I grew up at a beach town. There really is no debate here. If you go back to the 80s it's even more extreme.

I too grew up in a beach town. It's selective memory.

Combined with an increase in obesity over the last several decades, is saying "it's just selective memory" as strong of a rebuttal?

The average american woman weighed 163.8 lbs in 1999, she weighed 171 in 2020. Average BMI increased from 28.2 to 29.1 in the same time period. Women on average added 2 inches to waist size.

Men went from an average weight of 189.4 to 197.9 in the same time period and BMI went from 27.8 to 29.1. Men on average added 1 inch on waist size.

A 5% increase in weight over 20 years might be concerning from a public health perspective, but it's not something you'd see just by looking at people.

From memory, there weren't as many obese people back in the 80's/ early 90's. Being really heavy was a thing that made a person stand out.

I think it's a lot more common now but that might just be selective memory.

The internet exposes us to astronomically more people than we ever could have seen in the 80s and 90s. Really heavy people are still rare today, but if you look at enough pictures of enough people, especially if these sites showing these pictures self-select for oddities, you're going to see quite a few, which makes them seem much more abundant today than they really are, plus much more rare in the past than they really were.

Again, look at pictures of groups in candid settings and you'll notice similar levels of obesity.

But we have statistical surveys which can assert this without having to look at photos.