Last week my family and I flew down to Orlando, Fla., to celebrate the Chicago White Sox World Championship (or to take the vacation we had planned since May). The weather was beautiful, the sun was hot and Ariel the mermaid was looking good. But, while tearing through the many Disney World parks and enjoying my week off, I began to notice a pattern of inconvenience and discourteous behavior exemplified by one sect of the American demographic: fat people.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m no longer the sculpted Adonis that I was upon my graduation from Coach Siebert’s strength and conditioning program at Sandburg High. After two and a half years of Mug Nights and Pokey Stix, I could shed a few pounds. But the fact is that America is fat and getting fatter, and sadly, this trend is gladly accommodated. A central evil aggravating this problem is the electric powered motor scooter.

One can’t help but pity the elderly who wish to vacation but are no longer able to traverse great distances by foot, and therefore must ride electric scooters. Also, folks with endocrine deficiencies who have never been able to fight weight gain are exempt from this rant. But people who are huge because of a lust for Big Macs and disdain for treadmills lose my sympathy.

While in line to board a water ferry to Pleasure Island, a line of 50 people was stalled while a rather young and morbidly obese woman struggled to navigate her motor scooter through the dock’s gate and onto the boat. My patience was preserved through an inner conscience urging me not to judge, but it was worn thin after several minutes when she gave up, dismounted the scooter with ease and boarded the boat on foot. As images of the Eastland capsizing disaster surfaced in my mind, her humiliated husband was left to deal with the stranded vehicle.

Scooter-riding baronesses continued to haunt me later in the week at the Magic Kingdom. In a mass exodus following the nightly fireworks show, I was repeatedly rear-ended by yet another corpulent specimen on her scooter. When I was hit for the third time, I turned and shot my cold-hard-conservative glare only to be returned with, “Move it, Mister!”

Now, I understand if these people are just too busy or lazy to exercise or attempt to eat healthy, but nobody’s asking them to run a marathon from Pensacola to Miami – just to walk from Space Mountain to the Haunted Mansion! My 78-year-old grandfather was able to do it, so why can’t they?

And when I finally thought I had escaped this microcosm of tubbiness, I had one final encounter at the Mecca of all who swear by the motor scooter: McDonald’s. After the porker ordering in front of me returned all seven of her sandwiches for more customized ones, I had waited 20 minutes to order my sausage biscuit and orange juice.

The gall of these plump, scooter-toting people was really amazing, and I blame our culture of universal acceptance for this. If these people didn’t have the option of buying two seats for themselves on the airplane, they wouldn’t be on vacation. If they weren’t allowed to be carried by scooter through the parks, they wouldn’t be ramming me with their vehicles. And if it weren’t popular to serve 1000-calorie sandwiches and 72-ounce sodas, they wouldn’t be fat. By accommodating fatness, we encourage it.

I’m not so arrogant as to deny inconvenience as a part of daily life. Jaywalking has become an enforceable violation, professors assign papers over break and liberals still think they are always right. However, when it’s not an opinion or a requirement of yours that bothers someone else, but instead your weight, there is a problem. America has become a society of fat messes. Next week, take a pass on that leftover turkey and mashed potatoes, get off your butt (or scooter) and go for a run.

Chuck Prochaska is a junior in LAS. His column appears every Thursday. He can be reached at [email protected].