If a foreign nation did this we would go to war

[Spider]

[John Galt]

the microwave and all that empowered women. no longer did they have to slave away making a nutritious meal for the man who brought home the bacon. instead, they could all go looking for bacon and just microwave up some cheeze whiz soup.

so you're saying that women's empowerment has caused us as a society to be fat. i'd buy it

however, in 1950 about a third of the workforce was women. my grandmother got her masters at age 18, was an officer in the navy, and then a schoolteacher, and her husband worked on the railroad. she also had 6 kids while she was working. it's not like that was uncommon. now it's about a half. more, yes, but this isn't going from zero to a half,this is going from a third to a half. further in 1840 about 40% of the workforce was women and children. i feel like we build some myth up about the american golden age of the 1950s, a myth perpetuated by the shitboomers. the truth is, we ended up sending kids to school instead of the mines/homeschool so it was boring as f**k for women at home, and your children were no longer making you money. so unless you're breeding all the time you're gonna want to go do something. and yeah, technology helped that, a lot. helped by limiting hours needed for chores. obviously there are some drawbacks, but we work less now than ever. my entire point is whatever the case for why you don't feel like you have time for things this isn't "the corporations' " fault

[Spider]

If you're trying to make this a women's issues thing, I'm not biting. That's not my position at all. I also didn't say it was the corporations' fault. Quite the opposite, actually.

I'm simply pointing at the way the fat and the workaholism tend to run together in this country. And yes...we work far more. Only way around that is to discard that the other half of the population is also working. Goes without saying that this is a multifaceted issue, but I point out the WORK WORK WORK CONSUME CONSUME CONSUME cultural paradigm as the chief culprit, as it feeds the other issues. Toss in the corn and sugar subsidies, and whatever social programming we've got that drives us to forever buy bigger (compare the average size of a burger from 50 years ago to one today. Or a serving of pop or even a house for that matter) and bigger among dozens of other things and you've got a seriously complicated set of issues.

Unless your position is that everyone would choose to pay more for worse food even if they weren't rushed? Some people are lazy, and certainly would...but a widespread norm? I doubt it.

[John Galt]

[Spider]

Most of that you're just preaching to the choir. As I just said in this very thread, "We really do have to blame ourselves for this." Why you keep trying to convince me of something I already agree with you on...really don't know. For the third time, I also do not "blame corporations" or whatever. You must be confusing me with someone else.

But, I am absolutely correct that we are workaholics. Its not even debatable. The only way to come to any other conclusion is to compare our work habits with those of people in developing countries, most of whom are doing subsistence agriculture or near slave labor in a cell phone factory or wherever. Of course they work crazy hours. They have to so they don't starve. No, you have to compare us with those we most resemble...that being the rest of the developed world. Draw that comparison and you see that we're working too damn much, with too few benefits, and too little down time. Its just plain as day. Of course the overall hours worked has decreased as farm and manufacturing labor has been mechanized. I pointed out the decrease a couple pages back.

Also, I completely reject your simply writing off increased female participation in the labor force, and focusing on individual totals...because our society isn't based on individuals its based on households. Consider the change in hours worked per household...because of course the household is what is going to be the factor when looking at food decisions. Not how many hours one member of said household worked. Its the amount of time people actually spend, when they've got some energy left, at home doing things that take a little time, such as preparing nutritious food.

Bottom line is we could work even 10% less, and it would still be too much. Because we're all walking about with our workplace linked into our brains through our devices, all the time. I for example am literally never truly off work, unless of course I've arranged for some unplugged time in advance. The rest of the time we expect each other to be available if needed. This was not always the case. People used to leave their jobs at their jobs and go home. Now we just work with a reduced intensity at another locale pretty much all the time.

To sum it up, your position seems to be that the entire fast food/convenience food revolution of the last half century has been a result of peoples' innate laziness. I just don't think its that simple. I don't have any reason to believe that people are willing to eat shittier food at higher prices out of simple laziness. I'm sure some are, but most? Doubtful. There has to be a lot more complexity to it. And there has to have been an effect exerted by so much less time spent working on the home front as opposed to the rat race.

[eynon81]

Non understands we're much fatter and such but has anyone considered that one reason our obesity rate may be so high is that they are using a flawed measurement and that we're just bigger?

case in point...take a picture of US marines from WW2 and compare it to a picture of modern marines in Afghanistan. both groups of guys in good shape (the modern ones probably more so) but the modern guys are just bigger. A lot more folks lift now then back in the day.

[John Galt]

[Spider]

Galt...you really need to read my posts more carefully. Why are you bringing marriage into any of this? Why are you comparing my statements that are specifically about the undeveloped world to Americans buying iphones? How is that relavent to half the world living on $2 per day? Why are those the people you compare Americans with? Why are you harping on points repeatedly after I repeatedly explain that I already agree with you on them? Working slightly less than way too much is still way too much, for example. Working less doesn't matter if its still too much even after working less. Working a bit fewer hours, individually, only moves us up a couple seats on the short bus. We're still there anyways, with exactly the same problem. You act as though this GO GO GO culture we're living is simply a figment of everyone's imagination.

By pointing out that we're working fewer hours you aren't making a point I disagree with, nor are you refuting my points. I even supplied a link that said the same thing on page 2.

I'm sure there is some ideological reason why you are so passionately trying to demonstrate that the US leading the western world in working hours and trailing it in workers benefits is somehow acceptable, or even an acceptable norm. But I'm not sure what that angle is.

[Spider]

[John Galt]