Too Fat for A 'Small World'

I've been to Disneyland quite a few times in my day and I've been on most of the rides more than a few times each. Everyone who's been there more than once has probably been on the ride "It's a Small World" and has afterwards had that silly song stuck in your head for the next decade.

Well, visitors for the next 10 months or so won't be able to have that pleasure. The ride, which has remained virtually unchanged since it's construction in 1964, has been closed for renovation. Not because it needs to be hipper or cooler. It needs a massive overhaul because overweight and obese Americans have killed it. When the ride was originally installed the flume and boats were built to accommodate average-sized Americans and in the intervening 40+ years, the average-sized American has ballooned in weight, causing the boats to bottom out and stop the entire works until Disney employees can help the overweight offenders off the boats and out the emergency exits. The boats and the ride have been in faithful service with no changes until now and America's expanding waistline is the culprit. (It's reported that the drop in Pirates of the Caribbean has the same problem, but it's not as frequent as the Small World stoppages and I could find no evidence of that ride being further revamped any time soon.)

This is just one example of how America is being forced to change under the buckling knees of the Obesity epidemic we find ourselves in the midst of.

Killer at Large is the name of the film we've spent the last year putting together to show you and the rest of America exactly why it is we're getting so darn fat. We've been able to get interviews with experts in every field of this epidemic to illustrate the causes, effects and possible solution to this problem. From bestselling authors like Michael Pollan (The Omnivores Dillemma) to consumer advocates like Ralph Nader, we've been able to truly go in depth and examine the issue. Even former Surgeon General Richard Carmona chimes in to explain that, "...obesity is a terror within. It is destroying our society from within and unless we do something about it, the magnitude of the dilemma will dwarf 9/11 or any other terrorist event that you can point out."

It's no longer a "Small World" and if we don't act quickly, it's going to be a very fat world.

In the coming weeks and months, we'll be here with essays about the epidemic and stories to highlight the issue.

(Bryan Young blogs daily at This Divided State. Killer at Large is currently in the final stages of post-production and has been submitted to numerous film festivals, you can find more info about it at its official website.)

Comments

[avicenna]

There surely can be no surprise at the largess - gluttony is what America is based on. The more you consume - the better for the economy, right? Well, the growing girth is just testimony of how patriotic Americans are - and it is beautifully symbolic that Disneyland - the land where economic dreams come true - is doing its part to accommodate this milestone.

[JScott]

I didn't know they still had the 'Small World'
(at least in the Anaheim park) I thought it was taken out and other rides put in.

Oh how I remember 'The House Of The Future' in Tomorrowland, until the future caught up with it. google it folks!!!

[NABNYC]

It's the same thing as the issue of violence against women. And alcoholism, and drug addiction, and failing schools and drop-outs. If this country wants to make this a better place for all of us, we need community-based and nationally­-supported programs to change these things.

The Republican and neocon mantra that has been played nonstop for decades, since Reagan, is that if we citizens want our government to use our tax money to help make this a better country for all of us -- then they will call us names, and ridicule and demean us. They say we're wimps, we want a nanny state.

When will people realize that it's our money, and we have the right to demand that it be used for our benefit to make this a better country. The Republicans have taken our tax dollars and given it away to their biggest corporate friends who in turn give enormous bribes back to the Republicans. And that is why this country is such a disaster. The Democrats unfortunately are catching up in the bribes and corruption category.

Let's see. Nutrition education. Community-based exercise and diet programs. Exercise in the schools in each and every grade. After-school programs for children centered upon physical exercise. Work-based nutrition and exercise.

How about this: every overweight American is given some financial assistance to join a nutrition group, take cooking lessons (many people don't know how to cook anything except boxed or take-out), exercise, gym, group counselling if appropriate.

And we need to re-think our food system. There is something wrong with a country in which people can get so much to eat that they are grossly overweight, yet they suffer from malnutrition at the same time. Something is missing.

All we need is the national will to make this a better country. Just converting the diet to more fresh produce and grain, all by itself, would radically improve people's health. But we don't teach that to people, and we instead inundate people with advertising for junk food.

[ClaudiaJean]

When you visit DisneyWorld nowadays, people can arrive in and/or rent motorized scooter/wheelchairs to get them around the park.
I completely understand a loving grandparent who wants to treat their grandchildren to a family vacation in the world of Mickey & Minnie & Goofy...
What is more disturbing is the proportion of people utilizing these motorized vehicles. Not only are they a nuisance to the folks walking through the park but if you look at the people in them, they're not grandparents who are trying to still accommodate the dreams of their grandkids... they are people in their 30s and 40s with their children, anywhere between age 2 and 11, who are so obese that their weight would be prohibitive and/or painful to allow them to walk through the park on their own two feet.
It was alarming and disturbing how many incredibly obese parents of young children were puttering around in the scooters.
I'm not talking overweight. I'm talking morbidly obese to the point that they're virtually immobile except in these scooters that zip them around, often with a stop at a buffet. It was heartbreakingly sad to think that not only is this their life, what kind of life will these 8 year old's have moving foward with these parents and their health issues?

[darwin1859]

A couple of years back, we were in line for the Small World ride, and watched amazed as a family of 3 (dad, mom, and kid), who may have weighed in the neighborhood of 700 lbs in total, was being seated in front of one of the boats. I was really hoping the boat would flip over, but alas, I was disapointed. I still kick myself for not taking a picture though. That picture is all too common in theme parks nowadays.

[cinemaven]

The road outside my front door has been there unchanged since 1964 until recently. Fat cars and bloated traffic have necessitated changes be made.

Isn't it possible that the "It's a Small World" ride needs an overhaul because "The ride.. has remained virtually unchanged since its construction in 1964,"?

I'm an average sized Canadian who wouldn't tilt the Small World ride but that ride has tilted me. My sis convinced me to ride it when we were young and that evil song is still stuck in my head. Anamatronic singing children still traumatize me!!

[StephenSmoliar]

I believe it was the film SECUESTRO EXPRESS than ended with the narrator saying that we now lived in a world where half the people were obese and the other half were starving. I do not think the film got the percentages right, but we are definitely living in a bimodal distribution of equally unhealthy extremes. Don't expect any documentary to get our Ruling Classes to do anything about it, though.