CHEERLESS CHUBBIES | Our Fat Children
What causes your little fatty's insatiable hunger for food?
This I stumbled upon via procrastination some feminist blog. It is a 1961 article from Ladies' Home Journal about childhood obesity. 99% of the article is hilarious,* especially the repeated uses of "fatty" (endearing? shaming? in between?) - as if the author KNEW this word would soon be blacklisted by HRH Political Correctness and wanted to shove it into print as much as possible. While the bluntness of this article makes us laugh and makes it seem too dated to be taken seriously, it is actually this aspect which came across to me as refreshing. Nowadays, if your child is obese, and you dare recognize this as a [health] problem, then you'd better be prepared for a stampede stormpocalypse of uninspired mommy bullies bloggers. (Strikethrough is fun.) Of course, the internet is positively BRIMMING with stories, studies, reports about childhood obesity. Today's doctors and parents and bloggers are way more obsessively paranoid in 2013 compared to 50 years ago. Like, it's not even a competition. The chief distinction is that, nowadays, you'll sooner come across the real "f" word than the word "fatty" in [respectable] print...other than between quotes, sarcastically or in reference to oneself (i.e. all over this website), or on Dateline specials about cyberbullying. BUT I DIGRESS.
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| This is the sobering news that more and more child specialists are telling mothers of fatties these days. . . .Why were there more absences for illness among the "tubbies"? |
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* This bit about poor Ernie's mother represents the 1% of this article that is NOT funny.
Your husband's name is Mac, your nanny's name is Ingrid, and your son's name is Ernie. You suck, lady. |
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