Comment on Overweight people more likely to take sick leave, European study finds
GBU_28@lemm.ee 4 months agoNo, I’ll be quite clear: being obese and lacking mental healthcare are both harmful. I’ve been consistent on that.
There is not “health at every size”.
What I can extract and appreciate about that movement is that it champions the need to holistically address the many needs of folks with obesity, beyond simple calorie management. I’ve been consistent about that too. I believe every CICO content I’ve made mentioned mental healthcare.
Obesity is a very dangerous condition that should be removed with great urgency. But I acknowledge that CICO alone will likely not result in long term success.
exocrinous@startrek.website 4 months ago
Health is relative. Health isn’t an absolute boundary between healthy and unhealthy, that’s silly. Health is a polydimensional spectrum. If you want to categorise health “objectively”, well then seeing as men live shorter than women, we’d be forced to classify maleness as an illness and put every man in the world on estrogen pills. And that’s ridiculous. No, health isn’t a single standard that’s the same for everyone.
Health isn’t a point, it’s a direction. Like South. South is a direction. I see Americans say all the time that they’re from the south. They mean Texas. But I live in Australia. From my point of view, they’re from the north. But it’s not like they’re lying. In terms of America, they’re from the south. It’s true.
Health is like South. If you’ve lived your entire life overweight with poor health, then getting healthy can mean a lot of different things. If you start jogging once a week and get healthier, well congratulations, you got healthy. It’s relative. It’s unreasonable for you to demand somebody in that situation meet the ideal of human health. If you do that, if you belittle their progress and say the best they’ve done in their life isn’t good enough, you’ll kill their motivation and ruin what little health they’ve achieved.
And if you go around saying there’s no such thing as health at every size, well then I’ll tell you there’s no such thing as men’s health, because being a man is unhealthy. The two statements are equally ridiculous.
GBU_28@lemm.ee 4 months ago
Being obese is a version of being without health. Getting rid of excess weight is a critical need.
Acknowledging mental health as a critical component of achieving a health body weight is not accepting being overweight as “ok”. Identifying being overweight as “not ok” does not mean devaluing those with that condition, or making light of their needs.
exocrinous@startrek.website 4 months ago
Okay you’re still saying someone can’t be overweight and healthy, so like I promised, I’m gonna assert that there’s no such thing as men’s health. Being male will make a man die sooner. We need to give all men estrogen pills immediately and make sure they stick to the regimen. Being male is not okay, it’s bad for you and it’s driving up insurance costs for the rest of us. It’s selfish. Making bad choices out of stubbornness and pride while everyone else pays. That’s not okay.
Please note these are not my actual views, I’m just applying anti-HAES logic to other parts of our bodies in the same manner.
GBU_28@lemm.ee 4 months ago
Gender is intrinsic to a person. Weather they’ve been born as their gender, or not, they are what they are, and are valuable as such.
Being obese is like say, having diarrhea. Every effort should be made to undo the situation, with the acknowledgement that there may be underlying causes that need to be addressed first. (Food poisoning, food allergy, etc)
Being obese is a condition, not an intrinsic identity. Gender identification, and gender dysphoria are not conditions to be discarded. Being a gender is not a condition. I would no even hypothetically suggest someone should change their gender due to an external force,… beyond their own personal journey and choice, as that is bigoted speech.
Folks ARE the gender they visualize, or are born with. Gender affirming care, or confidence in your chosen gender are not up for discussion.
Folks HAVE obesity. It’s a condition. Even while having this condition, they are valuable, and important.
To throw your analogy in the gutter: the elderly also require more healthcare and support, and their age is intrinsic. They cannot change it.
Neither gender or age can be “fixed”. Obesity can, and should. CICO is how it mechanically happens, mental healthcare is how it lasts.