Fatsos.(products, services for overweight, obese people)

Byline: Lawrence Goodman

A new clothing store called Torrid recently opened near where I live in Providence, Rhode Island. Passing by, I happened to notice that there were a lot of--how should I put it--well, fat teenage girls inside. I thought this might be happenstance. But then I saw what they were selling: size 26 jeans, 42D bustiers, extra-long satin ribbon chokers. Torrid, I realized, offers fashion exclusively for young overweight women.

Fat has gone mainstream in America. Plus-size clothing like that sold at Torrid is the fastest-growing segment of the apparel industry. There are travel agencies that specialize in serving obese vacationers, toilet-bowl manufacturers making extra-wide johns, casket companies whose products are specially built to hold 500-pound corpses. Salter Housewares, a major manufacturer here, will soon increase the capacity of its standard bathroom scale to 400 pounds. And one of the most well-liked and popular TV stars right now is Hurley from ABC's hit show "Lost." He's a laid-back dude who happens to weigh more than 300 pounds.

Though not overweight myself, I have a great deal of sympathy for the heavyset, who suffer in a society where looking anorexic has long been considered desirable. All the same, I can't help wondering if we are now moving too far in the opposite direction--becoming too accepting of fatness. The agency that runs New York City's subway system recently went public with plans for a new fleet of cars featuring 17-1/2 -inch-wide bucket-style seats. There was an immediate outcry from fat-rights groups, and the agency buckled. The seats were redesigned to be flat and bench style so that they could accommodate even the widest New Yorker's derriere.

Those same fat-rights groups argue that all these ...