Are Americans really demonizing fat more than they used to or are we simply medicalizing it more -- focusing on it more as a health issue and less openly as a cosmetic issue (although that is clearly underlying a lot of the concern)? When I was growing up in the 1960s, fat kids were taunted mercilessly and in my opinion, in that pre-feminist era, women were judged more by their looks and less by any other attribute they might have than they are now. My grandmother, who grew up in the early part of the 20th century (she's now in her 90s), has always been obsessed by weight -- probably the influence of the flapper era.