*Not a spelling mistake!
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I guess that most years the month of January is the same.......approximately 95% of the world deciding to make New Year’s resolutions, a lot of which involve diets and losing weight. Nothing wrong with this in anyone’s eyes, I’m sure. What I object to though is the media coverage and the way that fat people are portrayed as lazy, good for nothing layabouts!
Now don’t get me wrong I’ve always been big and I’m always likely to remain so. I don’t necessarily mean that I’ll always be fat but I will never, ever be a size 8. I’m just not built that way. I also won’t make myself miserable and be on a constant diet. I’d rather be my weight and happy, than be a miserable toad like Victoria Beckham who would probably never even considering eating a Cadburys Creme Egg and always looks like a bulldog chewing a wasp but in beautiful clothes.
What has inspired me to write this post though is a comment I read the other day. I can’t for the life of me remember where I read it but on an article somewhere about how much obese people are costing the NHS, someone had left a comment saying fat people shouldn’t be allowed any treatments related to their obesity on the NHS because they ‘allowed’ themselves to get into that state. Therefore they should pay privately to get themselves better.
WTF? Really?
Some of you may agree with the commenter but here’s the thing......I am classed as clinically obese. Am I always at the Doctor complaining about my weight? No I am not. Do I have diabetes, obesity related disabilities, etc? No, luckily enough at this moment in time, I don’t and I’m hoping that I never will. However, if I did? So what? I pay as much tax as everyone else into the NHS. Do we say that smokers shouldn’t be allowed treatment because they’ve cause the damage to themselves? Do we say no to alcoholics and drug addicts? Do we stop people on benefits accessing the NHS because they aren’t paying into the system? In fact apart from smokers being mentioned in articles you never hear discrimination against the other groups.
Am I at fault for becoming this fat? Well yes of course I am but it isn’t quite that simple is it? I obviously have some major issues to have allowed myself to get to this point. Why do people feel that it’s ok to take pot shots at fat people? Is it because we are an easy target group? What do you think? Do you agree with the commenter that obese people should pay for their own treatment? Or maybe you believe that any self inflicted illnesses should be paid for. Please feel free to leave a comment no matter what your view as I'm interested to see what people think.
