I find it very curious that there are vaccine mandates all over the place but no weight mandates. There are more than a handful of venues that require visitors and patrons to show proof of vaccination to be allowed in, but there are none that require them to step on a scale and prove their weight.
Think about it: checking someone’s weight is a far better indicator of whether they will be seriously affected by Covid-19 than a vaccine card is. Throughout the pandemic – including before the recent Omicron surge – those most at risk of becoming very ill and dying from the virus were three kinds of people – the elderly, immunocompromised people, and the obese.
If venues like restaurants require proof of vaccination for people that have a 0.001% chance of dying from Covid even without a vaccine, then surely they should require weight checks because vaccinated obese people are more likely to die from Covid than those of a healthy weight without a vaccine.
We know at this point that vaccines don’t stop the spread of Covid-19, especially not the spread of Omicron, which has shown to evade protections provided by vaccines. So why are we bothering to ask for proof of vaccination? Ask about what matters – weight!
Now, you might think this sounds ridiculous, but is it any more ridiculous than the ever-flip-flopping guidance given to us by our masters in the CDC? No, it’s not. In fact, it makes a lot more sense.
If we want to focus on what really matters – hospitalizations and deaths – and want to take steps to mitigate serious illness from Covid-19 moving forward, we would stop asking for vaccination cards and instead install scales in restaurants.
Right. Let’s have scales installed in every restaurant. And then make sure to check the BMI factor based on height and gender.
While you do that, I’ll have the large fries…
Before anyone chimes in.
If this letter bothers you than you need to lose weight.
Relax. Not one restaurant in lkwd asks you for proof of vaccination
Some people that are overweight are more healthier than others. Don’t like that term let’s change it. In the olden days the more full you were the more healthier you were. Not sure that’s a good idea to ban them. Just imagine that these people would be offended. We want to bring Moshiach. We have to love all Yidden no matter what!
This isn’t well thought advise. Is this meant to be some kind of bashing satire? What twisted thought process… smh
Do the immunocompromised need to show proof of what’s wrong with them to decide whether they can eat?
Do you do this to generate activity on your website?
This is a bit insensitivity and written with a very immature attitude.
There are people who suffer from weight and you are shaming them on a public forum.
Halbunas pnei chaceiro is not simple!
I didn’t see any shaming or blaming. He just stated that they’re more likely to die from covid. True or not true, he never said anything negative about someone fat
It seems focused on the stores – on their responsibility toward society – and maybe even more so on the gov and the powers that be; what are they doing about this? Do they care?! Or do they make more money from health “care” by having people not in optimal health?!
Tell me, please, Boruch’l,
Does an overweight person endanger someone else by eating in a restaurant, even if he consumes double servings?
Will he infect with obesity someone who is immunocompromised, or someone who is simply elderly and weak?
Your entire point is hopelessly pointless!
This article is awful. I know personally so many people in the hospital with eating disorders. Pediatricians say it’s the new horrific wave with teenagers. How dare you publish such an offensive article.
and thank you fatty, you sure have a wonderful attitude.
What was rude about this article towards overweight people? nothing stated wasn’t obvious. The fact that you know people in the hospital etc. means nothing. I know people who died from diabetes. Does that mean I should never write anything about Diabetes and their vulnerability bec of their condition?
We need to stop getting carried away wh the notion that we can’t talk about reality bec it insults others. That just makes us regress.
AND puts MORE of a STIGMA on these issues. (which aren’t issues! Just reality of life!) We need to face the facts of life. Some people are fat. Some people have cancer. Some people have chronic bad breath!
Ofc we don’t blame or judge anyone. But it doesn’t mean it’s insensitive for me to write publicly that someone with chronic bad breath will possibly have a hard time learning with a chavrusah. Let’s stop living in the Land of Make Believe.
According to your logic you shouldn’t let black people in the restaurant because they are more susceptible to covid, elderly, women with PCOS who are more prone to obesity, how about the people that think they are healthy but don’t know they are immunocompromised. What is the weight cut off, will you ave a scale, go by BMI’s.
Thank you, that’s the point of the article!
It shows that the CDC is hooked on coercion & not public health…
If pediatricians know so many ppl in the hospital with eating disorders, then why when i took my daugjter to a well known in town pediatricians office did the np yell at me ad my daughter age 6 that shes fat?!,!, shes in the 70% percentile. It was so off sooo wrong. Havent gone back there with any of my kids. This np and this practice is causing eating disorders! Not mochel them
I wouldn’t say it to a child’s face, I would talk to the parent. But on the other hand, for the parents, it’s indeed important to take these things seriously and to serve healthy foods and not junk food. Not sweet cereal for breakfast, junk food for snack, even farmed salon is unhealthy – a major nutritionist says it’s from the worst junk foods, as they feed the fish a mountain of junk food (cheap), and then have to give medications, as they don’t have normal nutrition to be healthy, and then, since their flesh wouldn’t turn pink in the farms, they feed them food coloring! Terrible! Buy wild caught – it costs a bit more, but you’ll be healthy!!
Dear Mr. Rivlin,
I am appalled at you, and quite frankly, at the Scoop for publishing such a pathetic, insulting article.
I’m confused about whether you thought this was funny, cute, or just plain weird enough to generate comments and interest. What I’m quite clear about is that you have seriously offended overweight people, myself included, and doing that carries a far more serious transgression than ‘letting in obese people’. I was under the impression that the Scoop wasn’t out to hurt feelings or engage in fat shaming, but I guess I was wrong.
Aside from that, your reasoning is just plain faulty. Requiring proof of vaccination was put into place in certain venues because officially vaccines were supposed to help stop the spread of COVID (even though we’re aware that they don’t). Pray, tell, how do ‘obese’ people spread COVID? Do they blow out germs more easily than their skinny counterparts?
You actually owe an apology to those you’ve seriously offended. Just wow.
This opinion piece isn’t worth the computer memory it is saved in. Although obese people may be more at risk of getting ill from Covid, there is no evidence that they transmit the disease to others at a greater rate than anorexics.
So, if I go to a restaurant and sit next to a fat person and I’m not vaccinated, I’ll get fat, too?
If I sit next to someone who has covid and I’m not vaccinated, do I have a good chance of getting covid?
Ridiculous article.
Covid vaccines are useless and dangerous and is about controlling the population, which the sheep follow. However, in theory, a vaccine or social distancing or other method should be used to lower transmissibility of a disease. In contrast, obesity is not a communicable disease; it is a condition that is totally independent of another person.
The thought process is that if everyone is vaccinated, everyone else will be protected. Ie your being vaccinated protects me.
(Not sure if that’s actually what’s happening but that’s the logic behind it)
Being overweight is contagious and doesn’t harm anyone else.
This letter is fat shaming. Why didn’t you choose something like smoking?
I’m very surprised the scoop would choose to publish this letter. Not a post for a reputable site.
Let’s keep the standards a little higher
I totally agree. And while we are discussing weight problems I propose the following:
Ration how much pizza and ice cream people can buy. Since a lot of people are lactose intolerant, most should see the wisdom in this.
Ban all barbeques and Thursday night cholent.
Mandate grocery stores that all meat sold must be lean.
Fat free chop liver.
ETC.
I am overweight, quite so.
But I loooooooove food. I don’t want to stop eating. Food, most of it, is delicious. A good plate of chulent, low mein chicken, a burger with the works, a super sized sandwich, all of these are impossible to pass by.
At least you’re not too thin – that is also unhealthy! And maybe people who need to put on some weight can learn from you!
But the main thing is to eat healthfully and normal portion size. See # 23. and comment to #24 for some good tips.
And by the way, meat and fish are health fats – that’s not generally what is causing weight. The first thing to start with is white flour, sugar and the unhealthy oils – such as Canola and Soybean – extremely unhealthy for numerous reasons. (they’re highly processes, full of chemicals etc.)
Have sucess!
The majority of people who put comments here completely missed the point of the article. The point of the article is to show how the vaccine mandates are not about saving lives and no longer make any sense (if they ever did). Since the vaccinated could catch and transmit covid there is no logical reason to only allow vaccinated people into a venue. It is just political and a control issue which endangers everyone’s freedoms if this type of law is allowed to continue. It was not meant to insult anyone overweight but rather to say that if we were concerned about people catching covid and potentially dying from covid, perhaps we should be preventing high risk people (such as overweight people for example…) so they don’t come in contact with other people who may be infectious and putting their life at risk. Yes this is a ridiculous idea. And that was the point. People who are high risk can take care of themselves and do NOT need to be controlled and told where they can’t go so they won’t get sick or die CV.
saying you are insulted because the article mentions weight issues is just a way to deflect from his main point…
There is an expression that some use ‘right on the money’. Well, your points here are 100% correct regarding health and common sense, but it’s not where the money is. The $3.3 trillion-per-year–in-the-US-alone medical industry – which is 23% of the GDP – one of the highest in the world – the US spends the most on health-“care” and yet, has the least healthy people of any country.
So, of course everything you are saying is elementary and it’s a great chesed that they printed this article, but the simple answer is that the medical industry NEEDS sick people – it just wants them healthy enough to be able to work somewhat to be able to pay the high medical insurance costs so that the severely deranged wicked billionaires of the world (not all wealthy people) become richer. It’s that simple.
Thus, YSH”K gadol for posting, and you will get extra sechar because it is hard to do this. The seforim say that for the tircha of a mitzvah you get sechar in this world as well. (The Gaon explains that this is the peshat in what was said to Rus – ‘Usehei maskurteich sheleima me’eis Hashem – your reward will be complete from Hashem – it will be full – both in the next world and in this world as well, since she put in much tircha in becoming a Yid, as this was obligated of her.
By the way, there is a story about a fellow who weighed 400lb, and when he came to check into a flight, they made him buy an extra seat, as they said he simply cannot fit into one seat. That was a turning point in his life — when he realized he weighed as much as two people (or more than two…) He put in the effort and lost much weight. Now this is a normal person. Tragically, there are such who are so crazy, they’d turn around and sue the airline for discrimination. (The junk food much have gone to their brains!! By the way, I’ve seen that it’s not only a question of comfort to other passengers, it’s also a question of seatbelt safety – how strong it is…)
GOOD TIPS FOR HEALTH:
-White flour – eat whole-wheat – and even better if you can get organic – and for all foods
Greatly minimize all added sugar, you can use some all-natural honey – from a good source – not mass produced, as it may legally have 20% sugar mixed in. You can use Stevia – an herb that tastes sweet and naturally has no calories
-Don’t touch French fries, the white potatoes which are starch and turn into sugar in the body, the oils they use are very unhealthy to begin with – how much more so when reheated, you can bake sweet potato strips – which are much healthier than white
-one should relive oneself daily
– Do some exercise – quick walking, pushup etc, – at least 15 minutes, which should include several 30-second bursts of very quick running – the gold of exercise as it raises the heart rate to its highest. (If got the Shekerona shot should probably not do anything very strenuous, as many ball players have died on the field right after shot…)
-Get good sleep, in very dark room or use eye mask – sleep as long as you need, without alarm clock – an adam chashuv would say this to his talmidim
-By happy and besimcha – laugh!
Behatzlacha – with success!!
In the third paragraph: “since she put in much tircha in becoming a Yid, as this was obligated of her.” is supposed to say ‘since it was NOT obligated of her’
I don’t think this entire concept is accepted by ר’ ישעיה בן ר’ משה
R’ Yeshyaya is quoted on great chassadim (kindness). If so, isn’t helping people to be in good health and live long, not a great chessed? It seems from the comments that a lot of people think that weight is simply about looks. (Certainly we shouldn’t make fun of a person – and to be too thin is also unhealthy! But on the other hand, a person said that since today so many people have weight, there is less motivation to lose weight!)
But the truth is that regarding weight, it’s not just about looks, but it’s almost always – if not always a health issue as well. First of all, it usually means the person has too much sugar, so that is unhealthy in itself. Secondly, the heart has to pump harder, and that is unhealthy – it can even lead to an enlarged heart, as since it is muscle, it is working harder. And there are numerous other things as well. The wind pipe gets blocked slightly due to fat pressing on it, and this can cause sleep apnea, etc.
The main thing is to eat healthfully, get some exercise, sleep well, relive oneself daily, eat a balanced diet – vegetables with meal, fruit in between meals (except apples, grapes), don’t drink with a meal, expect a few sips – don’t drink from 20 minuets before a meal until two hours after — so that the digestive juices can do their job well — except some soup and wine which are like foods. This is all coming from big experts.
Have success!
You raise a good point. Physicians can do a thorough physical and will not mention diet and nutrition even once to an overweight patient. We have done away with kiddie pools for kids daycamps but the amount of candy distributed in schools has no been addressed. We’re missing something big here.