OBESITY

This has nothing to do with the obesity story that Conrad and Chris have been talking about, but caught my eye..

INDIANAPOLIS, May 27 (UPI) -- An Indianapolis women who weighs 650 pounds (that’s 46.5 stone or 294.5Kilos for non-Americans) has said she was humiliated after a cab driver allegedly refused to transport her because of her size.
WRTV-TV, in Indianapolis, reported Thursday that Mararika Parker who has ridden
in taxicabs for the past three years had never been refused until February. "He said 'I can't ride you. You too big for my cab. You'll pop the doors off of my cab,'" Parker said. "I was so mad, I couldn't talk to him."
She has complained to the Indiana Civil Rights Commission, which is investigating Indy Airport Taxi.
Officials with Indy Airport Taxi told the commission that the company had never
discriminated against a client and they claimed that Parker was physically unable to enter the cab.
"He (the cab driver) said he may have to pull me in and out of the cab," Parker said. "That's not true. I'm 28 years old, I'm not a senior citizen. I'm just overweight and can't walk far."
During the investigation, commission officials had Parker telephone for a taxi and observed her getting in and out of the cab without problems.
The case is still under investigation.

I must admit that my first thought on reading it was the usual “god Americans are fat” followed swiftly by “god Americans are stupid”, but then when I thought about it a bit more I wondered about the mentality that lets someone get to that size, and then to merely describe themselves as “overweight” instead of “a huge, stinky, sweaty pile of blubber”.

Somehow fat people all over the world seem to have convinced themselves that they are normal and the rest of the world is against them. There are constant stories of these tubs of lard bleating on about not being able to get into cabs, or airline seats, or cinemas, or some such drivel. And somehow it’s the rest of the worlds fault? There’s even a National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance in the US for gods sake. They claim being fat is a disability. That I agree with. What I don’t agree with is that we should give them any leeway. It IS a disability in as much as it makes it impossible to perform many of the tasks “normal” people can do, but it is SELF-INFLICTED. Why should we have to pay or apologise for the fact that they are so food-obsessed they that they become human Zeppelins. If they find the world is against them because they’re huge, then they should eat less! It’s simple physics – you can’t create or destroy matter, and biology – you take in more energy than your body can use then your body stores it as fat.

Eat less and do more exercise you blimps – stop whining to us.