Is That YOUR Fat Ass on My TV?

Published on December 28, 2006 By Texas Wahine In Health & Medicine

I was watching Big As Life: Obesity in America on Discovery Health last night, and it had repeated, extended scenes of fat people butt shots. You know what I'm talking about, right? The camera is set right at ass/abdomen level and it flips through various scenes of people walking, eating, and generally being merry and oblivious to the cameras around them.

Every time I see something like this on a news broadcast or a health program, I think, "wow, it must really suck to be them". I think that because it could be ME on one of those shows. It could be my lumpy ass or my overly padded gut fighting against the spandex blend in my jeans for all the world to see.

It could be my double chin an inch or two below the fat, anonymous face wolfing down greasy French fries.

I feel really sorry for these people. Do they know they're being taped? Has anyone ever been watching one of these programs and shouted out, "HEY! I have a pair of floral green stretch capri pants JUST like that. Wait a minute...OH MY GOD! That's ME!! Are my thighs really that enormous?!?"

Once the program or news broadcast is over I can breathe a sigh of relief...I dodged the "nationally outed as a fat person" bullet. THIS TIME.

I would like to get to the point where I'm thin enough that I can feel secure that I WON'T be seeing my over-sized hips in extreme close up on the nightly news, but I don't know if that will happen without my starving myself. I say that because I see people on these clips who don't look all that fat to me.

I think I've lost all sense of fat and skinny. My overweight-dar (like gaydar, only for detecting fatness) is broken.

I see those commercials for fat burning pills, and I think, "That chick didn't really look all that bad to begin with. Why did she need to lose 30 lbs?" OR "She looks the same. Only tanner and with make up."

I actually think to myself, "I'd be happy if I looked like her BEFORE picture. I'd be rockin' it in a bikini." Heh, so if those people who look normal and not super-fat to me are in desperate need of $80 diet pills, what about ME? How freakin' insanely fat am I?

If being chunky isn't bad enough, I'm also neurotic as hell.

Comments

Tova7

on Dec 28, 2006

HAHAHAHAHAHA.

Great article TW. When I was in the news business we'd do random shots like that on a slow day and keep them and reuse them all year. It's called "file footage". So someone's butt could get some real air time in a year and for lazy tv stations maybe two years or more.

If those diet pills worked, there wouldn't be any fat people left in America. Heh.

Glad to see you are writing again and the wit is still razor.

foreverserenity

on Dec 28, 2006

I'm sorry, but I'm laughing too, with you, not at ya!

! You're funny when you're ready! I don't want to see my own fat behind on any screen! I was just telling my daughter that Christmas is catching up with me, not just Christmas, but Thanksgiving too! Oh boy and here comes New Years Day! It's alright though, I started doing some easy stuff to get my butt in gear!

Don't cha worry none bout that right now though woman, you've got a itty bitty one and she needs you to be strong for her, not weak from hunger!

Texas Wahine

on Dec 29, 2006

Tova:

Great article TW.

Thanks! So glad you enjoyed it.

When I was in the news business we'd do random shots like that on a slow day and keep them and reuse them all year. It's called "file footage". So someone's butt could get some real air time in a year and for lazy tv stations maybe two years or more.

That is SO wrong! So I guess there aren't any release forms or legal requirements for airing film of someone's dunlap or dimpled butt cheeks?

If those diet pills worked, there wouldn't be any fat people left in America. Heh.

Ain't that the truth! The program I watched last night said that if current trends continued, within ?100? years, 100% of the population would be overweight or obese. Yikes!

Glad to see you are writing again and the wit is still razor.

Aww, thanks!

FS:

I'm sorry, but I'm laughing too, with you, not at ya!

No worries...you can laugh with me, at me, or both! I'm glad the article made you chuckle.

You're funny when you're ready!

Thanks!

I don't want to see my own fat behind on any screen! I was just telling my daughter that Christmas is catching up with me, not just Christmas, but Thanksgiving too! Oh boy and here comes New Years Day! It's alright though, I started doing some easy stuff to get my butt in gear!

I hear ya! The holidays make it sooo hard. I haven't been doing a lot of cooking, but there has been far too much candy in the house!

I just started watching my eating and when I get the logistics figured out I'll be hitting the treadmill. I'm 13 lbs. under the weight I was when I got pregnant, and I'd like to lose a minimum of 25 more! I've got a lot of work to do. It sure would be nice to be slim when Adrian gets home.

You are an inspiration with your committment to working out, FS.

Don't cha worry none bout that right now though woman, you've got a itty bitty one and she needs you to be strong for her, not weak from hunger!

Hehe, lucky for me since I'm breastfeeding I get to eat more!

Texas Wahine

on Dec 30, 2006

LW: Right back atcha.

terpfan1980

on Dec 30, 2006

You asked if these people know they are being taped and I'd hazzard a guess that many have no idea of it happening. It's not reasonable to expect persons that film a crowd in public to get releases from everyone whose image they plaster on our screens but the mis-use of such images in the way you mentioned makes me wish that it was required.

Sadly it'll continue over time though, at least until there is a magic pill that someone can take to lose the extra person that they are carrying around with them. Then it'll become a matter of having those people outted by an investigative report into just who is buying all of those magic pills.

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