Why Are Southerners So Fat?

[Elfdart]

Lard and flour breading in a deep frier?

How's that supposed to work?

Dip the chopped beef in combination of eggs, milk and either lard or shortening, then roll in flour. Repeat, then fry it.

[Frank Hipper]

Lard and flour breading in a deep frier?

How's that supposed to work?

Dip the chopped beef in combination of eggs, milk and either lard or shortening, then roll in flour. Repeat, then fry it.

You're not going to get lard to stick to eggs or milk, no matter what order you dredge the meat in.
Raw lard deposited into hot fryer oil will melt and float off, carrying any flour sticking to it along for the ride before any cooking even takes place.

Batters and breadings require water based wet ingredients (or no wet ingredients at all) to react to hot oil, not fat.

Sure you're not confusing the cooking oil used for a breading ingredient?

[Elfdart]

I've never actually cooked it myself, but I remember the eggs, milk and IIRC lard or Crisco shortening to make the bread crumbs and flour stick to the meat. Maybe you're right and it was only used in the deep fryer.

EDIT: After asking my cousin who still cooks this thing from time to time, mixing lard or shortening with the breading is only for frying in ungreased pans, not the deep fryer.

[Commander 598]

The no exercise in the humidity/heat is bullshit anyways, it's regularly high 30's with 100% humidity here and I see folks running all the time. Add to that I worked with some very fat guys and yet we where out every weekday morning doing PT (usually running up and down hills). They just need to do it in the morning or evening when things are cooler and drink a lot of water.

The average summer temperature around here is like ~100F, usually hitting 110F pretty often.

Here's my weather now: http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b329/ ... eather.jpg And this is 5:30 in the afternoon.

If I spend any longer than about 30 mins outside my shirt just becomes a soaking wet rag, as a result I generally don't bother with one around the house.

They just need to do it in the morning or evening when things are cooler and drink a lot of water.

I should point out that people generally have places to be in the morning (Preferably in a clean state), and most probably don't even remotely want to think about it in the evening. Granted my boss exercises in the morning, but he also has a small building for an exercise room with air conditioning and TV and also owns his [expensive] business.

Now as for obesity itself I can only really relate observances of my sister and brother in law: They don't eat shit at home but basically stuff their faces everywhere else and eat out a lot...and don't get a lot of exercise from their jobs (Or at home, I've mowed their yard more times than they have, at least they pay), my sister teaches like 2nd Grade and her husband is some sort of programmer.

I, personally, get plenty of exercise (In our wonderful ~100F weather) and presumably still have a decent metabolism as I continue to be the opposite of obese.

[Fire Fly]

I was curious what health trends across the United States looked like and found a few interesting things. A lot more information can be obtained from the CDC's Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System.


Source


Source


Source


Source

Additionally, this site says that rural states, in particular Southern states, consume more gasoline per capita than states more urbanized.

So to answer the question of why Southerners are so fat, it's because they drive too much, don't exercise enough, and eat very poorly (just as the article says).

[Broomstick]

Here's what I see, based on my in-laws who are definitely southerners when they're not insisting they're Appalachian or redneck (yes, they're proud of that, mostly), living in Tennessee, Virgina, Kentucky, West Virginia, and North Carolina. With the understanding that there are exceptions (the Other Half being one of them, but there are others, usually living several hundred kilometers away from the idiots):

These people eat like their ancestors wanted to: pork=meat, meat=pork, and they eat porkmeat at every damn meal. What isn't porkmeat is friend in porkfat or somehow incorporates porkfat (a.k.a. "lard). Portions of meat are massive. Portions of starches - bread, cornbread, breading, etc. - are likewise massive. A typical dinner is porkloin breaded and deepfried that then has gravy (using porkfat) generously ladled over it. If there's a potato it's either mashed (with more gravy on top) or baked then layered with butter, sour cream, cheese, and bacon (see, more pork). Vegetables are typically prepared with lard or butter (or even both) and are very much an afterthought, frequently overcooked into mush, and seen as undesirable "poor people food".

Gardening is not done. That's what poor people do, and God forbid anyone admit they are poor. You buy your vegetables, whatever looks familiar at Piggly-Wiggly or Food Lion. Or better yet, buy pre-prepared food that you can heat up in the microwave, because store bought is always better than homemade, because only poor people have to cook from scratch - middle class and rich people can buy their food already made.

They are, by and large, fucking ignorant. My nephew on that side was the very first person in his extended family to graduate high school - and that was considered a foolish indulgence by many, the boy was lazy to stay in school instead of getting a job and earning money as soon as possible. No one reads unless they absolutely have to, most of them have no books at all in the home, and consider me extremely weird for having a library card (a couple of them didn't even know what a library card was!) Thus, their only information about the world comes from TV and maybe radio. Nutritional education (ha!) is what is advertised on TV, and even that is not to be trusted when it differs from multi-generational food customs. If it says "healthy" or "lite" on the box they believe it. Thus, their understanding of nutrition is somewhere between 1850 and nonexistent.

They do not exercise, and non-manual work is preferred. From their viewpoint, physical labor was the reason they used to own slaves. It is low class. Well, alright for a young man just starting out in life, but even there it's far better to get a job that doesn't involve physical work. Coal mining is a bit of an exception, as that is seen as acceptable for white men, but really you want to be management or an owner.

"Sport" usually involves something with a motor - boating is invariably motorized, never sailing. Only children too young to drive ride bicycles - a man's bike is a motorcycle. Or maybe an ATV. In any case, bicycling is dangerous due to narrow, winding roads, overloaded coal trucks, and either narrow or non-existent shoulders. Roads may be a slot cut through the mountains (there is nowhere to go but straight up a vertical cliff) or bordered by cliffs hundreds of meters tall - a certain number of people can and do drive off those roads, or fall off them, to their deaths every year.

There are parks in which one can hike, but invariably my in-laws regale me with tales of poisonous snakes and bear attacks. There are not entirely without basis - the venomous serpents include rattlesnakes, cottonmouths, and copperheads and they are found (and frequently killed) in town and suburb backyards. Well, that's why I wore sturdy hiking boots that rose partway up my shins. The bear attacks do occur - the last time I took my nephew out hiking that same afternoon someone in a neighboring county was mauled by a black bear. (It says something about the lack of exercise in that my 18 year old nephew, who had lived in the mountains all his life, could not keep up with his 42 year old aunt accustomed to living at an elevation 1.5 kilometers lower. I thought I was going to have to carry him back to the car.) We have also seen bear tracks in the back yard of my mother-in-law's house. But the animals, as noted, occur in town as well as in the parks. You could be bit by a snake or charged by a bear in the parking lot of McDonald's though yes, the chance is slightly higher in the parks. But my point is that animal attacks are feared and used as an excuse not to exercise in the parks, though it never seems to discourage people from going to Wal-Mart or Country Buffet.

So, their eating habits are deplorable, they're fucking ignorant, and they view exerting themselves physically as distasteful or low-class (as if you could get lower class than some of these assholes!) or, really, there is no pleasant way to say this - it's work for slaves. Or the black or brown people you hire for a pittance where possible to do that work for you.

Now, a lot of people from outside the south/Appalachia are settling in the region (the scenery is gorgeous, among other things) and the recent imports do tend to offset the native locals - it's why there are hiking trails in the local parks and why the Food Lion carries ethnic foods and "weird stuff" like kiwi fruit and arugula. But all those people are damn Yankees, of course they're weird and full of strange and even dangerous notions. Hopefully, some of the education and sense will spread via osmosis or something. But it's no puzzle to me that most of my in-laws are fucking grotesque in size. The exceptions tend to be rail thin (they eat very little, either because they don't like the food available or they're "nervous", which I suspect is code for "eating disorder leading to being skinny). The rail thin ones are actually no healthier - their diets are typically horrible (my mother-in-law didn't like pork - sorry, I mean, meat - so she didn't eat it hardly ever, being left with a few overcooked vegetables and too much cornbread and biscuits) and, as they don't exercise, they are physically weak. They are thin so much as emaciated and wasted.

The association between AIDS and meth abuse and being skinny does not help the situation - not only is being fat socially acceptable, in the case of women expected once they have children, but it also is proof you don't have the gay plague or use bad drugs (alcohol and weed being acceptable. Also, any painkillers you can score off your doctor are OK).

Yeah, perfect storm of obesity-inducing factors indeed.

Oh, forgot to add - no one drinks water if they can avoid it. It's what poor people do. Real people drink soft drinks or, if they're Real Men, beer. Or wiskey/bourbon. Or moonshine (yes, they still make moon shine). And everything is FULL of sugar. If you've ever had "Southern Style Sweet Tea" you know what I mean - the stuff has so much sugar you practically have to chew it. That's how ALL their beverages are.

[Commander 598]

Wow, that's bad even by North Louisiana standards. Also I think pork may be price related.

[Simon_Jester]

What's the situation like in the urban South, as opposed to the rural South?

[neoolong]

Oh, forgot to add - no one drinks water if they can avoid it. It's what poor people do. Real people drink soft drinks or, if they're Real Men, beer. Or wiskey/bourbon. Or moonshine (yes, they still make moon shine). And everything is FULL of sugar. If you've ever had "Southern Style Sweet Tea" you know what I mean - the stuff has so much sugar you practically have to chew it. That's how ALL their beverages are.

I had McDonald's Southern Sweet Tea, and man that thing was sweet. It was like half of it was sugar.

All you wrote is depressing, and reminds me of Idiocracy actually. Replace soft drinks and alcohol with Brawndo and it's the same thing.

[The Spartan]

What's the situation like in the urban South, as opposed to the rural South?

It's not great, but in my experience it's not nearly as bad as what Broomstick described. By and large...

[Broomstick]

Oh, forgot to add - no one drinks water if they can avoid it. It's what poor people do. Real people drink soft drinks or, if they're Real Men, beer. Or wiskey/bourbon. Or moonshine (yes, they still make moon shine). And everything is FULL of sugar. If you've ever had "Southern Style Sweet Tea" you know what I mean - the stuff has so much sugar you practically have to chew it. That's how ALL their beverages are.

I had McDonald's Southern Sweet Tea, and man that thing was sweet. It was like half of it was sugar.

I have in-laws that add sugar to McDonald's southern sweet tea because it's not sweet like "real" southern sweet tea. Man, that stuff causes tooth cavities and diabetic comas at 10 paces.

What's the situation like in the urban South, as opposed to the rural South?

It's not great, but in my experience it's not nearly as bad as what Broomstick described. By and large...

Gotta remember, Appalachia is a third-world country. It's like the South, only more so in some respects.

Don't ask me about snake-handling churches and the strychnine drinking.

[Darth Wong]

It sounds like your Appalachian relatives follow the "things my momma told me" school of thought, where everything is judged by whether it fits the things they were taught before they were six years old. This kind of person exists entirely on feeling and instinct (which he is too stupid to realize are both rooted in early childhood pattern forming rather than any kind of inherently right or wrong moral foundation).

[Aaron]

Gotta remember, Appalachia is a third-world country. It's like the South, only more so in some respects.

Don't ask me about snake-handling churches and the strychnine drinking.

You can't drop something like that and not expect to be asked about it, I've heard of snake-handling but strychnine drinking?

Reading your bit about your relatives makes the rednecks here look like bastions of logic and reason, I honestly though that sort of thing was an invention of Hollywood.

[Darth Wong]

Gotta remember, Appalachia is a third-world country. It's like the South, only more so in some respects.

Don't ask me about snake-handling churches and the strychnine drinking.

You can't drop something like that and not expect to be asked about it, I've heard of snake-handling but strychnine drinking?

I actually know about that one. In the gospel of Mark (IIRC) there is a passage where it says that the true believers can drink poison and not be harmed. As a result, some crazed religious fanatics have taken to building up a resistance to certain poisons over a period of years, so that they can drink small quantities without dying. In doing so, they believe that they are fulfilling prophecy, and that they are proving their own Jesus follower credentials.

[neoolong]

Appalachia is the part of the country where you get Mountain Dew Mouth. They give Mountain Dew to babies. I'd believe anything at this point.

[Frank Hipper]

Broomstick, you may rememember from my grandmother's funeral thread last year that my mom's side of the family is from deepest, darkest Kentucky.

But, honestly.....jesus.



Do you actually claim these people?

[Broomstick]

Well, they're not ALL like that. I've occasionally had to tolerate them at family gatherings (my mother-in-law, after the departure of one of these demonstrations of why inbreeding is a bad idea, struggled to find something positive to say. After much pondering she came up with "At least he was sober this time") but mostly I haven't had to "claim" them. Everyone is related to someone unpleasant. My Other Half is NOT like those people, if he was I wouldn't be married to him. My nephew who graduated high school obviously is different from worst of them (though I have concerns he'll wind up like no better in the end)

Here's a short video about the practice of "snake handling".

And.... here's humorous take on it, with many of the images taken from snake handling services, including one shot where you can see someone chugging some strychnine water in the background.

In fairness to my in-laws none of them (so far as I know) are a member of a snake handling church. These sorts of oddball practices persist due mainly to isolation, as many of these mountain towns are very hard to get to even these days, being off the beaten path down country roads that aren't always well marked.

[Darth Wong]

Well, they're not ALL like that. I've occasionally had to tolerate them at family gatherings (my mother-in-law, after the departure of one of these demonstrations of why inbreeding is a bad idea, struggled to find something positive to say. After much pondering she came up with "At least he was sober this time") but mostly I haven't had to "claim" them. Everyone is related to someone unpleasant. My Other Half is NOT like those people, if he was I wouldn't be married to him. My nephew who graduated high school obviously is different from worst of them (though I have concerns he'll wind up like no better in the end)

Here's a short video about the practice of "snake handling".

And.... here's humorous take on it, with many of the images taken from snake handling services, including one shot where you can see someone chugging some strychnine water in the background.

In fairness to my in-laws none of them (so far as I know) are a member of a snake handling church. These sorts of oddball practices persist due mainly to isolation, as many of these mountain towns are very hard to get to even these days, being off the beaten path down country roads that aren't always well marked.

I can't help but think that the whole area would look just like "Deliverance".

[Broomstick]

Actually, I've always been afraid to watch Deliverance because of that...

I once watched O Brother Where Art Thou? on a big screen TV while seated in my mother-in-law's basement while squished between to beer slurping hillbillies on a couch that was held up on one side by a piece of two by four. They didn't "get it" - meanwhile, I had the horribly uncomfortable sensation of feeling like I was actually in the movie with some of the stupider characters.

[The Spartan]

I have in-laws that add sugar to McDonald's southern sweet tea because it's not sweet like "real" southern sweet tea. Man, that stuff causes tooth cavities and diabetic comas at 10 paces.

Oh god I hate that shit. I used to eat at this place when I was in college and I'd have to get them to mix unsweetened with sweet tea. People didn't understand why I did that. Well, it's because it wasn't tea! It was sugar water that was tea colored. I've had Kool-Aid that wasn't that sweet. I mean I like a little sweetness in my tea, but I grew up in a house with a Scot and while we didn't drink gourmet teas or anything I expect to actually taste, you know, tea when I drink it.

Sorry, pet peeve of mine.

Gotta remember, Appalachia is a third-world country. It's like the South, only more so in some respects.

Don't ask me about snake-handling churches and the strychnine drinking.

I never really thought about it in that way, but yeah I can see how it would be. Though I've never encountered places like that.

Though I do know about the snake-handling churches and what not. I've never been to one or encountered someone who participated but I know about them. Crazy fucks.

[LadyTevar]

*reads Broomstick's long rant about her In-Laws*
*sighes*

Even in my own family, which I will freely admit has a Celtic Knotwork for a family tree (yes it DOES Branch, dammit, but the branches start weaving amongst each other and back every few generations), this level of backwoods is looked down upon. I think it's because my grandparent's generation tried to get their kids out and educated, and those kids got the grandkids out and educated. We were pushed to read, to learn, to make the best of ourselves. Having several Military Vets in the family probably helped, as they had 'gotten out of the holler' and wanted their children to do the same.
I actually felt -bad- because I didn't finish college and was working for the longest time as food service or hotel employee, because I had so many cousins working as medical professionals, ministers, office professionals, and teachers.

However, there is a side of my family that is generational welfare recipients. By now, it might be on the 6th generation, as they had no concept of birth control. Dad and Mom both would not let us mix with that side of the family. I knew them from school, where they were all the worse stereotypes of backwoods white trash -- unwashed in body and clothing, uncouth, often in remedial classes, and often dropped out of school by age 15.

I and my cousins were pushed to be better than 'that side of the family', so I escaped that part of the "Appalachian Curse". Still, a few of the 'Curses' caught up to us. The majority of us can be labeled 'obese' rather than 'overweight' -- one part genetics we like to think, but our 'comfort foods' don't help. Most of us have Good Jobs, but they had to leave the state to get them. Amusingly, very few moved Up North; the majority of the family lives South of the Mason-Dixon line, with a few exceptions West of the Mississippi (Like the one who went to Washington State, married a girl out there, brought her home and found out she was a 3rd Cousin Twice Removed). We don't exercise much after we reach age 20, but we ran and biked and hiked and played outdoors like kids should do until that point. Now a nice walk around the store is about the most we do, except those who own houses and do yardwork. The older women (35 and up) get really into diets once the 'middle-age spread' starts, but the men just belt their pants below the belly and ignore it. Having all your teeth by age 50 is a bonus, since the dentist is expensive, and there's other bills that need paying first.

Yet we drink our sweet tea (except for the diabetics who have admitted it's better unsweet). We eat our fried potatos and onions (those with heart disease sneak it in the 'bake, boil, or broil' menu). We put salt on our corn and watermelon (or the Mrs Dash/salt subtitutes for those with high blood pressure). We try to count our calories (those on diets), or say 'hell with it, I'm fat' and just do as we please. The men often die first, to heart-related illnesses. The women die of cancers that often follow the genetic lines (breast, ovarian). But we don't change our habits from what we learned from our parents and grandparents that much.

[LadyTevar]

Gotta remember, Appalachia is a third-world country. It's like the South, only more so in some respects.

Don't ask me about snake-handling churches and the strychnine drinking.

I never really thought about it in that way, but yeah I can see how it would be. Though I've never encountered places like that.

Though I do know about the snake-handling churches and what not. I've never been to one or encountered someone who participated but I know about them. Crazy fucks.

Religion is the opiate of the masses. Appalachian families need that opium, need the support and hope religion gives them. They want to hear that God's got a better place in heaven for them, and that all the little things that happen to them in this world have a meaning.
"Satan is alive in West Virginia" is a common saying from the pulpits. Fundies have made a stronghold here, because so many are wanting someone to tell them it's not their fault they are struggling in this economy. We try to cling to our traditions, and it's used against us, telling us that Science and Progress are bad.

But we knew that. We see Progress cutting the trees off the hillsides, then stripping the mountain top away. We see our children leaving for jobs in other states, because there's no work here. We see towns where our grandparents were born vanish back into brier and bramble, because the coal mine closed decades ago and everyone moved away. We see Progress... and it's either killing us, robbing us, or smothering us. Is there a better reason to try to shut ourselves away? Try to build a fortress of religion, that still tells us that Hope is there? That for all we suffer now, Temples and Riches await once we die?
It worked with the poor, the lost, the dispossessed, the slaves of the Roman Empire. Why not work with the lost, dispossessed people of Appalachia?

[Frank Hipper]

Well, they're not ALL like that. I've occasionally had to tolerate them at family gatherings (my mother-in-law, after the departure of one of these demonstrations of why inbreeding is a bad idea, struggled to find something positive to say. After much pondering she came up with "At least he was sober this time") but mostly I haven't had to "claim" them. Everyone is related to someone unpleasant. My Other Half is NOT like those people, if he was I wouldn't be married to him. My nephew who graduated high school obviously is different from worst of them (though I have concerns he'll wind up like no better in the end)

Well, in all fairness, I'd never discuss the worst of my family (on either side!) for fear of possible prosecution/angry mobs.

And that's with them dead...in one case for 30+ years.

[Steve]

Sweet tea? Bah. Southern savages, tea is best without sugar!.... yes, I know, I live in Florida and we're in the Southeast too. Thankfully we're in the one part of the Union where the further north you go, the further South you are.

Anyway, I admit to being overweight and I don't work out as I should, but I'm not above walking down to the CVS for milk or to pick up my dad's prescriptions and have even walked to the nearby Target and Publix to get things. It helps that where my Dad and I live in Orlando permits easy access to various places as opposed to where I grew up (out in the boonies, a rural town called Osteen, on a dirt road even). Though with it being the middle of summer now I usually do such walking trips late in the day at sunset or try to get them done early.

The gist, though, is that I don't mind walking and think that refusal to walk is, well, pretty goddamned stupid.

[Stark]

But we knew that. We see Progress cutting the trees off the hillsides, then stripping the mountain top away. We see our children leaving for jobs in other states, because there's no work here. We see towns where our grandparents were born vanish back into brier and bramble, because the coal mine closed decades ago and everyone moved away. We see Progress... and it's either killing us, robbing us, or smothering us. Is there a better reason to try to shut ourselves away? Try to build a fortress of religion, that still tells us that Hope is there? That for all we suffer now, Temples and Riches await once we die?
It worked with the poor, the lost, the dispossessed, the slaves of the Roman Empire. Why not work with the lost, dispossessed people of Appalachia?

So you're saying when the economy tanks and everyone moves to where the jobs are - except you - that's why it's okay for you to become religious and fat? Everyone else followed the economy; why not you? Parochialism? Stubbornness? Fear?

Hell, I could write the same post from the perspective of horse wagon manufacturers.