Survivor

   I’m seeing statistics that say more than half of all Americans are now overweight. As a left-handed, left-wing Episcopalian feminist, I’m delighted finally to be in the majority on something—although I wish it could be for one of my more valued characteristics.

   A recent newspaper article suggested that being a “chronic dieter” might no longer be a sign of neurosis but, rather, a reasonable response to a culture that chronically supplies too much food. That article supported a notion I’ve been formulating: That those of us who are overweight are simply the first ones across the pivot point on an evolutionary teeter-totter.

   For most of history, and still in most of the world, getting enough to eat is the fundamental struggle of human life. Figuring out how to hunt the bison and the deer, how to hybridize corn to match the soil and the climate, how to preserve some stash of something against the winter and the drought—all of those things occupied most of human attention.

   I attended Overeaters Anonymous for a few months, where I sat with a group confessing our obsession with food as though it was abnormal. Well, guess what—finicky eaters weren’t the winners in that original, million-year game of Survivor.

   But now the rules of survival have changed, because we have a new enemy. Instead of the natural world, with its floods and drought, its lions and tigers and blights and parasites, we’re pitted against the market economy. We have a thousand times more choices than we need. We’re offered serving sizes that are based on maximum profit margin, not sound nutrition. We’re hooked on additives that make food far too palatable—msg, sugar and salt, preservatives.

   This is a dizzying, dazzling change in the human condition, and it’s happened with lightning speed. There’s a generation still alive that remembers when an orange was a Christmas treat. Now the oranges and grapefruit some in 5-pound polybags, and we have papayas and kumquats available year-round. We have gone from the root cellar to the megamarket deli in the span of a single generation.

   Of course we’re confused. I’ve only started to get the message in the past year or so. I’ve always believed that living within my means was emotionally and spiritually healthy, and that maintaining my health required me to resist the siren call of the marketplace. I’ve feared and avoided fast cars and high fashion. I’ve never believed that my credit limit was mine to spend, just because the folks at Visa said it was.

   But I’ve never been able to keep my boundaries clear when it comes to food. If the manufacturers decide that the diameter of a muffin is 6 inches instead of 3, that’s a good thing, right? Turning away from a silk blouse or an emerald ring is, for me, an act of moral superiority. But turning down chocolate seems like an act of ingratitude against Creation.

   I’m beginning to believe, though, that overconsumption is overconsumption. Visa sets unrealistic credit limits. Betty Crocker sets unreasonable calorie limits. It’s all the same thing.

   For me, that’s a happy notion. I’m not diseased. I’m not a victim. I’m not part of a lonely minority in a church basement. I’m part of a vast evolutionary struggle. My ancestors got through the winter on shriveled potatoes and not much else. They used the last of the sugar and lard to make pancakes on Fat Tuesday, then tightened their belts and prayed until spring. And, for the most part, they didn’t die or go mad from depravation.

   The market would suggest that I honor their memory by eating all I can, eating enough to make up for generations of want and hunger. But self-indulgence wasn’t their goal. Survival was. And survival is my goal, too—even though, ironically, the threat to survival is now now hunger but self-indulgence itself.

                                             November 2000

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