The first few times I came across to the United States, I noticed something…
I noticed that on my return each time when people asked about the United States, one of the queries was whether “everybody was overweight?”
My answer in 2005 when I visited New York and Boston, in 2006 when I visited Chicago, Boston and various areas of California and in 2006-2007 after spending 11 of the last 13 months here in Chicago, was (and is) that there are a lot of overweight people, but generally not in large cities…
Something that may surprise some is what I would also say in addition to the above: “When I came back to the UK (especially in Grimsby - my home town at the time), a greater amount of people looked fat and those who were not, look like a Chav or (if Female) dressed like a prostitute. There seems to be a lot more visible ‘normal people’ in American society.”
I’ve said for a few years now that the stereotype in the UK of negativity at ‘Overweight America’ may be quite true in some places, but that Britain is well on it’s way to catching up and unlike America, where from my experience people in the suburbs who get everywhere using their car - and are overweight because of a lack of exercise in that respect - Britain seems to have the problem everywhere, and in noticable numbers.
This isn’t an attack on either Britain or the U.S., it’s an observation based on actual experience and actually going to places to learn about them. McDonald’s (who by the way, now have an extremely healthy menu - if you choose to eat the healthy items from it) may have originated here in the USA, but they have spread worldwide, so will fat people - but not because of McDonald’s…
I’m just over 6ft tall and I weigh about 162lbs, I eat burgers quite a lot (even McDonald’s ones) , but I also walk this city endlessly. At least once a month I’ll even have a day where I walk my wife to work, walk the city for nine hours (taking photos), then walk her home again. There are ‘illnesses’ that cause people to be overweight and a lot of people choose to blame someone/thing else (like McDonald’s or an ‘illness’) for their problem, rather than accepting they are the ones who walked through the door (or in most cases - drove through the drive-through) in the first place.
You hear the occasional news story where a man who was 600+lbs had to be pulled through a demolished wall by firemen and taken into hospital for his life to be saved. Why aren’t people strong enough to save their own life at say, 240lbs? I’ve been through a lot in my life and as I get older and reflect on things I have experienced - and pulled through - I start to wonder why some people don’t… Perhaps someone may reply and educate me a little because although I understand the technicalities of Mental Illness (brain chemicals and the like) and have felt pretty damn low at certain times of my life, I don’t understand why blame of a ‘Medical reason’ seems so prevalent in this day and age when in the past it seemed people just dealt with whatever life threw at them.
Maybe that’s the answer, if life throws food at you that you shouldn’t be eating - throw it back? Anyway… I think that before long the stereotype of ‘Overweight America’ shall seem oddly misplaced in a world of obesity.