obesity hype and twittery

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Okay. I was about the size of Kirstie in the image on the left, without the custom girders, when I decided to crash diet down to skinnier than a bird. I don't think I was fat. My esophagus may have thought I was fat. I did it because the machine to combat death by sleep apnea was going to kill me before it could save me, and the only other thing I might try is to have a bunch of the tissue at the back of my throat burned off. I think she was definitely into the zone one should think of as "obese" in the image on the right, though, and I think the linked piece at the NYT is a piece of crap from start to finish.

I think everyone with body image issues, and the people who incite them, should be locked up in the Louvre for a month or two, and have their access to tv, fashion magazines and movies taken away for a minimum of a year. They should be made to learn everything about Monsanto and other megalithic ag-corporations. They should be made to take courses in food additives and laboratory food. They should have radio collars that hit them like tasers when any closer than, say, five feet from fast food.

Yes. I am stumping for Fat Nazism. Clearly, democracy in this area is not up to the task. Clearly. Attitudes about what we call fat need adjusting back to reality, but just as clearly attitudes about loving your body when you are mortally obese need to be slapped off as well. Even as I believe in the individual right to take whatever chances with one's health one feels suit, it should not be undertaken and controversialized to the point of outright psychosis either. If you don't want to be fat, lose the weight. Do it however you want, but quit whining. Quit indulging yourself, you candy-assed "American". If you don't like people making you feel guilty about it, work on your guilt issues and/or lose the weight, and shut up. Quit acting like factory hogs to slaughter and take charge of the food you consume.

I decided to drop the weight in the last week of November. I cut out everything with sugar in it. Everything with transfat in it. Everything with chemicals in it. Everything with salt in it. And all simple carbohydrates like bread and pasta, etc. I did not starve myself. I drank regular milk. I put half and half in my coffee. I ate as much fruit as I wanted, and vegetables, and meat. I never use anything but extra virgin olive oil to cook with. I lost ten pounds a month for four months, and then I started adding back in a little bread, bread WITHOUT high fructose corn syrup and/or partially hydrogenated soybean oil, you know, bread... sourdough with garlic cloves and/or cheese baked in... sometimes toasted, with whipped cream cheese spread on it. Now I'm losing only about two pounds a month, and that is fine by me. I will get to the lowest weight I feel is healthy and I will stay there. I will know that if I cannot stay there that there is something medically the matter and get my ass to the doctor, but I will know that because I don't give myself all these STUPID excuses to eat crap I know is bad for me.

I had a good excuse before. Healthy food is extremely hard to find here, and when you do find it, it is extremely hard to afford, and I was too whupped to deal with this ugly reality until I did something about my wretched health.

Yes, but what about people who CAN'T do something about their wretched health, 99? People who can't just run to a doctor and wail, "HELP ME! I MIGHT AS WELL BE DEAD!"

Those are the people I worry about. Those are the people truly being victimized by the food poisoning and complete failure of healthcare in this country, and THAT is what this NYT piece SHOULD have been about.

WE make our world what it is. If you're capable of holding down a job, you are capable of reminding everyone around you of our shared responsibility for fixing it, and then TAKING responsibility for fixing it.

Why do you think I'm so pissed off at the president?