"Girth control" vs. contraception
William Saletan of Slate Magazine just wrote an article identifying parallels between contraception and obesity control.
The point of birth control is fun without consequences. You still want sex, and you still get it, but we tinker with the process so you don't get pregnant. Last week, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops complained that separating sex from procreation violates nature. Of course it does. Nature put the fun and the consequences together, but for reasons that no longer apply. Nature has produced a creature clever enough to take nature apart. We get the orgasms without the organisms.
Why not try the same with food? Keep the fun and lose the consequences. We invented birth control; why not girth control?
While the tone of article is in very poor taste. (Saletan sees both pregnancy and obesity as consequences of having too much "fun" whereas sex can be anything but fun) but the parallels are sound.
I'm particularly curious why contemporary moralists, especially religious moralists, have so little to say on the subject of eating when they've had so very much to say about sex.
Any conceivable claim you could make about natural vs. unnatural interventions into sex, any talk of cheapenings, or alienations, or reductionisms, or degradations, or violations of natural orders, or, responsibilities or, especially, any conversations about dignity must hold equally for food. And yet the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (for instance) is mum.
As Saletan says, whereas tradition provided only for abstinence, modern science has provided barrier methods, pharmaceutical blocks, and even surgical interventions to remove offending tissue or to prevent its formation to begin with. If one's bad the other ought to be equally so. And yet...
[Note: Please don't construe anything in this post as an acceptance or rejection of the controversial issue of weight or weight management. The closest it comes is a abstract-level question about the way we discuss that acceptance or rejection. --fl]
If I am not mistaken, gluttony was considered a far more serious offense in biblical times than adultery, e.g., the parable of the rich man Dives and the beggar Lazarus. Such indulgence in food and drink when failed crops frequently resulted in famine and starvation would have seemed egregious. It is interesting that today in the *land of plenty*, which is the result of science and modern agriculture, obesity has become more of a secular sin than a religious one.
What ties together the sins of adultery and gluttony is the negative concept of the body, or acceptance of what is pleasurable to the body.
Very interesting line of inquiry, Figleaf.
[The issue for me isn't about gluttony per se in slightly different times or places, with slightly different fashion sensibilites, people can and have intervened to fatten rather than slenderize themselves and others for fashion's sake. Instead it's about the notion of intervention itself. In the case of sex I think it's pretty obvious that any condemnation of contraception-as-intervention is about not liking sex, not about corporeal integrity. Why they don't just *say that* instead of distracting us by just making other stuff up drives me crazy. Thanks, Kochanie. --fl]
The food analogy I've heard used often in anti-contraception arguments is to compare the use of contraception to bulimia.
[Which, while extreme, doesn't really enter the realm of morality. Which is fortunate since bulemia is a compulsive mental disorder while a desire to space your children at regular intervals (the primary use, as the very name suggests, of "birth control") is in no way compulsive or disordered. Thanks, Lynn. --fl]
Wouldn't that be awesome? the CCB coming out against late-night food porn TV commercials?
I never heard of anyone dying from overfucking. Unless they were behind the wheel of a car at the time or something. Sure, it's possible to ruin your life with a sex addiction, but anytime you go to an outdoor concert or street festival and check out the sagging asses and bellies, and you get the idea that gluttony is a more common mortal sin than lust. Pride and greed are even more common.
I've always thought that if churches spent more time talking about envy (covetousness is a violation of an actual commandment) and less time on lust, the world would be a far more satisfying place.
I mentioned this to a priest once and he said something like, "Coveting someone's car, house, whatever - doesn't seem to be much of a sin. I know it is, but I just don't see what it's doing on that list."
I haven't heard the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops say anything about car or food advertising.
[That's not to say the CCB hasn't said anything about food and health though -- outside the realm of sex and relationships they're generally quite progressive. Thanks, Heart. --fl]
In the same way that sex can be anything but fun, please don't dismiss all eating as fun. If someone has a weight problem, it can be a nightmare.
I don't live in the US, but where I am at the moment, there is probably more moral outrage (to put it a bit strongly) over artificial methods of losing weight than over artificial birth control. Although there are no activists in the same way as pro-life activists (not so very vocal here), doctors often dismiss overweight patients with a message of just eat less and exercise more.
[I agree that eating can be no laughing matter either. Thanks, A. --fl]
It is important to place Biblical words in context of the culture during discussions such as this, as well as properly define them.
While "to covet" is traditionally defined as synonymous with "to envy" that is NOT the case. To covet something is to desire inordinately or without due regard for the rights of others; desire wrongfully (Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary, 2001 if you'd like the citation). Quite simply - to covet something is to want it badly enough to steal it.
When you place covetousness and gluttony within the Biblical culture, you have someone who is at best an awful houseguest, and at worst someone who will eat you out of house/home and rob you blind.
While Organized Religion has not addressed the "girth control" issue, parisioners are organizing weight loss groups within their individual churches. Additionally, a google search reveals quite a number of web pages devoted to "Biblical weight loss". A similar search-string on Amazon.com reveals several different book titles also dealing with weight loss according to biblical principles.
[And then there's that whole "Body by God" book series. Good points about covetousness vs. envy vs. gluttony. I get a little ticked off that only lust seems to be a problem anymore but it's more because I'd prefer to see the emphasis spread more evenly against all the vices. Thanks, Emily. --fl]
Of course the problem with the sex v. food issue is that it IS possible to live without sex. But you will die without food. That being said, the religious right doesn't have to make commentary on weight issues... Because it is a given that the overweight are a lower class of people biologically... They are worthy of scorn and ridicule... The moralists are too busy changing the minds of people who disagree with people who disagree with them... not preaching to the choir.
[Thanks, LushlyMe. --fl]
That being said, the religious right doesn't have to make commentary on weight issues... Because it is a given that the overweight are a lower class of people biologically... They are worthy of scorn and ridicule...
I reject that train of thought. I am overweight, decidedly NOT biologically inferior, nor am I "worthy" of scorn and ridicule.
The religious right doesn't make commentary on weight issues because they're just as overweight as "the rest of us".
[She can speak for herself but I'm pretty confident LushlyMe was bitterly reflecting an external opinion, not stating one of her own. Thanks, Emily. --fl]
Thank you Figleaf.. I was most definitely being bitter... I am tired of being ignored and avoided because I don't meet some ideal.. sorry if it was misunderstood
[Black humor doesn't always transmit well online. No need to apologize, LushlyMe. Thank you. --fl]
I'm a big girl. My mom was a much bigger girl, and on my 16th birthday had gastric bypass. She nearly died.
I'd rather be a big girl, and battle with "food abstinance" (which in my family hasn't really been very effective, for a lot of reasons)--than nearly die trying to obtain someone else's idea of "health" and "beauty."
I thought the article was lacking on the outcomes of gastric bypass. It's dangerous. It doesn't always work. The complications sometimes kills folks. And also, as it's a relatively new procedure, the longterm effects are not known. A year after my mom's surgery, 200lbs lighter, she was diagnosed with RA, which her doctor said she might not have ever presented the symptoms nearly as pronounced without the "trauma her body endured." GB is basically a starvation diet for the first year, as your body is still healing, and you can't eat certain foods. For the first two months it was broth, and nonacidic juices and water. She could progress to watery mashed potatoes and jello after that. Now she can eat anything but coconut, but can only eat a few ounces at a time. She'll get very sick feeling after that. Forget sweets. She used to get sugar dumping, now her stomach sounds like a freighter for an hour.
That's hardly a happy way to live. It's not a decision to be made lightly. My mom tells everyone she knows she wouldn't recommend anyone else do it, even though as a little tiny lady now, she's happy with her body, she suffers more from RA than she did from being obese.
[Yup. The other year I read in The New England Journal of Medicine that for unknown reasons gastric bypass patients develop an unusually high risk of diabetes. Sounds like you know even more about it now. I have a bunch of extended-family step-cousin-in-laws who all lost hundreds of pounds each on everything from straight Atkins to stomach stapling and yeah, the Atkins people have had way, way fewer complications and better overall outcomes. Surgery sounds really, really drastic. I'm sorry to hear about your mom, Rae. --fl]
Ah, LushlyMe, I do apologize for being so reactionary.
[Thanks, Emily. --fl]