Let’s go back to rationing – once a month a book of coupons could be mailed out to every member of the population
One of the worse insults in the English language does not involve race, sexual proficiency or lack of brainpower.
This insult causes outrage – it’s almost as toxic as the N word.
Dare to describe someone as FAT and you stand accused of body shaming, a lack of empathy, a philistine mindset.
And yet, if we can bear to face the horrible reality – a third of us are just plain FAT.
There’s no other way of describing the self-inflicted mess we’re in.
The medical profession has become so frightened of causing offence that they’ve banned using the word ‘fat’ and turned to the softer term ‘obese’ as a way of describing the blubber we’re carrying round, wrecking our knees, clogging up our arteries and devastating our hearts.
As the problem has grown into an epidemic affecting one in three children, so has our reluctance to confront it. We can’t see our knees, or even our genitalia, and we refuse to face up to reality as well.
We’ve become disgustingly FAT.
On a trip to Australia a few months ago, I discovered that fatties there have proliferated to a disgusting degree.
They waddle around supermarkets, shuffle around shopping centres, stuffing mountainous portions of chips into their chubby faces.
Dare to describe someone as FAT and you stand accused of body shaming, a lack of empathy, a philistine mindset
Clothing comes in XXXXL, for men who look like they’re about to give birth to triplets.
Rather than tell the population the stark reality, doctors in New South Wales have been ordered not to call patients fat or even obese – but instead come up with non-confrontational alternatives, like telling Mr and Mrs Bloaty they are ‘well above a healthy weight’.
Fat is a touchy subject. In the UK, GPs found that one in three patients were highly offended when the issue of their weight was even mentioned.
Now, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) wants doctors to adopt a tone that is ‘respectful and non-judgmental’.
That’s like telling an alcoholic ‘ok go right ahead and drink yourself to death’.
We are constantly given all sorts of reasons why we are fat. I’m sorry to use the offensive word, but it is the best way to describe the end result of stuffing food into your face and taking as little exercise as possible, gorging on sweets and biscuits whilst slumped on a sofa in front of the television.
Some experts claim obesity is a direct result of poverty – Mississippi, the third most overweight state in America, is also the poorest.
In the UK, five of the ten areas with the most overweight children also make the list of the ten poorest.
Fat is a touchy subject. In the UK, GPs found that one in three patients were highly offended when the issue of their weight was even mentioned
But this link is not conclusive – in March 2017, the UK’s Institute of Economic Affairs used data from leading supermarkets to contradict the theory that bad diet was a direct result of poverty.
They calculated that the raw ingredients for 3 healthy meals a day cost £3, a healthy vegetarian diet could be achieved on £3 a day, whereas a medium extra value adult meal at Mcdonalds currently costs £4.69.
A cheeseburger costs 99p, which would buy a kilo of sweet potatoes, 2 kilos of carrots or 2.5 kg of pasta, all of which would last some time.
Plus, obesity has soared as food prices have fallen.
Lack of time because of long working hours is often cited as a reason for eating fast food – but Jamie’s fifteen minute meals was an international best seller, and these days every newspaper and magazine features recipes that take less than 20 minutes to prepare and cook.
For most people, over-eating is a personal choice. Sure, a small percentage will have glandular or inherited medical issues that impact on their metabolism, but 90% of fatties could be thinner, if they stopped making excuses and pretending that being fat was gorgeous.
A cheeseburger costs 99p, which would buy a kilo of sweet potatoes, 2 kilos of carrots or 2.5 kg of pasta, all of which would last some time
Is heaving your arse up and down stairs really a delightful life-style choice?
Naturally, politicians think that they have the right to nanny us into losing weight.
The British government wants food companies to cut the size of ready-made meals, reduce the calories in prepared foods like pizzas, sandwiches, sausages, dips and crisps.
This week, health experts announced they want us to adopt a healthy diet of 400 calories for breakfast, and 600 calories each for lunch and dinner.
It will never work, why civil servants waste their salaries coming up with this drivel, I cannot imagine.
Smaller pizzas will just result in fatties buying two, ditto with crisps.
In fact the last time any population existed on 1600 calories a day was probably during the Second World War. Which brings me to my JSP solution for fat-busting.
Let’s go back to rationing – once a month a book of coupons could be mailed out to every member of the population.
It would contain coupons for the purchase of evil foods like pizzas, biscuits, cakes, chocolate, crisps and full fat dairy products, sugar and fizzy drinks.
We would have to use our money, accompanied by a coupon permit to purchase the offending items in strictly regulated amounts.
This week, health experts announced they want us to adopt a healthy diet of 400 calories for breakfast, and 600 calories each for lunch and dinner
Of course it could lead to a black market, to trading and bartering, but it’s a lot easier to enforce than ‘asking’ food manufacturers to cut portions and trim off calories when all they are interested in in profit.
Look back at pictures of our great grandparents and their children- not a fattie in sight in the early 1950’s. People were wiry, trim and walked everywhere.
Yet they ate white bread, potatoes, used sugar, drank beer, smoked and loved cakes on Saturdays and Sundays. They had known deprivation during the war, and rationing was a way of life – they were resourceful, no matter how poor.
I grew up in a working class home with an outside toilet and two parents who had left school at 14. We were all thin.
Food was basic, but nutritious, even if my mother always overcooked green vegetables.
So bring back rationing and stop feeling sorry for overweight food addicts.
It’s time to shame them off their very large backsides.