Not examples of Ms Deen's recipes - just a load of high-fat foods, courtesy of the National Cancer Institute
Having looked through some of her recipes - I'm struck by two things; 1) the amount of meat, fat, and sugar she uses, and 2) how alien her food seems to me, a non-(southern)American! I'd have thought that anyone with the slightest bit of nous would be able to adapt her recipes to be healthier (113g butter to cook 200g bacon and one onion??? Ouch!), so whose fault is it that they don't? I'm not trying to defend Ms Deen (goodness knows, from the recipes I've seen, I can feel my arteries begin to harden just by reading the ingredients lists), I'm saying that just because one person says and does something, it doesn't mean everyone has to follow them like sheep...even if they are a 'sleb. And by 'everyone', I mean a significant amount of people, not literally every single American! And by 'sleb, I mean someone who is apparently vaguely famous.
As far as I know, no one has ever held a gun to the head of any American, and forced them to replicate Ms Deen's recipes and gorge themselves silly. I'm pretty certain that, like some manic culinary Santa, Ms Deen has not visited the homes of every overweight American, and left a trough of artery-clogging deep-fried-chocolate-cake, along with a note saying, "Eat this or I will make a pie from your fat babies". So why all the hate?
What happened to free will? Did free-thinking adults become overweight because a celebrity cook forced them to eat their food, or did it happen because they chose what they put into their mouths? I know I became overweight by my own volition, not because of anything anyone else said or did. I take full responsibility for it, just as I am taking responsibility for becoming less lardy, and much fitter.
Certainly it seems that Ms Deen has known about her diabetes for a while now, yet has continued to promote her 'traditional' recipes (for 'traditional' read, 'food we used to eat when we worked at hard physical labour for 12 hours a day'); it could be argued that she perhaps should have cleaned up her food, and promoted a healthier approach to cooking, and actually she has - but she continues, it seems, to still serve up 'the wrong stuff'. Thing is, even though she's essentially telling people it's OK to eat this food, she is not responsible for making the nation fat. No more than Whitney Houston is responsible for all the crackheads, or Billy-Bob Thornton for all the serial adulterers. I should add that I don't actually know that Mr Thornton is a serial adulterer, I'm merely repeating internet-gleaned information....which may be spurious!
My point is that what's wrong with America (and the UK, and anywhere else you care to name) is all the people who, rather than take full responsibility for their actions, blame anything and everything/one they can. People who continue to whine about the unfairness of life, how unjust their system is*, how unhealthy their food culture is, and a million other things most people are too bloody lazy to get off their arses and be bothered to even try to change. If people put as much energy into sorting out their lives as they do complaining about how unfair everything is, they'd be super-healthy and super-fit in hardly any time at all, I'm sure of it! Isn't it about time people grew up, and accepted responsibility for their own lives and actions instead of constantly whining and blaming the media, TV, magazines, celebrities, etc.?
And before you start thinking, "Oh it's OK for her, she is super-virtuous", I have to tell you that if I put as much effort into my workouts as I do into procrastinating and pontificating, I'd be kicking Jillian Michaels and Tony Horton's butts into next week!
*I'm obviously not talking about fascist regimes, dictatorships, etc., and other places where quality of life really is terrible.
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