When I first read that an AP reporter was covering my college town and home for 6 years, dubbing it the “fattest city in America”, my first thought was, “Come on, I moved away from there a year ago, surely I must have made some statistical difference?”
But clearly not. The story went live today on the wire and I read it here on MSNBC. It pretty much infuriated me as a former resident of this poor, toothless, stupid obese town.
Huntington is not a great city. It is a city that is riddled with petty crime and fighting a losing battle with drugs. It has a failing economy, a city where educated people take $6.50/hr retail jobs because there’s nowhere else for them to work. It’s a suitcase campus city that falls asleep during the summer when Marshall students aren’t there. It has beautiful architecture and pleasant streets and the best motherf’ing cheese wontons in the world.
I, for one, felt this article was written with preconceived notions of what a town in West Virginia is like. The lede itself veers on offensive - “As a portly woman plodded ahead of him on the sidewalk, the obese mayor of America’s fattest and unhealthiest city explained why health is not a big local issue.” Plodded? Because you know, all portly women in this world plod along. I’m surprised they didn’t say something like “As the completely disgusting fat person wheezed and waddled on the sidewalk, desperately straining to catch one more gasp of air into her already overtaxed lungs.”
Look, I’m not a pro-fattie. I don’t do the whole fat equality thing. But I think there’s a fine line between descriptive language and poking fun at a fat person.
I often wonder if stories like this really wake a person up. Because for me, they don’t. It’s not like I read a story like this and think “Oh my gosh, I am totally fat!” Because honestly? It’s not like I don’t know that already. It’s not like I’m out there walking around thinking that I weigh 120 pounds and man, I look good in this tube top.
The article goes on to say that one possibility of obesity is the West Virginia culture, where we all apparently eat fried meats laden with gravy. Hm. No. That was not my diet when I lived in Huntington.
Let’s continue. “Many workers lack health insurance, and corporate wellness programs — common at large national companies — are rare.”
This is true. I had health insurance for one and a half years after I turned 21. I have health insurance now, but there was quite a large scary gap when I didn’t. As far as corporate wellness programs, well, since there are so few large national companies in Huntington, I can see why something of that nature would fail.
“In the hilly coal fields to the South, people still live in houses or trailers with drooping, battered roofs.” - This is also true. I was lucky enough to stay in the main parts of West Virginia when I lived there - Charleston and Huntington. Though my last job, I had to travel to a smaller, poorer county everyday. There were places on the side of the road that I couldn’t believe people actually lived there - tiny one room shacks with roughshod tin roofs and windows covered in cardboard. West Virginia is a very poor state, and it shows the hardest when you go into its poorest counties.
“They stare hard at any stranger in a new car.” - UGH. This is not true. Come on. We are not aborigines. If we’re staring at your car, maybe we’re staring because it’s that ugly shade of yellow that so many people think is cool nowadays. Or maybe we’re staring because you’re driving 5mph on the winding, mountainous roads that weave through southern West Virginia. We’re not staring in wonder at this ‘magical moving machine’. And as a sidenote, people in West Virginia, especially southern West Virginia, are the friendliest freaking people in the world. Every time you pass someone, it’s like a state law that you must wave or smile or nod your head. Otherwise you get billed as that uppity asshole who can’t drive.
“Hot dog places also abound, with the city hosting an annual hot dog festival every summer.” - Okay, this is one thing I never understood about Huntington, it’s obsession with hot dogs. I don’t do hot dogs, it’s rare for me to eat one. But there are like 5 hot dog places in Huntington. And everybody wants their hot dog with this runny chili sauce and it’s kind of gross. But I have to say - why vilify the fact that Huntington has a hot dog festival? Are fat towns not allowed to have festivals? Why didn’t the reporter mention that the hot dog festival also has a 5k (adorably called the Bun Run) that is popular to participate in? Would this have been mentioned if Huntington hosted an annual lettuce festival? I mean, it’s not like Huntington is the host of the funnel cake festival (holy crap, I would never have moved had that been the case) or the chocolate doughnut festival. Ugh.
(And on another side note, one of the more popular hot dog places in Huntington was a place called Hillbilly Hot Dogs [hate hate hate the name] where if you sang the Weenie song by heart, you could get a free hot dog. This was amazingly popular and I still know most of that stupid song, but I can’t remember who our 9th president was.)
“During a warm and sunny autumn week in Huntington — the kind of weather that would bring out small armies of joggers in some cities — it was unusual to see a runner or bicyclist.” - I have to wonder if this reporter was in the wrong part of Huntington during this time. There’s a park in Huntington called Ritter Park that is constantly (seriously, constantly) filled with people walking their dogs or jogging. Huntington itself is not a really pedestrian-friendly city, nor does it have an adequate mass transit system, so everyone basically drives everywhere. As far as walking, that’s fine, but you have to take your chances on someone running over you while you try to cross the street.
I don’t know about Ritter Park these days - my best friend lives in Huntington in that area, two blocks up, and has been the victim of some crime these days. So maybe people weren’t out exercising for fear of mugging. Also, I would hardly call Ritter Park a tony neighborhood. We lived on the outskirts of the Ritter Park area in our second apartment and believe me, it was not a tony place.
And I have to laugh at this a little:
“Other communities have taken more ambitious steps to control the amount of fat in local restaurant food. In July, the Los Angeles City Council placed a moratorium on new fast food restaurants in an impoverished area of the city with above-average rates of obesity. In 2006, New York City became the first U.S. city to ban artificial trans fats in restaurant foods.” - You’re comparing two of the largest cities in the country to a town with not even 50,000 people in it? Like these “communities” are just DOWN THE STREET? Come on. Huntington wouldn’t pass any sort of moratorium on new fast food restaurants because those restaurants bring jobs (albeit low-paying ones) to people and that’s something Huntington needs. As far as trans-fats, I’m pretty sure the majority of restaurants these days have already eliminated trans fats since the great Trans Fat Scare of 2005. I mean come on, everything in the grocery store has NO TRANS FATS on it. Is this really still that big of an issue?
There are lots of reasons that people are fat. There are emotional reasons, medical reasons, genetic reasons, laziness reasons, diet reasons, etc. For me, it’s essentially a unnatural love for all things carbohydrate coupled with genetics and a smidge of laziness (though I do eat somewhat healthy and also exercise regularly). West Virginians have a poor stereotype to other states - backwards, fat, toothless, dumb. It’s hard to tell someone you’re from West Virginia because you’re always waiting for the cliche response - “But you’re wearing shoes!” Oh haha, lordy be, look at that, I must have decided to get dressed up today.
However, it seems that lately, every day, there’s an article about the nation’s fattest state, or the ten worst drinks in America, or kids are fat because of video games (that last one might true, I logged quite a bit of hours playing Sega Channel in the 90s).
I mean, look, I get that there’s an obesity crisis (uh, how could I not?), but do we have to have this shoved down our throats every ten minutes? Has this obesity crisis lessened since the media decided we need to hear how fat we are constantly? People lose weight when they want to lose weight - that’s how it happens. Sometimes people watch a “World’s Fattest Woman” tv show on TLC and think, “Uhhhh… yeah, time for me to hit the treadmill.” (World’s Fattest Women shows always work for me. I usually get like 3 weeks of eat-a-salad motivation out of one of those episodes)
I guess I just don’t understand the constant need to tell us how unhealthy we are. Clearly it’s not kicking in. You can show us the 20 Worst Foods in America but some people are still going to eat them. You can put calories on menus (something I am a huge proponent of as I am calorie-obsessed) but people will still order 600 calorie drinks. Nothing is going to change until people decide it’s time for a change. You want a healthier nation? Lower the cost of healthy food. Provide neighborhood recreation centers with free gym equipment. Offer small tax writeoffs to families who start a garden. Create neighborhood gardens in cities where people can pitch in to maintain it and take a small box of produce every week, sort of like a CASA. Start nutrition education early, explain to kids why it’s better to eat an apple instead of 3 Oreos. Ban high-fructose corn syrup.
Even still, with changes of that caliber, there will still be people who refuse to eat vegetables (my boyfriend, he is one of them… and skinnier than me) and there will still be people who refuse to go the gym. But these changes will also help people - if I had had access to a free gym while I lived in Huntington, I would’ve gone in two seconds (maybe). I lived in an apartment so I couldn’t start a garden (though I desperately wanted to and still do), but I would’ve gladly hoed a row of zucchini to get free vegetables every week. When I was in elementary school, the closest thing to a fruit at snacktime was a Fruit Roll-Up.
I was originally annoyed with this article and still am a bit. I feel that it portrays Huntington unfairly and also paints the picture that we’re all running around, jiggling and toothless. But then I have to think - if this article helps at least some people become healthier, if it leads them to a healthier lifestyle, if this is their World’s Fattest Woman show, then that’s great. I just wish that the people of Huntington could have been spared the embarrassment.
