A very interesting statement of one of our contemporaries is that any person, to one degree or another, is both a psychologist and a philosopher - they say, life forces him to. On the one hand, the main driving force of every person is the craving for knowledge, the desire to reach certain social heights, the desire to be wise in any everyday situations - and this is the philosophy of life. How to Analyze People on Sight by Elsie Lincoln Benedict (best contemporary novels txt) 📖
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He of all types likes most to be amused and very simple toys and activities are sufficient to do it.
¶ A serious drama or "problem play" usually bores him but he seldom misses a circus.
The fat person expresses his immaturity also in that he likes to be petted, made over and looked after.
¶ Like the infant he demands food first. Almost the only time a fat man loses his temper is when he has been deprived of his food. The next demand on his list is sleep, another characteristic of the immature.
Give a fat man "three squares" a day and plenty of sleep in a comfortable bed, and he will walk off with the prize for good humor three hundred and sixty-five days in the year. Next to sleep he demands warm clothing in winter and steam heat when the wintry winds blow.
¶ If it were not for the exertion required in getting to and from the beaches, dressing and undressing, and the momentary coldness of the water, many more Alimentives would go to the beaches in Summer than do.
¶ Anything, to be popular with the Alimentive, must be easy to get, easy to do, easy to get away from, easy to drop if he feels like it. Anything requiring the expenditure of great energy, even though it promises pleasure when achieved, is usually passed over by the fat people.
¶ "Let George do it" is another bit of slang invented by this type. He seldom does anything he really hates to do. He is so likable he either induces you to let him out of it or gets somebody to do it for him. He just naturally avoids everything that is intense, difficult or strenuous.
¶ If an unpleasant situation of a personal or social nature arises—a quarrel, a misunderstanding or any kind of disagreement—the fat man will try to get himself out of it without a discussion.
Except when they have square faces (in which case they are not pure Alimentives), extremely fat people do not mix up in neighborhood, family, church, club or political quarrels. It is too much trouble, for one thing, and for another it is opposed to his peaceable, untensed nature.
¶ The fat man has his eye on personal advantages and promotions and he knows that quarrels are expensive, not alone in the chances they lose him, but in nerve force and peace of mind.
The fat man knows instinctively that peace times are the most profitable times and though he is not for "peace at any price" so far as the country is concerned, he certainly is much inclined that way where he is personally concerned. You will be amused to notice how this peace-loving quality increases as one's weight increases. The more fat any individual is the more is he inclined to get what he wants without hostility.
¶ The favorite "good time" of the Alimentive is one where there are plenty of refreshments. A dinner invitation always makes a hit with him, but beware that you do not lure a fat person into your home and give him a tea-with-lemon wisp where he expected a full meal!
¶ Substantial viands can be served to him any hour of the day or night with the certainty of pleasing him. He loves a banquet, provided he is not expected to make a speech. The fat man has a harder time than any other listening to long speeches.
The fashion of trying to mix the two most opposite extremes—food and ideas—and expecting them to go down, was due to our misunderstanding of the real nature of human beings. It is rapidly going out, as must every fashion which fails to take the human instincts into account.
¶ No prizes lure a fat man into strenuous physical exercise or violent sports. Although we have witnessed numerous state, national and international tennis, polo, rowing, sprinting, hurdling and swimming contests, we have seen not one player who was fat enough to be included in the pure Alimentive type.
The grand-stands, bleachers and touring cars at these contests contained a generous number of fat people, but their conversation indicated that they were present more from personal interest in some contestant than in the game itself.
The nearest a fat man usually comes to taking strenuous exercise is to drive in an open car. The more easeful that car the better he likes it. He avoids long walks as he would the plague, and catches a street car for a two-block trip.
¶ Due to his immaturity, the fat person gives little thought to anything save those things which affect him personally.
The calm exterior, unruffled countenance and air of deliberation he sometimes wears, and which have occasionally passed for "judicial" qualities, are largely the results of the fact that the Alimentive refuses to get stirred up over anything that does not concern him personally.
This personal element will be found to dominate the activities, conversation and interests of the Alimentive. For him to like a thing or buy a thing it must come pretty near being something he can eat, wear, live in or otherwise personally enjoy. He confines himself to the concrete and tangible. But most of all he confines himself to things out of which he gets something for himself.
¶ The fat man is no reader but when he does read it is nearly always something funny, simple or sentimental. In newspapers he reads the "funnies." Magazine stories, if short and full of sentiment, attract him. He seldom reads an editorial and is not a book worm. The newspaper furnishes practically all of the fat man's reading. He seldom owns a library unless he is very rich, and then it is usually for "show."
¶ In making the investigations for this course, we interviewed many clerks in the bookstores of leading cities throughout the United States. Without exception they stated that few extremely fat people patronized them. "I have been in this store seventeen years and I have never sold a book to a two hundred and fifty pounder," one dealer told us. All this is due to the fact with which we started this chapter—that the fat man is built around his stomach—and stomachs do not read!
¶ The fat man has the child's natural innocence and ignorance of subtle and elusive things. He has the same interest in things and people as does the child; the child's indifference to books, lectures, schools and everything abstract.
¶ "I believe I could digest nails!" exclaimed a fat friend of ours recently. This perfect nutritive system constitutes the greatest physical superiority of the Alimentive. So highly developed is his whole stomach department that everything "agrees" with him. And everything tends to make him fat.
As Irvin Cobb recently said: "It isn't true that one can't have his cake and eat it, too, for the fat man eats his and keeps it—all."
¶ A tendency to over-eat results naturally from the highly developed eating and digesting system of this type but this in turn overtaxes all the vital organs, as stated before. Also, the fat man's aversion to exercise reduces his physical efficiency.
The pure Alimentive and the alimentively-inclined should learn their normal weight and then keep within it if they desire long lives.
¶ Sweetness of disposition is one of the most valuable of all human characteristics. Fat people possess it more often and more unchangingly than any other type. Other social assets of this type are amenableness, affability, hospitality and approachableness.
¶ Gaining his ends by flattery, cajolery, and various more or less innocent little deceptions are the only social handicaps of this type.
¶ His unfailing optimism is the most marked emotional quality of this type. Nothing can be so dark that the fat person doesn't find a silver edge somewhere. So in disaster we always send for our fat friends. In the presence of an amply-proportioned individual everything looks brighter. Hope springs eternal in human breasts but the springs are stronger in the plump folks than in the rest of us.
Money spending is also a marked feature of the fat man. His emotions are out-going, never "in-growing." A stingy fat man is unknown.
¶ A tendency to become spoiled, to pout, and to take out his resentments in babyish ways are the emotional weaknesses of this type. These, as you will note, are the natural reactions of childhood, from which he never fully emerges.
¶ The ability to make people like him is the greatest business and professional asset of this type, and one every other type might well emulate. One average-minded fat man near the door of a business establishment will make more customers in a month by his geniality, joviality and sociableness than a dozen brilliant thinkers will in a year. Every business that deals directly with the public should have at least one fat person in it.
¶ A habit of evading responsibility and of "getting out from under" constitutes the inclination most harmful to the business or professional ambitions of this type. Again it is the child in him trying to escape the task set for it and at the same time to avoid punishment.
¶ Love of home is a distinguishing domestic trait of all fat people. The fat man's provision for his family is usually as complete as his circumstances will permit and he often stretches it a point.
As parents fat men and women are almost too easy-going for their own future happiness, for they "spoil" their children. But they are more loved by their children than any other type. Being so nearly children themselves they make equals of their children, enter into their games and live their lives with them.
¶ Dependence on others, the tendency of allowing one's self to be supported by brothers or sisters or wife, is the chief domestic weakness of fat people. They should begin early in life to depend upon themselves and make it a practice to carry their share of family responsibilities.
¶ Developing more of his mental powers with a view to using his head to lessen the manual work he so dislikes, and cultivating an interest in the more mature side of the world in which he lives should be two of the aims of all extremely fat people.
¶ "Letting down," soft snaps and temptations to evade responsibility should be avoided by the fat. Elbert Hubbard said, "Blessed is the man who is not looking for a soft snap, for he is the only one who shall find it." This explains why the fat man, unless brainy, seldom lands one.
¶ Optimism, hospitality and harmony are the strongest points in the fat man's nature. Upon them many a man has built a successful life. Without them no individual of any type can hope to be happy.
His popularity and all-around compatibility give the fat man advantages over other types which fairly compensate for the weak cogs in his machinery.
¶ Self-indulgence of all kinds, over-eating, over-sleeping, under-exercising and the evasion of responsibilities are the weakest points of this type. Despite his many strong points his life is often wrecked on these rocks. He so constantly tends to taking the easy way out. Day by day he gives up chances for
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