Obesity Epidemic Definition Essay
The Merriam-Webster dictionary offers this definition: “obesity: a condition characterized by the excessive accumulation and storage of fat in the body” (Webster Online Dictionary). The Center for Disease Control and Prevention defines obesity further: “…obesity ranges are determined by using weight and height to calculate a number called the “body mass index” (BMI). BMI is used because, for most people, it correlates with their amount of body fat. An adult who has a BMI between 25 and 2.9 is considered overweight, while an adult who has a BMI of 30 or higher is considered obese “(Center for Disease Control). Table 1 presents quantitative information on obesity, based on one’s height, weight range, and BMI. Figure 1: Summarizes obesity.
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Yet even as more Americans are becoming overweight, in our society, “thin is in, and fat is regarded as a stigma” (Langford). Stigma is defined as “1. a) a scar left by a hot iron, b) a mark of shame or discredit: Stain, c) an identifying mark or characteristic: specifically: a specific diagnostic sign of a disease” (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary). In whatever way the word stigma is defined, social stigmatization stems from societal values on body type. This stigmatization causes weight-based discrimination. Fat people are most of the time looked down upon because of their physical appearance; they are “often ostracized at social functions, find discrimination in the job market, and are somehow viewed as inferior or of lesser character due to a “lack of willpower”” (Langford). Studies have been directed to finding out how serious is the stigma attached to obesity in the United …show more content…
As a result, she committed suicide. She left a note that said: “I got fatter and fatter and sadder and sadder. Everyone got meaner and meaner…I wasn’t too stubborn to ask for help, I did ask, but they did not pay any attention” (The Times, 2004). Recently, Domonique Ramirez, a seventeen-year-old beauty queen, was told to ““get off the tacos”” after she showed up for a bikini photo shoot looking larger than the usual, which, as a result, made the pictures ““unusable””; she was stripped of her crown. This case was taken to the court, and justice was served when the jury ruled the pageant officials guilty; Ramirez won back her crown (Hindustan Times). While magazines, newspapers, and various articles display extreme examples of the result of stigmatization related to being overweight “reels out of control” (Rex-Lear), novels, poems, proses, and other literature works, are doing the same as authors release their attitudes and feelings toward weight
Yet even as more Americans are becoming overweight, in our society, “thin is in, and fat is regarded as a stigma” (Langford). Stigma is defined as “1. a) a scar left by a hot iron, b) a mark of shame or discredit: Stain, c) an identifying mark or characteristic: specifically: a specific diagnostic sign of a disease” (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary). In whatever way the word stigma is defined, social stigmatization stems from societal values on body type. This stigmatization causes weight-based discrimination. Fat people are most of the time looked down upon because of their physical appearance; they are “often ostracized at social functions, find discrimination in the job market, and are somehow viewed as inferior or of lesser character due to a “lack of willpower”” (Langford). Studies have been directed to finding out how serious is the stigma attached to obesity in the United …show more content…
As a result, she committed suicide. She left a note that said: “I got fatter and fatter and sadder and sadder. Everyone got meaner and meaner…I wasn’t too stubborn to ask for help, I did ask, but they did not pay any attention” (The Times, 2004). Recently, Domonique Ramirez, a seventeen-year-old beauty queen, was told to ““get off the tacos”” after she showed up for a bikini photo shoot looking larger than the usual, which, as a result, made the pictures ““unusable””; she was stripped of her crown. This case was taken to the court, and justice was served when the jury ruled the pageant officials guilty; Ramirez won back her crown (Hindustan Times). While magazines, newspapers, and various articles display extreme examples of the result of stigmatization related to being overweight “reels out of control” (Rex-Lear), novels, poems, proses, and other literature works, are doing the same as authors release their attitudes and feelings toward weight