Rant about weight, fat acceptance, obesity and health

[Dystopia]

This whole fat acceptance movement is simply wrong. I think this should go without saying, but I'll say it anyway: It is never okay to belittle, shame, or otherwise make fun of somebody because of their weight. However, society does not need to condone and coddle obese individuals "for just being who they are". Obesity skyrockets an individual's chances of acquiring a smorgasbord of maladies and diseases. Couple that fact with the number of obese people in the U.S. alone and you begin to have an idea of why insurance is so ridiculously high (one factor among others, but a factor nonetheless). Obesity not only affects those who are actually obese; their poor health and lifestyle choices affect the rest of us financially as well, and those poor choices, especially in nutrition, are typically passed on to children if they have any.

How many commercials have you seen trashing cigarette smokers? A lot. If a similar commercial were made of an obese person who neglects to exercise (or, hell, even move at all) and eats high-calorie, processed foods, the proverbial shit would hit the fan and outrage would sweep across the country, a million chubby hands raised in protest.

This is one of those issues that really sticks in my craw. Obesity is not healthy, it is not "just who you are", it isn't "being comfortable in your own skin", or any of that other bullshit. It's a serious public health concern as you mentioned, and it can be overcome by education on the importance of exercise and decent nutrition. But first, it has to be approached as a problem and not treated like it's some condition that people are powerless to change, or that it's just part of who they are.

As I said, I don't hate fat people and I have fat friends and relatives, I also don't make assumptions about their intelligence, job, who they are as a friend, etc - I just assume that they take more calories than they burn. The attractiveness part I find staggering, there's this group of tumblr activists, mostly women but also some men, who want society to convince itself that not being attracted to fat people is fatphobic and that every bit of happiness and hardwork other people put into fitness is "internalized fatphobia" - Now, there are some people who really hate fat people, the kind of folks who see a fat person and scream "HEY FATTIIEEE", but most people who criticize fat for being unhealthy are not this kind of person - Moreover, it bugs me that everyone who is thin is assumed to be privileged and everyone who is fat is automatically discriminated against when in fact many of it is just a disadvantage of being fat - For example, not finding clothes that don't fit you because you are too large is not a form of discrimination, it's just companies catering to demand and doing what they do best - I can't find super large shoes for NBA athletes on normal stores, and the same happens with clothing.

Even if being fat didn't cause diabetes and all those diseases, at least we need to admit that your mobility, romantic life and personal life are affected by it and people should try to feel better about themselves. I don't doubt some fat people may be genuinely happy, and that's fine, but nothing convinces me that someone who is obese and has trouble just standing on their feet are happier with their bodies than someone who is average...