General Chunkiness

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In the decade of the Seventies, people gradually became aware that exercise and diet were important for a healthy life.

Unfortunately, super-enthusiastic amateurs began to take the view that you needed a lot of dieting, and a lot of exercise.  From that time, for several decades, interest in an extremely lean body gradually evolved into interest in both lean and very muscular bodies, with many knowledgeable (and less knowledgeable) celebrities marketing their own exercise regimen via videos.  Women, especially, began to diet and exercise in such large numbers, that the women who did not go that route began to feel picked on.  (I suppose unless you oversell your point of view, you never get anywhere in this world.  It has ever been thus.)

Psychologists got into the act, and it came to pass that to remark on someone's weight or shape, or lack thereof, was considered anything from mildly insensitive to insulting, to positively rude.

Now the following facts are probably all acceptable as true:

(A)  You do not need to be very thin to be healthy.  In fact, being extremely thin is a health liability.

(B)  Being moderately slim is something we all want to strive for.  Some of us just don't want attention drawn to the fact that we ought to be a little thinner than we are.

(C)  There is a range of values within which a person's weight should ideally fall, based on the person's height and age and body type.  There isn't one particular ideal weight, but there certainly is a range outside which it is unhealthy.

(D)  People tend to gain weight over the years.  If you start out being chunky, you are likely to be very heavy when you hit your declining years.  See below.

(E)  Extra weight in an elderly person is a major liability.  It threatens the person's safety in numerous ways.  Heart problems, diabetes, blood pressure all become more likely with increasing weight.  (Being too thin is not good, either.)

So how shall we proceed with this discussion?  Should we respect the feelings of high-risk individuals who prefer not to address their health, and let them handle their diet/exercise issues at their leisure?  Should we respect this taboo on talking about weight under any circumstances?

Axiom D is the one I want to focus on.  Parents who defer addressing the excessive weight of their offspring ought to take note that an obese teenager will turn into an obese adult, and an obese adult will usually turn into a sick senior citizen.  Saving the feelings of an overweight offspring is a strategy with diminishing returns.  You've got to address the matter, but do it in such a way that the kid will continue talking to you.  This is tough, especially in this "Politically Correct" climate, but a parent who lives in fear of their child's moods is already in trouble.  Perhaps you need outside support to tackle the job!

One last thing: a person with tiny feet should take particular care to control their weight, or be prepared to face escalating problems with age.  A larger foot does help to handle a larger frame.

This article examines the link between
teen obesity and MS (multiple sclerosis ?)

Since I do not know any of my readers personally, you couldn't possibly take any of this personally.  At the cost of calling your ire upon me, I bring up these issues.  The younger generation is, at a superficial glance, getting to be very chunky indeed.  Health care is all well and good, but a weighty population could mean the end of any sort of health care very soon, simply because of the increased services they will need.  Even the Insurance Companies that we love so much must regard the increasing weight of their younger clients with some alarm.

"Look," you can tell your kid, "I'm not going to be around when you're sixty, so if you're overweight then, I won't be here to see it.  I could pretend it's not going to happen, and leave you alone.  But wherever you're on the weight spectrum now, you're going to be heavier when you're sixty, unless you make some changes.  I can help, or we can do it together.  I don't want to die sick and feeble, either!"

(I suppose the alternative is to die while you're in your prime, and that's not something anyone wishes for.  Think of something you can say instead!  And I hope that you mean it, if you choose to say it!)

[Afterthoughts:

My wife read this post, and remarked that we might be unusual in that we're tactful about how we talk to our children: respectful and diplomatic.  In other words, I've started to treat my child as if she were an adult friend --which she is, of course-- rather than my kid.  My wife, I realize now, has treated her children that way for a long time, which is admirable.  They're a lot younger than my child, so this is remarkable.

"Most parents tell their kids: 'You're fat!  Stop eating so much!  Get out and get some exercise!'  And that's what the psychologists were pushing to reduce."

And I realize that this was entirely reasonable, and had to happen.  (Telling a child he or she is fat is not quite the same thing as expressing concern about excessive weight.  I mean, it is, and it isn't.)  But of course, clinical psychologists understand the nuances of these things, while an overweight individual, reading about how bad it is to tell people that they're heavy, takes it to be an endorsement of being heavy.  Being heavy is not so bad, they tell themselves, because it is rude to remark on people's weight.  I'm trying to say that, yes, perhaps it is rude to make a disparaging remark about someone's weight in an isolated context.  But no, it certainly is unhealthy to be overweight.  And yes, it might not be easy to talk about weight tactfully, but if it is at all possible, it is not a terrible thing to do, especially if it can be done in such a way that it does not ruin a relationship.  What is deplorable is that the relationships of many overweight people are all conditional on no mention about weight at all.  This is not healthy.

The relationships of people who have a problem with alcohol also tend to be conditional on no disparaging about alcohol abuse.  But concerned friends find it possible to take risks sometimes, and suggest moderation, or intervention, though it is difficult.]

Michelle Obama on childhood obesity.

Bill Cosby on the subject.  Mr Cosby's ideas are a little naive, but he tends to reduce certain types of problems into the simplest possible terms, because he must believe that works with the black community, which is a primary concern for him.  He talks in terms of eliminating junk food, and improving school cafeteria menus, and so on, basically bypassing the family as the principal instrument of bringing about a healthy diet.  Is this the best thing to do?  Does it imply stereotypes about the circumstances in a typical African-American home?  Cosby is an educator, and educationists are strongly influenced by statistics.  But every individual must study the problem from his or her personal perspective.

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