Misapplication

I read a lot more than I post, and more than it would be practical to bookmark. It is inevitable that sometimes I will want to find something and not remember where I saw it or how to get back. Even if I never find what I originally intended, the search results can be interesting.

I was not looking for this story the other week, but I found it:

http://nypost.com/2015/01/16/i-gained-43-pounds-to-prove-obese-people-are-lazy/

I may vaguely remember reading something about her before, probably with someone else reacting to the article. Reading it so soon after reading The Obesity Myth put her experience in a new light.

She had to work very hard to change her body's natural shape. It consumed her, affected relationships, hampered other activities and made her miserable. Once she stopped fighting it, her body went quickly back toward her original point. Despite that, she did end up heavier overall (by about 6-12 pounds, depending on when you ask), and her body still does not completely meet the wishes of those around her, though they thought she was too thin.

That is exactly what Paul Campos would have predicted. If Hopkins were to try it again, she would find her weight creeping up each time. Of course, there is no reason for her to try that. She is naturally slim.

The really notable thing about that is that even though she says she has new understanding, she misunderstands. Yes, listening to her body and doing what came more naturally to her worked for her, because that's her body type. It happened to correspond to losing weight, but it doesn't work that way for everyone.

I was able to find something else I remembered from a few years ago:

http://www.celebitchy.com/393855/twiggy_interview_obesity_is_a_tragedy_its_so_much_easier_to_buy_rubbish/

Twiggy knows that she was incapable of putting on weight, no matter how much people criticized her thinness (despite it also being quite lucrative), but is still sure that obesity is the result of bad choices.

I suppose there is a segment of the population who sees a body like mine and imagines that I live a life like Hopkins did when she was trying to gain weight: thirteen meals a day and not able to move. That does make it seem ironic that when I am out walking by myself I get catcalls, or that a heavier person at the gym might have people snapping photos and making snide comments on Instagram - this is your fault but trying to change it will be mocked.

There is probably something about human nature worth exploring there, and I may get to that later. Currently it seems more important to take a look at Susan Estrich.

Estrich was also featured in The Obesity Myth. She has an impressive resume, having been the campaign manager for Michael Dukakis and a law clerk for US Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens. Before that she was the first female president/editor-in-chief of the Harvard Law Review.

Despite that, she says her proudest accomplishment was going down from a size 12 to a size 6 (sometimes a 4). As part of that, she had to focus to a point where she could not do those other things. She had to be miserable and food-obsessed to do it. And I guess she did find it was worth it, but how much of that is because society told her that's how she should be? Size 12 sounds pretty good to me.

Here's something else that's really old:

http://paulgraham.com/nerds.html

There were a lot of interesting ideas, though I didn't agree with all of them, but the one I always come back to is that nerds can't be popular because they care too much about other things. In an environment where maintaining the right level of cool detachment takes complete effort, kids who also care about anything else can't achieve it.

I care about a lot of things. They come up in the blog all the time. I care about books and comics and music and animals and gardening and politics and so many things. Mainly I care about people, which has its downsides, but is still often rewarding.

Yesterday I admitted that I want to be thin, and I have wanted that for a long time, even back when it wasn't quite so far away. I did not grasp the total dedication it would take then, though in retrospect it makes sense given the lack of payoff for some pretty good efforts.

There may be some sense of absolution now in looking back and seeing how the odds were stacked. There is a greater sense of how good health is not out of reach, but is in fact more attainable once you stop conflating it with thinness.

Most of all, I have to acknowledge that I can't want it as much as I want everything else. I can't want thinness as much as I want knowledge and friendship and peace of mind.

I know some people will judge me for my size, and others won't, but in my judgment of myself there are too many things more important than that number on the scale.