Childhood Obesity: National Pandemic or Evolutionary Progress

Stay with me on this one because you might not get what I'm saying on the first attempt. In fact, you should read it twice, then send a link to two friends who have never read the Fat Guy Report and get their opinions. I know this sounds like a cheap trick to bump my numbers, but I swear it's not. I just think this is something that needs to be discussed.

(Editor's note: This is a cheap trick to bump my numbers.)

Eventually, every local news station or hack scientist finds a lull in time and devotes their resources to the "crisis" that is childhood obesity. I'm not saying that being a FFG (Future Fat Guy) doesn't have some negative health consequences, but you really only see these kind of reports on slow news days or from increasingly outdated research centers.

Well, that was the case a few days ago when I happened upon the local news here in Los Angeles. At first, it just brings back a flood of personal memories of myself as a FFG. A most upsetting time if I don't say so.

Anyways, I got to thinking while watching a seemingly endless progression of chubby children flashing on the screen. "You know what?" I contemplated aloud. "These kids have it a lot easier than I did."

It's true. As I was growing into my own in the early 1990s, I can only remember one, maybe two other fat kids in my class of 30 students. Now, if you believe the statistics, there's enough fat kids in each class in America to make up a little FFG crew.

As I have well noted in this forum, the fat guy crew is the greatest part of being a fat guy. It took me until high school, and really college, to find my place in a quality fat guy crew. Today, these kids get to share that experience at a much younger age.

The key to a fat guy crew is learning to feel empowered by your size, rather than the shame often levied on the rotund by the svelte masses.

Not to restate the painfully obvious fact the Fat Guy Report was founded on, but being a fat guy is something to celebrate. The problem for most of my brethren in the Fat Guy Coalition is that we didn't understand that lesson until much later on in our lives.

Now, with the growing abundance of FFGs in the country, this is a realization most of our little brothers will come to much earlier.

And that means a nation of confident fat guys from sea to shinning sea.

I understand that it is very unlikely to happen in my lifetime, but I believe we are at the dawn of an evolutionary shift — one where life will begin rewarding its above-average-sized residents.

Think of it this way: If you have a forest full of bears all relatively the same size, and then introduce a family who average 100 pounds heavier than the status quo, wouldn't that family immediately become the alpha members of their species? Of course.

However, in our world, the same does not hold. That is all going to change.

Eventually, the largest young men on the playground will no longer have to put up with the verbal barrage of spite we had to endure as children. One day, the biggest will be the baddest.

That's progress. That's innovation. 

That sounds like a damn great place to live.

(Editor's note: Don't forget to send to two friends. Also, if I die, I want this post written on my tombstone. And while we're here, let me extend a belated welcome to Johnnie Boy and his beautiful better half who have been a part of the FGC since the beginning. While no longer big enough to be Big John, he and Jaime's love and support will always be an ingredient to the FGR's foundation. I'm eternally thankful.)

I (heart) pie.