Hmm, Fireworksgod, lets get on-topic again..
""people still don't lose weight.
Which points to some weakness, as you pointed out...""
The word weakness is a morally charged word. The general idea seems to be that if people just got off their ass and did something about it they would not have a given problem. The impression that rubs off on others is that if you have a given problem for a long time you are too lazy to do something about it. People who are judged to be "too lazy" are deemed inferior in most societies.
Therefor your statement bears the charge that obese people are weak-willed and that they themselves are to blame for it. That it is a matter of inferior moral fiber.
There is such a thing as an equilibrium between mind and body there is undeniable. When a Cambodian kid trips a POMZ landmine and has both his legs blown off, the brain centers controlling motion and awareness of the legs may need some time to adjust (phantom limbs, the sensation of feeling the limbs you have in fact lost.) but in the long run these braincenters will shrivel to make way for brain centers that actually are in use. So basically the poor kid not only loses his legs, but in fact after some time the "legs" themselves grow out of his mind/brain.
In this case a change in the body causes a change in the mind.
Now the kid he was playing with at the time has experienced that his buddy ran from the path to catch the ball he threw, suddenly there was this big thunderstrike and the next thing he knew he got smacked and splattered by meat, bone and blood and sees the top half of his buddy lying on the ground screaming and bleeding. He right then and there decides he will never leave his hut and because of the solemness of the vow he never does. His legs atrophy away by lack of exercise and he becomes physically incapable of walking.
In this case a change in the mind leads to a change in the body.
A third kid hears a thud and screaming and the whole village pours out to help the wounded one. Not him: he was born without legs and the braincenters to operate them and so he is incapable to act on it.
In this case genetics have rendered his mind and body impotent.
[please donate to demining charities: these people are TRUE heroes; there are over 6 million mines left in Cambodia alone]
Well this was a pretty rough scene but it represents the three major points of view: Incapability of mind, incapability of body and genetic predisposition. In all three cases there is an equilibrium between body and mind. The one adjusts to the other or both adjust to a pre-existing factor.
Now likening this to severe obesity sounds pretty harsh to most. But is the difference really that large? All three (obesity, lack of limbs or limb atrophy) are clearly visible distortions of a healthy body template. All three lead to disability in the physical sense. All three conditions are predicaments that most who have them rather not endure.
But a lot of Cambodian kids watch their steps and won't trip the POMZ anyway.. So is the first kid to blame for being so careless? Is his predicament his fault, morally?
A lot of kids see their friends blown up over there and yet most do not crawl into a corner and let their legs wither.. So is the second kid to blame for not getting over it and moving on?
Is the kid that was born without legs morally weak for not coming out right?
It is recognised by most that severe obesity has all three factors rolled into one: There are bodily causes (like thyroid/insulin anomalities), there is such a thing as psychological eating (eating for other than nutrititive reasons) and there is a genetic factor involved. It seems reasonably straightforward to think that you should just cut down on foods and you get slim, right?
And yet for some reason over 95% of people who were over 50lbs overweight (severe obesity of the kind that clusters in families) in any time of their life (unrelated to pregnancy) are unable to retain a "normal" (has the subjective word "norm" in it) weight for the major part of their life thereafter.
It quite rare for a truely obese person to "recover". So rare in fact, that it can safely be assumed that being slender is alien to their equilibrium.
You could argue that third world countries have no such problems. And indeed they don't. Most of them are reasonably slender while some die of starvation. Here in the west we have got an abundance of food. Here too most are reasonably slender, while some pop their belts. Put third-worlders in a rich food enviroments and a lot of them will get weight problems. Put first-worlders into a poor food enviroment and a lot of them will die of starvation. (healthy foods or not)
But interestlingly it is the rich-food-obese that is in best shape in the poor food enviroment while the rich-food-slenders die, and it's the poor-food-slenders that pop their belts in the rich food enviroments while the poor-food-starvers are in best shape in the rich food enviroment. So oddly enough tending towards overweight or underweight are both desirable in one place but very bad in the other.
So what do we have?
1...Obesity has physical, mental and genetic factors.
2...95% of family-clustered obese people basically stay obese no matter how hard they try.
3...Tending overweight/underweight is healthy in the opposite food enviroments but almost inevitably spells disaster in the other.
Is there something not right with obese people? True. No denying that. Is there something not right with named Cambodian kids? Ofcourse!
But I think it is wrong to bring morality into it. There is something not right and this manifests itself visually through being either way to light, way to heavy or people with some limbs missing. Who would dare to ridicule and the Cambodian kids and turn them into social outcasts?
Well, way too many Cambodians do. Who would dare to ridicule extremely overweight people and turn them into pariahs? Well, the vast majority of western society.
There is something wrong here. If you truely, TRUELY want to live without limbs or bearing 100 excess pounds (imagine) you should be able to in my opinion. But let us by all means keep morality out of it if that means the crosses people bear are made heavier by it.
Severe obesity, severe underweight problems and the loss of limbs are absolute tragedies. There is a distinct deviation in body, mind and brain present.
But let's stop playing the blame game, the pain game, and start building that dam together side by side, for we will all drown if we fight amongst ourselves and don't stand united, for in this 21th century there are many floods that threaten all of humanity.
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