Does anyone remember the lessons of prohibition?
New York City is going to ban its restaurants from serving any foods containing the evil trans-fatty acids.
During the U.S. alcohol prohibition, booze clubs called "speak-easies"popped up all over the country. I predict the emergence of the "eat-easy." People will need a special password to get in and will have to show credentials proving they are in no way connected with the fat-police. NYC will spend millions raiding these dens of senseless fat ingestion and possibly billions prosecuting and incarcerating these fat-mad diners. Yeah, we know who the real criminals are in our society - it's clearly fat people. This will be money well-spent because we need another war on a substance as money sink-hole, since we already don't know what to do with all the excess cash we have laying around in this country. I can just see The Far Side cartoon now, with tubbies lurking around foggy alleys, comically attempting stealth as they furtively slip into darkened doorways.
Now, some British professor says that enormous clothes for fat people should have a label sewn in warning the buyer that this is a fat person's size and that they should get help. Well, hello, asshole, the fat person's clothing already has a "fat warning label" -- it's the size tag, dickweed.
I think anyone who is overweight already has a pretty clear idea that they are having a problem. A warning label on clothing would be as ridiculous as that "help" line for gambling addicts that's printed on every lottery ticket. And they don't need some rocket-surgeon academic to tell them about it - I suspect they've already noticed. What will he suggest next - that manufacturers should be prevented from making large clothing because people won't be fat if they have nothing to wear? The other idiocy of this label thing suggests that someone will grow into a size because they aspire to wear a particular garment. What a load of crap.
I think it would be a neat idea if we fixed our governments and the major societal ills we suffer instead of interfering with peoples' personal lives. But that's just me.
16 comments:
You have four people sitting around a table and at the end of the meal, one reached for a cigarette. The other people there begin ridiculing them, "Cut that out, don't you realize what that will do to your health? That is gross and don't you dare smoke!" But when someone who is overweight goes to order the double bacon mushroom burger they don't say "Cut that out, don't you realize what that will do to your health? That is gross and don't you dare eat desert!" It is the same concept. If they can control when and where people damage thier own bodies, then why should it matter in which way? Now, I am not a smoker, and nothing disgusts me worse than the smell of cigarette smoke while I eat, but you can't argue that a fat ban is the same concept. By the way, love my margarine!
From the BIG side of life, THANK YOU so very much!
Those of us who don't wear a size 2, or 4 or anything under a 14 appreciate your outrage.
There are as many reasons for being a "Person of Size" as there are fat people.
I almost can't believe I just used a PC phrase like that. I must have a fever, LOL.
I have heard a theory that some people are fat, {and no, it's NOT a dirty word} because it's like armor against whatever threats they feel.
And for every study showing the health problems of obesity, there is a study showing that with exercise the obese can have healthy hearts, BP, and NO diabetes or joint problems. I know this b/c my Masters thesis before I dropped out of grad school was on Size discrimination.
This effort by NYC is just another example of the encroachment of the "Nanny-State" mentality we can expect under a democratic controlled gov't. I'm surprised Bloomberg is putting up with it. Glad I don't live there.
Bring me some Chicken fried Steak, quick w/ fried taters and a bunch of gravy
I have struggled with my weight since puberty. I've gone through anorexia (which I didn't realize until years later)between ages 15 and 16, to totally binging when I was a stay-at-home mom, and in between I was active duty military, when I was buff and lean.
I know exactly how to get thin, it's just very hard!
It is also frustrating for me to see my kids, who are skinny, eating five times as much as I do, with no repercussions. Metabolism, I guess.
Regulating what people are allowed to eat is ridiculous, almost as ridiculous as parents suing McDonald's for "making" their kids fat and "giving" them diabetes.
The information on proper nutrition and exercise is out there, available to everyone.
People just need to get off their collective asses and do something about their health.
Rant over.
Gosh, I really can't visit the US now... They'll put a Fat Person badge on me at Customs & Immigration at the first port of call!! Kind of like the striped PJs and the star of David under the Nazis, except.... ummm.... fat people.... you can look and tell we're fat, cantcha?
I'm envisioning it now... transfat greasyspoon speakeasies where delicacies fried to within an inch of their existance in hydrogenated oils are procured and consumed, and everyone will be hydrogenating fats in their bathtubs like gin was distilled during Prohibition...
Somehow, somewhere, I am sure this is a civil liberties issue...
I'm going to start bootlegging Crisco and running it up to New York. Yeeee haaaaa!
Hammer - I'm all for that.
After all, Joe Kennedy Sr. was a bootlegger and one of his sons becaue President of the United States! Plus, two of his sons became senators!
Also, please provide the home address of the British scientist you mentioned so I can go to his house and personally thank him by sitting on his lap, hugging him and telling him that obesity is contagious.
People are just jealous because everybody wants to wear a mumu.
It's a tediously regular thing. People with power try to use it to do good, inevitably meddling into things they have no business meddling in. How do you define the difference between what is personal and what is public? When your eating or smoking habits put you in the hospital or on meds that I have to help pay for with my taxes, the logic says that I should have a say in what you are allowed to eat. It's the other end of the welfare state equation. Read "The Road To Serfdom". Remember, prohibition was sold to the public as a measure that would prevent all sorts of crime and sickness. It was practically a feminist issue; men would get drunk and beat or rape their wives less if alcohol was taken away. Who could argue against that? Next thing you know you've got Al Capone making millions a week selling booze to people who want to keep drinking. Look at the drug war today. More like a war on personal freedom. We need a personal liberty amendment to the bill of rights. Never happen though. Too many people would have to stop telling everyone else how to live.
Sudiegirl, this guy: http://www.gla.ac.uk/departments/pathologicalbiochemistry/NSattar.html - shall we all email him?
Well, I quit smoking. Not because I wanted to live longer. She wanted me to live longer. And she can make me pretty miserable. But she ain't gettin' my bataters 'n gravy. No way. And in the world we're in today, I'm not at all convinced living longer is a good thing. But I may have no choice. My paternal grandparents lived into their mid 80's and my maternal grandmother lived to be 96. Don't know about my maternal grandfather. He got kicked in the head by a mule in his 40's. Guess it's in my genes, huh? I'm going to get to put up with this crap a few more years. Really though, I'd rather look at the green side of the grass. What's this have to do with fat-cops? Not much. Just felt a rant that had to get out.
darkmind - I am not fond of the smell of cigarettes, but I don't mind people smoking at the dinner table, and I am a staunch supporter of a restaurant owner being able to decide whether or not people smoke in their establishment, rather than being dictated to by a municipality - that is tyranny, in my book. Now, I WILL ask people not to smoke in my vehicle because I don't want it to smell like smoke, but otherwise, I wouldn't dream of commenting on someone else's smoking. The fatty foods thing is a finer line, because although smoking isn't necessary to live, food is, and it's idiotic for anyone to presume they have the right to dictate what another person ingests.
hollyb - Remind me to bring a box of Krispy Kremes when we meet. Nanny-state is exactly what this is. Disgusting. These people need to be run out on a rail.
christina - EXACTLY. People are responsible for what they serve their own kids, not McDonalds or the gubment. Seriously, inactive lifestyle is key, along with our society's shift to a diet of very processed foods with little dietary value other than calories.
meg - I've seen your picture and I wouldn't call you fat, honey. You're just a little undertall.
maven - damn skippy!
hammer - You'll be the first lard-runner. You'll be in the history books. You'll have a vehicle outfitted with secret compartments for tubs of fatty products.
sudiegirl - see the address so kindly provided by Meg below.
barbara - You know, a good friend of mine who is a fit, sexy woman (and about 34) started wearing a muumuu this summer. She said she'd been waiting all her life to be able to wear a muumuu because you have to respect the muumuu and not wear the muumuu before its time. Now, granted, she wore a strapless muumuu with elasticized bodice, but with her enormous Jackie-O shades and her hair pulled back in a bun, she looked like some glam-doll channeling a 70s Bain-de-Soleil ad. Hot cha cha!
fathairybastard - It's crazyness, that's what it is. And other peoples' health care may get paid for the gubment, but they sure haven't ponied up a dime for mine, so as long as I'm toting my own note, I'll bloody well eat what I please. I'm no Twinkie fan, but I support everyone else's right to eat Twinkies.
meg - you're SO on the case! and what a schmuck - I'll bet he's been deluged with email. I hope it crashed their system
myron - rant away, darlin'! After all, what is life if you have to give up most of what you savor about it?
Meg - you rock, m'dear. I think we should just all go to his house and take turns sitting on his lap, eating the junk food of our choice while kissing him on the cheek and bouncing up and down to old ABBA tunes.
Just another little Amen in the general chorus!
It's the psychotic Nanny State run amok. It won't be long before we'll be lying on our backs, fed introvenously, and having government workers come change our diapers every day. My only question is who is going to change the diapers of the government workers?
I have to admit that I was really surprised when I saw this and that New Yorkers would allow themselves to be governed that closely. I can understand smoking since it affects everyone in the vicinity, but the fat only hurts the person taht chooses to eat it.
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