Wed 21 December 2022:
According to Dr. Vincent Candrawinata, a health and wellness expert and researcher at the University of Newcastle, NSW, all obese Santas should be prohibited from shopping malls because they convey the incorrect message and encourage binge eating.
According to him, being overweight has nothing to do with happiness, and all amusement parks should advise all of their Santas to lose weight.
According to the good doctor, a fat Santa will encourage holiday overeating, and he has yet to see a slim Santa posing for pictures with children. A healthy Saint Nick should be the new norm, he adds.
“For a lot for us, myself included, it’s one of our earliest, joyful childhood memories and I think that it can have a profound positive impact on children when they don’t see the association with a joyful holiday and the urge to gorge and overindulge in terms of food and beverages,” he said.
For the uninitiated, Saint Nick is where the real story of Santa Claus as an entity begins from. The name Santa Claus evolved from Nick’s Dutch nickname, Sinter Klaas, a shortened form of Sint Nikolaas (Dutch for Saint Nicholas).
This particular saint was known for his generosity and kindness, which gave rise to legends of miracles he performed for the poor and unhappy. As a result of his good deeds, devotion to Nicholas extended to all parts of Europe.
Dr Candrawinata says he wants to fight the stigma that one needs to eat a lot and overindulge to celebrate festivities and be joyful.
But it doesn’t look like all Santas are set to toe the line. According to a report in Reuters, losing weight is a big ‘no,no’ for the jolly, rotund character that has brought happiness to children all over the world.
In recent years, Santa has been accused of being a fraud, an interloper and even politically incorrect but now he also faces accusations of being unhealthy and a bad role model as child obesity rates soar.
Santas were ordered to attend a month-long boot camp with exercises before greeting children at Bluewater, a British shopping center near Dartford, Kent, where they were under pressure to get rid of the wobbly belly under the red suit.
Even the acting US Surgeon General, Steven K. Galson, agreed that Santa should go on a diet. He stressed the importance of role models for children being in good shape, eating well, and exercising.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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