All Your Weight Gain Are Belong To Us

Professor Philip James, chairman of the International Obesity Task Force, speaking to scientists at the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Boston, said that in order to tackle obesity, towns and cities need to be radically redesigned. If government is the ultimate solution to obesity, where do individuals come in, you ask?

“Blaming individuals for their personal vulnerability to weight gain is no longer acceptable in a world where the majority is already overweight and obesity is rising everywhere,”

“It is even more naive to tell people that they just need to make a little change in their eating habits or their daily activity and suddenly the obesity problem will be remarkably easily solved.” Rather than pouring billions into creating more car-filled town centres and motorway networks, it was now necessary to curtail car use.

It is good to see that someone in the world understands that it is not the individual citizen that holds responsibilty for their own obesity, but rather politicians, bureaucrats and Big Business.

Tell us, good doctor, how did we get into this obesity mess in the first place?

Urban designers had created an “obesogenic environment” by planning public spaces around the car. Transport systems that made it easier to drive than to walk, cycle or take public transport were the worst contributors to obesity.

He also blamed the rise of desk-bound office work and sedentary leisure activities such as watching television, surfing the internet and playing computer games. Lifts and escalators, and even labour-saving devices such as electric toothbrushes and can-openers added to the problem.

Obviously the professor wants to hearken back to the good old days, before all the new-fangled devices made our citizens into piggy’s.

I was out with my mom yesterday and she was telling me about the good old days, growing up in Ireland 60 years ago. She told me how she, her six sisters and two brothers managed to stay fit all the while without today's modern gadgets. For instance, not having running water gave my mom a lot of exercise as she had to go to the well 10-15 times a day. Having all the coal that was used for the stove, stacked in the living room gave the family a good lung cough, causing them to lose weight--who wants to eat when you're sick?

Not having a car or a bike and having to walk 5 miles to school every day was a fantastic cardio workout for my ma. Having a bare minimum of food really helped the family stay fit and tidy. Not having medicine killed off a sister and a brother--that made everyone stress about dying, and everyone knows that stress really burns off the pounds.

Choice is the enemy, always has been and always will be. How can obesity possibly be a fat person's problem when said fat person lives within 2 miles of a Burger King? The only solution is to ban cars, ban restuarants and more importantly, ban choice.

Now we're getting somewhere...isn't that right, Comrade Stalin?