This was published 1 year ago
Opinion
Being overweight can lead to heart disease ... but don’t tell the kids!
Brad Emery
Freelance writerThe runaway success Aussie kids show Bluey has become the perennial “Old Yeller” of the acolytes of cancel culture. Every time the show depicts something the social media police take issue with, they grab the trusty old rifle off the mantel – “C’mon Bluey, let’s go for a long walk in the forest.”
Popular kids’ cartoon Bluey is under fire over scenes discussing weight. Credit: ABC
The most recent “Bluey issue” to which online critics have taken umbrage aired last week. The episode, titled “Exercise”, opens with Bluey’s dad Bandit weighing himself. “Aw man,” he comments and grabs a handful of excess mass around his stomach. He lets out a sigh in front of Bluey and her younger sister Bingo and declares that he needs to get out and do some – wait for it – exercise.
Bluey’s Mum, Chilli, also airs her discontent with her own weight within earshot of the girls.
You’d think promoting exercise and the need to be healthy would receive a tick of approval from all and sundry. Surely anything that encourages kids (and parents who also secretly watch Bluey) to exercise would be widely applauded.
Wrong. Apparently, the episode was enough to send the tut-tutters on social media and within the health industry into a tizz. Doctors, dieticians, online content creators and social media personalities were among the chorus of voices claiming Bluey had engaged with “body-shaming”.
One prominent TikTok user took to the digital realm to share her frustration over the problematic scene. “Apparently, Bluey is totally OK with fat-shaming now,” she said. “I mean, overall the message of the episode was fantastic. But the fact they added in the scales and showed both parents being sad and disappointed after seeing the number on the scales, is pretty problematic.”
Bluey’s dad Bandit is concerned about his weight in the episode “Exercise”.Credit: ABC
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, body-shaming is criticism of someone based on the shape, size or appearance of their body. Abuse or criticism of another person based on their appearance can never be tolerated and should rightly be identified and stamped out. Bullying kills.
We do need to acknowledge that the importance of weight and/or shape to how a person thinks of themselves can be a risk factor for the development of eating disorders. About one million Australians, or 4 per cent of the population, are living with an eating disorder in any given year.
However, in the episode of Bluey in question, that’s not what Bluey’s Dad was doing. Bandit was checking his own body mass and using it as an indicator of his overall fitness. He then made the assessment that he needed to get off his bum and get moving.
Isn’t that something that should be encouraged?
The Heart Foundation lists being overweight or obese as one of the key risk factors associated with heart disease. Being overweight, especially around the waist, is also a lifestyle risk factor for type 2 diabetes.
So, taking this into account, the critics who have attacked Bluey would have us adopt the position that being overweight can lead to heart disease and type 2 diabetes, but whatever you do, don’t tell the kids!
It’s ridiculous.
My father and grandfather were both heart patients. My grandfather died of a heart attack in his 60s and my father had three heart attacks and a quadruple heart bypass.
So, I’m constantly looking down the barrel of either getting my shit together or getting my affairs in order. Over the past few years I’ve chosen the former.
As a parent, my child has a pretty good chance of having to be heart smart from an earlier age than many of her peers, as her genetic compass will likely shift toward heart health being an issue.
That’s why we educate our child about the need to be fit and healthy, to keep our body in good condition, like an engine that we don’t want to break down.
Whether she gets that message from the excess jiggle around my middle, or from an episode of Bluey, I don’t really care.
When woke warriors scream at the world, I usually grab a healthy bowl of unsalted popcorn to watch from afar.
However, when these blinkered blusterers create a reckless and unnecessary fuss over an innocent health message for kids it needs to be called out for the crock-of-kale that it is.
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