Speaking of rants, I meant to write about this a few weeks back but got sidetracked. One night I was watching one of my favorite shows, Girlfriends, and @ the end, right before credits, they do this 30 sec bit that sort of off the wall, but always pretty funny.
That night, the bit was that Joan, the main character and her lawyer buddy, William, were dressed in fat suits standing @ the fridge gorging themselves of food while writhing around the door in pleasure.
I cringe when I see Fat Monica from Friends going out of her way to be the butt of all the jokes. I hate when I see TeeVee portray fat people, women especially outside of Roseanne but the women who dress up in fat suits to make a point that there are no fat actresses I suppose, and proceed to make fools of them.
Who are these people?
When I go out and about and I see someone who is as fat as the size they poke fun off, usually...9 times out of 10...especially if it's a women, they are trying to disappear and not be seen. I don't see large women jumping on benches hoping it'd break and then laughing @ the spectacle they just made.
And that whole gorging thing? Give it up. Really.
Friends also had a show where Joey imagined he was married to Monica. He had gained weight evidenced by his very own fat suit and was sitting around a table packed w/food. The funny part was her trying to shove him closer to the table, but his big ole gut was in the way. Excuse me while I slap my knees.
It's also why an earlier episode of The Biggest Loser, where they had a table full of food and one of the women licked the chocolate off of something, bugged me too. It played into the stereotype that here are these fat people, out of control and gorging in food.
Granted, being extremely overweight has a lot to do w/lack of control, but the laughs they like to turn it into, are not fair. It's bad enough that rail thin stars jump into fat suits as if they have any real perspective on what being overweight is. It's even worse that they can't take it upon themselves to just cast overweight people, but I guess that won't work b/c then they'd be forced to show them w/dignity and whatnot and fat people aren't supposed to be 3 dimensional. No. They are clowns and buffoons, who when they aren't dreaming of standing in front the fridge, they fling their girth about to get laughed @.
Now here's what I think, and hey I could be way wrong b/c well, I'm not right about many things, but like the 17 year old 90lb girl I was suspect about, I don't think overweight thru very overweight people are standing in front the fridge night after night gleefully shoving food down their gullets.
Rather, I think, based on my near experience of teetering on the edge and the epiphany that pulled me back, it prolly starts something as simple as: mindlessly eating.
For me, it was mindlessly eating while mindlessly watching TeeVee.
My brain was zoned out so I didn't have to think and the food numbed the stress and emotional strain I was trying not to feel. I ate till my stomach hurt b/c that pain distracted me and could go away vs. the other kind of hurt.
I'm guessing when before and after success stories talk about the pain, more times than not food they ate was not used to roll around in and eat till they dropped. [I just reread that sentence, grammar queen I am not.]
Um...I'm not exactly shure where all of this came from. Guess it's things that have been in the back of my head for quite some time and needed to get out. And I may very well be in the minority in how I think, yea I'm used to it, but I don't have to have been extremely obese myself to not find this stuff funny. I just have to be human.
Well now that that's out of my head, speaking of TeeVee, be sure to watch the 2 hour finale of The Biggest Loser. It starts @ 8pm EST.
There'll be a pop quiz tomorrow 
