Fox News, Matt Drudge and their minions like Bill O’Reilly are trying to make political points by criticizing Obama’s nominee for the US Surgeon General post, Dr. Regina Benjamin. Sadly, Julie Deardorff of the Chicago Tribune has joined in the bully brigade.
The question is at the heart of a debate set off when Dr. Regina Benjamin was nominated for surgeon general. A MacArthur Foundation “genius grant” recipient who set up a medical clinic in hurricane-ravaged Alabama, Benjamin hasn’t responded publicly to criticism that her extra pounds may set a poor example.
[Click to continue reading Weighty issue rages in surgeon general debate — chicagotribune.com]
Even though Ms. Deardorff’s article doesn’t linger on the question of whether Dr. Benjamin is too fat to work for the government, even using the “criticism” as a jumping off point to a discussion of fatties legitimizes the “criticism” and the ignorant dispensers of the “criticism“.
Last I heard, brains and accomplishments are what matters, not what size dress one wears, unless one’s job is working for Fox News. The logic baffles me: are these bullies suggesting that if one is not model thin1, one has to be unemployed? Sent to a fat farm in Siberia? What exactly are the anti-chubbies suggesting? Their leader, Rush Limbaugh, aka The Vulgar Pig Boy, is not exactly svelte himself.
Footnotes:- and white – since body types often do have a racial and cultural component [↩]