{"id":3526,"date":"2019-10-27T13:51:31","date_gmt":"2019-10-27T13:51:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2019\/10\/27\/obesity-is-not-a-disease\/"},"modified":"2019-10-27T13:51:31","modified_gmt":"2019-10-27T13:51:31","slug":"obesity-is-not-a-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2019\/10\/27\/obesity-is-not-a-disease\/","title":{"rendered":"Obesity is Not a Disease"},"content":{"rendered":"

Contemporary liberals spout nonsense about an 'epidemic' of obesity or obesity as a public health problem.  True, we Americans are a gluttonous people as witness competitive eating contests, the numerous food shows, and the complete lack of any sense among most that there is anything morally wrong with gluttony.  The moralists of old understood something when they classified gluttony as one of the seven deadly sins.<\/span><\/p>\n

Obesity is not a disease; so, speaking strictly, there cannot be an epidemic of it.  There are two separate issues here.  One is whether obesity is a disease.   But even  if it is classified as a disease, it is surely not a contagious disease and so not something there can be an epidemic of. <\/span><\/p>\n

I know that 'epidemic' is used more broadly than this, even by epidemiologists; but this is arguably the result of an intrusion of liberal-left ideology into what is supposedly science.   Do you really think that 'epidemic' is being used in the same way in 'flu epidemic' and 'obesity epidemic'?  Is obesity contagious?  If fat Al sneezes in my face, should I worry about contracting the obesity virus? There is no such virus.   <\/span><\/p>\n

Obesity is not contagious and not a disease.   I know what some will say: obesity is socially <\/em>contagious.  But now you've shifted the sense  of 'contagious.'    You've engaged in a bit of semantic mischief.  It is not as if there are two kinds of contagion, natural and social.  Social contagion is not contagion any more than negative growth is growth or a decoy duck is a duck. 'Social' in 'socially contagious' is an alienans<\/em> adjective.<\/span><\/p>\n

Why then are you fat?  You are fat because you eat too much of the wrong sorts of food and refuse to exercise.  For most people<\/em> that's all there is to it.  It's your<\/em> fault.<\/em>  It is not the result of being attacked by a virus.  It is within your power to be fat or not.  It is a matter of your FREE WILL.  You <\/em>have decided<\/em> to become fat or to remain fat.  When words such as 'epidemic' and 'disease' are used in connection with obesity, that is an ideological denial of free will, an attempt to shift responsibility from the agent to factors external to the agent such as the 'evil' corporations that produce so-called 'junk' food.<\/span><\/p>\n

There is no such thing as junk food<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are public health problems, but obesity is not one of them.  It is a private problem resident at the level of the individual and the family. The totalitarians of the contemporary Democrat party don't want you to know this. They want total control, including control of what you eat. They want, so to speak, the whole enchilada. <\/span><\/p>\n

Here<\/a> are some arguments pro et con <\/em>as to whether or not obesity is a disease.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Contemporary liberals spout nonsense about an 'epidemic' of obesity or obesity as a public health problem.  True, we Americans are a gluttonous people as witness competitive eating contests, the numerous food shows, and the complete lack of any sense among most that there is anything morally wrong with gluttony.  The moralists of old understood something … Continue reading “Obesity is Not a Disease”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conservatism","category-health-and-fitness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3526\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}