Good Morning, Fellow Mastodons!

In an article titled "Our Big Problem," and accompanied by an image of an anthropomorphized stack of doughnuts, the Wall Street Journal's resident pseudonymous British doctor ("Theodore Dalrymple is the pen name of Anthony Daniels, a British physician. His latest book is "The New Vichy Syndrome.") explains how fatties are antisocial, irresponsible drains on society (who are also threatening the very planet by eating fast food off polystyrene dishes) and can only be helped via "prohibition," because encouraging fatties to exercise would be "extremely irresponsible," since "If the obese were suddenly to start exercising, emergency rooms would not be able to cope. For the sake of our health, let us have no sports."

So: No sport, and government-regulated diets. Got it.

Oh, and, I'm pretty sure the good doctor prescribes shame, too. Lots and lots of shame:

Never have so many human mastodons bestridden the earth as now. At one time, not so very long ago, such mastodons were rare enough to be curiosities, charitably thought by others to be the victims of their "glands." We had such a fat boy at school: His cheeks were so adipose that his eyes had become mere slits. We thought that he was ill rather than a member of a cultural avant garde.

Wow.

And once again I'd like to note how the Us v. Them anti-fat rhetoric in a major news outlet is framed with violent, eliminationist rhetoric. The subtitle of the piece is: "Obesity is spreading—and eating away at America's economy and health. Theodore Dalrymple on how society can bite back." Literally: Fatties are threatening America's way of life; society (of which fatties exist outside) must "bite back" before they take everyone else down with them.

It's really frightening how frequently I'm now seeing articles that position fat people outside of society, as an external threat. Separating a group to scapegoat them as a responsible party for the nation's "economy and health" failures is how Very Ugly Things can happen.

[H/T to Shaker Abra.]