Of course, reality is much different. Metabolic rates are different. That is why you can habitually eat under your calories burned rate and not lose a pound. It is also why certain lucky thin people can eat junk all day, never work out, and still maintain their 'healthy' weight. People who deny these realities are idiots. No. You don't become obese without eating too much and/or exercising too little. No fat person on the planet is arguing that fat appears by magic. However, treating the calories in/out measure like it's not dependent on multiple variables outside the person's control is the definition of ignorant. Add that to the various medicines that make people gain weight and obliterate their metabolism, disability, and you can see why labeling all fat people gross, awful, lazy fucks and thin people more 'responsible' and healthy is rife with problems.
Also, being overweight doesn't actually mean you are unhealthy. Being unhealthy is about your actual health: Body function, heart health, insulin production, etc etc etc. While being overweight increases your risks for problems in these areas, it is not as if it works like: you are fat so you will die of being fat. Smoking is far more dangerous. Thin people smoke all the time and yet their entire existence isn't treated as a societal burden or horrifying shame that they should hide from the masses for fear of a social media outrage. And while we are on the topic of more dangerous activities, I cannot tell you how many libertarian blogs I've read that charge the DEA, politicians, and the anti-drug lobby of overstating the dangers of drugs. So, to get this straight...you don't think meth addiction should get such a bad wrap, but being obese is worthy of mean, hateful public ridicule. Really? Why?
Fat Shaming is a social media pastime. Whenever someone who is fat decides he or she (and it's usually she) is comfortable in his or her own skin, a thousand 'concern trolls' come out of the woodwork to explain how they just 'care' about health and what if people start thinking being fat is okay?!?!? I've got news for you, folks. There will never be a widespread movement to become fat because it is glorious. But, let's say you believe that giving someone a cover shoot on a magazine 'glorifies' a certain body type. Where were the 'concern trolls' while the entire fashion industry has been 'glorifying' underweight body types (BTW, one should not judge the health of these people either unless they have read their medical files and have the expertise to understand them).
We all know these people do not care about health. I'll say this for the libertarian comments I read today, they made no mistake that they didn't give one single fuck about the health of the fat person in question. They were simply disgusted by her and thought that she should hide herself away in a closet because 'no one wants to see that but a sick fetishist!'. They congratulated themselves on pointing out that fatness is exactly like laziness which is pretty much the same as being on welfare. Duh! No. It's not. But let's dig a bit deeper.
The original article called upon us all to stop 'glorifying obesity' as is the call to arms for most people who are irrationally afraid that fat people are getting fat because society is being too nice to them. This charge comes from (OMG GASP!) letting a fat woman have a photo shoot for a company that went viral. A real libertarian would say, "Hey...this shit sells! Consumer women are relating to these women. That's awesome. Let's use this fat acceptance movement to try and sell shit." Fat shaming is NOT libertarian, especially in this case.
They go on to argue that fatness is a drain on 'the system'. lol Really? The same group of people who believe we should open the borders and who do not like smoking and drug laws because it's no one's business what free adults ingest, want to talk about the 'societal cost of healthcare'. Come on, guys. We libertarians are usually a smart bunch of people, is your irrational hatred of fat people just making it impossible for you to critically think?
I have a theory about why fat shaming is such a visceral gut instinct for so many people. It is twofold 1) Pure, undiluted sexism. These are the people who think fat people (mostly women) are ugly and don't think they should have to look at them. They deem women's attraction to be directly related to size and the bigger, the worse. And if a woman isn't attractive, what the fuck good is she, anyway? These are the fellows who think that men who like fat women are fetishistic perverts. The idea that perhaps they just are attracted to fat women is completely outside the realm of possibility. 2) Fear of one's own possibility of fatness. The fact is, metabolism crashes for most of us. Sure, you might be able to eat a diet of straight McDonald's in your 20s and stay a size 6, but in your 50s, even a handful of fries will make you gain weight. Because of the hateful vitriol spewed at pretty much any fat person who isn't ashamed of themselves, people's fear that they could become fat is heightened and terrifying. Then they attribute their normal weight to some piousness they possess when, for most, it's really just the luck of good genes.
Anyway, as a libertarian, I'm just a bit annoyed that we are being painted (by our own people) as such judgmental, irrational fat shamming dick weeds. There is nothing libertarian about shaming other people for their personal choices that do not affect us. And no, you can't use 'healthcare costs' unless you want to start shaming about 5 billion other behaviors (that most of us do) that are equally or more unhealthy. Then, we might as well be fucking leftists.
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