Fat Dudley, and Obesity in Canon

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 43233

Judy wrote:

>>Unfortunately, this reasonable approach 
is undermined by the heavy (er, no pun intended) emphasis on 
nasty, fat Dudley and what a glutton he is. JKR repeatedly draws 
attention to a connection between Dudley stuffing himself and 
being fat, while never at all mentioning Ron's fondness for 
sweets in connection with the fact that Ron is thin, or Draco's 
constant receipt of sweets in connection with the 
fact that Draco is delicate. So, on balance I think the books 
somewhat reinforce the idea that fat people are to blame for their 
obesity.<<

Only if you look at Dudley out of context. The books as a whole 
teach us that this kind of  thinking is a seductive but misleading 
way to understand the world. Even in the Potterverse, where 
symbols really can take on nature of the things they stand for, so 
that unicorns' blood, for example, keeps you from dying, we find  
that Snape, though he seems the type, is not a villain, and that 
Quirrell, whose physiological defect makes him seem 
innocuous, is evil. The ending of Book One would not be nearly 
so powerful if we hadn't been lulled into thinking that in the 
Potterverse defects in personality show themselves as defects 
in appearance.

Pippin