fat again!

Freddy posted this photo on the One World site and declared that there will no longer be any sugary junk sold in the vending machines at the gym. In part of his rant, Freddy writes:

Think about what you are feeding your children, and yourself for that matter. I am not telling you that your kid should never eat anything with sugar in it. Hell, that would just SUCK if I were your kid! Just don’t make sugary foods the norm. When I was a kid, getting a candy bar, or a Slurpee, or Baskin-Robbins was a treat! Take a few moments to read the label and think about what you are giving your kid to eat. Think of it this way: next time you go to hand your kid that Snickers bar or super-sized Slurpee, smile and say, “Here you go little Joey, have some diabetes.... Yummy!” Your child can make their own dietary choices when they become an adult, but remember that a lifetime of sugar addiction is hard to change. Don’t shoot your kids in the foot before they even start the race.

fathlete confession: Whenever there are posts about obesity, I tend to take them a little too personally. It's because I feel like I'm being personally attacked for being fat. I know this is not true. The posts are not directed to me. Such anxieties have more to do with my personal insecurities. I get this. Still. I feel like a schmuck. A fat schmuck.

In truth, I agree with Freddy's schtick on sugar. I wish my family helped me develop a better sense of health and food choices. In fact, I wish my mom came out about her diabetes way back in 1987 when she was diagnosed! However, as a fat kid who grew up to be a fat adult,the fatty part of me gets a little irked when I see stuff like this. I find that the commentary on fat tends to be a little on the hateration side. Seriously. I think this is why I'm still uncomfortable when I go to the gym. A part of me feels like people are secretly laughing at the fat girl who's trying to do "Cindy." Like I said before, I like exercise. But I like my cupcakes too. Health is an issue for everybody - fat, thin, and everyone in between. I follow Big Fat Blog with respect to fat discrimination and such and I find their articles informative. You should all check it out. There's also these Newsweek articles: America's Fat Wars; America’s War on the Overweight; Fat on Film.

Also, I remember watching a one of those rockumentaries on VH1 with C.C. Deville from Poison. At one point he was over 200 pounds and declared, "It was more acceptable for me to be a heroin addict than to be fat."

This is exactly why I can't stand all the anti-fat talk. Let's get something straight. There are perfectly healthy people who are fat or overweight. A lot of that is genetics and such. (I'm not a medical expert, but I'm sure you can find a lot of info if you looked really hard.) There are deathly unhealthy people who are totally thin. (Yeah. That's right. Heroin addicts are thin. Starving people in third world countries are thin. Anorexics are thin too.) No one gives these people shit. Can we start to re-think health and stop assuming that fat = unhealthy?! (Or is this too much to ask for?)

I'm not saying that obesity is not a serious issue. It is. But how we weigh and measure health needs a lot of tweaking. Granted, the kid in the picture breaks my heart. The video that Freddy posted on 7/29/2009 was also disturbing. In fact, when shopping a few weeks ago, I saw two kids who looked just like these kids. It also made me sad. However, I don't have these reactions because they're fat. (I weep just as much for the drug addict and the anorexic.) Instead, I'm reminded that as a nation, we're failing at educating ourselves and our kids about health. It's one thing when someone is fat, but it's another when it's to the point where it interferes with basic functioning (like the cop who couldn't stand up from a kneeling position). So can we please get our fat straight?! Thanks!