I'm Voting For Obama Anyway
No, I don’t usually write about politics here, but I am absolutely obsessed with the American presidential election. I can’t even tell you how many times a day I check FiveThirtyEight; it’s a sickness. So when I found an article about fat people and the election, I made a beeline for my web browser so I could tell you about it.
You see, it turns out there might be a correlation between fat voters and voters who favor Republican candidate John McCain. (Be warned that the article has its fair share of OMG FAT AMERICANS subtext.)
Of the 10 fattest states, nine show strong support for the Republican nominee, John McCain… Of the 10 least obese and overweight states, eight support the Democratic nominee, Barack Obama…
There are many confounding factors here imposed on traditional voting patterns – a link between poverty and obesity, that the conservative states of the South traditionally enjoy fried foods, and the influence of the healthier cuisines of Asia and the Mediterranean on the east and west coasts.
As a fervent Obama supporter, the idea that fat person = McCain voter makes me indignant, so I’m starting a group called Fat Americans for Barack (F.A.B. for short—it’ll be FAB).But it’s also good news, if you’re me, since the same fatness percentages predict an Obama win:
Using the percentage of their populations that is obese and overweight as an indicator, the slimmer Colorado, Florida, Nevada and Virginia – where the race is now considered too close to call – should deliver 54 electoral college votes to Obama.
Even if McCain wins all those toss-up states that are more obese and overweight – that is, Indiana, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio – that would give him only 57 additional electoral college votes. Thus, the weightometre has Obama winning the presidential race by a margin of at least 318 electoral college votes to 220.
This is probably as “scientific” a prediction method as the elephants, the coffee cups, or the cookies (all of which also favor Obama). Obviously people of all shapes and sizes in every one of the fifty states can and should and will vote for the candidate of their choice. But what can I say? Three weeks until the election, and I just can’t help myself.
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Cold Hard Cash, International, Media
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This fat chick is definitely voting for Obama!
Me too
Heh. So I apparently don’t exist – a fat woman from Virginia who is voting for Obama. ;)
yay FAB!!!!!
I’m a fat chick that lives in Maryland, so I guess I don’t exist either.
I guess I’m just bucking all the odds. I’m a woman, but my vag has yet to convince me to vote for Palin, plus I’m fat. And I voted for Clinton in the primary, so I’m supposed to be jilted and bitter. Still for Obama, somehow.
omg. I’m such an anomaly. haha
I hate these studies. We hear so many polls, studies, findings from reliable sources, research firms, universities, etc.
Do they really mean what they claim to? I don’t know.
The thing I hate the most, though, is that some people swallow this studies as truth, hook, line, and sinker.
Pweah. I’m fat and I live in Massachusetts. I’m clearly an anomaly.
It does seem that the coastal cities have fewer fat people, and they are also more liberal, so there probably is a correlation, but I am certain that in this case (unlike any others, of course) correlation is not causation.
Obama is working hard to court the fat vote. Just a few days ago he gave a wonderful and important speech about pie. I look forward to hearing him speak on the issues of pizza and cookies as well. He has earned my vote by directly addressing issues that are important to me and fat people in general.
There are many confounding factors here imposed on traditional voting patterns – a link between poverty and obesity, that the conservative states of the South traditionally enjoy fried foods, and the influence of the healthier cuisines of Asia and the Mediterranean on the east and west coasts.
I hate to see statistics used for evil. *Wails and gnashes teeth*
I wonder if they took the time to compare areas with high population density (i.e. people have to walk more and drive less) with areas of low density. Or really… anything… valid.
You know about http://www.270towin.com right? IT LETS YOU RUN SIMULATIONS OF THE ELECTION. I cannot tell you how many times a day I run it just so I can watch Obama’s electoral count go through the roof. I’ve been doing that for over a week and it has never once gone to McCain.
I’m addicted to 538 too. They posted about voter regs in my state today! Woo!
tara – I saw part of his pie speech last night on Rachel Maddow. My bestie and I decided that his campaign staff must’ve bet him he couldn’t work it in 5 times and he used it 15 just to show him he could. lol
OK,
I’m squarely within the Obama camp, but doesn’t this strike everyone as more of the classicist shitty-ness that’s become more prevalent and divisive in American politics?
It makes me wonder if there aren’t even more potential Obama supporters out there who feel left out by the broad demographic swaths being drawn, and maybe feel -even subconciously- as though the Obama coalition has no place for ‘people like them’?
Holls is onto something there.
For a different side of this issue, that’s been bothering me, I’ve found that some of the lefty writers have been playing on fat stereotyping to insult McCain supporters as fat/lazy/stupid. The worst example I’ve found was this:
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/23318320/mad_dog_palin
If I wasn’t already voting for Obama I’d sure pause before joining a club that, based on Tiabbi’s words, sure doesn’t seem to want to have me as a member.
Holls, I don’t know how to address that, because I live in a city so blue it sometimes turns green.
But I think Shane is probably right – not individual fat people (like my fat, white, middle-class, unmarried working mom Obama-supporting self) but *rates* of obesity are linked to age, inequality, lack of access to health care…and those things are clearly political demographic markers.
I’ll join FAB! Make a internet logo and I’ll put it on my LJ.
OC – Matt Tiabbi is a fatphobe. In every single article he writes, he writes disgusting caricatures of fat people, no matter the topic. Ignore him, he does not speak for Obama.
Ooh, I want to be in FAB! I’m just like Liza: a fat Coastie with a vagina who voted Hillary in the primary and yet still plans to vote for Obama come next month.
This study is brimful of scienterrific conflations and classist hogwash. Phooey upon it, I say.
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Thanks for the comment and link, Mo Pie. Love your blog! Much love and GoBama!
Apparently I’m proof that you can be as fat on organic produce and fair trade coffee as you can on pork rinds and fried chicken. There’s nothing Red State about the size of my ass, thank you very much!
ooh! Make it a facebook group and I will join that thing so fast!!
From this side of the Pond I don’t get the impression Barack Obama is any friend whatsoever to fat people. He’s been very keen to keep using that ‘1980 levels of obesity’ soundbite (did they even *measure* obesity in 1980?) when talking about healthcare. OK, so he may be reflecting popular and professional opinion about the pseudo-issue of ‘obesity’ having never really examined his own stance in any depth, but given that he’s a statist and an interventionist in the mould of recent British governments I’m still concerned about the implications of this ignorance (and policies that may arise from it) for fat rights.
Barack Obama is big on providing health coverage and disease prevention to the poorest Americans.
He’s also big on helping to reform food assistance programs.
I know that obesity isn’t always the same as unhealthy, but it can and does make it difficult for people who are at risk for certain health problems.
What he wants is to provide people with adequate care and medical support to be healthy at whatever weight is right for them.
Well, I’m fat and voting for McCain. (Had to throw it out there. =-)
I knew there was at least one of you out there!
Fat, in Texas, and voting for Obama!
Actually, there are at least two of us… here’s another fat girl who will be voting for McCain. Frankly, the alternative scares me to death. I won’t be fat for much longer if Barry is elected, that’s for sure. People talk about Obama’s plans for “providing health coverage and disease prevention”, but don’t ask where the funds will be coming from to pay for all these feel good programs and promises. People need to dig a little deeper and ask some important questions about how these programs will be implemented and what the promises REALLY mean, instead of just believing the hype they hear on the evening news (i.e., liberal media.)
Aside from that (and getting back to the original question) – I remember a book from my college Econ class, entitled “How to Lie With Statistics.” You can prove anything you want by manipulating the numbers. Generalizations are just another way to try to make people believe what you want them to.
i don’t understand the reasoning / logic behind fat people voting for mccain? Why are they more likely to vote republican and not democrat? It’s an interesting article anyway. I should think that Obama would do more for fat people because of a better health plan, etc.
Another fat chick voting for Obama.
Obama might not be going into specifics about his plans, just yet, but at least he’s GOT PLANS. Which is more than I can say for McCain – who didn’t say a word about how he’d be paying for his ignorant campaign of hate against fat people (oh, didja conveniently not hear that part, fat McCain supporters? Yeah. He said that dreaded ‘obesity’ word).
Plus, I’d like to keep what few rights I have as a woman in this country. If McCain wins, we’ll all be expected to get married to a guy and head right back to the kitchen where we belong. If a candidate can’t treat his own WIFE respectfully, how the hell do you think he’ll treat the nation’s women. Wake up and grow up and get your head out of the sand.
UGH. Even if you aren’t fat or whatever, voting for McCain is stupid. I AGREE WITH LIL. McCain is not a good face for America for every reason out there, including the fact that he is ugly too. Obama sucks too but at least he’s not crazy. Let’s all just vote for oursevles election day… I wonder what that would do.. I’m totally serious.
Wow. Thanks for the reasonable, adult arguments for your case, rebecca – NOT! Not voting for McCain because he’s ugly? Oy vay – I fear for the future of this country with voters using criteria such as this for their decision making. Do us all a favor and stay home on November 4th.
Babs,
My mom voted for Bill Clinton in 1992 because she quote “thought he looked much hotter in his running shorts than George Bush Senior and she couldn’t stand to look at another 4 years of media covering the old man out on jogs.”
For reals.
I’ll be voting Democrat for the first time this Fall when I vote for McCain. Yeah, that’s right, John McCain has mostly Democratic ideals so much so he almost dumped the Republican Party for the Democratic one just a few years ago.
But I’m fat, so I guess a vote for McCain was aligned in the stars…….or in the Star Crunch Cookies. Whatever.
Barack Obama is more than pro-choice. He is pro-infanticide. He’s the only Senator in both the Illinois Senate and the House Senate to vote NO on the Born Alive Infant Protection Bill which would provide medical care to a baby who survives a partial birth abortion. He said that it would be a “burden” to call a doctor to attend the suffering baby and that it would contradict the mother’s orginal decision. He even went as far as to deny that a live baby born is a citizen with Constitutional rights by declaring it as a “viable fetus” instead of a baby. Seriously WTF?
I am fat, Californian (San Diego Chicana), a Mediterannean/organic foods freak, educated to doctorate level and a die-hard Obama supporter. Since before the primaries and from the 2004 Dem convention. Never considered Hillary because to me Obama was smarter, more sensible, has a broader view of the world and other cultures, and is better educated. Yes, I look at where they went to school and research their GPAs….LOL
I am a complete freak of nature according to this stats I think…
Hugs,
Milla
Another Texan for Obama here, doing my part to turn a red state blue. McCain frightens me, and Palin frightens me more. We’ve had 8 years of Republican “leadership” and I don’t think we can afford 8 more.