But, you know something, the celebrity issues with weight are plastered all over because people/society buys the magazines.
Marketers and corporations advertise the crap and people choose to buy it.
....[/B]
So in THIS culture, at least, perhaps it is time to take responsibility for ones' own weight issues. I've said it before, and at the risk of boring all of you, I'll say it again -- no one forces ANYONE to buy the magazines, watch tabloid tv, purchase the junk, nor go through the drive-thru twice a day, nor to supersize anything, nor to go out for lunch every single day...
Stand up! Opt out! Become independant! Don't fall for the advertising! Exercise your free will and REFUSE to patronize those tabloids, tv shows, books, and products! Let YOUR money talk, and the B#S will eventually stop...
Oh, I agree. The two things feed (no pun intended) off each other. And there is a measure of responsibility on both sides, I think. No, nobody forces people to go into the fast food joints but when the reality is that it's a cheap, fast and convenient way to feed a person/family, it can be hard to pass up. In my neighborhood, in about a 6 block stretch of the main street, you'll find quite a number of pizzerias, a McDonalds, various ethnic take-out places, several candy stores, 3 bakeries, a Dunkin Donuts...and 2 public schools.
But I think the image of what is beautiful/acceptable starts on a smaller scale (oy, another pun) and is marketed to the masses. For instance, Marilyn Monroe was marketed as the ultimate pinup girl and she had a few pounds on her. Then along comes Twiggy. Why did she become famous? Who decided she was a model in the sense of someone people would want to be like? Why did people wanna look like MM in one decade, then Twiggy in another? What shifted? Who decided to promote one, then the other? Why do we glamorize curvy, voluptuous women in one generation and waifish, boyish women in another? How does that shift in thinking happen? I think it happens because we get told/shown/inundated with certain specific messages and images and a lot of people believe it.
Last edited by trekkiegirl; 06-02-2009 at 12:01 AM.
Think of the horrible "heroin chic" days of Ralph Lauren...Yikes...
And shows like Sex in the City, with the emphasis on high fashion sure don't help. But don't you think that alot of these industries are self-perpetuating? The magazines are published with funding from advertisers. Advertisers use magazines to flog their wares. The wares that are presented are created by designers who need to make new stuff to sell. Designers work hand in hand with the magazines as editors and special contributors. People want to look at the "newest trend" (maybe says more about social climbing and social values than about the products themselves?) so they buy the magazines. Because the magazines sell, the advertisers want to advertise in them, and designers have to create new things to sell, and people want to see the new stuff...and so on.
The wedding industry is one of the worst for this, as is the home renovation industry...Perhaps a sign of a society that has (had) far too much money and time on their hands? I wonder how things will change with the poor economy, although the crap food manufacturers use their low prices as incentives to buy, that's for sure!
ok. so i just want to throw in my two cents here. kiramira, i do definitely agree with you about personal responsibility. passing the buck on the blame isn't really gonna help anyone get any healthier. people need to watch out for themselves. abstractly blaming "society" or "corporations" or whatever is too easy and abdicates any real culpability on our own part. and it's really not terribly meaningful either. however, there is also truth to the "blame society" line of thinking that shouldn't be ignored. but the devil's in the details. for example, advertising and cross-marketing and product placement is a huuuuge industry. those people are professionals and they really know what we're doing. so that's one thing. another thing is access and availability. a lot of areas, particularly in lower-income urban areas (and probably other places, but i am going to talk about the areas that i know), do not have fresh produce readily available. for example, i work in harlem. i try to bring a lunch with me to work, but sometimes i forget. or get busy. and if i don't bring a lunch, my food options in the neighborhood are mcdonalds, starbucks, popeyes, blimpie, white castle, golden krust, a soul food buffet, and a jamaican takeout restaurant. there is not a single supermarket in walking distance. so imagine if i lived in that neighborhood and worked one or two jobs and stuff. feeding my children nutritious meals wouldn't be impossible, but it would certainly be more difficult than if i lived near a whole foods or trader joes and had disposable income. also, many schools have commercial vending deals with soda and juice companies that prominently place their high fructose corn syrup products in our kids faces all the time. and school cafeterias don't necessarily offer fresh fruits and vegetables or milk. so these are areas where i think we can make a difference through local government policies. in nyc, we're doing a better job by subsidizing fruit carts out on the street so now i can at least buy myself a banana or mango instead of a hostess cupcake for dessert when i'm at work. and some local governments are requiring that schools make fruits and vegetables available wherever they serve food to kids. i think these are just a couple of things that we as a society could be doing better to help with the obesity epidemic.
ultimately we are responsible for what we put in our mouths and our children's mouths, however, there are very real factors at play here and barriers to access that do very much make a difference in our ability to make the right decisions for ourselves and our families.
Absolutely! I think the adults absolutely need to take care of the kids in schools. I would LOVE it if all the money poured into diet pill and research for medication to "cure" obesity by the pharmaceutical companies was directed into a decent breakfast/lunch program for school kids and to a decent recess/after school sports program. That would be billions of dollars every year going towards nourishing kids from the very get go and getting them active right off the bat, and would at least give them a fighting chance two meals a day! Vending machines in schools should go. Junk food sponsors of school activities should stop. These are huge, huge factors. But if you think about what drives the diet pill industry, it is the desire for pharmaceutical companies to provide a "magic bullet" for weight loss. Because they think the market would be huge, and it WOULD be. The only problem is, because weight gain is so multifactorial in nature, I don't think that will EVER be a "cure" in the form of a pill. The pill industry is a 90-BILLION dollar a year industry! And all that effort to "cure" something which is curable by ones self. The problem is that, well, wouldn't it be easier to take a pill than to plan/cook/exercise?
But I guess what I am saying is that for those of us who choose to deal with our weight issues (which is pretty much everyone on this forum!), it isn't impossible and it isn't a problem to be downloaded onto anyone other than oneself. That's all. And if you can afford to buy the tabloids, booze, and cigarettes, you can probably get to a supermarket for some decent groceries. And that you can do it if you choose to do it, and I think that people are super-resourceful and super-resilient and have done a lot more things of significance with a whole lot less...
Kira
I find it impossible to forget that weight & appearance have somehow become a class & status issue.
Why did the curvaceous female figure go out of style & the thinner female figure come in style? In part, it has to be because as soon as being thin became a sign of personal achievement, great effort & an investment of time (which commodity is growing increasingly rare for women) & money, that's when it became a status marker. And thus it became more desirable. When being heavy made you look poor, that's when it became unfashionable.
Being thin within an obese society signifies that you have educated yourself on food & nutrition, that you have leisure time to spend on cooking & exercising*, that you can afford to avoid a lot of the cheaper fast food outlets. It means that you can fit in clothing lines that don't bother to carry sizes beyond maybe a 12. It means that in a boutique where the clerks have to unlock a door before they'll let you in, they'll smile at your thin frame & know immediately they have plenty of stuff they can sell to you, to earn their commissions. It means that you look like you play tennis & swim & go horseback riding & run & sail boats & etc. (Picture some Ralph Lauren ads while running through that list & you'll get the general picture of the life I'm trying to paint.)
So yeah, I agree with Kiramira's schadenfreude theory. Everyone's enjoying how the mighty have fallen. "She could buy everything ... but a thin, stylish body for life."
* Hypothetically, anyway. Reading the forums here will tell anyone immediately how hard many of us have to work & plan to fit in our exercise because we **don't** have leisure time.
my food options in the neighborhood are mcdonalds, starbucks, popeyes, blimpie, white castle, golden krust, a soul food buffet, and a jamaican takeout restaurant. there is not a single supermarket in walking distance.
I didn't know this. It's shocking. It does help me understand the whole "obesity" thing better in the US. I have found it odd that every single thing I read about being healthy or having a good family life implores folks to "cook and eat at home." This would suggest most families do not--I figured it was time preassures or whatever. I hadn't realised there'd be an access problem!
Good grief--when I was in Europe many many years ago I bought my lunch every single day from a supermarket or open street market--whether I was in London, Vienna, Venice or Paris, I could find wonderful food for my backpack--and often cooked, too.
Last edited by Alana in Canada; 06-02-2009 at 12:01 AM.
Absolutely! I think the adults absolutely need to take care of the kids in schools. I would LOVE it if all the money poured into diet pill and research for medication to "cure" obesity by the pharmaceutical companies was directed into a decent breakfast/lunch program for school kids and to a decent recess/after school sports program. That would be billions of dollars every year going towards nourishing kids from the very get go and getting them active right off the bat, and would at least give them a fighting chance two meals a day!
I'm going to go off on another tangent here but the talk about schools has reminded me of something. I'm in NYC. I know several people who supervise afterschool programs within public elementary and junior high. They have told me that any food they receive from the city which goes unused has to be thrown away. If one day, they anticipate 100 kids to attend and only 40 actually show up, the other 60 meals have to go in the garbage. Doesn't matter if it's the half-pints of milk or bags of potato chips. Nobody is allowed to take anything home, not even staff. It cannot be donated anywhere. It cannot be left outside in the garbage without being made inedible (like pouring bleach on it). I have very little faith in government agencies doing things that actually make sense and don't involve monumental waste.
BTW, we have a councilman who right now is actually trying to make a law about how far away fast food places need to be from schools. His opponents basically act like it's a non-issue and he's just trying to draw attention to himself.
Last edited by trekkiegirl; 06-01-2009 at 11:53 PM.
And if you can afford to buy the tabloids, booze, and cigarettes, you can probably get to a supermarket for some decent groceries. And that you can do it if you choose to do it, and I think that people are super-resourceful and super-resilient and have done a lot more things of significance with a whole lot less...
Please do a little more research. This is a real issue for some people. It's much easier to buy cigarettes than produce in some areas. If you had no car, no extra money, how often would you take a bus/cab to a grocery to buy produce? Or would you just walk to a convenience store and buy what's nearby? Could you prepare a healthy, well balanced dinner for your family every night from foods bought at a 7-11?
A growing body of evidence suggests that the location and types of food establishments in a community affects the eating habits of its residents, with significant nutrition-related health consequences. Simply put, having a supermarket nearby makes it easier to buy healthy foods such as fresh produce (Zenk et al., 2005).
Compared to more affluent neighborhoods, however, communities with lower socioeconomic status have been shown to have fewer large supermarkets (Morland et al., 2002; Moore and Roux, 2006; Powell et al., 2007), less access to healthy foods (Baker, et al., 2006), and greater distances between residents and the nearest major food store (Zenk et al., 2005). Instead, low-income communities typically have a higher proportion of small convenience stores, bodegas, and liquor stores to full-service groceries and large supermarkets. Though some low-income neighborhoods have specialty grocers supplying high quality food at an affordable price, in many communities, small shops and bodegas generally have fewer healthy options and less fresh produce than larger grocery stores and supermarkets located in higher-income neighborhoods (Graham, et al., 2006).
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As a mounting volume of studies attests, residents of many low-income communities lack
access to a supermarket within reasonable walking distance. Because they often do not drive
their own automobiles and public transportation is inadequate, the absence of nearby
supermarkets often represents an inability to purchase nutritious, affordable food, particularly
fresh fruit and vegetables and other perishables. Healthy diets therefore are compromised,
contributing to a high prevalence of hunger, food insecurity and obesity. These conditions, in
turn, contribute to severe consequences affecting health and well-being.
***************
Despite all of that, many New Yorkers confront what the American Institute of Nutrition has called “food insecurity” – an inability, either because of money or availability, to get safe, nutritional food.“Where to Grab a Bite,” a 2004 survey by City Limits, looked at the number of grocery stores in each ZIP code. If it's not surprising that affluent SoHo has the most places to buy food per resident, it is certainly startling to discover that several ZIP codes in Queens, including ones covering parts of College Point and Bayside, have no grocery stores at all. Overall, Manhattan has the most grocery stores per resident; Brooklyn the least.
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LIFE WITHOUT GROCERIES
Numerous studies have shown that fresh produce, meat, and fish are hard to find in low-income neighborhoods. The New York Coalition Against Hunger recently mapped the availability of food resources across the city. It found that residents of low-income neighborhoods are forced to choose between bodegas and unhealthy restaurants because they lack access to larger grocery stores and farmers markets common in affluent areas. (See the interactive map).
Eight of every 10 food stores in Bedford Stuyvesant are bodegas, according to a study published this year by the city’s Department of Health. While almost every supermarket carries apples, oranges, and bananas, less than three in 10 bodegas do; supermarkets are also three times more likely to carry reduced fat milk.
Food stores generally lose money by carrying fresh fruit and vegetables, but supermarkets carry such products to attract customers, according to JC Dwyer, co-author of a recent report on food availability in three of the city's poorest neighborhoods.
"A place like Pathmark can afford to carry the stuff that's not going to make them any money in order to get them in the door and sell them other things," he said. "[Bodegas] have a lot less space with which to make a dollar, and need to fill that space with products that are cheaper to obtain, can sell at higher margin, and will last longer."
In 2004, researchers compared the availability of several foods healthy for diabetics in East Harlem and Upper East Side grocery stores. Only 18 percent of the East Harlem stores had all five of the recommended foods, compared with 58 percent of the Upper East Side stores. And in East Harlem, stores selling unhealthy foods near schools outnumbered those selling healthy foods by almost six to one, according to another study.
When bodegas do carry produce, it is generally much more expensive than it would be at a larger grocery store. In one study researchers found that a mango cost 67 cents at Pathmark, 79 cents at Associated -- and $1.79 at an East Harlem bodega.
Still, I stand by what I say. For the majority of people who choose to address their weight, there are ways to do it.
There are healthier options at MacDonalds, for example. A bus fare costs around $1.50 in most cities. A bag of Frito-Lays costs over $2.50 (depending on the size). Heck, you could take a bus to a grocery store and a taxi home for the cost of a 6-pack and smokes...
And I am really, really sorry that there aren't easier ways to eat healthfully for a segment of the American population. But there aren't easy ways to eat healthfully in Chili (you want to talk about poverty?) or India or Bangladesh...but the US (the richest nation in the world) has the highest rate of obesity in the world and it just keeps rising. And the American view of poverty IMHO is somewhat relative -- I've been to the slums of India, and Africa, and Mexico, and Haiti -- when your daily minimum wage is less than $1.00 and people are living in favelas or slums without electricity or plumbing, in shacks made of corregated tin on dirt floors...
The US poverty rate is around 12%. (http://manyeyes.alphaworks.ibm.com/m...nd-/versions/1, http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/ec...w-poverty-line)
So if you believe that ALL 12% of impovershed people have weight issues (which we all know isn't so, but let's assume so for arguement's sake...), how do we explain away the other 54% of the population that are either overweight or obese? I know that there are many definitions of poverty, too, but you can't convince me that 66% of the USA are living in such conditions!
Studies like these, unfortunately, permit us to say "well, it is the fault of society, economic status, big corporations, the government for not doing something" -- depersonalizing the individual problem makes it easier not to address on an individual level. And not all overweight people live in Harlem. There are thin people there, too. So how do THEY do it? I mean, it stands to reason that if healthy choices aren't available, then everyone would be fat within these neighborhoods. But this isn't so. And if you look at national distributions, overweight/obesity is pretty well spread out instead of being isolated to specific street addresses. I mean, have you been to a SoCal suburban mall lately? Or one in Texas? What is THEIR excuse?
Anyways, I have said that there are indeed socio-economic issues and challenges in US society. And not everyone who is overweight chooses to address their weight issue and that is absolutely fine. But for those who DO choose to address the issue, depersonalizing the problem to the third person often just makes things harder, that's all. It seems to me that the majority of the US population is used to having medical conditions treated by medication and pills and this is, unfortuantely, where a fair amount of money is being focused rather than in areas that would be helpful to address this health crisis at a public level. Certain preventable disease processes are externalized and impersonalized and this relieves people of taking responsibility for their own health because some one else is responsible for solving the problem. People do want the easy fix, and it is easier to wait for a pill than it is to catch a bus to a grocery store once a week. It is easier to say "I can't eat properly because there are no grocery stores around the corner" than it is to catch a bus. It is easier to go through the drive-thru than it is to plan and prepare a healthy meal. And to say that "I am fat here in Iowa in my middle-class lifestyle because those in Harlem can't buy mangos at a fair price" is, with all due respect, ridiculous...
sort of coming from another direction....still a powerful force: ingrained in American culture is that whole self-made (wo)man scenario (all tied into the self help scene). We can make ourselves over into whatever we want to be. If you want it bad enough, and you try hard enough, you can achieve it (see Horatio Alger). The Biggest Loser seems to me to fit into that too.
I know this is an old thread, but I kind of wanted to join in.
I think part of the problem is that the FIRST STEP seems impossible. I know I never thought I'd be able to live on a healthy diet before, because I was addicted to food and I couldn't stop eating it, even when I didn't want to. I felt helpless, like I had no way to change. Now of COURSE the power was in my hands all along, but when you are in this kind of situation, sometimes you just feel helpless and don't realize that you CAN DO IT. Once I started and restricted myself, I found it easier and easier day by day to eat healthy. Now it's easy. What was hard was that first step. It's like jumping over a crevase to get to a set of stairs on the other side. The leap over the crevase seems impossible, but if you DO manage to get over it, all you have is a nice, leisurely winding staircase... a cakewalk, really, and then you realize you CAN do it. But first you have to take that leap, and I think that's where a lot of people fail, because they never even try because it seems impossible (this is for the ones that AREN'T in poverty and DO have the means to eat healthy... those who don't are in a whole different category IMO and I'm not talking about that aspect).
I will read the article later as I don't have much time but I think we are obsessed with celebrities period. So not only with their weight. But I guess the weight struggles are that more interesting to us because they prove that you can have all the money on the Earth and personal chefs and personal trainers and yet you have a weight problem like you and I or your next door neighbour.
I'm running to class and dont' have time to read the whole thread/article right now, but I will when I get home. I just wanted to comment on the idea.
This "fat self-loathing"--I'm afraid I have a terrible case of it. THere are days that I get so hung up and distraught over the way that I look that I feel I will never be happy again. The idea of being "thin" or even "normal-sized" (around my goal weight is my idea of that) feels like such a pipe-dream that I get overwhelmed just imagining myself at that weight. In fact--I can't imagine myself at that weight! When I try, it's always a girl who looks a bit like me (dark hair, eyes, features), at 130 lbs, but it's not me.
I let myself be crippled by this extra weight, as though I cannot walk out my front door with it on me. I feel like I can never be loved because who would want me? (I have a wonderful, devoted, doting, loyal, loving bf) I feel like I can't talk to strangers because inside their heads they're thinking "what a fat cow. she's disgusting. doesn't she have any self control? look at the way her rolls spill over her pants like that." And I'm half the size of some of the people on here, who do NOT feel this way about themselves at all, and are losing weight purely for health reasons, and are LOSING. I am not losing. I feel like a booby trap pushing a 70lb boulder up a hill with a hole at the top--"even if you do lose the weight you'll just gain it all back, what's the point?"
The voice in my head makes it impossible for me to be comfortable in my own skin. I know that learning to love yourself and accept your body is one of the most important steps in losing weight, learning that whether you lose the weight or not you will be beautiful and confident, but that the healthier choice is to be lighter. The thing is--HOW are you supposed to do that? Obviously there's no handbook--but I have history in multiple eating disorders (starving, purging, compulsive overeating, binge eating), and it seems like I have been battling my weight my entire life and will continue to do so forever, and will never be happy.
I know it's off-post but...does anyone understand where I'm coming from? I feel like my body image perception is so warped that I don't even know which way is up with myself anymore.
munchie, i know EXACTLY where you're coming from. while i haven't battled the EDs, i have always had that horrible self-loathing counterproductive mentality when it comes to fat and body image. (in fact, i used to half joke that i basically would have an eating disorder, since i totally shared the same processes, except that i didn't have the willpower. not really funny, i know, but so true.) i have always been larger than my friends, even though when i was a child, i was well within the normal range. it was just that everyone else was skinnier. i think it's something pathological in me that is always comparing myself to other people and wanting to be the best, the smartest, the prettiest, the thinnest, and when i realize that i can't, i get sad and frustrated.
and of course i know that this is not healthy and not right and for the most part, whenever the evil monster starts to surface, i quickly try and shove it back in my pocket and keep going. this is a workable solution for me for now, but i'm afraid of somehow passing this disordered thinking onto my hypothetical daughters and offspring.
as an aside, have you ever read kate harding or any of the other fantastic fat acceptance bloggers? while i unfortunately don't share their confidence or even always agree, the fact that they're out there, sharing their message, and being heard makes me happy.
munchievictim, this makes me think of a video I saw the other day. I think you should watch it. It might help you. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUTJQIBI1oA
It's called A Fat Rant, and is about fat acceptance.
