To be specific - they edited things like “But Augustus was deaf to everything except the call of his enormous stomach” to “But Augustus was ignoring everything”. It's not just the description of Augustus they toned down, they even literally removed lines from the book which explains he was motivated by hunger.
Perhaps it would be best to not read a book with them.
It is forbidden to say being fat is unhealthy, undesirable or to pathologize it at all.
Does that seem sensible?
I don't understand the modern idea that you must celebrate every part of a person to love them.
[1] https://www.thesun.co.uk/tv/19487821/thomas-the-tank-engine-...
A significant portion of my learning English came from reading books, and now that literature is being dumbed down, simplified, and sterilized, for no reason other than going woke.
Education for today's kids and the coming generations are going to be an even bigger shitshow than anything any of us ever saw in our times.
But whether it's acceptable to be fat or not, it's ultimately a social measurement that changes like the wind.
Objectively and biologically, being fat is not good for one's health. Period. There is no room for argument here. Being fat is unhealthy. Being too skinny is also unhealthy, incidentally.
In general, I suspect these kinds of cultural phenomena generally begin by fairly mundane scientific observations being processed through a game of telephone within academia.
It's not about the relative merits of more or less body fat, it's about overweight people constantly being told they need to do something, either in person or in the media. Worse, people will try to shame them into action, probably on a weekly basis, taking the moral high ground that they didn't allow themselves to gain weight, despite having no idea what conditions or mental issues have led to that state.
It's just tiring for people who are a little different (height, skin, fat, ability, etc.) to constantly be reminded of it and ignored as a person because of it.
The old books will continue to exist. But just like we don't tell our kids everything their beloved grandpa said, we do the same with the media they consume. Publishers making these changes are just adding value through convenience, making a calculated bet that it's in demand.
I read these books as a kid in the 80s and was definitely happy in my early years to join in with jokes about differences in people. Took longer than necessary to realise that wasn't funny for them.
The people in america we're talking about can barely walk. They are not just fat, they're morbidly obese.
I'm surprised in the direction we've headed. Instead of encouraging people to develop the ability to give and receive constructive criticism we've demonized it.
Awdry and Dahl were from the days when men were men, women were women, and the sun never set on the British Empire. That's going to upset some people.
"because God doesn't trust Brits in the dark".
See, I can play the witty quotes game, too.
Not that I added much of value with this comment.