Comments on: Delighting in Fatness

By: AmazingChick

AmazingChick — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 02:28:37 +0000

“Please critique the argument, not the person”
Ok then.

The rest of us hate hearing about how fat someone feels.
If someone is fat/obese just do your best to diet and exercise and for the love of donuts, get professional help if that’s where you put all your worth.
Thinking that people around you are on a quest for beauty has more to do with yourself than them.

By: a friend

a friend — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 06:33:30 +0000

Here is a statistic…my husband does anesthesia on 2-4 women (every time he works) who are getting boob jobs done. This is in Utah County.
Here’s another…
My neighborhood has approximately 40 houses, 15 women have had boob jobs done.
My next-door neighbor went to lunch with eight friends (all Mormon girls) and in the middle of lunch realized she was the only one with real boobs.
What does this tell you????? It is an epidemic.
I guess I don’t care if a woman makes that choice, what I care about is what it means behind the decision. What brings the daughters of God to change the bodies that God gave them?
and Erin, I don’t get women like you.. I’m 5’10″ and have a great figure..I exercise every day, etc. etc.” “Yes, we do need to boost our confidence levels and self-acceptance, but too often that breeds complacency with being overweight. I know that most women aren’t really happy with being 30-60 pounds heavier than they were at age 20.” What does a woman like you know about being 50 pounds overweight and thinking that overweight women’s self-acceptance is breeding complacency???? That is extremely judgmental, in my opinion.. The shoe doesn’t fit you, girl, so don’t try to say what it is like to have it on.

By: m&m

m&m — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 03:51:09 +0000

As to the plastic surgery thing, I recently heard someone talk about the plastic surgeons in the area who were suggesting that girls need to start AT AGE 12 to get plastic surgery done.

There is no question that plastic surgery has its place, but I am socked-in-the-gut sickened to hear things like that. I think there is a lot of sick-and-twisted thinking with our culture.

Elder Holland didn’t talk about this kind of thing for nothing. While I’m grateful to have a bunch of ladies around me who are not caught up in this game, I think it’s more of a problem than we sometimes want to think.

By: Michelle in AR

Michelle in AR — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 01:04:41 +0000

Beautifully written, and an issue that strikes home for so many of us.
I have thought about this a lot recently. Our bodies are temples, we know. The idea that beauty means thin and tan is just a cultural belief. During the Rennaissance, women who were thin and tan would be considered lower-class, poor and unhealthy. Beauty and prosperity was portrayed as plump and white. I wish I had lived then!
For now, though, I am working to understand what it means to take care of my body as a temple. To believe it is beautiful simply because I am God’s daughter, and my body is His creation. It already deserves respect because of that. And to respect it is to take care of it to the best of my knowledge. I think He delights in the softness of mothers. He knows their physical sacrifice to give mortal bodies to His children. How unnatural it would be for a pregnant woman to be bony, or to have a six-pack within a few weeks after giving birth! (or ever, for that matter!)
Our physical softness makes us more cozy for our children.
Anyway, those are some of my ramblings. I never read any celebrity stuff–it makes me forget that I already am beautiful, 15 “extra” pounds and all.

By: Leslie

Leslie — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 00:06:52 +0000

I too will defend the statistic when my utah-raised friends tell me 8 out of 10 friends have had implants- I want to cry and scream. I think the statistic can be extended to our population.

You can read the original article put out by forbes and here is a link to it’s vanity rank not only due to plastic surgeons per capita, but also $ spent on hair coloring, skin care and makeup– (the arguement there are more there because they do more reconstruction doesn’t really hold water. They have approximately the same per capita reconstruction needs as anywhere else. I certainly appreciate the reconstructive work of plastic surgeons- I have witnessed over 1000 such procedures firsthand worldwide)

http://www.forbes.com/2007/11/29/plastic-health-surgery-forbeslife-cx_rr_1129health_slide_2.html

By: AmazingChick

AmazingChick — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 23:06:56 +0000

This comment was deleted due to violation of the commenting guidelines
2. No insults. Please critique the argument, not the person.

By: anon this time

anon this time — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 19:53:30 +0000

(this is the first “anon this time” with the four boys, not the above “Anon this time”.)

In defense of Michelle L. and her statistic:
I have been in enough different wards and have enough LDS (if I could make that any bolder, I would) friends and relatives opting for plastic surgery enhancements that I have no other choice than to, at the very least, make the logical leap that that statistic evokes commentary on Mormon women and their plastic surgery trends.

By: Michelle L.

Michelle L. — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 17:24:28 +0000

Anon this time– I’m sorry but I believe that statistic(which I did indeed skew for my own purposes) is just the tip of the iceberg. It only takes a jaunt through Southtowne Mall or a visit to a Jazz game to see hundreds of beautiful women. EVERY visitor I’ve talked to in Salt Lake has commented on this phenomenon. Yes, we have an incredible gene pool and beauty through clean living, but there is no escaping the fact that many LDS women feel that physical perfection is one of their many tasks in life.

By: Anon this time

Anon this time — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 13:06:57 +0000

The phoney “statistic” about plastic surgery was not for the whole of Utah, but only for the Wasatch Front. There was no attempt to correlate it to Mormons, or even to women. There was no subtlety in the measurement, merely a simple count of plastic surgeons and population.

Those who rushed to claim it meant Mormon women were vain ignored the fact that the Wasatch Front has a relatively small population, yet is home to some of the finest children’s surgical hospitals in the world. Primary Children’s Medical Center and the Shriners’ Hospital perform tens of thousands of cosmetic surgeries a year … not on women who want plump lips and firmer breasts, but on burn victims, separated conjoined twins, and children with cleft palates. Those surgeons rebuild missing noses and ears, and put eye sockets back where they belong, and make it possible for babies to suck and for trauma victims to breathe again and for burned fingers to hold a hairbrush.

Please don’t perpetuate the Mormon-women-are vain, or Utah-women-get-more-boob-jobs myths unless you have something more than a half-remembered misinterpreted “statistic” from last year’s Tribune to go by. Thank you.

By: m&m

m&m — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 05:40:24 +0000

Another thought…for those who get frustrated with people who express concerns about their weight…try considering that they may not be deliberately vain, but struggling with something real and more deep-seated that they may not know how to fix. I know that was the case for me. I was never very heavy, and I’m sure people couldn’t understand why I obsessed so much. But it wasn’t something I could just *stop* either. It was constantly with me. It was an illness, something wrong in my brain, and I couldn’t fix it alone. I wish I had understood that more about myself, because I really hated myself for it.

That’s not to justify this stuff, but just to say that sometimes things are not as they appear, and sometimes what we think would be an easy fix might not be for someone.