"When you're out at a restaurant with a man, don't order a salad without dressing. You know you want egg, bacon and dressing in it. Order it! And take home a doggie bag. So the next day you can have something to eat when you're watching Oxygen, and when your man calls and asks what you're doing, you can say, 'I'm having some of that dinner you bought me last night." This is one of Monique's dating tips interspersed in this train wreck of a show.
According to official estimates, about two-thirds of adult Americans are overweight or obese, and the effect on individual health and the health-care system is considerable. Obese people are more likely to develop cancer, diabetes, heart disease and high blood pressure, which can lead to stroke. Hospitals have had to "super-size" their wheelchairs and beds to accommodate the new generation of sick and overweight Americans. And overweight African-American and Hispanic women, who make up some of the contestants, are at even higher risk of heart disease and diabetes.
And besides the health risks, there are the substantial lifestyle factors that being overweight affects: Climbing a flight of stairs is a strain, walk a block and you're out of breath, you can't sit comfortably in a movie theater or plane seat (Mo'Nique advocates airlines making their seats wider. Yeah, that's going to happen).
There are certainly unhealthy body images perpetuated in pop culture, and everyone deserves to feel good in her skin. But that Mo'Nique is celebrating and rewarding an unhealthy, dangerous conditionand calling it a "movement"is appalling and shameful. What's next, the Miss D.R.U.N.K. or Miss M.E.T.H. pageant? I mean, you want that drink, you want those drugs, you want that fat and cholesterol? Don't deny yourself or worry about your health. Have it! Hell, we'll even call it a movement.
