I had more problems with this article. Maybe it is alarmist to call obesity an epidemic, but can we at least agree it;s a problem? Have you been on a city subway filed with teenage girls lately? Many of the fourteen eyar old girls I see are either obese, sitting across ("in" really isn't the right preposition) three seats while texting, drinking soda and eating chips, or beanpole anorexic and smoking cigarettes, hoping to be noticed by a guy seven years older then her.
Even if it's loosey-goosey to reapproriate the terminology from epidemiology (ooh, big words, he must be a scientist!) to describe a eprsonal failing, does that necesarrily obviate the role of personal responsibility, giving it up to the Huge Government Spendocats (because lord knows Dick Cheney wasn't bi government or big spending) If something is an epidemic, we try to be more careful about what we do with our bodies, we help the people afflicted, we teach them how to help themselves, and we try to stop them from being discriminated against by people who blame them for getting themselves into this mess. Maybe it is their fault, but that doesn't mean we don't help him. Maybe obesity isn't a disease per se, but why is it so absurd to talk about it in those terms?
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