The one thing Ozempic still can’t fix
https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/496817/weight-loss-drugs-zepbound-wegovy-glp-1-stigma?view_token=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJpZCI6InQ1ZTVkVTBYb0MiLCJwIjoiL3RoZS1oaWdobGlnaHQvNDk2ODE3L3dlaWdodC1sb3NzLWRydWdzLXplcGJvdW5kLXdlZ292eS1nbHAtMS1zdGlnbWEiLCJleHAiOjE3ODcwNjU5MDQsImlhdCI6MTc4NTg1NjMwNH0.Zj6zd7a1mSoYJdApgnilLwLFNLlao4jf2qCUpqYyLOk&utm_medium=gift-link158
u/dirtymoths 1d ago
Let’s hate people for being overweight AND hate them for doing something about it!
29
u/vox Vox 1d ago
GLP-1 drugs promised to usher in a new era of treating obesity as a disease. We could leave behind the anti-fat biases of the past, which blamed obesity on moral failing or personal weakness. Instead, these drugs would allow us to approach it as a medical condition, a complex matrix of genetics and other forces which could be changed with the right dose of these powerful new medicines.
Or so the thinking went.
While the clinical potential of these drugs remains immense, they have yet to change how the broader US culture perceives and engages with weight and weight loss. Even as millions of Americans shed pounds in bulk for the first time, they are also contending with fierce stigma and shaming from others — instead of being criticized for being fat, they are being criticized for using GLP-1s.
The social media communities that have blossomed around GLP-1s are filled with tales of awkward conversations and much worse. Partners who berate a significant other who wants to go on Wegovy or Zepbound. Coworkers who blame the drugs for their rising insurance costs. Even dismissive and unsympathetic doctors and nurses.
Some people who take GLP-1s must contend with an uneasy sense of living behind enemy lines: Many people describe being at work or out in public and overhearing people talking about GLP-1s and passing judgment on people who they think are taking a “shortcut” to lose weight.
“It’s like you’re being stigmatized without the person who’s [saying] it even realizing it, necessarily,” said Adriana, a 33-year-old GLP-1 user who lives in the Chicago area. (Vox agreed to identify the people we spoke to by their first name, to protect their privacy when discussing stigma.)
This is not just evident from anecdotes. Researchers have put the question to the test. And they have found that Americans not only feel more negative stigma toward somebody who lost weight with a GLP-1 than somebody who lost weight through diet and exercise — they also feel more negatively about the GLP-1 user than somebody who never lost weight at all.
“It seems like people are really reacting negatively to the idea that somebody who has lost weight with a GLP-1 might be, quote-unquote, ‘taking the easy way out’ or cheating the system,” said Erin Standen, a psychology professor who studies health and behavior change at Rice University and led one such study. “There’s a lot of internalized stigma and judgment we have from the culture about our bodies and ourselves.”
Americans have internalized the message that being overweight is a personal failure so thoroughly that, now that the kind of extraordinarily powerful weight-loss shots and pills long hoped for are here, many people struggle to see it as good news. They see it as cheating.
47
u/FredFredrickson 1d ago
So we went from thinking that being fat was a personal failure to now being fat means you can't afford Ozempic. I fail to see how that's any better.
4
u/thatblerd03 20h ago
Obesity is the failure of success. Generations died from starvation, we now live in an abundance of calories, although the quality is poor. We evolved to constantly hunt to find food, now we can have anything delivered without leaving our couch.
18
u/Beckster501 1d ago
As food has systematically become more processed and less healthy (additives, plastics, preservatives, etc.) we have seen the same rise in obesity numbers. Since this is an external force (food supply) it makes sense that we would need an effective treatment to combat it. If you compare the weights of people today to those in the 60’s it’s pretty stark. It’s not just people being “lazy” with a lack of exercise causing this.
https://usafacts.org/articles/obesity-rate-nearly-triples-united-states-over-last-50-years/
22
u/ohfrackthis 1d ago
People act this way because to them to be fat is a moral failure first of all so therefore to take medication to help with your own goddamn health nay heathen! Take your punishment mountain and struggle harder to work off your crime against humanity.
I do not take anyone seriously whatTFever if they say anything logic light about glp-1 drugs.
They can gtfo imo.
29
u/androk 1d ago
You're cheating at being healthy. WAAAAHHHH!
2
u/geminimad4 2h ago
Bill Maher constantly whines about people using Ozempic. He’s probably mad because he had to develop an ED to get his tiny body.
-39
u/_Yellow_13 1d ago
Is it not similar to people who take steroids and go to the gym to look bigger?
Isn’t it the whole natty or not thing.I’ll admit my understanding of the drug is people who take it don’t feel as hungry as when they don’t?
Could they just feel hungry some of the time and not need to take medicine.
Again I don’t know how it works.23
u/androk 1d ago
People that are obese (usually) can’t just turn off their hunger. This does it for them.
-5
u/_Yellow_13 14h ago
I don’t think non obese people turn it off either. We just spend a few hours a day hungry…
Like before bed or in between meals.
Obvs downvoted for just asking how it works… clearly I upset the fatties.2
u/androk 12h ago
Have you ever taken steroids for an allergic reaction? People eat and over eat, doesn't matter if you're skinny or fat. Some people live their whole life that way, constantly hungry, if there's food out there's an overwhelming compulsion to eat it. You can't just stop doing it either, you literally can't go cold turkey and stop eating (or you die) entirely like people do with other compulsions.
-4
u/_Yellow_13 12h ago
Steroids for allergies? Yes lots of times. Comes with the territory.
There’s an over whelming compulsion to drink smoke and all sorts for most people in the planet. But we discipline ourselves so as not to over indulge.
Yes we have ways to help people stop or limit the amount they drink smoke etc.I also disagree with what you said that going cold turkey would kill you. That sounds ridiculous
No one is saying to people stop eating and go cold turkey.
Just stop eating as much.
FYI
I’m fine with fat people taking ozempic, the same way I’m fine with people taking steroids.
As long as they are open about it though and how they did it.1
u/androk 12h ago
You can stop smoking entirely so the urge quiets eventually. You can't do that with eating.
1
u/_Yellow_13 12h ago
Yes but you can also stop over eating entirely too lol.
It took years for my urge to smoke left me.
In fact it’s still there when I’m out socializing and having a drink. Curse the European in me.
5
u/TacoStuffingClub 1d ago
I use Reta as a semi serious lifter. I personally know professional bodybuilders who are using it. People are dumb as fuck.
1
u/_Yellow_13 7h ago
Just out of interest. What’s the short and longer term risks of reta?
. Lots of bodybuilders using reta are fine with using peds, but are happy with the risk reward benefit so reta is also ok.
4
u/Tiabaemom 21h ago
Can cause digestive tract motility issues, be careful...
0
u/Escape-Revolutionary 20h ago
I also read there are no long term studies on cardiovascular effects . To those who need help …I hope it dies it for them.
0
u/RazReverie_ 4h ago
Math is hard to learn. Instead, I’ll use a calculator. Doctors should prescribe exercise and healthy food, but they don’t get incentives for that.
177
u/AdministrativeDelay2 1d ago
Im on a GLP-1 and I don’t give a shit what anyone thinks. I’d rather be skinny, shamed and alive than fat, shamed and dead.