Great detailed response but…

Are you honestly saying that the problems obesity causes are purely based on societal factors? The reason for the discrepancies in risk between BMI categories is because obesity is inherently unhealthy. Not because of societal factors.

BMI might be flawed, but for the majority of people it’s a decent indicator of their health. With the occasional exception of people who carry large amounts of muscle. Obese people are unhealthy. There’s no getting around this fact.

I don’t know which data you’ve looked at, but all the doctors I’ve heard have said that obesity increases the risk of death from COVID19. This makes perfect sense of cause, because carrying excess fat puts a lot of extra strain on your lungs. (As well as countless other problems).

The problem is, only half of the discussion is being had here. And this is actually a trend I see across Medium in general — people don’t want to accept biology.

Everything in life is caused by nature and nurture. But it seems a large group of people only want to talk about nurture and completely ignore nature. Fat stigma exists in the first place because we’re biologically wired have distaste towards people who are unhealthy. We instinctively know that carrying excess fat is unhealthy. It may not be pleasant fact, but it’s the truth.

So all this talk about thin privilege, a weight loss obsessed culture etc etc — it all completely ignores the biological reality that being obese is bad for your body. Your bones aren’t built to carry around that much weight, that’s why many obese people end up breaking ankles or having various other joint problems.

The truth is, if an individual was to eat a healthy diet and exercise, they would lose weight and become healthier. There’s no disputing that. The major complication is that most obese people have a food addiction. And addiction is a tough thing to deal with. On top of the possible depression, anxiety and yes, weight stigma from society.