There comes a time when you fade into the blackness

Now that I'm An Adult, I have a lot of daily rituals. My alarm goes off at 5:25 a.m. and I hit the snooze button on 5-minute increments until I get up at 5:35. I go to the gym directly after work, spend 30-50 minutes on an elliptical or treadmill, consider doing a few weight exercises, don't, and leave. Tuesdays are House. Every day is cereal.

I've also begun listening to Eric and Kathy's morning radio show on 101.9 (THE MIX!) during my drive to work. Unfortunately, since I don't have cable or even basic television, the short, culture-heavy news blurb on their show is often the only taste of "news" that I get (save for when I start to feel guilty about my uninformedness and browse the BBC website, which happens every fourth day or so). My perspective on "news" gets understandably distorted, considering today's E&K news segment spent 5 seconds on the election results and 30 on the fact that Chicago Bulls' player Derrick Rose stood up the cast of The Good Wife, leaving a show crew member knocking on the door of his empty house, fruitlessly expecting to put him on a plane to go film a cameo appearance in an episode.

But occasionally some of their pop-news interests me. The other day, the studio was in a brief tizzy over the post that a prominent blogger (I find it hilarious that those two words actually belong together) from Marie Claire magazine made about the new TV show Mike & Molly, a pretty generic sitcom about a married couple. The story apparently made national news as well. The Marie Claire blogger wrote that watching two "fatties" with "rolls and rolls of fat" kiss or "do anything else" onscreen grossed her out (the title characters are, as you probably surmised, overweight).

I was more than anything intrigued by the response that this blog generated with the media and laypeople, squishy and beanpole alike. Rightfully so, most people were outraged by the writer's insensitivity, eventually eliciting a long, plaintive, sorrowful retraction from the writer. Critics accused her of being a bully, unfair, disrespectful, judgmental, sizist (oh yes, there's an -ist for everything), and a slew of other things she generally deserved.

While I agree that the blogger's comments were offensive, as far as hatemongers go, the Marie Claire blogger is more in the ranks of Scrooge than Stalin. She starts her post in an indignant tirade of off-putting insensitivity, but then backpedals from her own position. She concedes that losing weight is extremely difficult, that there are psychological factors involved, and that the show doesn't promote being obese or anything. While she clearly leans towards an opinion that would offend most people over a size zero, she leaves room for argument and self-criticism, ending her post with "...I don't know."

Given that the blogger isn't exactly the most vehement of bigots, what I find so intriguing is that this--this show, this issue--is what caught the bloodshot, crazed eye of the media. I later heard about it on three different news shows. I suppose I'm pleasantly surprised that The Public is capable of getting riled up on behalf of others, but that surprise comes from the fact that there are dozens, perhaps hundreds, of TV shows and movies out there that are either offensive in of themselves or prompt others to make derogatory comments. When South Park made a joke out of depicting Muhammad, many people acted like it was an overreaction when anyone got offended about it (granted, the terrorism threat didn't help the case of anyone who might've been legitimately put off). Why is it only sometimes cool or attention-worthy to be justifiably offended?

I guess what I'm trying to say is: let's spread the hate around, guys.