Essay
From a tender age, I believed that fat people were lazy. Having been raised by work alcoholic and overly athletic folks, I grew up with the understanding that obese people never tried hard to engage in physical activity. The gospel according to my parents was that “fat people ate lots of fats, were couch potatoes and outright lazy bones.”
In the effort to stay fit and skinny, I grew up staying away from all sugary and fatty food stuff such as sweets, candies, chocolates, pork and hamburger. Eating out or getting take away of fast foods was a taboo in my home because they were said to be the receipt to obesity or fatness. My breakfasts and dinners were ‘expertly prepared’ by my mother, and carried my packed lunch to school right from elementary school through high school. The same way that plutonium in the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant was the “darling and demon of the nuclear age” (Iversen, 2012, p.86) to Kristen Iversen, calories and fats were the “darling and demon of obesity”. In the same vein, my entire family was always up at the crack of dawn to go jogging for a mille every morning before heading t o work, school, or church in the case of Sunday. All these extreme measures were in the effort to avoid becoming fat. As far as I was concerned, being obese was self-inflicted and not a multiplicity of other out-of-control factors such family history. Furthermore, at the time, mainstream Media was abuzz with the propaganda that poor eating habits and lack of physical work out is responsible for increasing numbers of obese people in developing countries.
In view of this, my screwed perception of obesity was shaped at this early stage when I was most naive and took roots in my mind for a long time that was to come. Learning was thus a key factor influencing my perception. The opinions and beliefs of my family, the media and the society as large played a big role in informing my own point of view (Amerland, nd, p.121).
Whenever my misconceptions came under increasing challenge in upper elementary school, I blocked my minds and often picked up fights. Even when I was presented with scholarly facts pointing to the contrary, I still remained defensive about my pre-acquired ideas on plus-sized people. Like many other people, I was open to that which I already new and very uncomfortable with new ideas relating to the contentious subject of obesity. My open-mindedness was limited to assumptions that conformed to my acquired knowledge, line of reasoning and expectations of what caused someone to gain weight.
As stated in Confirmation of Bias article, my opinions were a product of years of affording attention to information which attested my beliefs while discarding information that challenged my preconceived notion. There is no doubt that I have long been a victim of confirmation bias, where I perceived obesity through a filter by thinking selectively to match the already-existing worldview on obesity. Today, I fully understand why I was that protective of my conceived opinions and beliefs about obesity. It was simply for the reason that they were intertwined with my self-image, meaning that I had difficulty shaking them off without inflicting damage to my very core concepts of self – an active fit healthy person. Consequently, I was bound to be indifferent to any suggestions that contradicted those beliefs.
The change in my opinions has been influenced by a host of educational material, which have refuted my preconceived ideas about the whole topic of obesity and its contributing factors. Consistent readings have shown me that obesity is not necessarily a behavioural issue. I have come to the understanding that weight loss and management efforts need a balanced integration of behavioural change and scientific/medical evaluation and intervention (Campos, 2004, p.131). In addition, I now know that obesity may be as a result of hormone disorders such as those associated to adrenal glands, thyroid, ovaries and pituitary glands. All these have helped challenge my ill-founded opinions and obsession with weight-reducing practices.
However, the most interesting element of obesity that I came across and which has invited me to a change of opinion is one that relates to poor eating habits. It has been interesting that the prevalence of obesity is just as high in third world countries (with high malnutrition levels) as they are in developed nations such as mine. A recent study by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization suggested that childhood obesity could be prevented by reducing malnutrition in pregnant mothers. It is explained that under-nutrition in the womb can significantly compromise a fetus’ metabolism – training the child’s metabolism to converse, instead of using, calories – something that predisposes childhood and adult obesity (Campos, 2004, p.146).
In addition, I have learned much about obesity from friends and learning colleagues. Consequently, there has been an almost paradigm shift in my opinions. In line with arguments by Lehrer (2011) I am a social animal whose memory of the past is continuously being revised to fit the social pressures. I have gradually tweaked my story to make a better story so that it may appeal more to my friends or social group (Lehrer, Jonah, 2011, p.218). The power of social conformity thus left me with no choice but to trust the opinions of the social group although they greatly went against my personal original beliefs. I have had to adapt, for the best. Finally, I must admit that my story identifies with Kristen Iversen’s in the Full Body Burden because lack of full knowledge about my convictions made me harbour misplaced ideas about obesity for a long time.
References:
Amerland, David. nd. The Social Media Mind: How social media is changing business, politics and science and helps create a new world order. Georgia: New Line Publishing.
Campos, F. Paul. 2004. The Obesity Myth: Why America’s Obsession with Weight Is Hazardous to Your Health. London: Penguin.
Iversen, Kristen. 2012. Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats. United States: Crown Publishing Group.
Lehrer, Jonah. 2011. How Friends Ruin Memory: The Social Conformity Effect. Richmond: Virginia Commonwealth University.
