Great article, except for the end, especially this bit:
The first occurred in 1998, when BMI standards shifted a few points. Formerly, one needed a BMI of 27 (for women) or 28 (for men) to be classified as overweight, but the new standard lowered the cutoff to 25 points. Twenty-nine million Americans instantly became overweight without gaining an ounce. Under the new guidelines, doctors could prescribe them diet drugs or recommend weight loss surgery.
A nationwide panic rose; headlines screamed about a new plague of fat people whose bodies were ticking time bombs destined to deliver death and destruction at any moment. Stock footage of fat people ambling about in public, filmed from the neck down to protect their identities (and more effectively dehumanize them), became a common sight on television news as bony broadcasters droned about the horrors of the Obesity Epidemic. Curiously, hardly any of the reports on this sudden increase in overweight/obese Americans bothered to mention the BMI standard shift.
Yeah, fat-shaming is bad and the people on screen are too thin and perfect, but obesity has skyrocketed over the years, regardless of the standards you use. (And the shift in the definition followed a better understanding of what was healthy, not anything arbitrary.) Bad diets and sedentary lifestyles are a problem - one caused primarily by social trends, not individual choices.
The diet/exercise/bodybuilding craze is the overreaction to the real problem of ill health/obesity. I think that is a mostly self-sufficient explanation than some psychological militarism, which you'd think would be greater during the Cold War. The USSR was crazy about exercise too, but not because it was thought of as good for the military, rather because it was considered a natural part of improving humanity.
Great article, except for the end, especially this bit:
Yeah, fat-shaming is bad and the people on screen are too thin and perfect, but obesity has skyrocketed over the years, regardless of the standards you use. (And the shift in the definition followed a better understanding of what was healthy, not anything arbitrary.) Bad diets and sedentary lifestyles are a problem - one caused primarily by social trends, not individual choices.
The diet/exercise/bodybuilding craze is the overreaction to the real problem of ill health/obesity. I think that is a mostly self-sufficient explanation than some psychological militarism, which you'd think would be greater during the Cold War. The USSR was crazy about exercise too, but not because it was thought of as good for the military, rather because it was considered a natural part of improving humanity.