Beyond the antivaxx stuff MAHA is either banal or fake
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The President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports was established in 1956 by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in response to concerns about the declining physical fitness of American youth. The catalyst for this initiative was a 1953 study comparing the fitness levels of American and European children, which found that over 50% of American kids failed basic physical fitness tests, compared to only 8% of European children. This alarmed U.S. officials, who saw physical fitness as crucial to national security, especially in the Cold War era.
Early Years (1950s–1960s)
• Eisenhower formed the President’s Council on Youth Fitness, with Vice President Richard Nixon as its first chair.
• In 1960, President John F. Kennedy rebranded it as the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and aggressively promoted fitness through public campaigns. He even published an article, “The Soft American,” in Sports Illustrated, urging Americans to embrace physical activity.
• Schools were encouraged to implement new physical education programs, and in 1966, the President’s Physical Fitness Award was introduced to recognize students who excelled in fitness tests.Expansion and Peak Popularity (1970s–1980s)
• President Lyndon B. Johnson added “Sports” to the Council’s name in 1966, making it the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports to emphasize both general fitness and organized sports.
• Under President Richard Nixon, the Council developed the President’s Physical Fitness Test, a standardized set of exercises in schools that included:
• Pull-ups (or flexed-arm hang for girls)
• Sit-ups
• Shuttle run
• 50-yard dash
• One-mile run
• Sit-and-reach flexibility test
• In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan promoted fitness through celebrity endorsements, and Arnold Schwarzenegger became the Chairman of the Council in 1990 under President George H.W. Bush, boosting its visibility.Decline and Shift (1990s–2013)
• Over time, concerns grew that the test discouraged less athletic kids rather than promoting lifelong fitness habits.
• In 2013, the Presidential Youth Fitness Program replaced the old fitness test, focusing on health-based fitness standards rather than competitive benchmarks.The program’s legacy remains significant, as it helped shape physical education in American schools for decades. Let me know if you’d like more details on any era!
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The most amazing thing is that we knew as scientific fact that smoking was bad for you long, long before it reached its current low levels. One is tempted to think cultural messaging and social factors that go along in that stew, played a larger role than the academic truths that pre-existed them. But I know that the smart people don't actually think that cultural messaging or cultural forces in general are important, as compared to academic truths.
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But yes, the T2 diabetes thing can be hammered home, they can talk about blindness, amputations, comas, all that, they can talk about how it's epidemic just as much as being gross and fat (most often messaged in simply aesthetic terms). These things can make a dent in the culture, and "fat Matt" (a name I never call him myself, as I think it is mean) will have to find a way to accept that without complaining too much.
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The cultural messaging re cigarettes was going full blast already in the 70s. At some point smoking became uncool among higher social status people. While it would be idiotic to say health concerns weren’t a cause of that, it wasn’t so simple as getting the message out on, say, MTV instead of PBS Newshour.
Honestly being in shape and eating well long ago completely swept through higher status US culture. Like smoking, it lags in middle America and among the poor.
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If the findings are the same as all of the other studies, is it really going to change anybody's mind?
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Depends on who's lying to whom.
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@Jolly said in Beyond the antivaxx stuff MAHA is either banal or fake:
Depends on who's lying to whom.
A simple 'no' would probably have been easier.
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Trust, once broken, is hard to regain.
It's why cheating kills marriages.
“Cry havoc and let slip the DOGE of war!”
Those who cheered as J-6 American prisoners were locked in solitary for 18 months without trial, now suddenly fight tooth and nail for foreign terrorists’ "due process". — Buck Sexton
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@Jolly said in Beyond the antivaxx stuff MAHA is either banal or fake:
Trust, once broken, is hard to regain.
It's why cheating kills marriages.
The bogus link between autism and MMR vaccines goes back decades. The lying and fraud started in the 90's, and it wasn't perpetrated by those who support vaccination.
I was only joking
