Posted on 08/28/2006 11:20:06 AM PDT by freepatriot32
Fat is not a feminist issue, as Susie Orbach once claimed. Fat is a class issue. Rich, educated people are not fat; you see almost no children in private schools who are overweight. Fatness and obesity are directly related to lower education and lower incomes. What is sad is that at a time when this country is richer than ever and ought to have better schools than ever, we have far more fat people than ever — a dangerous explosion of flab. Last week the Department of Health issued a report grimly called Forecasting Obesity to 2010 and its findings were grotesque. Within four years, it predicts, a third of all adults — 13m people — will be obese. So will 1m children
Obese means not just podgy, but dangerously, disablingly, distastefully fat, as in American fat.
This is not just shocking; it has also happened shockingly fast. As the report says, a third of all men will be obese by 2010; in 1993 the figure was only — if one can say only of such a large figure — 13%, rising to 24% in 2004.
The same is true of women, although the rate is rising more slowly; 16% were obese in 1993, 24% in 2004, and the trend is expected to rise until 2010. The proportion of boys who were obese stood at 17% in 2003 and is predicted to rise to 19% by 2010, while among girls it is expected to increase more swiftly from 16% to 22%.
This presents an awkward challenge to libertarians. The libertarian assumption is that we should all be free to do what we want, as far as possible, and if some people’s lifestyle choices involve snacking on deep-fried Mars bars and triple-processed cheeseburgers, other people have no business interfering, still less the government.
Besides, there is the embarrassing fact that those who eat and drink junk do so for cheap comfort and because they are either too poor or too ignorant (or both) to prepare healthy food. It doesn’t come well from the consumers of steamed organic asparagus and free-range ducks’ breasts to criticise those who can manage only frozen reconstituted chicken nuggets and sugary baked beans.
However, obesity does not concern only the obese. It concerns all of us. Obese parents produce obese children, and obesity places a crippling burden on the National Health Service, quite apart from the many personal miseries involved. Currently 10% of NHS resources are spent on diabetes (two-thirds of which is the avoidable type 2 associated with obesity) and this could easily double within the next four years to 20%.
This is quite apart from the increased risk among the obese of heart disease and other serious illness. More young people are being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, something previously seen only in people over 40. In these circumstances even the most swivel-eyed libertarian would probably agree, for once, that something must be done and even perhaps by the government.
Curiously enough, however, in one of the few areas where our ever-intrusive government might for once justifiably intrude, new Labour does almost nothing. Possibly as a result of the ferocious lobbying of the food industry, ministers restrict themselves to making repetitive noises about healthy living and “small changes” that won’t cost anybody anything.
Tony Blair said last month that if the food industry did not agree to limit junk food advertisements by 2007 he would bring in mandatory rules, but he has said that before and more than once. Besides, why not bring them in straight away? His government has persistently ignored the demands of the Commons health select committee for a traffic light system of food labelling, enabling shoppers to make informed choices.
England’s chief medical officer warned in this year’s annual report that public health budgets were being raided to deal with deficits. That is the reality behind government talk of raising public awareness.
I have never been convinced that government health education has any effect. Despite the “five-a-day” campaign, only a quarter of people in England eat vegetables every day. About half of overweight men are in denial; they don’t see themselves as overweight, according to the report.
There is nothing complicated about being thin. Being fat is usually the result of eating too much junk food and taking too little exercise. Being thin means eating much less food, avoiding junk food altogether and taking exercise every day. It may be that nothing can be done about the plague of obesity; there is a growing epidemic in Europe and worldwide. Perhaps affluence is a disease to which only the fortunate few are immune. But if anything could be done about it, it would have to be radical.
Nobody who craves cheap comfort food will willingly give it up. But if over-processed, over-refined food and junk food were to become expensive while healthy fresh food became cheap — the opposite of the case today — people would be forced to eat well. This could be done through taxes or subsidies. Alternatively, you could ration unhealthy food.
There could be a public campaign against fattening food, just as there was against smoking, aimed at making everyone ashamed of consuming anything naughty but nice. I am just as greedy as anyone else but I have come to think of cakes, biscuits, crisps, sweets, white bread and puddings as more or less toxic. Foods like this should have health warnings — “cake can kill”. They are not just unnecessary, empty calories; they interfere with your blood sugar levels, affect your appetite and your mood; they may even induce food addiction. The same applies to alcohol: more than a modest amount makes you fat, interferes with your mood and is often addictive.
Just as there would need to be financial incentives to eat well, there should also be inducements to take exercise. The cost should be subsidised or declarable against tax. Employers should be required to give workers time off to go to the gym or jog. We could imitate the Japanese and have mass group exercises at work every day.
And that is the problem. Obesity, one of the trials of affluence, can be solved only, if at all, by the kind of interventionism that has been discredited by the failure of socialism. Liberty is indivisible; it belongs to the ignorant and the low paid just as much as to anyone else. Perhaps obesity is one of the many prices of liberty. Fat is a freedom issue.
You have hungry critters. Introduce a fox into the mix and your garden will be yours again. Or you'll need a permanent fence dug a foot into the ground.
I have a red and a grey fox, and I think I even have a coyote. I don't get the deer I used to see, I believe thanks to the coyote, and my foxes are fat and sassy.
goat cheese - try the Norwegian cheese "gjetost"
Slice it very thinly and place on thin crackers or a thin roll with butter. You can even drizzle a bit of honey on top for breakfast.
Try using the dried fruits in biscotti. I used to make one type that used dried cranberries (for the life of me I can't find the recipe). Biscotti keeps very well in coffee cans.
I came across a recipe for "can cake" the other day. I have solved my problem for teacher gifts and other sur of the moment situations around the holidays. You use 10ounce soup cans to bake the cakes. One batch of the recipe makes 8 of them and they can be frozen. It's a super idea for kids because the cake needs to be taken out of the can to cool and the can can be decorated before the cake goes back in, or else they can just be wrapped in colored plastic wrap.
Hmmm......I'm "in town." Do I really want a fox? I wouldn't mind if a hawk or an owl moved into the neighborhood.
A friend of mine swears by human urine... she sends her husband out every night after dark to do the deed.
LOL! Hope the neighbors weren't watching!
Pantry dinner!!!!!
Payday isn't until Thursday, if it isn't in the freezer, fridge or pantry it's not going get eaten in this house til then - And we're going fishing Thursday, so hopefully I'll have dinner in the cooler :)
Interesting ideas.
I've thought for years that food stamps and WIC should be replaced with government soup kitchens for the truly needy. A healthful gruel of lentils, whole grain and a vegetable with a piece of fruit and a glass of milk would be offered to all comers. Recipients would be required to work for an hour on the premises doing some kind of piece work or assembly or whatever to offset the cost. The point is to save the misfortunate from starvation, but eliminate abuse and leave incentives for work. The main dietary problem of the poor is not hunger but obesity, so the current system of subsidizing junk food is the worst of all worlds.
If I remember, in the eighties Newt proposed soup kitchens and was of course demonized as heartless and cruel. But since then we've had the success of welfare reform and the obesity wave, maybe it's time for another try.
I've never tried the deer-off spray. Plant some corn around the perimitter - the deer will eat that and lave everything else alone.
Since the neighbors are a quarter mile away, they'd need high-powered night vision binoculars LOL - and knowing that crowd (ex-military) I wouldn't put it past them ...
Human urine is another good one..........and it's far easier to acquire than dried blood.
My husband thought the idea was a hoot when he first read about it.......his aim really improved over the summer into the gallon jugs.
Eeeewwwwww!!
I'm saving a fortune by making my own pizza from scratch, including the sauce, crust, and cheese. I've got the routine down to about 20 minutes, as much time as it would take to go to the Hut and back. To make the cheese just boil a quart of milk, dump in the juice of a lemon, strain and there it is, rivaling fresh mozzarella. The dough requires a food processor to do it fast, but you can save enough from not doing takeout and frozen pizza to buy one pretty quickly.
I hate to admit it but it is nice to see them spew their venom towards someone other than smokers.
I guarantee within a few years people will actually approach,and insult,the overweight.
LOL!!!!!
I do pizza from scratch, but have never attempted making the cheese myself. I don't even bother with the food processor for the dough - I just pour all the ingrdients in the bread machine.
I'll have to look into making the cheese, though.........a quart of milk is a heck of a lot cheaper than even an 8oz block of mozzarella.
Yeah, the trend right now is "smokers are easy targets". You, being a non-smoker, have deemed it necessary to tell me I am irresponsible....except, you don't know me, so how can you assume that? Do you speed in your car? Do you drink alcohol? I never had any more sick days than anyone else I worked with, and less than some. In all the years I've been smoking I have never been treated for anything related to my smoking. Anyone who has been treated for any long term care (smokers or not) have contributed to the increase in health care. Why didn't you just say you were bigoted when it comes to smokers and the overweight? In a perfect world we'd all be just like you. Where do you get your sources of information from? It must suck for you to have to be living on this same earth as someone like me
It's already happening, m'dear. The dunce that made a comment to a friend of mine not long ago backed off and apologized real fast after he got a dressing down from me. My friend is quite capable of taking care of herself.....but this (fill in the blank) was so vicious in his onslaught on her that not only was she speechless, both her 8yo and my 8yo burst into tears, which then set off her 2yo. I went nuclear.
This girl is my friend and I can say anything I want to her. But I would never insult her about her weight........and this was a complete stranger. She is fat, no question about it, and she knows it, but there is also a medical/chemical reason for it and the doctor is trying to reverse it. I'm trying to do my part by teaching her how to cook more healthy meals for her and her family.
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