“The UK has the highest rate of obesity in Europe, according to figures released by the Department of Health.”
So reported the BBC and other major UK channels today. God bless them. I wonder why they portray the story in this way?
For those of us who are grossly obese, I very much doubt news like this is likely to change anything - other than engendering an extra layer of guilt and enhancing my own feeling of wanting to hide from the world. (oh yes, it's there, and I'm kinda glad that you would question that)
I suspect it is reported in this way so that those who are not significantly overweight can say their “Tut-tutts” over their skinny-lattés and maybe mutter, soto voce, that “something should be done about it”.
The main messages, from both the media and the government, seem to be:
1) Obese people are a problem.
2) We should rightly be ashamed of them.
3) How could they be so stupid?
The underlying message also seems to include quite a large dollop of: “It's OK to discriminate and demonise fat people”. In a country where great strides have been made to stamp out discrimination in so many areas, we've finally found a subject where we don't have to try. Phew!
I haven't spoken out about this before, because I think I was all too happy to be ashamed of myself just as suggested.
“But hang on a moment, Jack” I hear you say, or at least that is the sense of what I hear you say. (Some of you may have used badder words.)
“Hang on a moment, Jack, that news report was just reporting a fact, not taking a stance. You're completely over-reacting.”
It's a fair point, and I think the best, and therefore most dangerous, discriminatory rhetoric sounds this way.
It's important to note that the line I quoted did not mention people at all. Even a tiny change would have helped a bit. They could have said: “The UK has the highest number of obesity sufferers in Europe, according to figures released by the Department of Health.” Instead, they used a phrase that is normally reserved for crime figures - like “The highest rate of gun crime in Europe”, or whatever.
They actually make obesity sound like a crime.
So this blog entry is my attempt to fight back just a little. I'm not suggesting that obesity is a great lifestyle choice, or that we should encourage people to become obese - that would be equally stupid.
I'm just firing a warning shot, lest we utterly de-humanise a disease that a great many people struggle with. If those with influence would do more by way of getting alongside those of us who really do have a mountain to stop being, then I sense the possibility of progress.
It's time the government and the media thought about practical and innovative help in this difficult area.
Till then, I'm sticking with the Spry, it sure slips down easy...
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