leading to
weight gain are much more than just simple gluttony. "There's this general
perception that weight can be controlled if you have enough willpower, that it's
just about calories in and calories out," says Dr. Glen Gaesser, professor of
exercise and wellness at Arizona State University and author of BigFat Lies: The
Truth About Your Weight and Your Health, and that perception leads the nonfat to
believe that the overweight are not just unhealthy, but weak and lazy. Even
though research suggests that there is a genetic propensity for obesity, and
even though some obese people are technically healthier than their skinnier
counterparts, the perception remains "[that] it's a failure to control
ourselves. It violates everything we have learned about self control from a very
young age," says Gaesser.

In a country that still prides itself on its Puritanical ideals, the fat self
is the "bad self," the epitome of greed, gluttony, and sloth. "There's a
widespread belief that fat is controllable," says Linda Bacon, author of Health
at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight. "So then it's unlike a
disability where you can have compassion; now you can blame the individual and
attribute all kinds of mean qualities to them. Then consider the thinner people
that are always watching what they eat carefully—fat people are symbols of what
they can become if they weren't so virtuous."

But considering that the U.S. has already become a size XL nation—66 percent
of adults over 20 are considered overweight or obese, according to the Centers
for Disease Control—why does the stigma, and the anger, remain?

Call it a case of self-loathing. "A lot of people struggle themselves with
their weight, and the same people that tend to get very angry at themselves for
not being able to manage their weight are more likely to be biased against the
obese," says Marlene Schwartz, director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and
Obesity at Yale University. "I think that some of this is that anger is
confusion between the anger that we have at ourselves and projecting that out
onto other people." Her research indicates that younger women, who are under the
most pressure to be thin and who are also the most likely to be self-critical,
are the most likely to feel negatively toward fat people. .

As many women's magazines' cover lines note, losing the last five pounds can
be a challenge. So why don't we have more compassion for people struggling to
lose the first 50, 60, or 100? Some of it has to do with the psychological
phenomenon known as the fundamental attribution error, a basic belief that
whatever problems befall us personally are the result of difficult
circumstances, while the same problems in other people are the result of their
bad choices. Miss a goal at work? It's because the vendor was unreliable, and
because your manager isn't giving you enough support, and because the power
outage last week cut into premium sales time. That jerk next to you? He blew his
quota because he's a bad planner, and because he spent too much time taking
personal calls.

The same can be true of weight: "From working with so many people struggling
with their weight, I've seen it many times," says Andrew Geier, a postdoctoral
fellow in the psychology department at Yale University. "They believe they're
overweight due to a myriad of circumstances: as soon as my son goes to college,
I'll have time to cook healthier meals; when my husband's shifts change at work,
I can get to the gym sooner.…" But other people? They're overweight because they
don't have the discipline to do the hard work and take off the weight, and that
lack of discipline is an affront to our own hard work. (Never mind that weight
loss is incredibly difficult to attain: Geier notes that even the most rigorous
behavioral programs result in at most about a 12.5 percent decrease in weight,
which would take a 350-pound man to a slimmer, but not svelte, 306 pounds).

These words called out to me big time. Being overweight has always been a stigma about self control. I have had people say these exact words to me - and it led to the feelings that I have abotu myself that to this day - 100 pounds lighter - I still struggle to overcome. So does the fact that I have now lost 100 pounds mean I found my self control? Hardly! I don't believe it was a matter of self control or will power. I can do hard things - I believe that about myself - but essentially - I don't believe I can do them of my own will power. It is Christ who works within me and through me to accomplish His great works. And it sure wasn't my own self control and will power that made me lose this weight. Let's not be fooled people - I had major surgery to re-route my insides to FORCE me to loose this weight. That is the realization I came to - I needed a major intervention in my life to change A LOT of things about myself - not just my self control around eating. This journey has been about FAR MORE than just calories in and calories out for me. I have had to confront a lot about who I am and what I do and how I react to things. That is NOT FUN!

I had developed many coping mechanisms for my life that had to do with food. If I felt stressed - I ate. If I wanted to reward myself - I ate. If I was upset - I ate. If I was happy - I ate. If I just didn't want to feel what I was feeling anymore - I made it go away by eating. And if you wanted to get in my face about what I was eating or how much - oh just you wait - you ain't seen nothing yet - I would just do it more to prove I could. I did it out in the open - I did it in private when no one was looking.

I've been on the receiving end of hurtful comments about my size. From subtle comments like "You have such a pretty face", or "We only have booth's left and you probably don't want to squeeze into one of those - why don't you wait for a table to open up", to the not so subtle from family members about "How could you let yourself go like that?" I've even been laughed at - to my face - in public - about how fat I was. The whole sticks and stones thing? Crap, I tell you. Pure crap. It hurts and it hurts for a long time.

I have made the excuses about why I couldn't exercise - why I couldn't loose weight. Not all of them were invalid either. From my PCOS, to the various surgeries I had, to my "genes", to my hectic schedule with 3 small children, to my hectic schedule at work, to having all the other responsibilities that life throws my way - be just that - in the way.

And I have swung to the opposite end of the spectrum - feeling like I had found the promised land! I have found the answer my obese peeps! You can loose weight too! I found myself wanting to run up to anyone I saw who I thought could benefit from the surgery and shake them going "Wake up! You can do it! If I can do it - you can do it! Follow me! I know the way!" I didn't feel an anger, but I identify strongly with what was said in the article about how people who struggle with their own weight are more likely to be mad at others about their weight. I went through a stage where I did feel judgemental of others and it bothered me because I have been on the other side of that coin.

All that is to say that I know that it takes time to confront your own demons. You have to be in a place where you can be prepared - mentally, emotionally, physically, to do the battle that needs to be done to win this war. I am no where near winning this war. I am still in the midst of the battle to be sure. It is still a constant struggle for me. I am far enough out from surgery that I can eat more normally than I could right after surgery - and it is now where the rubber meets the road - this is where I have to be sure to make the right decisions. I have to be sure to use this "window of opportunity" that surgery has given me to make the hard changes for my life. I don't get it right every time - the surgery is the tool that helps me make the right decisions right now.

But let's get back to the point of the Newsweek article. What do you think? Do you have a prejudice against fat people? Do you think that you have problems with other people's issues because you struggle with that issue yourself? Such as impatience, laziness, self control, foul language, etc... Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!