Diet Denial

I was looking at one of the many message boards or forums, if you'd rather call them that, last night. It's amazing their specificity. You name the diet and you'll find a message board for it. Low carb, low fat, low calorie, low salt, the list is endless.

I have noticed one thing, at least, that they all share and that is denial. It comes in many forms, but it is always there. Case in point:

I spent the evening reading the posts on one dieters thread. Her journey to success. It was a journal of sorts that she posted to every few days and then her online friends would answer her posts with rousing cheers for your successes and heartfelt sorrow for her failures.

I read all seventeen pages which covered a thirteen month period. I know, I need a life. Anyway, she started this journey at about 177 pounds. Within this thirteen month period she went up the same twelve pounds to end up thirteen months later back at 177 pounds.

This isn't news. Many people, myself included, lose and gain the same pounds over and over again. What I found interesting were her posts, and this is where the denial comes into play.

Her posts came in two fashions. One were posts where she had lost weight, a pound or less. The other posts, which made up 95% of the posts were complaints about not losing weight and how the diet just simply was not working for her.

In all of her misery, her online pals gave her virtual hugs and admired her stick with it attitude. They weeped and moaned about her fate and how difficult she had it while trying too hard for so long to lose weight.

What no one seemed to mention or perhaps not even notice, as they did not have the perspective of looking over a year at once, was that those 95% of posts that complained of no weight loss also contained the confession of the extra sugar, bits and bites, and days of eating off her plan.

That bit of information seemed to be pushed aside as far as possible and ignored. Of course, here was the true reason she wasn't losing weight. It was right there in black and white if she or any of her buddies wanted to take the time to look and acknowledge the hard cold facts. With all the cheats and days off plan, she was never really truly on plan.

Instead, it was easier for her and everyone else to deny the obvious and sit back and pretend that she and they were helpless. For if they were to admit her faults, then they would have to admit their own.

From personal experience, I know that denial tastes much better when shared with company.

DOT Says Pigs Can Fly

The Department of Transportation in all its wisdom declared today that airlines must allow service animals on planes, including pot belly pigs and miniature horses.

Please know, this post is not about the need some may have for service animals to help them with their daily needs regardless of what type of animal it may be. I say, God Speed, and whatever gets you through the day is all right with me.

This is simply about the irony of it all. They throw fat people off planes for being too big to fly, but a horse or a pig, no problem. The article went on to say that if there wasn't a seat available for the animal, that a passenger might be asked to move to a new seat to accommodate the animal unless, that is, the passenger is willing share some of their floor space and leg room with the animal.

When's the last time someone was willing to share some of their seat with an overweight person let alone livestock?

Honestly, it boggles the mind.

I can hear it now, "Excuse me, ma'am, you don't mind if my pig sits in your lap do you?"

The passengers with these animals do have to promise that the animals won't go to the bathroom while on the plane. You know, I had a hard enough time house training my dog. I'm not sure I could get a horse to go...or not go...on command.

The airports will be required to have bathroom spaces and personal to take the animals for that all important last potty break before boarding.

All I'm saying is if a 300 lb pig can fly and not have to pay for an extra seat than so can I.

Why Do People Hate Fat People?

While I was trying to fall asleep last night, I started to wonder why people hate fat people. In history, it seems, that one group's hate of another group stems from fear. People fear what they don't know or understand, but I don't think that is it. I think, in this culture of political correctness, people are running out of people to hate. It is no longer acceptable to judge people based on race or religion. Not that it was ever correct, but in years past correctness didn't stop anyone. Today, it is not tolerated.

What's a person to do? Hating someone gives the hater a sense of moral superiority. It's like early risers. I'm sure you know the type. The man or woman that gets out of bed at four or five in the morning and looks their nose down at anyone who might dare to sleep until 9:00 am. Somehow, we have infused getting up before light as a sign of virtue. While the poor, lazy, bum that dares to sleep past sunrise, is held as an example of sloth and all that is wrong with our society. I've never figured out why a person that gets their eight hours of sleep between 9:00p.m. and 5:00a.m. is somehow better than a person that gets their eight hours between 2:00a.m. and 10:00a.m.? Eight hours is eight hours.

I think this is the key to the question. People need to feel that in some fundamental way they are better then someone else. The easiest way to do that is to find something about a person that one can point to and and say, "Hey that's a choice you've made." People don't have a choice of skin color, nor do most make the choice of their religion as they are born into it. However, people can say, a person makes the choice of what they put in their mouths, and just like early risers it becomes a distinction between good and bad.

It doesn't matter that weight gain and loss has many components. It doesn't matter that some people, although few, have health issues that cause weight gain. It doesn't matter that if weight loss was as simple as eating or not eating, there would be no fat people. Our relationship with food is complicated to say the least, but none of that matters.

What does matter is that people can look at someone and point and simplify the issue to a question of willpower and self-worth. They can point and say, "You're fat. I'm not. That makes me better than you." Once they have made that leap in logic, it gives them permission to hate.