Journal to a Muse

What SHOULD we do about fat people?

Below is the real, verbatim text of a piece that ran in Sunday's (June 12) Dallas Morning News.
It ruined my breakfast. Yeah, I'm overweight and defensive. I might have still been a little off balance from anesthesia last week. Let me know what you think. And if you write to Ms. Mitchell, I'd love to know what you said.

Deborah Mitchell: Can we increase our revenue while decreasing our waistlines?

About a month ago, I had dinner at a local all-you-can-eat pizza buffet as part of a school function. I'm not going to mention any names, but this restaurant seems to bring out the worst in people, encouraging customers of all ages to load their plates heavy and high with pizza and desserts.

I have to wonder why we even have these types of restaurants when the majority of us are considered overweight. One glance at the average family's table looked like a train wreck of food: mounds of plates and leftovers stacked in crooked piles, enough "throw away" food to feed a small army. It made me wonder what lessons I was teaching my kids when so many in this world don't have enough.

Surely, there must be a silver lining somewhere in the buffet line.

We often pay a price for our "sins," for what is considered immoral or unhealthy by our legislators' standards. When there is a tax cut or budget deficit, our sinfulness is re-examined. Cigarettes, gambling and alcohol have been easy targets so far. Yet we seem to be overlooking another obvious sin: gluttony, one of the big seven.

A gluttony tax might help us increase revenue while decreasing our waistlines. Perhaps we could even use the extra funds to fix the school finance problem or to build our roads more quickly.

Look around. Chances are, 66 percent of us are overweight, 33 percent are considered obese. According to the American Heart Association, only 35 percent of Americans have a body mass index (a measure of "fatness") that is considered normal. Even children are jumping on the fat wagon -- a sinful 30 percent of our youth are too heavy.

Businesses are capitalizing on the expanding opportunities: A casket company makes triple-wide coffins. Furniture companies have designed office and recliner chairs for heavyweights. Restaurants are buying bigger tables and chairs to accommodate larger customers and larger plates of food. There's even a "Big John" now, an extra-wide toilet seat made especially for big bottoms that can handle up to 1,200 pounds. It's really not a laughing matter, as funny as it sounds.

Since companies are benefiting from our widening waistlines, why shouldn't Uncle Sam ask for a piece of the pie? Alcohol and tobacco must surely be tired of shouldering all the weight.

Let's consider weigh stations. Many states collect taxes based on the weight of a truck's goods.

Truck weigh stations have two purposes: one is to generate income through taxes and the other is to ensure that trucks follow safety guidelines.

It is not much of a leap to see that our bodies are machines; they are our vehicles. When "human vehicles" weigh too much, it causes problems, not only for the individual's health, but also for the rest of society in terms of medical costs.

I'm probably not going to be the most popular person around town, so I might as well dig myself a little deeper. Here's another place to levy additional taxes: doctor's offices and hospitals.

If you have to seek health care or become hospitalized because of a weight-related issue, then you should have to pay an additional "gluttony tax." And the insurance company should not have to foot the bill for that one.

This brings me back to where I started. Why don't buffet restaurants install scales right at the register? If a pizza joint charges $5.99 for all-you-can-eat pizza, why not slap a "gluttony tax" on any customer more than 50 pounds overweight (since, of course, that person will most likely eat much more than a little old lady)? That seems fair enough. If we are charging smokers and drinkers for their habits, why not charge overeaters?

Maybe I am not being "politically correct," but taxing weight may not be as taxing as we expect -- we may even decrease our collective poundage as a population.

I realize that, with so many Americans tipping the scales, weight is a heavy subject and one that can provoke tempers. Many of us say we can't help being overweight. It's in our genes. But I wonder if weight would still be in our jeans if money were coming out of our pockets.

Deborah Mitchell lives in McKinney. Her e-mail address is deborah_mitchell @comcast.net