In Shrek 1, Lord Farquaad was convinced he had created the perfect kingdom:  “Mirror, mirror on the wall is this not the most perfect kingdom of them all.”  He was convinced the fairy tale creatures in his kingdom were a blight in his otherwise perfect world and had them gathered up and dumped onto Shrek’s swamp.   At the same time, the Ginger Bread Man was being held in Lord Farquaad’s dungeon, and Farquaad threatened to remove the Ginger Bread Man’s gumdrop button, if he didn’t tell him where the Muffin Man was.  The Ginger Bread Man told Lord Farquaad, “You’re a monster!”  Farquaad replied, “I’m not the monster here, you are. You and the rest of that fairy tale trash, poisoning my perfect world.”  Shrek might just be a movie but it does make many good social points!

The Senate proposal (original article is no longer available but here’s another related article)  for healthcare reform proposes stiff penalties for being overweight or a smoker.  The concept is nothing new.  Private insurers and employers have been doing the same for many years.  I always found it rather intrusive of my privacy to answer questions from my insurance company twice a year about my eating and exercise habits and my mental well-being.  If I didn’t fill out and return the questionnaire, my premium would be doubled.  A few weeks after I sent off the survey, I’d receive letters from the insurance company telling me how I could improve my health based upon my answers.

In some ways, that seems benign enough.  Reducing cost is a great benefit to insurance companies.  After all, insurance companies just want to collect monthly premiums and never pay out.  It’s in their best interest that I remain healthy and never go to the doctor.  However, being forced to divulge my medical history or lifestyle to a private or government entity bothers me.  For it wasn’t truly my best interest that was at heart; it was their interest – a profitable interest.

Sure, it’s great to educate people about fitness and health.  We should take care of ourselves better and think about the ramifications of smoking, binge drinking and eating buckets of lard.  Personal responsibility is of huge importance in a Democracy.  However, equality means we are all of equal importance, and deserve equal treatment  – regardless of our waistlines.

Adolph Hitler believed in the concept of a “master race.”  Beyond his belief that the Aryan race was superior, he also believed in physical fitness – everyone was to be buff, chiseled, blond-haired, blue-eyed and smart.  He believed there was a hierarchy in the human race, with Aryans on top and dark-skinned people on the bottom.  What bothers me about penalizing people, who don’t fit whatever government thinks is the ideal weight and BMI, we too are creating a hierachy of “the worthy” and “the unworthy”.

The worthy deserve health coverage because they won’t cost the government a lot of money; the unworthy should be punished because they don’t fit the mold.  “Ask not what eating that doughnut will do to your waistline, as what that doughnut will do to the nation’s bottom-line.”  It’s a slippery slope that leads to government intrusion and mandates upon what we do with our own bodies.

In the Senate’s proposal, the Ginger Bread Man and the Muffin Man would be considered “poison” to a perfect world, imprisoned along with the Potato Chip Man, the Cheeseburger Man and the Soda Pop Man.