I received a DM on Twitter last night from Mrs Q, aka fedupwithlunch on Twitter. She wanted to let me know she saw my posting on the OAC and was going to be posting about it today herself. See, Mrs Q is a school teacher that started an anonymous blog in which she chronicled eating the same school lunch as the students did, every day in 2010. Since then she has also gone on to tackle all sorts of food related topics surrounding nutrition in schools, the sources of our food, the special dietary needs of her own family and more.
See, last week she had posted about how they served chocolate mini-wheat for the school breakfast, and she noted about how various teachers and other staff frequently eat the school breakfast, often without seeming to pay for it. Her original intent was to point out how this is a federally funded program, aimed at providing a “nutritious” breakfast for under-privileged kids… not a potentially second, free breakfast for the staff. Had she left it there, it likely would have been just another posting by Mrs Q that garnered her such a loyal and dedicated following. Thing is, she added this lil comment…
I have seen one administrator in particular grabbing a hot breakfast every day. The person is really overweight and I can’t help but wonder silently if they need those extra calories. I know it’s bad to think that, but I can’t help it.
At this point, I’m sure you can imagine what happened in the comments (which she has since decided to close)…. it pretty much runs the gamut, some were supportive:
I have to defend Mrs. Q on the overweight comment – let’s be honest, a lot of people are overweight these days due to poor eating habits. I live in the South and see it every day. I myself have struggled with weight. Yes, not everyone who is overweight is so because of overeating, but I would venture to say a large percentage are. And I, too, have thought in my head “That person really shouldn’t eat fast food” especially if I know that person has complained about not being able to lose weight in the past. The other day I happened to see a VERY overweight coworker go into a Chinese buffet restaurant and thought “I wonder what they’re cholesterol is like” – not because I was judgmental about their looks, but I was worried about their health (as I’m sure Mrs. Q was, too, when she made her comment).
There was one or two that were pretty ambivalent:
Meh. Everyone needs to lighten up. It’s not offensive or mean-spirited. It was an observation followed by thoughts of concern/worry. Move on.
And there were a number that were critical:
That said, I’m disheartened by your judgement of your overweight coworker. Regardless of the reason she she is overweight (emotional eating, biological disorder/disease), it’s mean-spirited of you to assume you know the cause and base judgement on it. … Frankly, I’m embarrassed for you after making these comments. I truly thought better of you after reading months of your blog entries.
-and-
It’s comments like yours that make it extremely difficult for me to eat anything in public and has actually landed me in therapy. If I am eating out and hear someone laugh near me, I assume they are laughing at me. This is my problem and I am dealing with it. But Mrs. Q, you need to understand that your judgements DO have consequences, unintended or not.
Actually, it was rather nice to see that even with those who took issue with Mrs Q’s statement, they were very … well, polite.
This comment in particular seemed to sum things up rather nicely though:
The difference between fat people and skinny people is that the whole world can see what an overweight person’s “biggest” foible is. You have to dig to find out what a skinny person’s personal weaknesses are. That’s the difference that’s so painful for an overweight person.
A fat person will be prejudged by virtually everyone they encounter. Every day. Every encounter. Not so for a skinny person. You can’t look at a skinny person and immediately tell that he/she is on his/her umpteenth marriage, cheats on his/her taxes, habitually speeds or tailgates or runs red lights, never wears a seatbelt, watches too much TV, smokes, doesn’t pay his/her bills, skips routine medical screenings such as mammograms or prostate exams, or votes Republican or Democrat or whatever political ilk most irks you. An overweight person can have any of those weaknesses, too, but their weight will always trump all else in most people’s minds.
Judgmental ideas and attitudes are learned during childhood and ultimately stem from adult influences with parents and teachers exerting the greatest influence. Mrs. Q, I have every confidence that, although you freely shared those judgmental thoughts here, you never express them in the presence of your son or your students and that you would explain to any child that openly judges overweight people the way you did here why it’s wrong to do so.
While I agree with this commenter, I must add that I believe “everyone is prejudged”. But like this commenter said, when it comes to a fat person, the weight tends to trump it all.
Is it right? No. Is it reality? Pretty much. Can any of you reading this honestly say you’ve never had such a thought? Maybe not about a fat person… it could be about just about anything… we all have such thoughts at times.
And as I told Mrs. Q this morning… as someone that used to be 380+ pounds, I too have had times since my weight loss where I’ve seen someone who is morbidly obese and had similar thoughts.
Am I proud of it? No. As someone who’s “been there”, one would think I would know better, that I would be more sympathetic. And I suppose I do, and I am. But sometimes I can’t help it. I know what it was like. I know (sorta) how I got to be as large as I was.Are they thoughts I would say to anyone? Of course not.
I don’t believe Mrs Q. did anything “wrong” in expressing her thoughts as she did, she is entitled to her opinion and unlike many she has owned up to what she has said. On the contrary, while some took her comments to be “harsh”, to other (including myself) they seemed to come from a point of concern – maybe in part for the person’s health but mostly the possible abuse of the school meal program. Overall, in reading the comments there seemed to be some meaningful dialogue that came out of the whole thing, and they were in quite a different tone than the comments made by a doctor in the recent Twitter dust up I wrote about.
And that’s maybe Mrs. Q could have done better here. Despite her anonymous nature of her blog and vague reference to the co-worker, at some point there may be a way for that person (or others) to figure out who was being talked about. And despite what some of the commenters seem to feel, nobody that is obese needs to be reminded of it. When I was 300+ pounds, there wasn’t a day that didn’t go by that I didn’t know I was fat. Yes, most of the time I was in a form of denial as to just how fat I was, but trust me, it’s not like I ever “forgot” I was fat. I had plenty of reminders of that without anyone ever having to point a finger or say a word.
While nobody would have been able to shame, coerce or otherwise force any changes upon me before I was ready to make them for myself… continued denial of the fact that obesity is a problem is not good for anyone. There’s a bit of a line to walk here when it comes to telling the truth in a way that is hurtful versus helpful. And that line wavers a bit for each individual, and I unfortunately do not have the answer. But I do believe that we need to continue to be open to talking about it, open to the discussions, even with… or maybe especially with those who think, feel, and say things we don’t agree with.
Ignoring the issues here will not make them go away. Every time we have such a discussion it’s a step towards making a change, and hopefully a change for the better.
Hi Rob — Thanks so much for blogging about this and adding your opinion. I hope I can learn from my mistakes.
That’s all any of us can hope for Mrs Q… to learn from our mistakes. None of us are perfect, I mean, how boring would that be? You have done so much “good” out there, that this sort of thing needs to be kept in perspective. It’s a speed bump, not a road block.