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PaperclipPerfector  4mo ago (text post)   37971 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 8, 2024

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My crackpot theory: In the beginning, there was scarcity to keep people thin. Rich people tended to fat if they weren't careful. Then food got fairly cheap, but lead and cigarettes (and sometimes amphetamines) kept people's weight down. Now food is still cheap but the lead and cigarettes are gone, so... boom.

That... actually makes a lot of sense. The insane growth in marijuana consumption can't have helped either.

It still doesn't really explain why Japanese women are skinny, given that they don't really smoke.

Comprehensive and massive fatshaming affecting the meme-gender in a conformist culture?

Everything I've ever heard about fatshaming in other times and places reinforces the idea that American fatshaming is ineffective because there's not nearly enough of it.

Smoking is very common in Japan, even among women. And even if you don't smoke, there's a lot of second hand smoke there.

But it's probably more to do with genetics, rice, and walking a lot there.

Could secondhand smoke deliver enough nicotine to meaningfully suppress appetite though?

(I agree that the smoking is probably small potatoes compared to the other factors you mentioned)

Notably, weights were rising that entire time even with lead and cigarettes. The thing is, that was a good thing for the first half of the 20th century because quite a few people were undernourished and underweight.

This is also why I find the simplest theory the best - food got cheap, people got rich, and the people that aren't rich get a bunch of money from the government to buy food. You don't need a complicated story, just a super-rich country that doesn't require much physical labor combined with the human inclination to eat a lot in times of plenty.

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