I'm not arguing that a company that implements such a policy is randomly hating fat people. But it's emblematic of our cultural assumptions about fatness - if being male is correlated (and in fact, in some research more strongly correlated) with illness, one could also charge men for being men. That, of course, is and likely sounds ridiculous to anyone. Men can't help being men, however more likely that might be to kill them. And we don't know which part of maleness is the morbid part. What would we want them to change?
Fatness, on the other hand, is still assumed to be a sickness AND something fat people can control. It's a bizarre, circular form of logic. And yet few people consider that ridiculous. So few people, in fact, that when a company is feeling pressured by rising healthcare costs, it seems reasonable to them to target fat people (who are, of course, more expensive in theory to ensure - that is, after all, what insurance companies think). Is it all about fat hate? No, it's about money. But it's an economic issue aimed at fat people because fat hate and assumptions about fat are still so prevalent.
I'm not sure, by the way, that it's just shitty-job-having people who'll be screwed by this - it's anyone who isn't high-demand for whatever reason. But yeah, that does tend to mean people who already get paid less and have less horizontal job mobility, so not only do they have to accept the cut, but it also represents a greater percentage of their income.
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Date: 2007-08-20 11:12 am (UTC)Fatness, on the other hand, is still assumed to be a sickness AND something fat people can control. It's a bizarre, circular form of logic. And yet few people consider that ridiculous. So few people, in fact, that when a company is feeling pressured by rising healthcare costs, it seems reasonable to them to target fat people (who are, of course, more expensive in theory to ensure - that is, after all, what insurance companies think). Is it all about fat hate? No, it's about money. But it's an economic issue aimed at fat people because fat hate and assumptions about fat are still so prevalent.
I'm not sure, by the way, that it's just shitty-job-having people who'll be screwed by this - it's anyone who isn't high-demand for whatever reason. But yeah, that does tend to mean people who already get paid less and have less horizontal job mobility, so not only do they have to accept the cut, but it also represents a greater percentage of their income.