Meet the New Boss - from Fatshaming to Fitshaming

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Bill Glasheen
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Joined: Thu Mar 11, 1999 6:01 am
Location: Richmond, VA --- Louisville, KY

Meet the New Boss - from Fatshaming to Fitshaming

Post by Bill Glasheen »

Everyone's a victim today. Because of one's age, race, gender, ethnicity, income, religion, sexual orientation, etc., etc., one can claim protected species class and bully the world into getting their way in life. Such is life.

The "fatshaming" campaign these days is all the rage. Hollywood has made morbid obesity the new cool. Melissa McCarthy is cashing in on the movement - as she should.

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And as part of the whole movement, people are being shamed for making fun of the morbidly obese (a.k.a. fat). I get it. We all have choices we make in life, and we come in all sizes and shapes. And we have an entire industry dedicated to addicting you to overeating.

But from my vantage point, I work on behalf of people who pay to have their medical care covered. And if there's one thing we know from my data vantage point, obesity, metabolic syndrome, and Type II diabetes are epidemic. If you think this is just an aesthetic thing, you would be wrong. If you haven't found religion by the time diabetes hits, then you're looking forward to retinopathy, neuropathy, nephropathy, heart attack, stroke, peripheral vascular disease (complete with lovely limb amputations) and in some cases diabetic coma. It starts with a beach ball figure (a telltale sign of metabolic syndrome) and finishes with an empty bank account and a miserable life. As a health services researcher, I don't find that to be attractive; it makes me want to scream "Ugly!"

But fine... Live and let live. I pay more in health insurance premiums to spot your lack of discipline, but whatever.

And then we have this...

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... which is one of the many vandalized examples of a poster advertising weight loss and/or meal replacement products.

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Welcome to the world of fit shaming or - as another just posted on my Facebook page - cry-bullies. The examples are plenty; the inspiration not so much.

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Do these glamor shots get Photoshopped? Probably. Do fitness shamers open themselves up to a massive backlash when they accuse proud, healthy people of being evil? Apparently... and it's about time. I've bitten my tongue way too long already.

By the way... I'm going to a female friend's first ever bodybuilding competition a few weeks from now. She works in a shop that sells nutritional supplements. I'm proud of her, and would take a shame bullet for her seven days to Sunday. And at the risk of being typically-male shallow, she's very easy on the eyes. Just saying.

- Bill
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