EquALLity wrote:
But it's not just delusion anyway.
The full spectrum of variables is delusion, ignorance, stupidity, laziness, sexual fetish, and apathy.
In very very rare cases, in full knowledge, somebody may not care that he or she feels constantly uncomfortable and will die sooner -- that would be true apathy. Anecdotes of people who have lost weight and say they wish they had known this earlier suggest to me that knowledge is usually the missing link, not informed apathy.
Apathy is not a realistic explanation for the vast majority of people, so it's reasonable to discount it in statistical terms unless you have evidence that this is a prevalent idea.
Sexually fetishizing obesity is another rare problem; most people do not want to be fat in order to feel sexy (although some do; I see this as more common than true apathy). This may well be equated to delusion or mental illness. I don't consider this a realistic explanation for the vast majority of people, and it's reasonable to discount as a likely cause in a random person you meet.
Delusion and ignorance is frequently rolled in with stupidity; it is 'stupid' but it may be distinct. It is distinct from low IQ. Somebody with a low IQ could be ignorant and/or delusional -- the benefit of the latter problems is that they can be fixed. You can't fix stupid.
The problem is, given our standardized education and access to information, complete ignorance is very rare. The person probably received the information at some point but rejected it due to delusion or stupidity. And delusion has some serious teeth; it bites down and doesn't let go.
However, none of these qualities -- delusion, ignorance, or stupidity -- are favorable ones, and even if you differentiate them it doesn't speak well to somebody's character if you're looking to hire that person.
Ignorance in particular also indicates a level of laziness, because the person failed to acquire information that was so easily accessible.
There are reasons of deductive logic and psychological theory to believe this about overweight people.
EquALLity wrote:
brimstoneSalad wrote:A few rare counterexamples of rich and powerful people doesn't really disprove the point from a perspective of overwhelming statistical probability.
Again, what statistics, though?
This whole discussion is about probability. I'm not talking about specific surveys (although I have mentioned a few).
Appropriate discrimination is always statistical.
If somebody comes up to you with a Nazi swastika tattooed on his or her forehead, you can fairly make a judgement about that person's character and beliefs. It may be that it's an old tattoo that just hasn't been removed yet; but why didn't he or she cover it with makeup, or even a bandanna? Is this person stupid or lazy? Or just apathetic, and doesn't care that people think he or she is a neonazi? The latter seems unlikely, unless he or she isn't really off being a neonazi and doesn't mind being confused for one. A person who has rejected such a past will cover the tattoo for sensible (and sane) fear of being judged by it and associated with the repugnant belief.
Now, there's a very very small chance that he or she did cover the tattoo, and it just rained or he or she got hit in the face with a sprinkler and wiped it off without realizing. VERY small chance. It's fair to assume this didn't happen. Neonazi is a reasonable assumption, otherwise Stupid or lazy.
We make reasonable snap judgements about people all of the time.
EquALLity wrote:
I don't think so. I think that being a politician requires a strong will, along with the type of work Cenk does.
There's no reason to believe that. Can you prove it?
Many of these people are profoundly lazy. They've gotten by through being unethical instead of hard working, or just from being good people-persons. It's not always what you know, but who you know.
EquALLity wrote:
He was the director of the CIA, he kind of has to be.
No he doesn't, that's as terrible an assumption as people thinking Trump
must be hard working and intelligent because he's rich. A lot of rich and successful people are lazy and unethical, or just lucky.
See this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k7jeQQdqPA
Trump is probably a pretty competent businessman, and he may be intelligent, but he might also just be lucky. When you cherry pick examples rather than using statistics, the argument is useless because you may just be picking the lucky ones.
In medieval times, the same bad logic was used to justify things like infallibility and divine right of the King. He's he king, so he must be ordained by god, right? He must be infallible, otherwise he wouldn't be the king.
There's no reason to believe any of the people you mentioned were intelligent and hard working rather than rare exceptions in terms of dumb luck.
If you want to argue against a statistical argument, you have to present statistics to counter it.
EquALLity wrote:
Those problems were a result of that the CIA was under enormous pressure by the White House to support the Iraq War. It doesn't demonstrate the Tenet is lazy or stupid.
I think it does demonstrate that, and I disagree with your counter examples, but as I said it's meaningless to cherry pick counter examples to disagree with a statistical argument.
It's like cherry picking a female body builder to argue against the claim that in general (and with overwhelming statistical odds) men are stronger than women.
EquALLity wrote:
However, Tenet probably did convince himself Iraq had WMDs, so I suppose he was delusional about that. But that's very different from being delusional about weight.
It's not so different, really. Sounds like he's good at convincing himself of whatever he wants to believe.
EquALLity wrote:
Pretty much everyone knows it isn't healthy to be overweight.
Sure, unless they've deluded themselves into thinking they're an exception, that they're not really fat, that BMI is just a number, actually "I'm big boned", or healthy at any size "or at least at my size".
EquALLity wrote:
brimstoneSalad wrote:Lazy and stupid correlate to degree of obesity; it's not an off-on switch.
Correlation doesn't equal causation. This isn't evidence that people are overweight because they are unintelligent, or that overweight people are unintelligent in general.
It doesn't have to be causative. If it's correlative, then you know a fat person is more likely to be stupid. That's enough to prefer a thin person.
EquALLity wrote:
You also don't actually have evidence of a correlation between obesity/being overweight and laziness; you're just speculating.
How do you test for laziness, exactly?
We do have studies on physical activity:
http://www.hindawi.com/journals/jobe/2013/437017/
It's not hard to find many on the subject. Obese people are certainly physically lazier.
It's hard to find controls and objective standards on much beyond that. Low IQ is a confounding variable if you look at school performance.
There are actually studies on this in animals. Here's the first link I found:
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/does-a-junk-food-diet-make-you-lazy-ucla-psychology-study-offers-answer
(the guy who did the study is a bit of a paleo nut though)
That deals with lever pushing behavior.
This suggests that the causation is the other way around: that being fat (or at least the diet and the reward systems it stimulates) makes you lazy. And being lazy, of course, as I mentioned will likely prevent weight loss.
It's really unfortunate when children are raised fat, so they never really have much of a chance to not be lazy in adulthood.
Whether the cause of laziness is genetic or environmental, the correlation still holds, and the correlation is what judgement is made on.
If you meet a fat person, it is a reasonable belief -- based on evidence -- that person is going to be stupid and lazy (or at least one of the two). It's also reasonable to understand that laziness prevents weight loss, so beyond the statistics, there's logic to the claim (regardless of where the laziness originated).
Maybe the stupid caused the poverty which caused the obesity and led to the addition of laziness. OK, fine. That's a decent theory. It doesn't change the fact, though. At the end of the day, the fat person is more probably stupid and lazy.
The point is, if the person is both stupid and lazy now, why would somebody want to hire that person?
EquALLity wrote:
Fair enough, but just because a group may have more stupid people doesn't mean everyone in that group should be discriminated against in applying for jobs because of that. Intelligence in the workplace should be determined on a case-by-case basis.
In an ideal world, maybe, but why would you waste time and money testing more people, when you can narrow down the list to the most probably intelligent individuals by just culling out the visibly obese ones?
Saves you money and time in hiring.
IQ tests may also not always be legal in hiring. Also, you can't practically test for laziness like you can for stupidity. In that case, it's much safer to hire the thinner applicant. We at least know the thinner applicant will be less physically lazy, and generally less tired. Healthy body weight provides nothing but benefits to the worker and employer.
EquALLity wrote:
It also doesn't mean people who are overweight are unintelligent in general, or that people are overweight because they are unintelligent.
Maybe there are rare exceptions. Maybe the guy with the Nazi swastika on his forehead is a perfectly nice fellow without a racist bone in his body. It's reasonable to believe otherwise, though, until it's proved.
A fat person carries an appropriate and pretty accurate stigma, and in order to be regarded intelligent and industrious adopts that burden of proof. The fat person needs to prove his or herself intelligent and hard working. It's not fair to expect everybody to assume that about you when you're visibly advertising otherwise -- as if the person with the nazi tattoo got offended every time somebody assumed he was a neonazi. It's pretty understandable, and I couldn't blame somebody for assuming something like that of me if I had such a tattoo, or if I were overweight.
EquALLity wrote:
You don't have evidence of that.
It's human nature.
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/2007/11/most-college-students-wish-they-were-thinner-study-shows
This suggests that stigmatization is the motivating factor for weight loss in many people, and indicates the normalcy of obesity as an issue for idealized body shape and the mismatch with health science:
More than 60 percent of U.S. adults are considered overweight or obese. And "because they don't meet the societal ideals propagated by the media and advertising for body weight, they are often targets of discrimination within educational, workplace and health-care settings and are stigmatized as lazy, lacking self-discipline and unmotivated," says Lori Neighbors, Ph.D. '07, who conducted the research with Jeffery Sobal, Cornell professor of nutritional sociology in Cornell's College of Human Ecology.
These factors have led many people to be dissatisfied with their bodies, says Neighbors, now an assistant professor of nutrition at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.
When the Cornell researchers assessed body weight versus the weight and shape individuals wish they had, they found that:
The findings suggest "that the idealized body weight and shape, especially among underweight females and overweight individuals of both genders, are not in accordance with population-based standards defining healthy body weight."
EquALLity wrote:
Sometimes it's more convenient for people who are on the go to eat fast food. Or, some people live in food deserts and don't have access to healthy stores. There are a lot of reasons people can be overweight.
Food deserts are kind of a myth. The only places that really are close to that, are rich suburbs where everybody has a car, and even so -- grocery stores aren't out of reach. There's also affordable food delivery today.
Maybe it's more convenient to eat fast food, but it isn't cheaper, and it's a false economy. Bring a sandwich, like Red said. Brown bag it. That's very convenient. It just takes will power and an ounce of planning. If they don't do that, it's because they're lazy or stupid. Probably what got them into the mess to begin with.
There are even healthier options at fast food places. People choose not to order them.
EquALLity wrote:
brimstoneSalad wrote:As more people get fat (because they accept it), it becomes normal. By comparison, they see themselves as average, and not overweight.
Do you have any evidence for this theory?
It's mentioned in the article I linked above, and discussed in the Gallup poll I linked earlier I believe.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/the-shape-we-are-in-blog/2014/sep/10/obesity-body-image
There are a number of articles on the topic, it's a pressing public health issue. Overweight people are increasingly believing that they're normal, and losing the impetus to lose weight because they look the same as their peers.
EquALLity wrote:
brimstoneSalad wrote:That's not a mechanism I have seen. It usually reminds them. It can lead to self loathing, but I don't think there's a very credible link to denial from shame. Fat is something openly apparent; it's not like homosexuality where somebody can be closeted and deny feelings because of homophobia.
Which is worse than obesity.
It isn't. It depends on the extent, and how many people succumb to it to what extent.
What if 99% of people exposed to a message are motivated to lose weight, changing their lives massively and making them much better, and 1% kill themselves (either directly, or by anorexia), ending and otherwise uncomfortable, unhealthy, and miserable life?
What about 99.99% vs 0.01%?
Where's the tipping point where the harm done by shame is less than the benefit? Do you know? More importantly, do you have evidence of it?
EquALLity wrote:
brimstoneSalad wrote:A lack of shaming allows them to deny it because everybody around them isn't insisting on it.
BMI and your doctor don't lie.
As Red said, people can ignore them. If you look around (not even hard) on discussion forums about health you can find people complaining about their doctors calling them overweight, when they personally disagree and don't think of themselves as fat.
Hopefully what I've linked already is enough to demonstrate that this isn't doing much to help.
EquALLity wrote:
brimstoneSalad wrote:Well, I guess that's progress.

If you understand that shame might be productive, then it comes to an empirical question.
How is that progress?

I never said it
couldn't be productive, just that it's primarily bad.
I'm talking about being net productive. More good than bad. If you are asserting that it's more bad than good, you need to back that up with evidence.
I don't know if it's more bad than good, or more good than bad. I'm not willing to make those kinds of assumptions or claims. The burden of proof is on you if you want to criticize people for fat shaming. The whole "fat acceptance" is deviating from the norm, and it's something that requires evidence as a force upon social standards.
EquALLity wrote:
It has different effects for different people depending on the situation, but I think it's mostly harmful in this case.
Evidence?
EquALLity wrote:
Convincing people to lose weight for health reasons is effective, because people care about living as long as they can and being healthy.
Evidence? It doesn't seem to be. People seem much more superficially oriented.
EquALLity wrote:
I don't see why we need to add negativity to it and make people feel 'ugly'- that's the kind of thing that leads to eating disorders, which are a lot more dangerous than being overweight/obese.
Evidence? Is anorexia or obesity killing more people per year?
Google says:
Only 724 were found, which equals an average of 145 annual deaths, and a rate of 6.73 per 100,000 deaths. The age and sex distribution suggests two fatal forms of anorexia nervosa, an early-onset form comprising 89% women and a later form comprising 24% men.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11513012
Doesn't sound like quite an epidemic.
OBESITY AND MORTALITY. According to the National Institutes of Health, obesity and overweight together are the second leading cause of preventable death in the United States, close behind tobacco use (3). An estimated 300,000 deaths per year are due to the obesity epidemic (57).
https://www.wvdhhr.org/bph/oehp/obesity/mortality.htm
We'd have to look into changing trends, but that's about 2,000 to 1.
I think we can stand to have more people die from anorexia to save more people from death from obesity. What would the numbers look like?
EquALLity wrote:
What do you think is a more encouraging message?:
1) You should lose weight, that way you can live longer and have more time doing stuff you love and being with your loved ones!
2) You're a stupid and lazy POS for being FAT!!11 Moooooo
I don't know, and you don't either. Unless you have a study on it. I know that the second is a
cheaper message.
It's great to send out a positive message when it's easy to do; it doesn't have the same risks, but it also may lack efficacy. When we're spending resources on these messages, you need to provide evidence to back up that expenditure.