The Doctors: What's your BMI, and why should you care?

I have always disregarded Body Mass Index (BMI) as a false, superficial metric. Take my current BMI for example: According to the Centers for Disease Control, I am overweight.

I wouldn't say I look like a triathlete, but I certainly am not fat. And surely there is a difference between what is "fat" and what is "overweight." The CDC explains why BMI is used and how it is calculated, but they don't really explain why this particular metric is an indicator of obesity.

An article from today's USA Today attempts to explain (The Doctors: What's your BMI, and why should you care?). Fortunately, this article admits that the BMI does not take into account age, muscle, and other body dimensions.



Me, in the eyes of the federal government

Still, I'm unsatisfied. I say, BMI... WTF?!

I run, eat fairly healthy, moderate my intake of toxins and other putrefaction, but still the CDC will call me a fatso. And the BMI they recommend for someone of my height is a weight I haven't hefted since early high school.

Maybe that's the point. Maybe the CDC is trying to convey in their motherly kind of way that we are a nation of fatsos. Instead of directly shattering our self image, the BMI is the federal government's way of saying, "Why can't you be more like your friend Adonis? You know, the one who respects his mother."

So, despite my disdain for artificial measurements of health and wellness, I will attempt to lower my BMI. Can I lose 13 pounds - because I am not going one pound lower than 184 (a weight I haven't seen since I was a lanky high school sophomore)?