Tuesday, February 22, 2005
This Has Got To Stop
The old saw goes that weirdness starts in California and travels east. HOGWASH -- it starts in Europe and travels to California, then eastward. These stories, one from England, and one from Australia. (OK, not Europe, but somewhere between us and them culturally) I truly hope are an exception to that generalization.
Both stories concern obesity. The Australian one is actually fairly typical of some of what we see here, public health menace, blah, blah, blah. Nanny State stuff.
The Brit story is terrifying. They have defined a syndrome of some sort for a morbidly obese guy, called it mental illness and taken him away. Literally. This is a little beyond nanny state, this is nanny-police state.
Public health my eye. Public health is about transmittable illness, typhoid, AIDS, etc. Fat is not contagious -- sorry to break it to you.
The current fight against obesity is based on single payer, i.e. governmentally provided, health care. Obese people are "a disproportionate burden on the system." Didn't Hitler justify killing the Jews using similar logic? Sounds like a good reason to pay cash for health care to me.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I am obese, not as obese as I used to be having worked pretty hard in the last year, but I have a ways to go to drop out of the category. I pay for my health care - people, especially my wife, love me - I am a productive member of society. Try and take me away and I will do a little more than go crying -- count on it.
Both stories concern obesity. The Australian one is actually fairly typical of some of what we see here, public health menace, blah, blah, blah. Nanny State stuff.
The Brit story is terrifying. They have defined a syndrome of some sort for a morbidly obese guy, called it mental illness and taken him away. Literally. This is a little beyond nanny state, this is nanny-police state.
Public health my eye. Public health is about transmittable illness, typhoid, AIDS, etc. Fat is not contagious -- sorry to break it to you.
The current fight against obesity is based on single payer, i.e. governmentally provided, health care. Obese people are "a disproportionate burden on the system." Didn't Hitler justify killing the Jews using similar logic? Sounds like a good reason to pay cash for health care to me.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I am obese, not as obese as I used to be having worked pretty hard in the last year, but I have a ways to go to drop out of the category. I pay for my health care - people, especially my wife, love me - I am a productive member of society. Try and take me away and I will do a little more than go crying -- count on it.
