The Body Positive and Fat Acceptance Movement

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Years ago, just before I got married, I had had a job operating a spot welder, in which I'd sit all day, and only more my hands and my foot to work the pedal. Already overweight, I ballooned up to almost 350 lbs. I only started losing weight when my job got cut.

Looked over the posts so far. Very interesting comments. Would like to throw something into the mix more controversial. What if humans were, biologically speaking, most adapted to a whole foods plant diet? Doubt that? Then is the cause of the obesity epidemic in the US the type of food we eat (SAD, Standard American Diet full of empty carbs, meat and dairy), or how much excericise we get? I lost 100 lbs doing no extra excercise at all, and I _love_ my body image now, so I have my serious doubts.

Look, this is a hard one. Your whole life you have probably been told eating meat is part of a normal "balanced diet". Those societal fixed ideas are kind of a pervasive mental framework that is hard to get around. Consider this trope of a question, "where do Vegans get protein?" answer: same place cows do, from plants. Did you know that? It is true. If I did not get you with that one, trust me, there are other examples where the average 'wisdom' falls on its face when confronted with the facts.

What does the science say though? Check it for yourself. Who are the most scientific in their approach to what the human diet actually is. I found out, quite to my own surprise, that it was the Vegan Drs. who consistently showed the most scientific accumen. These Drs. didn't just preach either, they were all lean and healthy and doing it themselves. The movement is growing too because truth beats out falsity, given enough time.

So, here is the hard time I have about Fat Acceptance Movement. It is a disease. Even being a little overweight increases your mortality and morbidity. It is completely preventable using a plant-strong diet. This acceptance of a disease state because it is so common and misunderstood does not make it right. Link in the Environment and it gets worse. Add in that non-human animals are suffering daily only so that others can get a fix off of the substance of their choice {ice cream, steaks, veal, etc, etc.}; Can you see why Vegans are so annoyed sometimes???

So please, have a Positive Body Image. don't buy in to societies crap. Hairy shoulders/back, wide face, lanky, ... ? Cool, you are beautiful. Overweight, I am sorry, that is not normal. There is no need for you and those you affect to continue suffering. Just please stop and consider all the possibilities. That is fair right. Do your homework as they say.

BTW, I feel great on a Vegan Diet. That is what you will hear, over and over again, too. In fact, I am 41 and I feel better now than when I was 19. Did I work my ass of for it in the gym? Nope.

^^^
Meat tastes better than veggies. For me, that's case closed.

Meat tastes better than Veggies huh? Love it (I have heard this defense a million times, it is not rational). Crack cocaine is great too, but it is an addiction. Just because you enjoy something does not mean it is right. The meat you eat is causing you to be fatter with one foot closer to the grave, just like with crack or meth. Nice try Get veducated. Addiction is not a joke.

Respectfully, you don't know anything from the sounds of it. Perhaps you just want to have an excuse to carry on with your negative habits. Sorry, I don't accept your logic and hope that everyone can come around on this one, because it is so important to our group survival.

If you question my facts, fine, lets discuss and debate them. If you question my ethical reasoning, cool, let's dicuss. Handwaving away reality with some seemingly pithy comment is less than honest though. Saddly, it is a maladaptive self-serving misuse of belief in the face of contrary evidence.

Until your taste-buds change when you go off meat, you will not understand how good veggies really can be. Especially how good fruit can be. Your missing out man! And am I missing out. I get to have vegan icecream and vegan cookies, hell, even vegan cheese-burgers that has been reported as tasting better than the real thing (ok, less juicy, big woop, still pretty juicy). Your taste-buds are probably so drenched in fat and salt all day you have no idea what it is like to really experience the tastes you are deriding.

Thanks for falling for a common idea. It makes arguing for this position so much easier.

Someone has recently asked me to choose between two, false alternatives.

She said she was infatuated, physically, with a skinny person, too palsied, to stand on a city bus.

They pressured the bus driver, to relieve the fat person of his seat. She was also somewhat phobic of fat and made her biases clear.

I answered that I had never offered to provide transportation to either person, at my expense.

But, if it is ok to create odious, public debts, without consideration, there can be many buses, which come with rotisseries and soda dispensers.

Primus -- My Name is Mudd
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=953PkxFNiko
Fat woman serves booze and trays of pastries, to fat men, implying low, social status. Also, in museum paintings, as a classical sign of luxury.

I have always been physically-strong, good at growing and foraging, but lost, now, over 10 inches and 50lbs, by substituting state-subsidized, bulk foods, for the less-processed ones. I have not increased my physical activity or reduced calories. I eat all I want. This is another contrived war on (fill in the blank), in which the govt plays both sides.

But, if I was forced to choose only I one, I would rather of die of diabetes, in a bed, than in the Holodomor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

I am in interested in urban permaculture, have raised 15 peach and nectarine trees, with different colored fruit, from seeds. I have twisted-off most of the immature fruit, by hand, so the few remaining will be huge. Which peach would you rather be?

As well as making you fat, govt can punish the farmer for being too productive. Some Ethiopians were good at this, too. Their produce was burned, in the open, and they were shot. (Under the theory of original accumulation, food can be used to subvert and own your fellow man. So, having too much is seditious.) Food is a good thing, prestigious enough to be stolen.

Any who are immigrants or first generation, will have strong opinions about this.

The govt had apparently issued cookbooks, with 'recommended daily allowances', like in our health-and-nutrition classes, during the Ukrainian, Soviet-caused famine . I have decided not to post pictures, but, maybe, a more accurate choice, would be between chickens and dogs. I feel that it's better to have the option to be fat -- so fat, that you are grown into a bed -- but not to exercise that option.

Uncommonly-attractive people have also been persecuted -- like in monster movies -- assuming that we all have to be the same, in terms of status.

Conspicuously-fat people are probably, differently-abled, and, like gender and racial minorities, use all the normal words about themselves. I am not at all offended by open discussion, but don't think anybody needs to bring it to their attention.

Few answers.

@Sweatpea: Vegans are not supposed to use or eat animal products of any kind (definition). Vegetarians can and very often do have dairy/milk.

@Kraichgauer: "No, meat just tastes better to me." Are you trolling or is there another cause for your lack of interest in actual debate? The No part seemingly gets rid of supposed counterargumentation, but really it is quite a boring response indicative of a lack of willingness to actually engage in meaningful discussion. No, you are wrong. Good, now both of us are children and I can move on from this meaningless excercise. [x] ignore.

@friedmacguffins: Soviet Russia was a mess. If they caused famines based on whatever idealogical nonsense they believed in I am not at all surprised. If you want me to name drop I can give you some doozies. World Health Organization recommends a plant strong diet. I could look up the list for you if you want, it has a number of very reputable organizations associated with it.

People exist within a given society with differing cultural norms. Most of the cultures throughout history have been plant-based with a main starchy foodsource (rice, quinoa, oats...) as the driver, and they all did quite well thank you. If your society is subsistence, than life can be tough, eating rats and dogs if you can find them kind of thing. Suggestion: find out what plants grow naturally in your region that you can eat and learn to identify them. Bugs are the next best thing to plants in terms of nutritional profile so make some bug lentil soup with that tin-pot you keep from the authorities.

I am sorry you had to suffer in a society lead by irrational people. I am in one right now too, so I can understand the feeling somewhat. Lack of food is never a good thing though. That is not what this is about, the right food for our future should be the topic of the discussion. If you do not believe in the scientific method then I will not try to convince you, but if you think the scientists and engineers who make your planes and cell-phones know what they are talking about, then perhaps we have more to discuss in that vain.

There are three main body types, ectomorphs[skinny], endomorphs[average] and mesomorphs[bulky]. It is an interesting hypothesis that some people are naturally fat (and there are medical conditions that lead to abnormal metabolisms, example 'hyper/hypo-thyroidism'), but the idea is not correct. If you are overweight passed the point of your body type, it is because you have a disease, pure and simple. There is no perfect indicator of when you are perfect, but don't count the carbs, just eat as much as you want and get excercise, you will feel great.

On meat. It is a mixed bag. I am not against survival, I am for rationality. Nature is red in both tooth and claw because protein is very important, but we do get waaaay too much of it. So if I was stuck out on some island, I will do what it takes to survive. I value my brain more than a fish's brain, but when I get back to land .

@BettaPonic: Chicken, In general, or vegan alternatives?

However, I would love to answer the question of vegan alternatives. Vegan chicken is the easiest, tofu. Tastes like chicken. Getting off of the grid is good, love to here about permaculture, aquaculture or any of that. Chickens are interesting. If you want diseases, go for it.