Forum - View topicAnswerman - Why Are Fat People Ridiculed In Anime?
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Velshtein
 Posts: 72 |
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Make healthful eating choices and exercise regularly. It really is that simple. |
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mc55
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Amen Zac, Sir.
This is a complex issue. Well, both are. The difference in cultures and the issue of obesity and such. The Japanese are healthier, but I don't think this is due to the mocking. Mocking folks who are overweight does not get them to change, and it isn't the place of anyone to do it. It's elitist and vile. Even more vile is to encourage someone to kill themselves. I struggle with overeating and with mental health issues. Suicide is a real danger for many folks, including to myself. It takes a special brand of evil to speak positively of folks harming themselves as one poster did. |
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Terrible90sDub
 Posts: 168 |
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Yep, this. I've seen people dismiss medical reasons before as excuses, but I have hyperthyroidism which makes it difficult for me to gain weight at all. (There's, uh, definitely a lot of downsides to this though, especially the potential of irregular heartbeats and thyroid storm) I'm guessing it's still possible for me, but I would have to eat a lot more than the norm for it... So I see no reason why the opposite, hypothyroidism, should be be dismissed, as it makes sense that a lower metabolism would make losing weight a lot harder, if not nearly impossible. I think it's easy for people to think something like "well, it's this way for me, so they clearly just need to do [x] like me!" ... but everyone's personal situation is different. Someone may even be trying their best to get to a healthier weight, but lacks the time due to work (especially if their job involves sitting all day) or has to fight a lot harder due to medical reasons. In general, I do wish that the common food in the west would be healthier, though. Having healthier food around would likely help a lot even for people who aren't overweight and, with the exception of buying raw produce directly, often the healthier options here are more expensive. Last edited by Terrible90sDub on Mon Feb 26, 2018 2:53 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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mangamuscle
Posts: 2658 Location: Mexico |
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If by surgery you mean gastric bypass or banding, yeah, why not. But if you mean liposuction, that is a big no no, they are literally chopping you to pieces, you will lose a lot of blood and you might even die or fall into comma. |
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otagirl
Posts: 111 |
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I used to be a little fatty until I started going to the gym.
To be honest, only a small fraction of people would probably fall under medical/ mental issues. Most people are just lazy. Either can't be arsed exercising or eating too much. Fat doesn't come from nowhere. It accumulates because the energy you consume is greater than what you expend, simple as. People just have to learn self control and have a sense of pride. That said. East Asian standards are pretty ridiculous since they're physically so petite. As a UK size 8 I would probably be considered a bit "big" over there. |
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lossthief
ANN Reviewer
 Posts: 1392 |
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Worth noting that Gastric Bypass is NOT an easy option - besides the medical costs and screening process necessary to even receive the surgery, it entails a massive, permanent change in a person's lifestyle for the rest of their life, which is why it's pretty much always a last resort for somebody who needs to drastically lose weight for their health with no other recourse. That usually means folks who are overweight due to disability or other medical conditions that make change of diet and exercise a non-viable option. |
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Brand
 Posts: 1028 |
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I feel like people think that doctors give out Weight Loss Surgery like candy. As someone who had it done trust me you have to go through A LOT of hoops to get it. Insurance companies want to make sure it worth spending the money on it. That is even if your insurance covers it, many do not. And most insurance companies want at least two comorbidities before they will even consider the surgery for someone. ---- On the manga from though "Mori no Takuma-san" is a really cute manga with an obese love interest that is really cute. I won't say it isn't without problems but overall it is pretty sweet. |
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Chiibi
 Posts: 4829 |
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I don't think they're that wrong, really.
Rather this whole "Accept obesity because people are beautiful no matter what" attitude the West has embraced sounds highly dangerous to me. :/ You can get a heart attack and die you know? Self-acceptance is important, yes. But who really cares when the person is 600 pounds and on their deathbed because of that? Getting them medical help to lose weight should be a priority over their sensitive wittle feelings about being called "fat". |
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TheOtakuX
 Posts: 344 Location: Wooster, Ohio |
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Exactly, people are more concerned with getting their feelings hurt than they are with the physical health problems they're inviting. Or they want to keep eating food that's terrible for them, which I can relate to. I've recently started eating better and exercising more to try to lose some weight, and not being able to snack is by far the hardest part. |
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DmonHiro
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NO! Don't do a gastric bypass it unless you are in serious medical danger. Those things have horrible side-effects that your doctor may not tell you. How would you like to throw up daily for a few month (at least). |
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Stuart Smith
 Posts: 1298 |
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True enough. What people openly say can definately differ from how they truly feel, especially in a public space. People can say being overweight or ugly doesn't matter, but then you notice some people who say that only date skinny attractive people. I was heavy in high school, and while I wasn't bullied or anything, I was hardly popular with the ladies. Around my senior year I started dieting and exercising, and by college was down to a healthy weight and mysteriously I was way more popular in the dating scene. As far as fat characters go, perhaps I'm shallow, but I prefer attractive, normal sized characters. Don't see any benefit to purposely unattractive characters, unless it's a fetish show about that stuff, or the character's weight is part of their character, like Chouji converting calories to chakra or his body expansion jutsu. Or they're supposed to be unattractive. Not sure how true the 'America moved away from mocking fat people' is though. Fat guys are still the obligitory funny person usually. Maybe the jokes are less about their weight, but they're still regulated to being the funny one, and usually dim-witted at that. -Stuart Smith |
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Jose Cruz
 Posts: 1773 Location: South America |
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I never noticed fat jokes were more ridiculed in Japanese media than in Western media. In fact I think Western shows tend to be way more obsessed with fat people, mainly because they have far more fat people in society. I can only recall a few jokes aimed at fat people like in Princess Principal there was a fat girl that worked at the laundry and was shown to be always eating. To me that was a rather harmless joke, nothing compared to what South Park does.
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Gatherum
 Posts: 773 Location: Aurora CO |
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This holds no water whatsoever. Very, very few people hit a weight that high--not even professional heavy-weight wrestlers and strongmen, whose bodies are comprised of more in muscle weight than anything else (and muscle is known to be heavier). Prattling about with the most extreme fantastical bullshit helps neither your case, nor the people you're patronising. Honestly, the article is accurate, but I would stress that obesity is more socially acceptable in American relative to Japan--and that's a low bar. I've seen the results of this kind of shaming in most every person I've met with a weight problem. These people aren't trying to justify their weight. They're giving their detractors the verbal thrashing they deserve for being short-sighted, pedantic edge lords, for sure. In the company of friendlier folk, though, they're fiercely lamenting their predicament, trying desperately to find some balance between body acceptance and body improvement. It's not like they aren't aware of both the aesthetic and health issues. The truth is that there are a goddamn fudge-ton of reasons for why they're there. For some, it's hypothyroidism or other physical disorder. Others, it's a destructive combination of anxiety, depression, and the eating they do just to cope because that's the only comfort they have. Gee, I wonder why. Couldn't possibly be because motherfuckers keep assuming they're too sloth or thin-skinned for self-improvement. As for Japan...I guess we can chalk this up to yet another cultural toxicity from which they'll need to move on over time. A population with only a 3.5% obesity ratio has no business being the dicks they are about this because it serves no purpose: That figure was true before the Metabo Law, which means that its implementation does nothing except kick the minority while they're already down. It's juvenile and heinous, and no amount of, "Cultural differences; deal with it," gets them any passes. |
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TasteyCookie
 Posts: 421 |
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I'm sorry Zac, but I do not agree at all. I have lost 4 (2 which were blood related) uncles and 2 friends to heart failure caused by obesity. I have 2 other friends with severe diabetes who are also at high risk of heart failure because of their weight, and another 28 year old friend who spends entire weeks bed-ridden because they physically cannot get out of bed due to back pain caused by being morbidly obese... Being OK with it is deadly, and being an advocate to people losing weight is not elitism. I agree you shouldn't just be shaming them and ridiculing them, but it is not OK in the slightest to be fine with someone being morbidly obese; not if you care about them as a person and want them to not die before they are 35.
Now I want to stress there is a difference between being slightly overweight and obese. Being slightly overweight is totally and completely fine, and not exactly unhealthy as long as you are getting proper nutrition. But this whole fat acceptance just makes me absolutely furious as I've been too affected by people who are unwilling to change their life and have it end drastically short. |
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Stuart Smith
Posts: 1298 |
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On the contrary. If Japan has only a 3.5% obesity rate, America and the rest of the western world are the ones who need to step up and 'move on'. Japan is clearly doing something right. It may have only decreased 1%, but like all doctors say, losing 1 pound a year is great, because it means you aren't gaining any weight, which most adults struggle with. A 1% drop in our obesity rate is almost impossible because of how much it increases each year. -Stuart Smith |
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