I don't just see heft. I see elegant lines, and shadow. I don't "see" mentally weak, but you must have!

She is saying that what is seen is powerful elsewhere is seen as weakness of mind here.

I'm feeling this on many levels

;)

This is a direct response to Sally Swift's post that indicates that she thinks all fat people are either metabolically ill or mentally disturbed and eating out of irrational fear or depression.

I think she is obsessed with her weight and thinks everyone else should be, too.

I think she is completely irresponsible for posting this example of an outdated medically uninformed mentality.

I took an existing image that was rather a mundane image of a sumo demonstration and mide it crazy beautiful. I love this image. The giants tossing the tiny man about. It is fairy tale gorgeous. And I believe that a sumo master could kick Chick Norris's ass. And we all know what a badass Chuck Norris is, because earthquakes are just Chuck Norris jumping rope.

I think you are being a bit hard on her, sweets...

I think she is obsessed with her weight and thinks everyone else should be, too.

I am not sure I agree with that...I just think that when you have a strong feeling about something personally, its hard to imagine others might think differently, and aren't just putting on a brave face..and even if true, which I don't believe it is, it is most likely quite unconscious....but I most heartily agree with you regarding modern vs. outdated thinking about weight.

(she said, carefully, and trying not to step on ANYONE's toes...)

Ha! Enjoyed this one.

I am willing to step on her toes about this.

She is disparaging the mental work that a LOT of fat people have done. They are healthy in their minds and fat. She does not believe this is possible despite the lip service disclaimer.

I resent the perpetuation of this stereotype that should pass the way of minstrel shows.

She has obsessed and pored over calories and eating for 30 years to maintain this new divine image of herself. She has created a graven image and it is her scale. I will not bow down to it.

I think articles and posts like this that do not address the fact that fat is primarily a metabolic disorder piles on the issues of low self-esteem and makes people who cannot just jump on it and fix it "like you did" wonder what is wrong with them.

And a lot of the people I speak of are kids that were not taught to eat healthy, do not have mental health care, have not achieved full height....you are just grossly irresponsible.

Her advice also ignores recent genetic and socio-economic realities.

Fair enough. I see your points and agree with you regarding attitudes, and a desperate need for modern thinking. I understand and admire and respect your strong words and feelings.

I just also know that Sally is devastated....and am not sure if that's worth it for me.

I don't know how to change peoples thinking, myself...I tend to use the carrot more than the stick....but the damn stick has it's place.

Well, maybe she deserves to be devastated when she is a complete ass.

That is how we learn.

Gorgeous picture. Unfortunately, the haiku really speaks to me. I wish we had a more enlightened view here in the US.

I love the way you stand up for the truth...weight has very little to do with living a "perfect" lifestyle (even when and if that is an option) and a lot to do with the fact that evolution, over time, developed all of us in very different sizes and shapes. It is only recently due to matters of efficiency and clothing sizes that it has become a social pressure for us to conform like paper dolls to a standardization of body shape that is not natural (let alone "healthy") for many or most of us.

It is Friday, the 13th, after all !

Thanks for creating this image, and for posting it. I hadn't read anything by Sally Swift before, so clicking over and reading a few of her posts just about broke my heart. I understand your anger, and completely support your outrage (in my own case, it happens to be torture-as-entertainment -- my voice climbs, I start pointing my finger ... there are just some things that set each of us off). But Sally's posts seem so sad. At the end of her life, will she be able to think of laughter and beauty, wisdom acquired, love shared, compassion deepened? Especially for herself? Or will all she has be "Look! I stayed skinny."

Is that a person the sumo wrestler is tossing? This is really bizarre. I've watched quite a bit of sumo wrestling, and it would be rather very out of character for a sumo wrestler to be doing something like this in the ring (they are very solemn inside the ring). Now a sumo wrestler will twirl a long bow during the bow twirling ceremony. Maybe somebody photoshopped the person in there instead of the bow?

sharkdivers.blogspot.com/2008_01_01_archive.html

about halfway down is the story and the original picture.

I used it for the scaling.

There is no sport more fun to watch than Sumo. There is great beauty in what those men (and sometimes women) do. Sometimes, the biggest, baddest, head-slappingest Sumo wrestler will be bested by a much smaller man who simply steps aside and uses the big man's force to drive him out of the doyo: brute force doesn't always win over resourcefulness and quick feet.

Even a "small" sumo man is still very large.

The point of this post is to highlight the difference in attitude towards our cultural heroes.

Men as fat and large as sumo masters are ridiculed here, where entire cultures are designed around them elsewhere.

Fat is only a crime where food is abundant and puritanism is practised. We should rethink it and let it go.

Rich...I agree with you. Short matches, wonderfully mismatched in size sometimes. Absolutely brilliant fun, Sumo is. I got sucked into it one evening...cheering like crazy this small guy that was kicking arse....tell he was stomped by this extraordinary man....who was also fascinating.

Man...I LOVE me some Sumo!!!

It is a photograph of actual men, cited above.

Then it is taken into photoshop and altered in several ways.
It is graphic art, technically. It is the inspiration for the haiku.

I searched "fat suit" with one idea in mind and then ran across this and got a much better idea than the first.

It happens like that sometimes.

It reminds me of "Nude descending a staircase", definitely cubist.

ePriddy,

So I can better understand your diatribes against Ms. Swift, exactly what model of the etiology of obesity do you subscribe to?

I think the largest component is genetic.

Fat people can get fat eating carrots. It is a maladaptive strategy today that developed from a genetic adaptive strategy when food was scarce.

Diabetics, for instance, are remarkably efficient at making and storing fat. Type 2 diabetes can be seen as an adaptive strategy as people with it can get fat on low calorie diets, allowing them to survive better in drought or starvation events. But it doesn't kill you until well past reproductive success.

So with the adaptation, you can live on little food, with high blood sugars whenever food is plentiful, but live to breed. And that is the point of our living, not "happiness", biologically. And since it is a genetic strategy that works, it breeds more diabetics each generation.

And that is why the condition is now epidemic. When people who are diabetic have abundant carbohydrates to choose from and no exercise regimen in their lifestyle that involves walking everywhere you ever go and working 14 hour days to aquire basic necessities, they get fat. As children usually.

But when children get fat, it is genetic. Normal children burn off excess energy and stay normal weight. Kids genetically programmed for type 2 diabetes get it at very young ages now.

That is modern thinking. The idea that all you have to do is bootstrap your way through it and eat a lot of carrots and water doesn't address the underlying reasons for the phenomena.

They are woring on it.

Gastric bypass cures diabetes in normal weight people. If it was the fat, it would not work like that.

The whole issue is complicated. But the standard diet and exercise drill does not address the genetic problem, which is blooming in the presence of cheap, low quality carbohydrates.

And the genetic drift of human beings it TOWARDS diabetes, not away.

this is beautiful, epriddy. rated.