My childhood daytime tv came with ginger ale and chicken soup. I've been really sick and periodically bedridden the last few years, and Youtube is my version that kind of TV. Only way more choice than Gilligan's Island (which is now on streaming,) and game shows/soap operas, which don't even exist anymore.

That's how I discovered the social movement known as Fat Acceptance/Health At Every Size. Look at these labs, we're fine. You are merely being prejudicial. While there are bad beauty standards which kills models, ballerinas, and gymnasts, driven to extreme thinness, it's equally bad for it to go to the other extreme.

Especially since gaining weight seems to be a progressive disease. It becomes increasingly difficult not to gain, as I discovered in my forties. No amount of portion control was going to fix this. I tried.

I felt a movement like this was going to be a time-limited situation in any case. Instead of sharing their difficulties about eating disorders, the movement tried to normalize it. But a stretch of early deaths and recent scandals shook up the happy picture.

And now, with these weight loss drugs? Everyone is abandoning Fat Acceptance. It's these Influencers who must change their attitudes. Perhaps addiction counseling was what they needed all along.

Now we have the science of junk food.

It is a shame that Fat Acceptance “everyone deserves respect and love”, “shaming people for excess fat is unkind and counterproductive”, somehow became “any data/suggestion that body fat might have negative health consequences is evil, fat-shaming”.

I’m not up on how strong the data is on health consequences of “excess fat”, but surely there is a middle ground between “all your health problems are because I think you are too fat” (which is terrible) and “no amount of body fat can possibly negatively impact health” (which is likely untrue).

The Body Positivity movement makes far more sense, as people shouldn't be held to arbitrary attractiveness standards, cultural oppression, or ableist thinking. This was an offshoot, but quickly became a defense mechanism for their only coping mechanism gone wild.

And I even cut folks some slack these days, with mad scientists designing foods to BE addictive, and deliberate mis-information about what "healthy eating" really is.

I used to think, "But everyone knows junk food has no nutrition!" Sadly, I have met too many who think a Big Gulp is the same as a bottle of water. And they won't touch water.

Their taste buds have become so distorted that it takes a whole bottle of Montreal Seasoning for them to even notice a taste.

I am a musician, playing at a resort on the public beach in Florida for years now.

It's amazing how many fat young people come by. And they flaunt it, even wearing bikinis or speedos.

I would never call someone fat to hurt their feelings. But I dislike this "Fat shaming" attitude. If you are fat, and someone mentions that with no malice, if you are ashamed, you are ashamed of yourself.

I think in today's world, too many people are too sensitive and too eager to be offended.

I'm bald. You can mention that and I'm not ashamed of it.

I think modern life makes it easy to listen to only what a person wants to hear.

Flat Earthers have made a comeback! In 2023!

It's people who refused to change. Some have become so defensive and -- let's be frank, delusional -- because so much of society doesn't make money with the truth.

We're living in a Con Artist Peak. Instagram is essentially "let me make pretty pictures of my life and sell you something with a lie."

Not that different from Good Housekeeping in my childhood... yet so much more persuasive, we are discovering.

If there was a like button for that post, WereBear, I'd click it.

So consider this your "like"

Aw, thanks!