http://www.medrants.com/archives/2384 Internal medicine, American health care, and especially medical education Sat, 11 Feb 2012 15:15:48 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 http://www.medrants.com/archives/2384/comment-page-1#comment-23081 Chris Bacon Wed, 15 Jun 2005 05:07:52 +0000 http://medrants.com/archives/2005/05/27/the-controversy-of-being-overweight/#comment-23081 I have not seen the recent studies, but I am excited to hear that a lot of thought went into looking at the data for this new study to try to separate the factors which affect the correlations. I have a strong sense that the US has become obssessed with the "war against fat" in a way that could have easily started with a fashion trend. The fashion was subsequently rationalized and supported by throngs of believers who never thought to seriously challenge the original thesis. Now the dogma against fat seems to be defended with a taboo kind of energy. There is an aspect of the nerotic repression of sexual and sensual pleasures. Women tend to be more vulnerable to this kind of criticism, so there seems to be a strong underlying gender aspect to the issue. There seems to also be an aspect of how much fun we promote at the expense of others. Do we laugh along with the harsh criticisms? Do we believe them? Or have we been strongly influenced over time and hollywood to believe them? How would we feel about it without those influences? Questions like this make it very interesting that the thesis might seriously be overturned. I would venture to say that even if the thesis is not overturned, our apparent societal immaturity in regard to the subject deserves attention, if nothing more than to let people to feel better about themselves. I have not seen the recent studies, but I am excited to hear that a lot of thought went into looking at the data for this new study to try to separate the factors which affect the correlations. I have a strong sense that the US has become obssessed with the “war against fat” in a way that could have easily started with a fashion trend. The fashion was subsequently rationalized and supported by throngs of believers who never thought to seriously challenge the original thesis. Now the dogma against fat seems to be defended with a taboo kind of energy. There is an aspect of the nerotic repression of sexual and sensual pleasures. Women tend to be more vulnerable to this kind of criticism, so there seems to be a strong underlying gender aspect to the issue. There seems to also be an aspect of how much fun we promote at the expense of others. Do we laugh along with the harsh criticisms? Do we believe them? Or have we been strongly influenced over time and hollywood to believe them? How would we feel about it without those influences? Questions like this make it very interesting that the thesis might seriously be overturned. I would venture to say that even if the thesis is not overturned, our apparent societal immaturity in regard to the subject deserves attention, if nothing more than to let people to feel better about themselves.

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