Fat Acceptance – It’s All Fat People’s Fault! Fats Vs Establishment

On July 27th 2009 the Los Angeles Times printed an article which title reads “Tough love for fat people: Tax their food to pay for healthcare”. This stuff is outrageous but not surprising (at least not for me). It’s just the latest in a long string of attacks on our freedom. Now it’s our turn for the political magnifying glass to be turned on us fatties as we join the long and distinguished rank of whipping boys right along with big tobacco, big business, big oil. Yep, Big People have hit the “big time”, shoulder to shoulder with the rest of “The Bigs”.

In the Los Angeles Times article they’re blaming fat folks for the skyrocketing health care costs and that’s not fair according to LA times. They are pitting 1/3 of the American population who are not considered overweight against the other 2/3 of the population saying it’s not fair that the 1/3 should have to pay for the eating habits of the 2/3 in health care premiums. Now you may think my main point is to argue about the above statement but it’s not, in fact I think the above statement is only a symptom of the real problem not the problem itself. This is about building support for the health care debate (and more control over our lives) as can be inferred in LA times.

“In the debate over healthcare reform, the added cost of caring for patients with obesity-related diseases has become a common refrain.”

A common refrain meaning to say our representation is gunning for fat people. Then the LA time went on to quote a conveniently timed Center for Disease Control and Prevention report saying;

“It finds that as obesity rates increased from 18.3% of Americans in 1998 to 25% in 2006, the cost of providing treatment for those patients’ weight-driven problems increased healthcare spending by $40 billion a year.”

If you’re not yet convinced that Fat People are the target then read on;

“policy makers may need to consider interventions every bit as forceful as those that succeeded in cutting adult tobacco use by more than 50%”

LA times sited this statement from the Urban Institute and then went on to say;

“But in many ways, the drumbeat of scientific evidence and the growing cultural stigma against obesity already are well underway”.

Maybe you’ve been paying attention and have been witnessing this “drumbeat” against the dreaded Fat People and know that what I’m saying is true. But the larger issue here is not about fat people at all but about all people and specifically the freedom of all people. What they are really saying at the core of it is “You fat people don’t know what’s good for you or you can’t control yourself so we the benevolent government are going to. The government and a few busy body activists want to tell you and me how we should live.

What this article begs you realize is that the assault on our freedom is real folks. And there are (believe it or not) people who don’t like the way that America was founded and are very busy implemented laws to change it. Even some big money outsiders (people not from America) throw lots of money into organizations to circumvent our founding.

I ask you to ask yourself who are these people who want to implement more control over our daily lives? Control over what kind of car we should drive, what school our children have to go to, what doctor we go to, whether we should smoke or what we can eat… Who?

More than 60% of the American population is considered overweight and that’s a lot of voices and voting power.