Timothy Noah at Slate opines on the fact that very few Oscar winners are fat.

Looking back over a complete list of previous winners in the best actor and actress categories, I can locate only one fat person. That was Charles Laughton, who won playing Henry VIII in 1933.

Well, what’s new about this? Even in an art-form that seems to have very little to do with physical appearance, like music, there’s a lack of big bands containing big people. Thanks to MTV, anybody who grew up listening to music might easily draw the conclusion that overweight people can’t play rock and roll. But Noah appeals to the Academy’s professionalism:

It is well-known that audiences don’t especially like directing their gaze at people who fail to conform to their notions of normality and physical attractiveness. This is nowhere so true as at the movies. But it’s a tad dismaying to learn that even the film professionals who decide on academy nominations are susceptible to this small-mindedness.

One of the great paradoxes in America is the fact that, while the numbers of obese people are rising, our scorn for anyone who is less than perfect also seems to be increasing. Oh well.