To be overweight or not to be overweight should not even be a question!

After reading the conflicting news on Obesity in 2013 alone, I am mystified and dumbfounded. Why are we even asking if obesity is healthy or not? If you have ever seen a real human heart or a real human liver or spleen, you would know they were never meant to support gigantic amounts of fat. It is is clearly another attempt by the processed food industry and the GMO industry to avoid being looked at as a potential source of all the weight woes.

On January 2, 2013 CNN actually reported that if you are overweight you will live longer, the headline was 'Being overweight linked to lower risk of mortality' Then the next day read another shocking CNN headline  'Big deal: You can be fat and fit'. Really??!!

If we start justifying being fat and deceive ourselves into believing we can be fat and fit, then we probably will end up like the morbidly obese people from that animated movie "Wall-E (2008)", who are shown to be totally dependent on automated systems from feeding themselves to washing themselves, they actually never get off their high-tech seats that not only take them everywhere but also convert into beds at night. As a result the individuals never do much muscular movement, and hence don't develop the muscle strength to even walk.

The scary part is we already have people in the US who are so morbidly obese that they can't carry their own weight anymore and need motorized chairs to move around a grocery store or a mall. Some might have valid medical reasons for the weight gain but a huge majority do not. The major reason for them being overweight is poor food choices and too big portions. The fact that every American restaurant and specially fast food restaurant serves unhealthily large servings of unhealthy foods does not help.

There is also a huge lobby promoting the use of synthetic ingredients in our foods, such as trans fats, high fructose corn syrup, etc.... Whereas the Agriculture industry is pushing the use on GMOs on farmers everywhere and growing more and more bioengineered foods. Unfortunately very little legislation controls or oversees the use of these genetically manufactured seeds. And then the media furthers the public ignorance of what is really making them obese and sick by spreading news such as "Fat is fun and healthy".

Amongst this media madness it was a relief to see reports of the latest study on obesity that dispelled the myth that you can be fat and healthy. Here is an excerpt from the story on BBC World (Dec.3rd, 2013);

The idea of "healthy obesity" is a myth, research suggests.

Excess fat still carries health risks even when cholesterol, blood pressure and sugar levels are normal, according to a study of more than 60,000 people.

It has been argued that being overweight does not necessarily imply health risks if individuals remain healthy in other ways.

The research, published in Annals of Internal Medicine, contradicts this idea.

The study looked at findings from published studies tracking heart health and weight in more than 60,000 adults.

Researchers from the Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto, found there was no healthy pattern of increased weight when heart health was monitored for more than 10 years.

They argue that people who are metabolically healthy but overweight probably have underlying risk factors that worsen over time.

Study leader Dr Ravi Retnakaran told BBC News: "This really casts doubt on the existence of healthy obesity.

"This data is suggesting that both patients who are obese who are metabolically unhealthy and patients who are obese who are metabolically healthy are both at increased risk of death from cardiovascular disease, such that benign obesity may indeed be a myth."

(Complete Story)

I do realize some individuals will find my point of view mean and unsympathetic, but often the truth hurts and isn't well received even if coming from our well-wishers. I write about this only to remind us that our bodies are not meant to be obese, and expecting them to keep functioning normally when overworked and overburdened is unreasonable. Most of the reasons besides actual medical and physiological causes of being morbidly overweight, have a solution. Trying to make being fat fun isn't one of them!

We need to address this problem head on as a nation and refuse to feed ourselves and our children these man made artificial items they like to sell as food. We have to look at what we eat and how much we eat. We need to regulate what the Food and Beverage Industry can put into our foods and drinks. We need to regulate the unnecessary use of GMOs, bioengineering and chemical fertilizers by the Agriculture Industry.
And last but not least we need to stop finding excuses for our own neglect. We alone are guilty of reckless behavior when it comes to benign obesity and therefore we need to accept responsibility for our own health.