Republican Presidential hopeful Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., takes part in a meeting of the Joint Task Force on Media and Childhood Obesity (AP Photo/Dennis Cook).

You can stop fussing over the freshman fifteen. According to new research, it’s actually more like the freshman five . And though five pounds really won’t kill anyone it still feels like it will. I’m not even close to overweight, yet I fear those five pounds of flesh all the same. And that’s what drives me to the haul my butt to the gym every so often.

What about the whole cerebral aspect of college life, you ask? Who cares about a little extra squish, Isn’t college about pining away over Shakespeare and Euler’s Theorems in an ivory tower? Well, no.. Cast an eye over to the skinny girls on the Stairmasters, and it’s pretty evident that many of us go to Pottruck to impress others, not because we’re clinically overweight. In fact, 34th Street satirized this phenomenon using the new mot juste, “ Hottruck.”

Yet — healthy eating quibbles aside — people are starting to take the villainization of obesity too far. Not only is obesity the silent killer, but fat is the devil. Gluttony, after all, was one of the seven deadly sins.
In fact, we’ve imbued the sin of obesity with all sorts of moral undertones. How can we stuff our faces when children are dying of malnutrition in the third world? Politicians rail against childhood obesity, and health centers lament the obesity epidemic that is sabotaging the national waistline. Schools tried sending out “ obesity report cards” to tip-off parents. And then, to add greenhouse gases to injury, a study proclaimed fat people require more fuel to travel and therefore contribute to global warming , the rising of world sea levels, and extreme weather phenomenon. Ouch.

The overweight and their advocates, however, have struck back. Universities are starting to adopt fringe curriculum, dubbed “ fat studies ,” to examine the political and social implications of being overweight.
It’s no secret that fat discrimination exists, notably how fat girls sometimes get picked last for image-crazed sororities. Psychology studies have revealed how fat kids are often picked last as friends in recess or as employees in the workplace.

There’s a myth that fat people have no self-control. Hey, we can’t all be like that Subway dude . But that theory is just a myth: obesity is not a moral crises or a failure of self-restraint. Instead, it can often be a matter of genes or a sign of depression. It’s not easy being fat. Rather than continuing the stigma, it’s better to focus on promoting physical health.

The obesity debate has cleaved society into two unhealthy camps, embracing the underweight and scapegoating the overweight. New stories crop up about skinny runway models dying alongside stories highlighting the surreptitious emergence of binge eating as a coping mechanism for stress.
In a world centered on extremes, learn to embrace the middle. Eat that cupcake and go out for a stroll while you’re at it. Start to embrace your curves.

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