Populism and Obesity
It is not because they are stupid that people become fatter. Same with voters falling for populistic arguments (foreigners steal our jobs). And it is certainly not a reason to claim that “people cannot be trusted”.
Today we face growing popular frustration which translates into growing support for populist parties.
For this reason, the self-righteous use the same argument ad nauseam: “we can’t allow the people to be in charge; look what they would do: build walls, pipelines, or even worse!… They don’t get it, they don’t understand!” And to a certain extend, I used to agree.
But wait, what’s the link with obesity?
I invite you to read this article from George Monbiot for some of the counter-intuitive reasons behind the increased obesity rate (and yes it is not necessarily related to the fact that we eat more or do less exercise).
The point with obesity is that there is a tendency to think that if people are fat it is there fault. Similarly if people vote for populist or xenophobic party it is because they are stupid. And I am not trying to say that we are not individually responsible for our choices, what we eat and who we vote for. I am looking at it at the level of a society.
Eating habits are the result of what is available to us, often ingrained in culture as well as local and seasonal prevalence of products. But it is also heavily influenced by the industries that produce the food we eat and the marketing associated with it. We are basically pushed into a certain lifestyle: processed sugar, additives, etc. It feeds on some of our most unconscious impulses and therefore it is so hard to resist. Remember, sugar is highly addictive.
At the end, there is so much you can do to escape the system that has been built around the food industry. At the scale of a community or society it is too easy to blame the people; to claim that they are solely responsible when you hardly give them the choice or openly manipulate them.
There is a strong similarity with populism: it feeds on another very addictive feature: emotions. And in particular on fear. That some fears are legitimate, no doubt. The problem is when fear is used as a way to manipulate and gain support.
Representative democracy features the same logic than the food industry, as its purpose is to generate support for a product — here a political figure to be elected, it tends to favour those that are the most addictive. The ones playing with emotions and fear.
In both cases, it is condescending at best to blame the people for responding to these stimuli.
But more problematic it leads to the conclusion that we need to protect the people from themselves!
And by ‘we’ I mean those of us who know better — the ‘elite’ if you wish.
For a long time I also used to think that way or along a similar line of thought. And I know that most of us are affected by such a bias. But it cleared away when I realised that the conclusion (they cannot be trusted) was based on a bias premise (our democratic system with its elected representatives).
At the end of the day it is a systemic problem that stems from the foundation of representative democracy. Like in the food industry, the problem is not that people should be able to choose what they want to eat — or that people should be able to choose in what kind of society they live.
The problem is the structure that offers that choice — the system of producing that choice. That’s where we need to collectively push for change: a new form of democracy not based on representation.
