How fat was Henry Vlll?

We are living in an age which seems to be dominated by health issues and we are continually bombarded by what we should or shouldn’t eat or drink; what is a healthy amount of alcohol to consume, how many pieces of fruit is good for us and how much exercise we should be having. Our BMIs have become as much a measure of our worth as our salaries and the length of our cars. Before anyone starts jumping down my throat accusing me of justifying fatness, I am not, I am noticing how powerful our attitudes are and how programmed we have become to hate flesh and therefore hate ourselves.
But there are more subtle and corrosive attitudes which are driving our health consciousness and they are far more dangerous to our health than our weight. The message seems loud and clear – fat is bad, thin is good.
My wife and I watched a brilliant film the other night called ‘The other Boleyn Girl’ about the sister of Henry Vlll’s wife Anne Boleyn. What hit me immediately was King Henry’s stature. The actor who played Henry was Eric Baner, a slim muscled, hansom American Actor. Now, as I remember it Henry Vlll was a fat geezer and my guess is that his women were curvaceous women and not holywoodesque skinnies. Undoubtedly Natalie Portman and Scarlet Johansen play their roles superbly; I just wonder whether the real Boleyn girls looked quite as perfect.
I highly recommend this film; however, I am upset that we have to have stereotypes in the lead roles of films so somehow we will all feel inclined to see it. The implication therefore, is that fatties aren’t attractive enough and may even put us off seeing a film. This is the same nonsense that our fashion industry slaps us around our fat bottoms with. Thankfully, from time to time, I see an advert for cloths with real people wearing them.

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