Obesity: A Health crisis or a moral one?
- Thread starter Quinlan
- Start date
On the issue of obesity and mass...I align with my signature. I have heard the term tossed around a few times "correlation is not causation." I agree, but feel that this logical fallacy can be directly applied to the very studies the "pro-obesity" side cites. The fact that skinny people are at the same risk for something like heart disease does not inherently mean that losing weight is in vein. One could venture to guess that it's because skinny people are just as guilty as fat people of eating unhealthy cholesterol-ridden foods.
Exactly my point! So why destroy the self esteem of one set of people if other groups are just as guilty?
I think the first step on the road to healthy living is accepting your body and not being ashamed of it and hating it. It is hard for someone to want to tend to their garden if they hate their garden and are bombarded with messages since childhood telling them that there is something fundamentally wrong with their garden. I would say shame is a terrible motivator, it is more paralysing than anything.
S
Shai Gar
Only one person can destroy self esteem. The self.
Feel guilty enough to destroy it? Maybe there's a reason.
Explore the reason, fix the fault. Don't lash out in self pity.
Feel guilty enough to destroy it? Maybe there's a reason.
Explore the reason, fix the fault. Don't lash out in self pity.
I have a few qualms with the evidence that you have brought up. For one thing: your sources may be unreliable (in a scientific sense, and for use in academic setting with peer review).
I'm fairly confident that your source for weightwatchers is unreliable.
Your source for junkfoodscience may also be unreliable: the medical blogger site that she is affiliated with has a gmail account. As we all know, gmail accounts are free to get. The fact that the group does not seem to be affiliated with any professional organizations also gives me some pause. If you are presenting scientific evidence, make sure they are good sources with peer review.
I have provided the wiki on reliable sources.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_source_examples
Do you have any evidence that there is a negligible risk with increasing weight? Otherwise, I will have to point out that you still have increased weight (which generates more force when it hits the ground). If you have evidence that the weight acts as a cushion and is protective, please provide it. Otherwise, this is speculation.
I am finding sources as I type this. Unfortunately, many of them require payment for other users to access them (and I will not repost them here because of copyright law). I will provide the authors and titles of the articles, and will continue to search for some that I can post here for discussion purposes.
It depends on what field you are in healthcare as to the guidelines. If you would like, I could try to see if I can find it for (insert field here).
While this is an interesting graph, it is talking about old data. Is there a more current graph with data from within the past five years? As it stands, this graph would probably not be considered a good figure to use in academia.
As far as I am aware, the obese have the same legal rights as everyone else in America.
I am fully comfortable with this being a 'humanized' issue. However, I am interested in discussing the scientific facts surrounding obesity as being unhealty.
I am aware that the issue may not be in the correct proportions because of incorrect figures that were given by agencies. However, obesity is a great cause for concern; I do not have any figures to og on yet, but I am of the opinion that less than 25% of the obese population have 'normal' glucose and cholesterol parameters. Once I have the information that I require, I will present it here.
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I have never heard anything about limiting the procedure and costs.
Can you clarify to explain how did you hear that and where that happens?
By the way, we don't call it "socialized medicine". Only americans call it that way, we just call it "public health". We see it as the same as education, security and roads. An act of respect to the taxpayer.
It's funny that something that a lot of countries in the world have been living with forever seems so alien to US citizens now. For the rest of us, it's just natural. Ask anyone who lives in a country with public health care (whether they pay for private or not) if they'd think it'd be a good idea to remove that and they'd say that's absurd.
The only people who REALLY suffer with the lack of public health care are the poor, and they are the people who'd benefit the most.
I don't know why americans in general seem to have this crazy idea that private medicine would stop existing once they had Universal Health Care.
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Because the moment any policy that might benefit the poor is suggested, people go "Oh no, the dirty commies are taking over! Save our freedom! Save America! The rich don't deserve this kind of tyranny!"
the people who really benefit from it are the poor
the rich will continue going to their fancy hospitals with 45 channels on cable
the rich will continue going to their fancy hospitals with 45 channels on cable
Uh-huh, and I totally can't see unhealthy fat people not trying to get healthy by using this as an excuse. They'll say "you can be fat and healthy!" and then stuff their faces with two overfilled plates for breakfast, and when asked they will still maintain they "don't eat a lot".
And don't tell me they don't exist. Don't even try to sell me that these kinds of people all have some kind of medical problem that makes them gain weight easily. I've seen far too many people who are fat, and who stay fat, through their own gluttonous actions to ever buy that.
For the record, I don't care if people don't mind being big. They want to stuff their faces with all the good stuff cuisine has to offer and not do anything to keep it off? That's their prerogative, just like it's a smoker's prerogative to become a rattled addict. They'll both be chipping years if not decades off their life expectancy, but they're adults so they can do whatever they please. They don't even need to justify themselves to me.
What bugs me is articles like that, weasely articles. Fat-acceptance movements, shit like that. Because the only thing I loathe more than people who bitch about their condition without even trying to remedy it, it's people who do that and then scream about persecution and try to peddle me excuses when they don't even apply to them.
That's why I mind the article. Not because it doesn't have some positive stuff in there, but because it slips down into fat-acceptance extremism from how I read it. Because it'll give people who don't scrutinize it so badly an excuse, when they need to be told to get their ass on the treadmill.
And just like I can't deny that there are people who get fat through medical conditions and can't help it nobody here can deny that there are people who get fat through overeating and under exercising. And that latter group doesn't need an excuse, they do need to eat sanely and exercise.
how could acceptance ever be extreme?
i mean, why is it anybody's business? someone's body, health, shape or habits?
why should it give anyone a certain right to assume something about them?
i mean, why is it anybody's business? someone's body, health, shape or habits?
why should it give anyone a certain right to assume something about them?
That's not all you have been claiming though. Your claims go as far as to say that losing weight is detrimental to health or even impossible. Like Billy has said, weight loss and gain is simply a product of burning more calories than you consume. I wouldn't argue that there are exceptions but they are not very common. In other words, truly obese people that eat terribly are quick to self-diagnose themselves with a glandular problem.
Myself, I weighed 155 to 165 lbs in high school. I ate terribly but was in track, cross-country and baseball so I never really gained weight. It didn't take long after graduating for me to gain 70 lbs with the absence of sports to keep me active. I also gained a lot of muscle because I have only really done physical work. I'm just now starting to get back into shape. Last time I weighed myself I weighed 215 lbs. According to BMI, I'm obese. I think using body fat percentage is probably more accurate, in which case I'm almost not even considered overweight (27% body fat).
I don't know why you are not willing to call it socialized medicine. There is nothing wrong with the term "socialized." I'm not saying it as a derogatory term.
As far as I know, every country that has socialized medicine uses a cap system. You were trying to frame it as if money was not a part of the health care equation in these countries when it very much is. If the United States took up this system, they couldn't just tell doctors to treat anyone for anything like you seem to think they can. The costs would be astronomical and disproportionate.
I would like to hear how you think costs are controlled if not through a cap system. You can't just use the money in a pool-style system because then your "equal care" goes right out the window. More common but expensive procedures would use up a major part of the budget and the money for more rare procedures just wouldn't be there.
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well, I have lived all my life in countries with public health care and no one i have ever known have associated that with the word socialized, because it's pretty much like saying public health care goes against capitalism, which is not true. Ideas for the people such as free education, health, workers rights and unions exist and are part the capitalist world.
never in my life i have heard that word associated to it, because to us public health care is simply a fundamental right, as well as education and pension.
There isn't such a system to control costs regarding procedures and treatment. Most of the people who can afford private health care, go private, due to the comfort of the treatment, not necessarily the quality of it.
Not only that, but medication is also free. You can provide such things by breaking monopolies of the pharmaceutical or sirurgical industry.
Also you have to consider how much the country actually gains by keeping people healthy and able to work, rather than bankrupt and losing their assets due to illness.
never in my life i have heard that word associated to it, because to us public health care is simply a fundamental right, as well as education and pension.
There isn't such a system to control costs regarding procedures and treatment. Most of the people who can afford private health care, go private, due to the comfort of the treatment, not necessarily the quality of it.
Not only that, but medication is also free. You can provide such things by breaking monopolies of the pharmaceutical or sirurgical industry.
Also you have to consider how much the country actually gains by keeping people healthy and able to work, rather than bankrupt and losing their assets due to illness.
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Okay, has it ever been implemented in a modern setting? In the 1800s, quacks ran rampant, and medical technology was nothing like it is now. I really don't see the merit or applicability of what happened then to what exists now. The most successful strategy is public health care, as demonstrated by pretty much everyone in Europe, Canada, etc...
A private monopoly is not subject to accountability, especially if the government is weak. A public monopoly could be controlled if the government is democratic. But, we're not talking about fully socialized here. Private medicine would still exist with public health care, but to do what you're suggesting is extreme and has .... no good evidence to support it. We're in a post-industrial economy now.
Also, it is impossible to get rid of the state.
If we don't accept other self destructive things then we shouldn't accept this one?
And nobody better come out swinging with the "but some people have a medical condition" because some people get hooked on drugs because they have a medical condition too.
One of the things that sets the US apart from many of the hybrid economies that have been discussed elsewhere is military. Most of the hybrid countries that I remember being brought up (Japan, Norway, Sweden, etc.) do not have to pay for having the largest military in the world. They also have much smaller populations (going by figures provided on wiki here; numbers are in the millions): Japan 127, Normay 4.8, Sweden 9.2. The United States has over 300 (million) people to take care of under a Universal Health Care plan. If the US really wanted to have a UHC, then costs would have to be cut somewhere. It's a matter of the numbers I'm afraid.
Also to note: free medication may not be the best option. Studies have been done to show that patients do not take their medicine as prescibed (compliance) as well if the medicine is free. The thought is that since the patient did not have to give any money for the medicine, that the medicine is not valued as much as if the patient did have to pay for part (or all) of it.
Finally, someone brought up trans fats somewhere in this thread. Trans fats were banned because their consumption increases one's risk for cardiovascular disease between 30-45% (I don't remember the figure exactly, but it is within that spread). Trans fats are one of the most dangerous substances to cardiovascular health. So I think that it was a good move to ban trans fats in foods.
Also to note: free medication may not be the best option. Studies have been done to show that patients do not take their medicine as prescibed (compliance) as well if the medicine is free. The thought is that since the patient did not have to give any money for the medicine, that the medicine is not valued as much as if the patient did have to pay for part (or all) of it.
Finally, someone brought up trans fats somewhere in this thread. Trans fats were banned because their consumption increases one's risk for cardiovascular disease between 30-45% (I don't remember the figure exactly, but it is within that spread). Trans fats are one of the most dangerous substances to cardiovascular health. So I think that it was a good move to ban trans fats in foods.
I wouldn't be completely against clinics becoming socialized...but just clinics. That way it really wouldn't be preventing the commercial market and preventative care would improve.