We're not even close, in spite of the idiocy spouted by Polly Toynbee. Not only does she go on about how Western countries are so fat, she's come to the absurd conclusion that this is because of racism and inequality.
Scott Burgess debunks many things she states as facts.
Ms. Toynbee claims the U.S. has the most income inequality (which is debunked by Burgess but is off topic for me) and the fattest people. Burgess takes her to the woodshed thusly:
Burgess: No it doesn't - Pacific Islanders have by far the fattest. Among non-Pacific Islanders, residents of Greece, Jordan, Palestine, Panama, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates are also fatter than Americans.
Toynbee: Britain and Australia come next.
Burgess: No they don't. The following countries rank ahead of England (which has the highest rate in Britain): Albania (urban), Argentina, Bahrain, Barbados, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Egypt, Israel, Kuwait, Malta, Mexico and Paraguay.
Toynbee: ... the Scandinavian countries best of all.
Burgess: No they're not. Finland is in a statistical dead heat with England (22.5% each). If we define "Scandinavian countries" as Sweden, Norway, Finland and Denmark, and average the obesity rates in those countries, we see that the following countries are slimmer (I have excluded countries where famine and starvation are endemic): Austria, Brazil, China, France, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, Poland, Singapore, South Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan and Vietnam...Looks like oriental countries are actually "best of all".
The racial prejudice inherent in Toynbee's argument is incredible. Apparently, she did no research at all. See Burgess' page for actual cites on his numbers.
Americans are fatter than we used to be, there's no doubt of that. You can see it everywhere, but this is an alarming illustration of where the fat has been distributed. [Warning: Quicktime. If you don't have Quicktime or are on a dial up, try this instead].
Even this fine visual display of quantitative information, admirable in and of itself, is a bit too alarmist. This is because it's based on BMI. Using BMI labels both Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger as obese. While it does provide a measurement, it's not free of flaws since those with a very low percentage of fat and a lot of mass fall off the edge of the curve. Nonetheless, I'm pretty sure that 25% of Mississippi isn't suffering from prejudice against the pumped. The maps are limited to people with a BMI over 30, and while not ALL these people would read as obese on a visual test, the vast majority of them are overweight. The problem may be that the overweight/obese line is drawn too conservatively on the BMI charts, placing too many people into the obese group. There is no doubt that Americans are carrying more weight than they should be, but a whole lot of people who just think of themselves as "chubby" are now faced with being "obese".
The food police want us to believe that we are desperately in need of their iron fist of regulation. They claim we are helpless against the message of yumminess foisted upon us by junk food. Junk food pre-dates the 80s though, and that appears to be when the problems started, so I kinda doubt that argument. I dismiss this branch of the nanny state's argument as just another power grab. It's very sad when people attempt to manipulate us into their world view while kidding themselves that they have our best interests at heart.
I agree that we are certainly fatter (children and adults alike) than we used to be, but I think that the hysterical calls for regulation are misplaced. While I think the primary problem is inactivity (in both children and adults), that there's more going on that just that, but it's a subject for another rant, as are the reasons for the increased popularity of sitting among Americans.
Posted by nicole at June 01, 2004 12:48 PM