Battle of the Bulge

We are a nation of self-love in the era of self-love. Entire industries have been built to short circuit the healthy social imperatives of shame and guilt, and entire generations have been convinced beyond any doubt they are each and all special. We no longer believe that we are simply deserving of the love of someone, we have now been led by teachers, parents and cultural leaders to feel as though we are entitled to the adoration of everyone around us - solely as a function of our own existence. One of the most troubling corollaries to this new axiomatic selfishness is the widespread preaching of mediocrity and laziness as model lifestyles and the acceptance of the effects such living has on the body as “natural” and even ideal.

It has become popular to blame the obesity epidemic in the United States on the peddlers of high-fat foods and high-sugar drinks, as corporate giants bent on making their profits on the backs our of own self-destruction. But it has gone without mention that there are celebrities, authors and scholars lining up to tell us that there’s nothing wrong with being a little overweight and lot indulgent. In the past two decades we’ve relentlessly pointed the finger at “negative media images” that have driven young men and women to eating disorders, performance enhancing drugs, and unnecessary plastic surgery, and created a backlash so severe that it’s suddenly become hip to have a “fat ass”, to “love your love handles” and to insist on being called a “foodie” instead of just a glutton. This widespread acceptance of the overweight population we have become is just as much at fault, if not more, for our burgeoning chubbiness than the fast food nation which often bears the brunt of the blame.

While still at law school, I recall the announcement of a seminar on campus for women called “Love Your Body”. Although I was not invited, the nature of the seminar seemed clear enough from their marketing materials. In an effort to avoid the deleterious effects that the “The Media Sexualization of Young Girls” was having on college students, the National Organization for Women was sponsoring large-scale group therapy sessions which would make gaining weight at college an exercise in learning to love one’s self, rather than the driving force towards an eating disorder. Funny thing was, all I could see running around campus were overweight undergrads in ill-advised and poor-fitting clothing who seemed extraordinarily content with their appearance. As it turns out, while the incidence of bulimia is approximately 1 in 5 and the incidence of anorexia is 1 in 10 amongst college students, 3 out of 10 college students are either overweight or obese, which is the same rate of occurrence as both of these eating disorders combined. Strangely enough, despite this fact, there was no competing “You’re Getting Fat At Far Too Young An Age” seminar scheduled on campus.

Tyra Banks became an international star as a runway and swimsuit model in the mid 90’s, riding a tall frame, a thin waist and natural good looks to the very top of the modeling world. She become the first African-American female to be on the cover of GQ, the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue and the Victoria Secret catalog, arguably the trifecta of pop culture relevance as a beauty icon. Unfortunately, this fame simultaneously never provided a real impetus to obtain an education and did provide for a stable of enabling handlers and a platform and audience for her inane ruminations, culminating in her own talk show. As Tyra’s comfort grew along with her dress size, the rumblings amongst pop commentators began to grow louder about how she was “getting fat” – reaching critical mass when photographed in a unflattering one-piece bathing suit at an America’s Next Top Model photo shoot. This prompted perhaps one of the greatest self-righteous tirades in recent memory and empowered women nationwide to tell us all to “kiss their fat asses!” Fantastic.

So, to sum up Ms. Banks’ moral crusade in terms we can all understand: we have a woman who made literally hundreds of millions of dollars by being an idealized physical specimen: tall, thin and naturally pretty. As that naturally thin body ultimately gave way to a much more average or slightly overweight body, she’s devoted her energies, rather than to fitness and healthy eating, to justifying her physical change as not only perfectly natural but as ideal, and something all women should strive towards. Despite her changes, she still expects to be treated like a supermodel and hopes to inspire women the world over to not succumb to the pressure of being “super-skinny”. For what it’s worth, the distance between Ms. Banks’ body condition (at that time) and “super skinny” was particularly vast – and if it weren’t for her body looked when she was 17, she wouldn’t have a pulpit to preach from. What’s worse, the majority of women who watch Ms. Banks’ primary pop culture outlet (America’s Next Top Model) are under the age of 25. And if she was so happy with how she looked at that time, why did she immediately lose 25 pounds? I suppose we’ll just now be invited to kiss her newly skinny ass.

The “food” movement has never been more popular. Overeating, once vilified, has become celebrated with more television shows and movies than could possibly be referenced here. Competitive eating has become a sport with it’s own league and coverage on ESPN. Eating has become a hobby, celebrated in blogs and social groups, and more often than not, the involved eating is indulgent and gluttonous. We’ve decided that as long as our food doesn’t come in a Styrofoam box or paper bag, it’s an acceptable health decision. I’ve witnessed the term “foodie” which used to reference those people who took particular joy in exotic and flavorful cuisine come to be self-applied by people who simply can’t stop eating desserts and things with melted cheese on them. Unfortunately, giving something a cute nickname doesn’t stop it from being unhealthy.

Childhood obesity is an epidemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warns that over the past three decades, the obesity rate has more than doubled for children ages 2 to 5 and for adolescents ages 12 to 19, and has more than tripled for children ages 6 to 11. Not only are we getting fatter, we’re making our kids fatter as our own attitudes for what constitutes a “healthy body” have become more and more accommodating. The self-love generations have come of age and are having children of their own, and we’ve never been fatter. To mark this downward spiral with celebrations of our fatness is the proverbial Nero’s fiddle. Only this time, the tune he’s playing is actually devoted to the flames.

On the heels of a blockbuster dystopian film that warns of the dangers of us all needing to be hyper-ideal physically, I’m mindful of the fact that there’s nothing healthy about a nation of people who endeavor to all look like soap opera stars. We’re all built differently, and there’s something wonderful about that. But we’re given to look to role models for everything from how to dress to how to act and from how to eat to how to look. We should, from time to time, try to take a step back to take a look just exactly what these models are trying to tell us. And to the extent we find that it is simply a rationalization of their own shortcomings and wealth-driven sloth, we ought to be able to tell them to kiss our own non-famous asses. Or at least stop short of puckering up.