Time is Lazy

Get a load of this charming paragraph:

"Chemistry is not destiny, of course. Lightfoot hopes to use his research to help determine which patients may need a bigger boost to get moving — he thinks that perhaps close supervision by trainers or rewards for exercising will encourage genetic lazybones to get to the gym. And maybe one day, he speculates, there might even be a drug to compensate for what your genes won't give you. A drug that makes you want to exercise? Now that's a pill worth swallowing."

*sits on the obnoxious writer's hands and breaks hir fingers*

There is already a drug that makes you want to be active nonstop. It even kills your appetite and helps you lose weight. Best of all, you can make it yourself from simple ingredients anytime, anywhere. Take cold medicine, match heads, starter fluid, etc....oh wait. That drug is called meth. It's illegal. And it makes you batshit crazy, lose your teeth, and look really awful eventually.

You nailed it, Paul. That was some lazy reporting there.

My husband is one of the laziest people I know and he's thin. I usually appreciate Time's coverage, but I agree. The headless fatties photo choice is just a lazy cliche.

The caption is lovely - "A Pair of Couch Potatoes Watch TV." I'm not even sure that's a tv remote, but whatever. What the hell? What kind of caption is that?

Zero isn't a size, it's a warning sign. - Carson Kressley
The Kevin Pease Beer Fund Foundation - Won't Someone PLEASE think of the psychology students?

It's quite simple, Annie. All fat people are couch potatoes. All couch potatoes are fat.

My neighbors must wonder what my fat ass is doing, dashing through the neighborhood with my iPod every evening. I mean, shouldn't I be inside sitting on my sofa eating chips? It irks the shit out of me that I have to endure public scrutiny of my body because of the incessant media portrayal of fat people as lazy slobs who can't stay out of the junk food. Way to go, Time!

I also took exception to the caption. Didn't the photographer ask the names of his/her subjects? (Hey. He/she must have the lazy gene!) Even a file photo ought to have names, and it's hard to believe the photo was snapped randomly in a public place (were they sitting on a sofa at a furniture store, or something) where they can get away without asking permission. If it was a photo illustration (deliberately staged), Time had an obligation to disclose that.

Also, did the subjects of the photo actually identify themselves as "couch potatoes"? If so, why didn't the caption say "two self-described 'couch potatoes' watch TV"?

The fat people is a cliche. It could also be a one-off — there's no proof that these two people consistently sit in front of the TV eating chips. Oh, wait. That's right. They're faaaaat. So of course they must; otherwise, they wouldn't be fat. And round and round we go again.

Now I remember why I no longer buy magazines. Good grief - are these people idiots??? no 1 ever saw a lazy skinny person?? I can show you more than 3 handfuls in my family tree alone -- and that's without even shaking the branches really hard ... meeeeee the 1 with a massive fattitude is the hyper version of our clan - it ain't pretty ya know - type A, borderline OCD, fat arse... there I am like a whirling dervish 18 to 19 hours a day, even talk in what little sleep I get... so, how do they explain my genetics???

Reading about how the "sedentary" mice re-purposed their wheels, I couldn't help thinking they were smarter and more creative than their busier brethren, frantically running on the wheel to nowhere.

Annie, I don't think it is a TV remote either; to me it looks more like a cordless phone, or an older style cell phone (the LCD gives it away). Rebelle, the picture seems to be credited to Corbis, an online library of free and paid-for stock images which along with Getty Images and a few others are used by the media to illustrate their stories. Some of the photos are posed by models, others surreptitiously snapped of unsuspecting victims on the street (the classic dreaded headless fatty shots mostly fall into this category).

I recall a discussion on here a while back about the woeful lack of positive photographic stock of larger people (ie, ones that didn't show them engaged in stereotypical activities such as stuffing on junk food, sprawled on the couch, trying to zip themselves into ill-fitting clothing, or grimacing / crying at the number on the scale).

If nothing else it demonstrates how even if you give your permission for your photo to be used in one of these image libraries, you lose all control over how you might then portrayed by the outlets to which those images are leased; of course, those who find themselves the victims of 'shooting from the hip' on the way to the grocery store never had the option to refuse in the first place.

And the article seems to be the usual speculative press-release based crap that seems to pass for health and science reporting these days. I'm increasingly coming to believe there's no longer a useful distinction to be made between the popular and 'quality' media where the topics of weight and 'omgbesity' are concerned.

"if you think fat people have no self-discipline, consider the fact that they haven’t killed you yet." - Miss Conduct, Boston Globe

I recall a discussion on here a while back about the woeful lack of positive photographic stock of larger people (ie, ones that didn't show them engaged in stereotypical activities such as stuffing on junk food, sprawled on the couch, trying to zip themselves into ill-fitting clothing, or grimacing / crying at the number on the scale).

This sounds like an excellent project for NAAFA or COFRA to take up -- the creation of a fat-positive collection of stock images by professional photographers, for the free use of media and individuals.

Is it me or does anybody else hear a train coming? You know; Lazy fat people sitting around complaining about how 'it's their genes', but really their just too lazy to lose the weight because of, yanno, their lazy genes.

Now the Fatophobes are going to have to decide how to do an about face on the whole, 'It can't be genes making you fat. Evolution doesn't work that way.', argument so they can hit us over the head with 'You're lazy genes are what's making you fat. . . Mutant Fatty!'

The photo? Stupid. Childish, even. When WILL they get tired of trying to scare people into reading their pointless articles with the Headless Fatty photos? Surely, by now, people have begun to yawn and their eyes have started to glazing over. Or, perhaps, Time has a rampant and rabid fatophobia problem. Could be their too busy trying to figure out how to scare folks into an 'Obesity Crisis' frenzy to actually think about what their printing. As evidenced by the 'moderate exercise doesn't work' link they've got at the bottom of their Lazy Genes article.

So what's the message here? 'Your not going to lose weight by going easy on yourself, you mutant gene, fatty! Starvation rations and death march workouts are the only ways to loose the flab!' Yeah, like I'm gonna torture myself for the rest of my life just to look the way YOU think I should. I mean, the way the exercise article is written you'd think they'd never even heard of HAES. Oh, wait! That's right. Weight loss IS the only point of exercising. Sorry. Forgot.

As far as lazy genes, I also seem to keep forgetting that for some people the argument never was about whether or not being fat is your fault. It's always been about whether or not we should be allowed to offend other peoples sensibilities by existing at all. Gotta remember that.

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you.
Then you win. - Mahatma Ghandi