A right to eat oneself to death?

Random tangent:

This talk about enforcing behavioral standards due to including everyone in the same health insurance pool has me thinking. IF we had a universal pool, do you think the FDA food pyramid and dietary recommendations would change? If the people telling the nation how to eat healthy had to answer to the actuaries instead of to the agriculture industry, would we have different rules on what we should be eating?

Oso wrote:

Random tangent:

This talk about enforcing behavioral standards due to including everyone in the same health insurance pool has me thinking. IF we had a universal pool, do you think the FDA food pyramid and dietary recommendations would change? If the people telling the nation how to eat healthy had to answer to the actuaries instead of to the agriculture industry, would we have different rules on what we should be eating?

Would comparing the FDA to Health Canada be a good case? I don't have any data, other than we use less corn syrup FWIW, but it could be a worthwhile experiment to see if Canada's health and nutrition guidelines support your hypothesis.

Shoal07 wrote:

The NFL player is still left with his life decison after he makes it. Medical care for them is very difficult, as the NFL drops them the second they retire (leave) and no insurance company will pay for any of their "pre-exsisting conditions". They basically have to use their millions to provide their own medical care.

Must be rough. I wonder how they manage.

Public healthcare isn't about providing everyone with a freebie. It's about protecting everyone's essential right of life. A professional athlete literally makes a fortune. If they destroy their body to do it then as long as they can afford treatment out of pocket they're no more entitled to publicly-funded healthcare. That'd be like bailing out a bank that destroyed its own livelihood through greed and mismanagement.

...

*sigh*

LobsterMobster wrote:
Shoal07 wrote:

The NFL player is still left with his life decison after he makes it. Medical care for them is very difficult, as the NFL drops them the second they retire (leave) and no insurance company will pay for any of their "pre-exsisting conditions". They basically have to use their millions to provide their own medical care.

Must be rough. I wonder how they manage.

Public healthcare isn't about providing everyone with a freebie. It's about protecting everyone's essential right of life. A professional athlete literally makes a fortune. If they destroy their body to do it then as long as they can afford treatment out of pocket they're no more entitled to publicly-funded healthcare. That'd be like bailing out a bank that destroyed its own livelihood through greed and mismanagement.

...

*sigh*

Even for them, with the extent of their injuries, costly several hundred thousand dollar surgeries and treatments can add up quickly. Imagine this for your lifetime, starting in your 30s, you had this burden. Even being a multi millionare (not that all of them are) it can add up fast.

Shoal07 wrote:
LobsterMobster wrote:
Shoal07 wrote:

The NFL player is still left with his life decison after he makes it. Medical care for them is very difficult, as the NFL drops them the second they retire (leave) and no insurance company will pay for any of their "pre-exsisting conditions". They basically have to use their millions to provide their own medical care.

Must be rough. I wonder how they manage.

Public healthcare isn't about providing everyone with a freebie. It's about protecting everyone's essential right of life. A professional athlete literally makes a fortune. If they destroy their body to do it then as long as they can afford treatment out of pocket they're no more entitled to publicly-funded healthcare. That'd be like bailing out a bank that destroyed its own livelihood through greed and mismanagement.

...

*sigh*

Even for them, with the extent of their injuries, costly several hundred thousand dollar surgeries and treatments can add up quickly. Imagine this for your lifetime, starting in your 30s, you had this burden. Even being a multi millionare (not that all of them are) it can add up fast.

Not to mention the fact that most NFL players never make millions.

The 2009 NFL league minimum salary was $285k/year. The league average across all players is $770k/year, but the existence of obvious outliers like Albert Haynesworth's $32milllion indicates that the median is somewhere far less than the mean. That sounds like a lot, but figure also that the average NFL career is 3.5 seasons.

As you mention, it is definitely not the gold mine it appears to be.

Shoal07 wrote:

Even for them, with the extent of their injuries, costly several hundred thousand dollar surgeries and treatments can add up quickly. Imagine this for your lifetime, starting in your 30s, you had this burden. Even being a multi millionare (not that all of them are) it can add up fast.

NFL players have an awesome benefits package, including full health insurance for five years after they leave the NFL. I wish I had the same benefits. Instead, I get booted from my company's insurance plan instantly if I left or I could get just 18 months of (really expensive) coverage through COBRA.

I'm not going to feel any sympathy for someone who failed to save enough of the money they made while they were paying to take care of them after they couldn't play anymore. Every player knows their job makes them much more likely to be injured and understands that the clock is ticking on their career.

Paleocon wrote:

The 2009 NFL league minimum salary was $285k/year. The league average across all players is $770k/year, but the existence of obvious outliers like Albert Haynesworth's $32milllion indicates that the median is somewhere far less than the mean. That sounds like a lot, but figure also that the average NFL career is 3.5 seasons.

As you mention, it is definitely not the gold mine it appears to be.

Wait, so the least paid guy clears more than million dollars during the average career and you still claim that's not a gold mine? The minimum salary is like six times what the average person makes. People practically have to work through to retirement to make as much money as someone who just sits on the bench for a couple of years.

I don't think we should treat former athletes any differently than other kinds of employees. If someone can't walk because they were doing their job properly there are laws in place to get their employers to step up and do what is right. Just because the job is sport doesn't mean the team owners get off the hook for what they ask their employees to do.

As far as the NFL situation, I'm pretty sure the hang up is the player's union. Players before 1993 are pretty much left out in the cold, while more recent players have better long-term care written into the collective bargaining agreement. You can read one side of the argument here: retiredplayers.org

Looking into this, I think I've answered my own question. Employees who get chronic injuries in the line of work can expect their employers to do their part. The woman in question didn't injure herself on the job, so I think we should categorize her case with alcoholics and smokers. On-the-job injuries are a different kind of scenario.

As far as the NFL situation, I'm pretty sure the hang up is the player's union.

I am pretty sure that the real hang-up is the market demand. There's simply too much money to be made entertaining a whole lot of people who aren't going to scrutinize the players' long-term health implications.

It sounds like encouragement to go to school for the education, rather than for a chance at the NFL. Even if a player's life goal is to play professional football, he can get another job/career afterward. When he ends his career at 35, he can start again. Take the degree earned in those free years of college and do something with it.

The pre-existing condition coverage is another argument entirely, but playing a few years of football shouldn't mean you get to retire and live well for the next 40 years with no additional effort.

Kraint wrote:

It sounds like encouragement to go to school for the education, rather than for a chance at the NFL. Even if a player's life goal is to play professional football, he can get another job/career afterward. When he ends his career at 35, he can start again. Take the degree earned in those free years of college and do something with it.

The pre-existing condition coverage is another argument entirely, but playing a few years of football shouldn't mean you get to retire and live well for the next 40 years with no additional effort.

Good point. However, most of our athletes struggle post football. They have little marketable skills since the focus from their parents and educational institutions their entire life is "play football". Maybe if we started pushing out well rounded athletes this would be easier for them.

Shoal07 wrote:
Kraint wrote:

It sounds like encouragement to go to school for the education, rather than for a chance at the NFL. Even if a player's life goal is to play professional football, he can get another job/career afterward. When he ends his career at 35, he can start again. Take the degree earned in those free years of college and do something with it.

The pre-existing condition coverage is another argument entirely, but playing a few years of football shouldn't mean you get to retire and live well for the next 40 years with no additional effort.

Good point. However, most of our athletes struggle post football. They have little marketable skills since the focus from their parents and educational institutions their entire life is "play football". Maybe if we started pushing out well rounded athletes this would be easier for them.

Then they wouldn't be as fun to watch.

I bet when she's hooked up to an IV and her heart and kidneys aren't really working... wait for it..
.. she'll EAT those words!

(as is my goal, today, to be both *coughed* and *filthy skimmer labelled* for one topic!)

LobsterMobster wrote:

I think I hit the key points, other than that she was already named the fattest woman to give birth at something like 530 pounds. It had to be a c-section with 30 personnel on hand.

How does that work? 13 on one side, 13 on the other, pulling back the massive folds, 1 with a knife, 1 with a toilet plunger, 1 with the some tupperware, and 1 to pick the jaws up off the floor?

MaxShrek wrote:
LobsterMobster wrote:

I think I hit the key points, other than that she was already named the fattest woman to give birth at something like 530 pounds. It had to be a c-section with 30 personnel on hand.

How does that work? 13 on one side, 13 on the other, pulling back the massive folds, 1 with a knife, 1 with a toilet plunger, 1 with the some tupperware, and 1 to pick the jaws up off the floor?

No I think it's the makings of a "How many x does it take to screw in a lightbulb" joke. Replace "x" with group of people you want to offend and "screw in a lightbulb" with "deliver a baby". Punchline: "30: one to hold the baby, 29 to remove the [size=1]corpulent irresponsible sub-human gluttonous troll of a[/size] mother.

MaxShrek wrote:
LobsterMobster wrote:

I think I hit the key points, other than that she was already named the fattest woman to give birth at something like 530 pounds. It had to be a c-section with 30 personnel on hand.

How does that work? 13 on one side, 13 on the other, pulling back the massive folds, 1 with a knife, 1 with a toilet plunger, 1 with the some tupperware, and 1 to pick the jaws up off the floor?

One to drive the forklift, one to hold the tub of shortening, one to operate the Jaws of Life, just in case . . .

Stay classy, guys.

Shoal07 wrote:
Kraint wrote:

It sounds like encouragement to go to school for the education, rather than for a chance at the NFL. Even if a player's life goal is to play professional football, he can get another job/career afterward. When he ends his career at 35, he can start again. Take the degree earned in those free years of college and do something with it.

The pre-existing condition coverage is another argument entirely, but playing a few years of football shouldn't mean you get to retire and live well for the next 40 years with no additional effort.

Good point. However, most of our athletes struggle post football. They have little marketable skills since the focus from their parents and educational institutions their entire life is "play football". Maybe if we started pushing out well rounded athletes this would be easier for them.

I'm not trying to straw man you Shoal so maybe I'm just reading your tone wrong. Please correct me if I'm wrong here.

When a woman decides to turn herself into a sea lion, she's a burden - if not a blight - on society. When a professional athlete decides to wreck his body to successfully become a millionaire, we should have sympathy for his struggle after he retires at the age of 35? We should prepare athletes for life after their outrageously lucrative career of playing a game but the woman's on her own? Is what the athlete does more legitimate simply because it entertains us? Are not some of us entertained by the woman as well?

LobsterMobster wrote:
Shoal07 wrote:
Kraint wrote:

It sounds like encouragement to go to school for the education, rather than for a chance at the NFL. Even if a player's life goal is to play professional football, he can get another job/career afterward. When he ends his career at 35, he can start again. Take the degree earned in those free years of college and do something with it.

The pre-existing condition coverage is another argument entirely, but playing a few years of football shouldn't mean you get to retire and live well for the next 40 years with no additional effort.

Good point. However, most of our athletes struggle post football. They have little marketable skills since the focus from their parents and educational institutions their entire life is "play football". Maybe if we started pushing out well rounded athletes this would be easier for them.

I'm not trying to straw man you Shoal so maybe I'm just reading your tone wrong. Please correct me if I'm wrong here.

When a woman decides to turn herself into a sea lion, she's a burden - if not a blight - on society. When a professional athlete decides to wreck his body to successfully become a millionaire, we should have sympathy for his struggle after he retires at the age of 35? We should prepare athletes for life after their outrageously lucrative career of playing a game but the woman's on her own? Is what the athlete does more legitimate simply because it entertains us? Are not some of us entertained by the woman as well?

I wasn't the one who argued the employer angle, but I agree with it. Because what they're doing is a profession, with an employer, there is some reponsibility of the employer, and to an extent the people (as much as they have with any worker) to provide care due to employment related activities.

I argue we should be created more well-rounded (read: educated) athletes so they can find secondary employment and continue to be productive once their relatively short athletic career is over.

I don't believe either of the above statements apply to the Fat Lady. She is not paying taxes, or into social security, or have an employer - she is just getting morbidly obese-r. While this may provide some people with entertainment, until it becomes some sort of profession, I don't think we should extend her the same benifits as we would a worker damaged by their job.

Shoal wrote:

I wasn't the one who argued the employer angle, but I agree with it. Because what they're doing is a profession, with an employer, there is some reponsibility of the employer, and to an extent the people (as much as they have with any worker) to provide care due to employment related activities.

I argue we should be created more well-rounded (read: educated) athletes so they can find secondary employment and continue to be productive once their relatively short athletic career is over.

Is employment important because it would legitimize what she's doing, or because it would provide her with support? I don't think the legitimization angle is very compelling. Keep in mind, people apparently are paying her to get fatter, so at least some people consider what she's doing to be worth money. It's a shame they aren't giving her health insurance as well.

As for the athletes, I don't think they're particularly productive to begin with and I think they've already got a very sweet deal. They make obscene amounts of money entertaining us. What exactly is being produced? We as a society have made a value judgment that what they do is "worth it" but that's an external decision. I'd imagine a professional football player would still play football with his kids or friends on Saturday even if he wasn't being paid for it. Likewise, this woman would still be eating even if she became a highly-paid international celebrity for it (and she'd probably have a relatively short career as well).

If the only incentive to train them for other careers is to make them productive, we'd be better off discouraging them from becoming athletes in the first place. Further, with the kind of money they're making, they don't need any outside help if they want to change professions. They can afford to take a few years off to learn a new trade. Any trade they wish. If their managers or whatnot want to help them with that, that's their call.

It sounds to me like you're saying what the athlete does is "good" and what the woman does is "bad," therefore it doesn't matter how much money either makes, the athlete deserves our support and the woman does not. I think your distinctions are arbitrary as both hurt themselves and neither provides anything other than spectacle.

Shoal wrote:

She is not paying taxes, or into social security, or have an employer - she is just getting morbidly obese-r.

Do we know this for sure? I think that for the sake of this discussion, this is a good assumption to make. It makes the conversation more interesting. However it is not necessarily a fair assumption. You have asserted many times that she will be a burden on the taxpayer without much by ways of evidence. I don't really want to argue about it as I don't know if she can or can't afford her lifestyle and again, it's more interesting to assume she can't. I just thought it was worth noting. Either way, it is certain that her job is not being fat so your argument is a valid one.

LobsterMobster wrote:

When a woman decides to turn herself into a sea lion, she's a burden - if not a blight - on society. When a professional athlete decides to wreck his body to successfully become a millionaire, we should have sympathy for his struggle after he retires at the age of 35? We should prepare athletes for life after their outrageously lucrative career of playing a game but the woman's on her own? Is what the athlete does more legitimate simply because it entertains us? Are not some of us entertained by the woman as well?

I think equating the body damage of this woman to a professional athlete's is not a good logical step.

Torn knee ligaments and back pain are a far cry from literally eating one's self to death's doorstep. They're just such different orders of magnitude as to make using it as the foundation of further comparisons too shaky of ground to be all that worthwhile.

Somehow, I don't see this chick making it to 94 years of age like Sammy Baugh.

I think the closer (but still imperfect) comparison would be between this woman and members of the Jackass crew.

LobsterMobster wrote:

As for the athletes, I don't think they're particularly productive to begin with and I think they've already got a very sweet deal. They make obscene amounts of money entertaining us. What exactly is being produced? We as a society have made a value judgment that what they do is "worth it" but that's an external decision. I'd imagine a professional football player would still play football with his kids or friends on Saturday even if he wasn't being paid for it. Likewise, this woman would still be eating even if she became a highly-paid international celebrity for it (and she'd probably have a relatively short career as well).

If the only incentive to train them for other careers is to make them productive, we'd be better off discouraging them from becoming athletes in the first place. Further, with the kind of money they're making, they don't need any outside help if they want to change professions. They can afford to take a few years off to learn a new trade. Any trade they wish. If their managers or whatnot want to help them with that, that's their call.

It sounds to me like you're saying what the athlete does is "good" and what the woman does is "bad," therefore it doesn't matter how much money either makes, the athlete deserves our support and the woman does not. I think your distinctions are arbitrary as both hurt themselves and neither provides anything other than spectacle.

Professional athletes have found a way to do what they love and get paid for it. I'd say more power to them for it. However, there is no entitlement to continued benefits after they have retired, simply because they were paid to hurt themselves repeatedly for money. They chose a career where that is the deal. Giving them 5 or 10 times the public benefits for that does not strike me as fair or rational. If they want continued health care, they should negotiate with their employer for lower direct pay in return for lifetime insurance and a pension, just like everyone else.

This woman is doing the same thing, IMO. She has found a way to do what she apparently loves doing while getting paid. She is self-employed. An even more apt comparison to her would be the Jackass crew, had they sold their videos online rather than getting picked up by the TV/film industry. They are hurting themselves for money, and enjoying it. And they shouldn't be granted any extra benefits when they've crippled themselves at the age of 35 from repeatedly jumping tricycles off of giant ramps.

LobsterMobster wrote:
Shoal wrote:

She is not paying taxes, or into social security, or have an employer - she is just getting morbidly obese-r.

Do we know this for sure? I think that for the sake of this discussion, this is a good assumption to make. It makes the conversation more interesting. However it is not necessarily a fair assumption. You have asserted many times that she will be a burden on the taxpayer without much by ways of evidence. I don't really want to argue about it as I don't know if she can or can't afford her lifestyle and again, it's more interesting to assume she can't. I just thought it was worth noting. Either way, it is certain that her job is not being fat so your argument is a valid one.

The assertion comes from the typical way sickness and disability are handled in the US for those who are unemployed/self-employed and without insurance. If she doesn't have insurance (we don't know if her partner's plan covers her and her lifestyle), any medical attention will be paid for directly(very expensive, rarely used), or it will come from a charitable organization/government program (free clinics, Medicaid), or from a trip to the ER/911 call. If she doesn't have insurance, that last option may well result in bankruptcy, meaning the hospital won't get paid. Which, in turn, means that the rest of us have to pay higher prices. If she does get on Medicaid, we the taxpayers are directly paying for her health care. We also pay if she is qualified as disabled and becomes eligible for benefits for that.

Edit: Damn, Paleo Tannhausered me with the Jackass reference.

Is she over-eating under the supervision of a trained professional? Ooh, like Kobayashi is training her?

I am perplexed as to how we got onto the NFL and public healthcare though. Kind of like an old person who concludes everything, and that's the problem with these f*ckin liberals.

Well, I didn't say professional athletes should get 5-10 times what we would give a normal person - in fact, I said

Shoal07 wrote:

(NFL)...there is some reponsibility of the employer, and to an extent the people (as much as they have with any worker) to provide care due to employment related activities.

(Fatty)...I don't think we should extend her the same benifits as we would a worker damaged by their job.

Shoal07 wrote:

Well, I didn't say professional athletes should get 5-10 times what we would give a normal person - in fact, I said

Shoal07 wrote:

(NFL)...there is some reponsibility of the employer, and to an extent the people (as much as they have with any worker) to provide care due to employment related activities.

(Fatty)...I don't think we should extend her the same benifits as we would a worker damaged by their job.

Sorry, that wasn't a direct response to anything you said. It was a general statement that people who hurt themselves in this fashion (Jackass guys, pro athletes, pro eaters) shouldn't qualify for extra help because of their decisions. I'd separate people who do something like this from people who injure themselves in the course of their normal work. Construction accidents and boxer head injuries are quite different.

LobsterMobster wrote:

Are not some of us entertained by the woman as well?

Man, if I wasn't at work right now I would find a picture of the morbidly obese lady and add the caption "ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED". So just imagine that image here.

Gravey wrote:
LobsterMobster wrote:

Are not some of us entertained by the woman as well?

Man, if I wasn't at work right now I would find a picture of the morbidly obese lady and add the caption "ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED". So just imagine that image here.

IMAGE(http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k264/mills_fokk/bigbigbigbigbigbigbig.jpg)

?

Shoal, I'd still like to know what makes the athlete legitimate and the crazy food lady, not. You still haven't told me how an athlete is "productive."

Are we at the "lifeboat" now Lobster?

KingGorilla wrote:

Are we at the "lifeboat" now Lobster?

Don't turn this around on me. He's the one who implied that athletes are productive while the woman is not. I'd like to know how he came to this conclusion if it's anything more than, "society tells us athletes are good and fatties are bad."