Not only are we used to getting more burger for our buck, we don’t have to go very far to get it. Junk food is cheap and readily accessible, and can be found everywhere from high schools to hospitals. On a road trip with friends, it’s easy to find yourself in a fast food restaurant, not because the hefty person made your collective decision, but because healthful options are few and far between. This, combined with pervasive food advertising, is constant encouragement to consume more food, more often.
If only we were still running from woolly mammoths, perhaps we could sit down, eat a three-tiered hamburger with fries and forty ounces of cola, and maintain a normal weight. But between the car and the cubicle, the only time many of us move our fast-twitch muscles is on the freeway.
Our Genetics Can't Change, but Our Environment Can
Of course, these societal influences do not exonerate our friends, or us. The people we enjoy spending time with are the ones we often eat with, so it makes sense that how and what they eat is likely to influence our own behavior. If your friend starts to look a little pudgy, it may help justify your own weight gain; if a friend orders a side salad with sparkling water, you may feel guilty about getting the burger and milkshake. And friends aren’t exactly shoving food down each other’s mouths; it’s up to the individual to show a little self-constraint.
But the trend towards obesity is bigger than the individual. Media, industry, and the government play a role in creating what is acceptable and available. As with smoking, it used to be normal for people to puff away in restaurants and in the office, or to see pregnant women with cigarettes. Though these were individual behaviors making it collectively okay to smoke, it was part of an atmosphere of acceptance largely promoted and cultivated by the tobacco industry. Our greatest sustainable gains, therefore, came from broad environmental changes—advertising bans, tax increases, clean indoor air laws—that helped change societal norms, discouraging people from smoking in the first place. Rather than targeting individuals, preventing obesity will require similar societal changes, many of which are already starting to be made, such as increasing availability of fruits and vegetables, “smart” urban design, and restricting junk food advertising geared toward kids.
Having an obese friend is no more likely to “make” you obese than having a thin friend will “make” you thin (unfortunately). Association is not causation, as the epidemiologist well knows. Unlike removing an infected water source to get rid of the origin of a cholera outbreak, removing an obese person from a social network will not remove the origin of obesity from our society. Our genetic predisposition is difficult, if not impossible, to change, but our overabundant environment is not.
Updated August 15, 2008
Related Article: How to Choose Your Food: Nourishing Thoughts
