Why it is acceptable to criticize smokers, but not fat people?

Jegsimmons

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Nov 14, 2010
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Fagotto said:
Jegsimmons said:
the fact that we ridicule either of these people for exercising a right shows just how fucked up people are now a days.
The fact you said that shows how amazingly ignorant and poorly thought out your position is. Or wait, do you also ask people to leave the WBC alone for exercising their rights? But more likely you weren't bright enough to consider something obvious like the fact that just because it's their right doesn't mean it isn't deserving of criticism.

In fact you're a flaming hypocrite. "Waaaaah people are fucked up for exercising their right to criticize!"

and if anyone says "second hand smoke" i say, get the fuck over it.
And smokers can get the fuck over the reaction. Works both ways. People who say stupid shit like "Get the fuck over it" do tend to be too blind to see that it can work for their whining too.
yes, i think the WBC has a right to do that, yes you have the right to criticize, but how a good number of people treat fat people and smokers like lepers is just sickening. If we treated a certain race the same way it would be racist. so why treat anybody like that for being big or for smoking? maby they're the hypocrites!
 

Dr. Crawver

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Nov 20, 2009
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because to become a smoker you have to choose to smoke. Some fat people have genuine genetic problems, as well as some of it becoming an addiction, the problem being it's an addiction to something we need to live, so you can't go cold turkey. Being fat isn't a good thing, but it's not right to rip them apart about it. Plus, who really criticises smokers beyond "you shouldn't do that, it's bad for you"?
 

Mallefunction

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Feb 17, 2011
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Electric Alpaca said:
Mallefunction said:
Pretty much this. Although we definitely need to regulate fast food and unhealthy food more than we are right now. The fact that lobbyists were able to CONVINCE congress that pizza is a vegetable just because it has some tomato sauce (which is a goddamn fruit by the way, not a vegetable) is insane. Push these fuckers out of Washington and I can promise that we will start seeing real change in peoples' diets.
I couldn't disagree more.

It shouldn't be up to the government to tell people what they should and shouldn't eat. If someone wishes to eat pizza for all three meals every day then let them.

I also don't see the reasoning behind punishing everyone just because a few can't control themselves.

Letting the government step in and dictate what you eat is the start of a very slippery slide.
I am not saying that the government should take control of people's eating habits. What I'm saying is that fast food and junk food companies SHOULD NOT have the right to influence the government!
 

AnotherAvatar

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Sep 18, 2011
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Fagotto said:
AnotherAvatar said:
Obesity is a problem, and an unacceptable one in a country where there are people starving in the streets, however obesity has a lot to do with the foods available and America loves it's greasy, fattening foods.
What an inane and ignorant thing to say. How much person A eats has nothing to do with person B starving. Person A not eating as much will not make the food magically go to person B. It is not as if there's a food shortage right here, the issue is that person B lacks the money. Person A choosing to spend his money on something else like video games is not going to suddenly make person B able to afford food.
Sounds to me like you're the ignorant one with an inane comment, because if they simply donated the food they shouldn't be eating (The excess stuff is what I'm talking about, to clarify so you don't fail to understand me again) then more starving people would be eating. They don't have to spend that money on themselves to get more video games or something superficial like that.

Way to not connect the world.
 

dfphetteplace

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Nov 29, 2009
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How about because not everyone over weight is that way because they over eat. There are many medical conditions that make people appear fat, when it isn't fat at all. Last time I checked, smoking isn't caused by any known medical condition other then idiocy.
 

Danny91

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May 30, 2011
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I dunno; my thoughts are just really what I was taught from a young age: That it's incredibly rude to go up to a stranger and criticize them; by all means you can have your opinions about them, but to just say something like that to them? Not really something you should do, no matter if theyre fat, smokers or whatever.
 

JonnWood

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Jul 16, 2008
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PaulH said:
It's bad for you ... there's no advantageous benefit to smoking, tis true. But a cheeseburger is probably worse. Or some beer battered fries.
Note "probably". You're not trying to actually verify your theory.

But stop prresenting your singular view on things that it is some horrible 5th Horseman of the Apocalypse coming to reap souls. You have no fucking clue, as does every other scientist. So saying that scientific consensus says that secondhand smoke is dangerous is a sensationalist thing to say.
Yet it's true, and all you can do is say it's "sensationalist" and declare every single scientist who has such an opinion wrong without evidence.

It's bad for you, add it to the million and 1 other things that are ... but is it bad enough that you must infringe upon the rights of others to smoke a perfectly legal substance simply because you don't like it?
And those people have the right to passively harm those around them why?

I don't like cars ... I think people should drive motorcycles. They are, afterall, more efficient vehicles, they are easier to park and take less room AND they cause less fatalities to -others- (though more often does the rider die than any other motorvehicle) ....
I love that even in your own analogy, you have to start omitting facts to make your point look good. In fact, it makes your point worse; smoking is most likely to kill the smoker, but also harms those around them.

I can prove this, but at the same time would it be right for me to mandate every single person not drive a car? Or not allowed to drive a car in places heavily populated by people?
Cars are safer than bikes. Not-smoking is safer than smoking. It is beautiful how you think you're actually winning.

Say what you like, just don't be surprised when people who know the literature can tell you that secondhand smoke is negligible a risk at best, and there are far more important things to complain about when it comes to things like nutrition or pollution.
You mean "the literature" that agrees with you, since you already dismissed every scientist who disagrees with you, which is the majority of scientists.

You aren't being very intellectually honest, even with yourself.
 

Sordak

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Oct 5, 2010
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IN Austria its different. Nobody cares if you insult fat people. they are fat.
Well you cant insult someone who smokes cause fuck 1/3 of all people smoke. And most dont like beeing insulted.

Imo its OK to insult smoking people cause passive smoking is bad for my health. Im not getting fat from Passive eating! (even tho i do not see why fat chicks wear clothes that are not made for fat chicks i mean come on!)
 

RoBi3.0

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Mar 29, 2009
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CODE-D said:
Secondhand Fat doesnt cause others cancer.
In facted second hand fat is fucking tasty when it's attacked to prim-rib or some other really tasty animal carcass.
 

Therumancer

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Nov 28, 2007
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Brawndo said:
I don't know how it is the UK and Australia, but in the United States, smokers have developed a pariah-like status over the years. There are all kinds of anti-smoking campaigns, city ordinances not allowing smoking within X number of feet from a building, etc. But at the same time in the US, it is politically incorrect to criticize those who are overweight and obese. Some might argue: "Second hand smoke harms other people, but it's my choice to eat what I want and this doesn't harm other people."

However, it DOES harm other people, just not in the same way as second-hand smoke. According to a recent study, annual spending on obesity-related diseases is expected to rise by 13-16% in the US by 2030, leading to 2.6% increase in national health spending. Total medical costs associated with treatment of preventable diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, stroke, and coronary heart disease are estimated to increase by $48-66 billion a year.

That means as a fit person, my taxes will be higher and my insurance premiums will go up to fund increased health care costs associated with an increase in obesity. Also, children with fat parents are less likely to have access to healthy foods and are more likely to be overweight themselves. Other people ARE harmed by you being overweight.

But instead of a nationwide effort to promote healthy eating, there is a culture in the United States of being fat and proud of it. Facebook groups promoting concepts like "big women are beautiful" have millions of followers, and criticism of fat people is called "hate speech". Clearly some overweight people don't want to feel guilty about their behavior choices, so they try to make others feel guilty or embarrassed for criticizing them.

Let make this perfectly clear: being fat should not be a protected class like race, gender, sexual orientation, or ethnicity. Unlike those categories, being fat is almost always a choice. Only a small percentage of people are overweight because of a legitimate medical condition like hyperthyroidism. And sure, eating disorders with psychological roots exist, but let's be honest: most fat people are fat because of poor food choices and because they lack the willpower and motivation to exercise regularly. They just don't like to be called out on it.

The differance is that smoking is always a voluntary choice. Being fat might usually be a problem with the person who is fat, but that's not always the case. To be honest I'm currently morbidly obese, at *70* pounds over my ideal weight, something that happened gradually (but still pretty quickly) since I stopped working. The reason being that I was forced to stop working (now collect social security) due to brain damage, which has caused me a lot of problems which had gotten a lot worse including things like talking to myself, pacing, temper and manic episodes, and other fun stuff. I always had a few extra pounds due to the meds and stuff I was on, but the stuff I take now makes me tired, sick, and hungry all the time and also messes with my metabolism. Some days it's all I can do to get out of bed, but it's better than the alternatives of NOT taking the medication. It's not an unusual situation for people in similar situations to the one I find myself in with these kinds of drugs. Basically I'm this way because I need to be to get by/survive.

Granted my situation isn't that of ALL fat people, but it can be, as there are a LOT of things that can make you pack on some serious pounds, sometimes very quickly, and put you in a situation where you can't easily lose the weight. The very fact that situations like this exist is exactly why there isn't the same kind of stigma.

What's more the important thing to understand about smoking is that it affects more than the smoker, where being fat mostly just affects the person in question. When someone smokes it can set off people's allergies and such, and tends to cling to everything around it and make people's clothing or the enviroment where they smoke stink, people who smoke a lot tend to get used to it and not notice, but non-smokers do. This is beyond any medical issues from secondhand smoke, which a lot of people tend to forget about. People frequently argue that the secondhand smoke from *A* smoker is no big deal, but the thing is that especially when smoking was common or in places where they congregate it's not just *A* smoker, and for a long time it was omni-present. A lot of the issues there occured because you literally couldn't walk into a resteraunt, bar, bowling alley, or other public space without huge numbers of people puffing away, and even non-smoking areas had the smoke wafting in from all the people smoking like chimneys.

Truthfully I don't think smokers are treated like Pariahs really, I think it only seems that way because in a fairly short period of time we've gone from a society where everyone was smoking all the time, and could do it pretty much anywhere, to a situation where smoking has become something a person has to do away from other people or in their own home. Not accomodating someone's recreational habit is a bit differant from making them a pariah in a general sense.

When it comes to the tobacco companies the backlash has been pretty extreme, with smoking being discouraged in TV shows, movies, etc... but you have to understand that it was behaving in a very shady fashion to cover up the health issues with cigarettes as well as the addictiveness, and it WAS attempting to get people hooked as young as possible with the media playing a huge role in that. I think that aspect of things will calm down in a few decades (which might not be re-assuring to someone right now) it's not surprising with some of the revelations that there has been a major desire for media companies to want to distance themselves from big tobacco.
 

Addendum_Forthcoming

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Feb 4, 2009
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JonnWood said:
Assorted garbage
Life harms. As I said before, the literature states that there is no significant causality between ETS and Lung cancer. it's not a matter of truth, it's a matter of fact. People don't know, and if they can draw any conclusion is that ets is bad, but it's not horrible and there are certainly other concerns far more common that could be addressed in a similar light.

oh, and cars are safer for the driver. Not for pedestrians or passengers, and certainly if you were to reduce car ownership to only those times when actually moving furniture or the like you'd cut down on multiple fatality crashes.

(of which I addressed in my point)
 

generalvash

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May 17, 2011
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GamerKT said:
It usually takes longer for someone to stop being fat than to stop smoking. Also, smoke stinks. The most a fat person could inconvenience another is by taking up extra space or food.
I disagree, the foulest B.O. I was ever forced to endure came from an overweight individual (it was so horrible I nearly vomited).