There is apparently one rule, and only one rule: Obey.

And before we go any further, yes, it has to do with dieting in the sense that the word “obey” itself is probably enough to to have soccer moms and weight loss sycophants on the edge of their recliners, clutching a cell phone in one hand, MasterCard in the other. 

There is always the Orwellian concern that people jump into certain crazes and fads without even knowing what the hell they’re even obeying, as advertisements such as this one uses language that convinces and pleads that: A, you’re fat, and B, something obviously needs to be done about it. 

It’s nothing shockingly recent that your personal information, likes, interests, and even demographics are used to serve customized advertisements on the right hand column of time-wasting social networking site Facebook. A single male friend of mine showed me an ad that was worded along the lines of “22 and still don’t have a girl?” One of my other friends who is married was already getting ads for baby clothing stores, and someone else I know was getting ads for ferret owner’s support groups for no clear reason. It was a while back that I logged in to my own Facebook on my 23rd birthday and saw the ad asking me if I was “23 and Overweight?”, followed by that cryptic demand that I “OBEY.”

Alright, obey what? Sites like Facebook and now even common media news outlets such as the god damned Chicago Tribune are hawking these subliminal guilt trips, all depicting the same formerly plump blonde woman, apparently now crack-skinny thanks to whatever the hell needs to be “obeyed,” apparently. It is always the same woman, too, but I have heard reports of “ethnic” variants, perhaps used to reach a larger demographic of insecure women who use the internet. 

Who is this broad, anyway? Breaking the ad ignorance vows I usually take before surfing the ‘net, I clicked on the damn link to find some answers. I was taken to the blog of one Michelle Thomas, a mother of two from Bloomington, IL, thanks to acai berries or whatever the hell, she’s now so thin she farts rice cakes. 

The skeptic in me immediately questioned Thomas’s existence. A quick Google search turned up a different Michelle Thomas, the late actress that played Myra on Family Matters, but even after a few pages in, no mention of diet plans, berries, or sappy success stories. 

This Michelle’s blog is made up to pass as a personal weight loss inspirational epic. However, the mechanical syntax of Thomas’s writing is void of any emotion or personal touch. She doesn’t blog about what books she’s reading, or what song she has currently playing in iTunes. We learn nothing more of her personal life beyond that she has two daughters that are inferably elementary-school age, and that she thinks her husband finds her unattractive, undesirable, and ugly! Oh no!

Several entries more, it’s all she can really attest to: the vile, incorrigible self-loathing her extra weight has brought upon her. And it wasn’t until she started using two aids: some vague product involving acai berries (that are coincidentally available for purchase every other fucking sentence) and a colon cleanser. And it was there that I found my answer: the secret behind all these annoying ads and weight loss itself is obeying the idea that you have a problem, whether you actually do or not, and that you should do something about it, namely buy what they’re selling and start shitting yourself thin. The rest of the blog just talks about acai berries and how amazingly fucking great they are ad nauseam, right to the point where I’m feeling that perhaps carrying a little extra weight isn’t a bad thing after all. 

What is especially annoying is that ads like these promote weight loss not as a preventative measure against epidemic medical afflictions such as heart disease or diabetes, but rather a tired aesthetic finish line that is redundantly beaten into people’s heads. As our friend Michelle puts it, “I feel sexy and beautiful again, I'm full of life and I cannot begin to tell you how good that feels!”

You shouldn’t have to fork over your credit card number to some pill scheme to lose weight. Just eat right, work out, and for christ’s sake, do it because you want to be healthier, not because dumb ads are making you hate yourself. I’m no fitness expert, but those who are can probably agree with me in saying that a regular exercise routine will most certainly be more effective than turning your own ass into a semi-automatic weapon.

Thomas also boasts that she can now go shopping with her daughters for the same clothing at department stores. It’s so refreshing to hear that she’s back to her 4th grade weight.