UPDATE: British Transport Police have responded to the news, tweeting:
You know how some people go out of their way to be pricks? Well, there’s a person – or maybe some people, plural – out there, who is/are printing up cards full of anti-fat hate and handing them out to people on London’s Tube. As far as we know, only women have been handed the cards, both by men, both at Oxford Circus underground station.
The card says ‘Fat’ on one side, and, on the other, ‘Overweight Haters Ltd’ in a big green font. We think they’ve added the ‘Ltd’ to give them the illusion of some authority, so that nobody mistakes them for a group of/just one pathetic little troll(s).
Anyway, the subheading is ‘It’s really not glandular, it’s your gluttony…’ perhaps failing to recognise their own hormone glands’ influence in their decision to spend time carefully printing and cutting out these cards.
Here's a few problems we've got with these guys. Oh, this is by no means an exhaustive list. We're sure there's plenty more reasons to get mad at people who delight in making others miserable...
World hunger is a bit more complicated than 'fat people take food'
The main text on the card reads ‘Our organisation [we’ve researched this, Overweight Haters don’t even have a Twitter account!] hates and resents fat people [we got that, thanks]. We object to the enormous amount of food resources you consume while half the world starves.’
FYI socioeconomics fans, only one in nine people in the world is starving. That's not great, but it's accurate. and they’re not starving because ‘fat’ people are taking their food. It’s more to do with poverty, corrupt/disorganised leaders refusing to invest in agriculture and drought. Unsurprisingly, world hunger is not as simple as that time your parents tried to make five-year-old you finish your dinner by telling you there are children in Africa going hungry, and you responded by bleating ‘Well send it to them, then!’
Obesity isn't exclusively caused by greed
‘We disapprove of your wasting NHS money to treat your selfish greed.’
FYI, obesity isn’t always caused by greed – some people really are born that way – but if greed is these people’s problem, they should probably branch out to shaming corporations that don't pay tax, or people who drink and smoke, costing the NHS £3.5 billion and £2.7 billion respectively. But then again, maybe they just don’t have enough paper/time to go around handing these little notes to everyone drinking or smoking or generally being a bit greedy.
‘And we do not understand why you fail to grasp that by eating less you will better off, slimmer, happy and find a partner who is not a perverted chubby-lover, or even find a partner at all.’
Another quick route to feeling happier? Not having twerps like ‘Overweight Haters’ hand you little hand-made fliers telling you you’re fat.
‘We also object that the beautiful [sic] pig is used as an insult. You are not a pig. You are a fat, ugly human.’
'Overweight Haters' could do with a better hobby...
It’s all a bit presumptious – what if the person they’re handing the card out is very beautiful? Does the fat get in the way of the beauty? What if they see someone they deem as painfully ugly and would like to insult them, too? Does each member/the one loser of ‘Overweight Haters' carry a Tippex with them so they can carefully amend their little notes before handing them to a stranger on the Tube? How do these 'Overweight Haters' handle Tippex on the Tube when it’s hurtling and wobbling through tunnels? Do they not just get covered with splashes of the Tippex, making it look* just like* they've spent the day at home in their mum's basement having a wank instead of paying close to a fiver to get on a Tube to do their valiant duty of handing people mean and hateful cards?
Unfortunately this whole exchange has left us with many more questions than answers. Apart from the answer to the question ‘should “Overweight Haters” get a better hobby and stop being pricks/pretending they’re a group when they’re one hateful lonely person? To which the answer is a resounding ‘hell yes!’
One person handed the card was Kara Florish, who’s posted on Facebook to say ‘this is hateful and cowardly’. Another is an unknown woman tweeted about today:
On the plus-size side, she’s been offered a free outfit worth up to £500 by Navabi Fashion, who have also announced they’ll be handing out their own ‘You look GREAT’ cards at Oxford Circus tube today!
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Follow Sophie on Twitter @sophwilkinson
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.