Brit Girls - Fat

[Matthew Storrs]

5 minutes ago, spudulike said:

I have often thought that the Mcdonalds door should be one foot wide and it would be hilarious watching many of their customers trying to get in!

Don't think it would do their sales figures much good though.

Let’s face it the real fatties just go through drivethru anyway.

[spuddog0507]

I have to agree on this subject, 30 years ago I spent a lot of time delivering for a landscaping co round the northwest and fat birds where thin on the ground back then, nowadays there seems to be plenty of them, its all down to the life style of today and all the crap food they eat ready meals takeaways pizza etc, there's a few lasses I grew up with that are still very tidy and all had kids and i would say fall in to the MILF.com category, and one in particularly stands out who has 3 children and 3 grand children but has a figure that a lot of 20 year olds would kill for.

[skyhuck]

I think its a downward spiral, when obesity was rare people took care to look like most others, they did not want to be the "odd one out".

 

These days fatties are every where, so people feel comfortable being huge, often couples become huge together.

 

Same goes for debt, in the past people where nervous and ashamed of debt, but now every one has it so its acceptable.

[Mick Dempsey]

5 hours ago, spuddog0507 said:

I have to agree on this subject, 30 years ago I spent a lot of time delivering for a landscaping co round the northwest and fat birds where thin on the ground back then, nowadays there seems to be plenty of them, its all down to the life style of today and all the crap food they eat ready meals takeaways pizza etc, there's a few lasses I grew up with that are still very tidy and all had kids and i would say fall in to the MILF.com category, and one in particularly stands out who has 3 children and 3 grand children but has a figure that a lot of 20 year olds would kill for.

Fat girls thin on the ground! Like it.

 

Anyway, obesity. Fact is now food is cheaper relative to income than its ever been.

When I was a lad (run for cover) our larder would start looking threadbare by the end of the week, we never went hungry but my father’s farm workers wages would not stretch to takeaways (didn’t really exist then anyway!) nothing noble about it, just the way it was.

Very few of us had money for chips or burgers on the way home, so we had to wait for proper tea as it were.

 Couple that with kids not walking or riding bikes to school as much and you have a situation where each generation gets fatter and fatter.

 I feel sorry for them.

Edited December 19, 2017 by Mick Dempsey

[sime42]

Matelot already gave Ukraine as an example, but in my experience any country in Central/Eastern Europe is full of slim, fit girls, (which should actually be a "normal" body shape). It's rare to spot a whale in fact. The opposite is almost becoming true here in the UK. This all applies equally to men as well as women.
Trying desperately not to climb on to my high horse here! I'm sure there's many reasons but binge drinking, binge eating, fast food and convenience food must be big factors.

[MattyF]

Wow ... We bored of been racist sexist bigots and now moved on to tearing up people bodies ?

 

[sime42]

Fair point. I do feel a bit embarrassed now about my somewhat harsh comments. I suppose I was at the top of the slippery slope down into bigotry. Apologies to anyone I may have offended.
However. It seems to me that there is one significant difference. People have no choice or control of their race, gender, sexual orientation, religion etc. Whereas most people DO have some choice and control of their health and body shape.

[openspaceman]

3 hours ago, Mick Dempsey said:

 

Anyway, obesity. Fact is now food is cheaper relative to income than its ever been.

When I was a lad (run for cover) our larder would start looking threadbare by the end of the week, we never went hungry but my father’s farm workers wages would not stretch to takeaways (didn’t really exist then anyway!) nothing noble about it, just the way it was.

Very few of us had money for chips or burgers on the way home, so we had to wait for proper tea as it were.

 Couple that with kids not walking or riding bikes to school as much and you have a situation where each generation gets fatter and fatter.

 

My generation  came after the war, sugar was rationed until I was about 4 so our parents generation had lived under rationing through their teens till late twenties.

 

My mum spoiled us when the sugar ration came off and my teeth suffer as a result of sugary food as well as lack of proper dental care (plus dentists were on piecework).

 

I think you are completely right about cheap food, I would include "snacking" and lack of exercise.

 

I'd love to know how to tackle it as my 22 year old grand daughter is obese and I worry for her.

 

 

[Arctostaphylos uva-ursi]

Technology is also making us more sedentary. We dont have to get out of our seats to answer a phone, change TV station, flip a record to the B side etc.  We can also order our shopping on-line, correspond with people many miles away at the touch of a keyboard and buy takeaways using our mobile phones. 

Even those who look thin may have significant fat around their internal organs due to a more sedentary life style.

Perhaps people in other European countries don't have the same level of access to technology or just have a healthier attitude to it an better outlook on life, on average?

[sime42]

Yep, I missed a couple of big factors out as well like lack of exercise and snacking.
This is actually a hugely complex subject.
Although I stand by my opinion that people do have a choice in the matter, I should be fairer and say that it's not always easy to exercise that choice in the context of the world in which we live today. With an abundance of extremely cheap and convenient but unhealthy foods everywhere, at any time. Plus a very persuasive advertising industry.
The reason that we have such cheap food must be largely due to intensive agriculture. Which is another f*ck up that needs sorting IMO.
As someone else noted;- in the Western World the perceived norm for body shape has been skewed. Walking around the streets of UK for example it would be easy to think that it's normal to be a whale and hence its acceptable so no need to do anything about it.