Thursday, October 13, 2022

You’re morbidly obese and it’s going to kill you – Piers Morgan

 

I remember chatting to an American customer at the Bistrot, who, upon mentioning the former president, said very emphatically, “There is no such thing as neutrality” on this topic. I remember this because if you look at every discussion these days, you’ll find that people expect you to be on one side or another.

While former US President Donald Trump remains the one character that inspires extreme views, the person who actually coined this phenomenon was his predecessor, George W Bush, who told the world that “You are either with us or against us.”

Modern discussions on science or politics are no longer discussions about science or politics but the propagation of religious beliefs, where people of a single position take the belief that theirs is a heavenly message whilst anyone who disagrees is part of satanic spawn that needs to be eradicated.

Whilst holding an extremist position of just about every issue may be fun and may be better at selling newspapers, the truth is that life is more often than not, far away from being a religious experience. Getting through one’s day-to-day existence does involve dealing with people who may hold different views from you and coming to a compromise. The national inability to work with people you disagree has reached a national level in many parts of the world, where large democracies have found themselves not being able to do anything because voters won’t let political parties “compromise” with each other.

In an age of polarisation, the “middle ground,” ends up being the most attacked because both sides refuse to believe that people don’t agree with their “divine mission.” Unfortunately, for extremist, things only get done in the middle ground.

Take the “Me-Too” movement as an example. Yes, its good that powerful men get taken task for using their position to get sexual favours. However, we need to ask if it’s reached an extreme stage where a man needs to get legal indemnity before he compliments a woman.

Then there is the issue of trans-rights. Yes, its right that society does not acknowledge that there are people who have a different psychological gender from their biological one and where possible, we should allow them to medically bring their psychological and biological gender inline. It’s also right that they are protected under law from abuse and discrimination. However, do we really need the other extreme where “pronouns” need to be “gender neutral,” to make people feel better or more importantly, to prevent reasons for law suites.

I discovered one of the most ridiculous case of “extremist” ideology when my nightly web surfing brought me to the infamous Cosmo UK cover, which featured Tess Holliday, a “plus sized” model, who is 165cm (5ft6) tall, weighs 127kg (279lbs).

Ms. Holliday is what you would call the cover girl of the “body positive” movement, which argues that people, particularly women, should be comfortable with their bodies instead being forced to conform to what the “patriarchy” expects them to look like:

 


 Copyright Cosmo UK

I am, an overweight 48-year-old, and I realise that I don’t have the discipline to deny myself some of the less healthy foods in life or the discipline to hit the gym with a strict routine to have a beautiful body. As such, I agree with the concept of “body positivity” in as much as we need to recognise that not every guy wants to look an Olympic athlete and not every girl wants to look like a Victoria Secret model. We should be comfortable with who we are and that should not stop us from feeling attractive and being able to attract people.

However, there is a difference between being comfortable in your body and being unhealthy. Britain’s most “infamous” TV show hosts, Piers Morgan, ended up a few spats because he was quite public in his disagreement with Ms. Holliday’s front cover, arguing that she was morbidly obese and promoting a lifestyle that had the ability to endanger people. Mr. Morgan’s letter in the Daily Mail can be found at:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6190487/PIERS-MORGAN-Stop-lying-Tess-youre-morbidly-obese-going-kill-you.html

Whatever one might feel about Mr. Morgan, the science does back him up. People who are obese are many times more likely to suffer from a host of nasty diseases and in another segment of Good Morning Britain, argued that he was against obsess models promoting obesity and also against anorexic models promoting anorexia:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxGEJqLEk2c

When it comes to human biology, it is clear that it is unhealthy when you are obese:

 


 Copyright TLC

However, there is also the other extreme, which is also unhealthy:

 

Human biology shows that extremes are bad for you. The body does not react well when you are either too fat or too skinny.

What is true of human bodies is also true of human societies. When people take one position to the extent that it cannot compromise with anyone and end up in power, they end up doing great damage. Hyper Communist systems ended up collapsing in 1991. However, hyper capitalistic societies have not been doing that well either. Balance is not a “trendy” word invented by those who cannot make up their mind but the essence of survival both on an individual and social level.

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Maira Gall