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There are lots of people talking about their proactive attempts to lose weight and how good it feels when, after hard work, it finally does come off. I suppose that might be interpreted in an unfavorable light at a stretch, but there's no hate directed at anyone.
The majority of people on these boards seem to be overweight and looking for other overweight people to talk to, or else formerly overweight people who lost weight with the community and have stuck around because in the process they made friends and want to encourage other people (who already wanted to change of their own volition, no one dragged them here when they thought they were fine) trying to lose weight.
In all I think this is a very positive forum full of good advice, complete with its own cheering section. It's one of the outstanding examples of what is right with the internet. But if it's not for you, I guess it's not for you?
Originally Posted by Chain
Really? I haven't seen it at all There are lots of people talking about their proactive attempts to lose weight and how good it feels when, after hard work, it finally does come off. I suppose that might be interpreted in an unfavorable light at a stretch, but there's no hate directed at anyone.
The majority of people on these boards seem to be overweight and looking for other overweight people to talk to, or else formerly overweight people who lost weight with the community and have stuck around because in the process they made friends and want to encourage other people (who already wanted to change of their own volition, no one dragged them here when they thought they were fine) trying to lose weight.
In all I think this is a very positive forum full of good advice, complete with its own cheering section. It's one of the outstanding examples of what is right with the internet. But if it's not for you, I guess it's not for you?
Most people here are discussing the food industry and the problems inherent within it. Just because there are worse problems elsewhere doesn't meant that the smaller problems should be ignored. Just because people are starving in Africa does it mean that roads shouldn't be repaired, school curriculum shouldn't be updated, health care shouldn't be addressed? There are always going to be bigger problems elsewhere but domestic issues are real and should be addressed too.
FWIW, I live in Brazil. We DO have people starving here so a lot of the health advice from the past focused on getting as many calories possible into people=very calorie dense food. Well, now the tides have changed. The economy has improved and we have 40% of adults who are overweight/obese (and if you go into the poor neighborhoods those stats are significantly higher). So the issue is now more of getting healthy foods into those neighbourhoods rather than just any food. See the difference? You can be getting enough calories in but actually be susceptible to malnutrition if you're not getting in any fruits/veggies, vitamins etc.
I really don't see the fat bashing that you're concerned about. If anything this is one site that promotes weight loss through healthy eating and fitness and I've seen responders on this site be honest with someone if they thought they had lost too much and have even encouraged a wider idea of what healthy means beyond just BMI. Almost all of use were at the very least overweight, if not obese so we've BTDT. We might not have been happy at that previous weight but many of us still loved ourselves and remember what it was like to be overweight/obese.
Like others said there's a big difference between what's acceptable in the media and in real life. I've had the same person say that a celebrity was "fat" (who was probably at a healthy weight) and tell me that I wasn't (when I was at the lower end of obese). There's really a double standard there.