I was disappointed by David, the Cynical Dragon's latest post Food for Thought.
I have enjoyed most of his posts, but in this case he is totally wrong. Blaming the obese for being obese, ostracising them and saying that the fat bastards deserve what they get is not a way to tackle the obesity endemic that exists in Wales.
The "easy targets" for the self righteous are the fast food outfits - MacDonalds, Burger King, KFC etc, but these aren't the real peddlers of obesity. The real peddler of obesity is the slimming industry.
The slimming industry has a vested interest in enabling you to lose weight and then regain it so that you become a perpetual customer.
A simple example. If you want to lose a few pounds, stop taking sugar in your tea; within a week or so you will get use to drinking unsweetened tea. NO! Says the slimming industry, don't stop drinking unsweetened tea - don't change this damaging habit - use pretend sugar to sweeten your tea instead.
Don't stop the chocolate habit - eat slimming chocolate. Have a slimming bicky with your brake, what ever you do don't change your lifestyle!
If you take sweetener, or slimming chocs, or slimming bickies you will relapse, you will use sugar and real chocolate and old fashioned biscuits again and you will get another guilt trip and come back to us again - you will become a yo-yo diet customer of ours for life.
And what about the slimming clubs? They tend to provide exercise for seven or so months a year (and sell you the diet chocies whilst you're there), but make sure that you have five months to grow fat again so that you come back again next year. I know women (and they tend to be women) who have been members of such clubs for over twenty years - and they are still not slim!
80% of dietary and exercise advice for the overweight in the UK (it's even higher in the US) comes to us through the vested interest of the slimming industry. Of course, the slimming industry spends millions on advertising in those papers and on those channels who are most likely to promote the fat bastards deserve it line, making us feel guilt about being fat, ensuring that we sign up to the slimming industry's products.
Wales, the UK, the US will never come to terms with the problems of obesity until the slimming industry is exposed as the evil charlatan snake oil peddler that it is.
My anger was directed at the mother, who stated she couldn't afford 'healthy' food.
ReplyDeleteYet somehow she managed to afford gargantuan amounts of 'fast' food for her daughter.
If you look at what that girl was eating there is no way on god's earth it was cheaper than a couple of salads and fruit.
I'm not blaming the girl for being obese, but the blame for her condition must be placed at the mothers door. She was guilty of a form of child abuse and I have no sympathy for her, she should be facing charges.
The mother bought the massive amounts of food, she was the one who somehow managed to pay for it out of benefits, she was the one that did nothing to limit her daughters eating.
If it is the mother or the daughter who are responsible the fact is that they are still victims of the slimming industry.
ReplyDeleteIt may sound like common sense to say that if you are eating 10 bags of crisps a week, you can lose weight and save money by cutting back to 5 packets - but that isn't what the industry encourages us to do. The industry tells us to replace our crisps with a low fat version of the same product, that costs more.
Don't take the bus, don't go in the car - walk its a perfectly good physical activity and saves the fair / petrol costs! That is not what the propaganda tells us to do, we are encouraged to pay mega fees to join fitness clubs instead.
You are right that healthy eating and effective exercise can be cheaper than an unhealthy lifestyle. But getting that message across to the likes of those in your story is bloody difficult, if not impossible when faced with the advertising power of a multi billion pond industry that tells us that the "best" way to get fit is through buying their expensive products.