A ‘thin and fit’ person tries to understand obesity

[green_grrl]

Dear Amy: I have always been thin and fit. I eat well and exercise. Like most people, I have friends and family who struggle terribly with weight issues. I have read volumes about the genetic origins of obesity and want to be sensitive to this issue.

I can’t help but noticing, however, that the overweight people I know eat a lot more than I do, exercise less and generally lead far less healthy lifestyles. Am I to believe they’re genetically prone to these behaviors? Please help me to understand the science!

— Trying Not to Judge

Trying Not to Judge: To quote author Roxane Gay: “When you’re overweight, people project assumed narratives onto your body and are not at all interested in the truth.”

If you truly wanted to understand the science, you would have gone ahead and digested (excuse the pun) the portion of research you’ve done, vs. the choice you’ve made — to scratch your head in disingenuous wonderment that you witness overweight people eating more and moving less than you do.

Genetics do seem to play a role both in obesity itself and in behaviors related to obesity, such as overeating. Based on my own reading, the causes of obesity are varied and extremely complex, which is why successful treatment of obesity is much more complicated than you imply.

This is from a study published by the National Institutes of Health: “The feelings of appetite and satiety involve complex interactions between hormones from the gastrointestinal (GI) tract to the hypothalamus and subsequent feedback. Within the hypothalamus are specific regions where hormones interact to produce sensations of appetite and satiety, leading to food consumption or a feeling of fullness.”

People overeat for a variety of sometimes complex physical and emotional reasons, including the fact that for some people, their brains are not receiving the message that they are full. And sometimes we humans overeat because we want to, and don’t work out because we don’t want to.

Bodies are not universally lean. It is possible to be both overweight and fit. The only wisdom I’m able to offer you with complete authority is that no overweight person wants or needs your gaze, your scrutiny or your curiosity about why they aren’t more like you.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/advice/2023/03/21/ask-amy-overweight-genetics-judgment/

Comments

[minoanmiss]

This response is the best thing I've ever read in my life. I have literal tears in my eyes.

[green_grrl]

I know, right? Amy is usually 50/50 and has getting better lately. But this? Knocks it out of the park!

[jadelennox]

note perfect. the final sentence is chef's-fucking-kiss.

[needles]

Damn, what an ending paragraph.

[green_grrl]

Preach!

[melannen]

LW: A lot of fat people eat more than thin people because in general, you need more energy when the body you are fueling is larger, the same way a stretch limo generally eats more gas than a Mini. (This is not always true of course because how much fuel any give person varies but it holds true over averages, and it also often applies to tall people, heavyset people, and very muscular people.)

This seems like it would be easy logic to figure out and yet somehow a lot of people can't get there, wonder why.

[green_grrl]

But LW is so logical, you see…

[ethelmay]

Well, and also people who weigh, let us say, fifty pounds more than LW are carrying around fifty pounds more all day long. I bet if she put on a vest that weighed fifty pounds and went about her normal day, she would think that was a lot of exercise. But somehow that doesn't count.

[ysobel]

I suspect it ties in with the theory that fat people just need more willpower in order to eat less, and that ~logically~ if they just eat less they'll lose weight. CICO and all that.

Never mind that in practice you'll just get a hangry miserable fat person whose body is in "oh no famine, better conserve calories" mode...

[feast_of_regrets]

Wow, Amy really nailed that one. Just gorgeous.

[dine]

this? is awesome! that last paragraph nails it so damn hard

[cereta]

That last line is a thing of joy and beauty forever. I give Amy credit: she has come a long way since she argued that fat shaming was good and necessary.

[shanaqui]

Can we just talk about how daft it is to send in a question to an advice column to "understand the science" around weight? I'm not aware of Amy Dickinson being a scientist who specialises in that field, or even having scientific training in general. That's certainly not the kind of question she usually answers.

The inappropriate target reveals, in my opinion, that this was in no way a genuine question. The LW expected Amy to tell her that she is right and maybe give her a gentle wrist-slap about being judgemental, at best.

[ethelmay]

Yep, exactly.

[firecat]

I'm very much less thrilled by Amy's answer than other commenters. I'm glad Amy said weight and eating are complex things and the LW should stop being judgemental, but her repetition of the word "overeating" and "overweight" galls me and weakens her response. The minute you use "overweight" to describe a person's body or "overeat" to describe a person's eating, you're applying the very judgement she is telling the LW not to make — you're stating that the person should weigh less or eat less.