Scientists say fat people cause global warming

Now, this is just silly:

British scientists say fat people use up more fuel to transport them around and the amount of food they eat requires more energy to produce than that consumed by those on smaller diets. According to a team at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine this adds to food shortages and higher energy prices.

Mr Edwards and his colleague Ian Roberts argue that because thinner people eat less and are more likely to walk than rely on cars, a slimmer population would lower demand for fuel and food. Because 20 percent of greenhouse gas stems from agriculture any reduction in food consumption would help cut emissions.

Okay, I’m sure fat people eat more than thin people but I think anyone who would do some serious research into it will also find that the type of food people eat is of more importance than the amount of food - and I think you’ll find that a lot of the healthy stuff carries a heavier carbon footprint than the fast food shit. All those exotic foods, all the bottled water travel all over the world before the thin people can pick them from the shelves in their favourite health stores.

Let’s just admit it’s people who are an environmental burden and not try to blame subcategories of them. It would make more sense to blame the West as a whole for its wasteful ways than for what part of it actually consumes - but if you want to be really perverse you could blame the starving people in Africa for all those planes that have to be flown in with food, medicines and all the paraphernalia of refugee camps.

Blaming fat people for global warming is just a stupid exercise - and talking of which: exercise I mean. I’m sure that a fully equipped gym contributes more to global warming than a fat person sitting on a couch, watching TV and stuffing his or her face. What’s more, doesn’t everybody drive to those gyms - and aren’t thin people on the whole more active and mobile than fat people? Burning off all those calories costs more than just a bit of sweat. Hell, even the production of running shoes - most of them flown in from Asia - comes with quite a heavy carbon footprint.

No, it’s a nice new scare tactic, dreamt up by the health fascists but this one won’t wash. Still, there have always been enough scientists who abuse science to stigmatise whole groups of people. First they ‘proved’ women were less intelligent than men because their brains were smaller. (A claim soon retracted when someone pointed out that in relative terms the brain of the female was actually bigger than that of the male. After which size suddenly didn’t matter any more.) Then scientists ‘proved’ that blacks were less intelligent than whites - and now it’s fat people who must bear this bullying by prejudiced white coats.

Ah well, it just shows that however much the human race has seemed to evolve, we still haven’t outgrown our primitive need to turn this or that part of the human family into scapegoats.

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