Fat people get a bum rap.

If you're overweight, you've no doubt been the object of looks or, even worse, comments about your size. (Even if they think you didn't see/hear them.) You know very well that people look at you and judge you: he/she can't control his/her appetite. Tsk, tsk.

But fat people -- and I apologize for the term but will keep using it nonetheless -- suffer unjustly because of one simple fact: their vice is visible.

We can all see it -- and you -- and know that you are struggling with your weight and your diet and your compulsion to eat too much of what makes you feel better, whether it's cookies or cakes or just high-fat dishes from your favorite restaurant. And our American restaurants are notorious for offering patrons way too much to eat and meals laden with fats and salts and sugars. They're trying to lure you in, to make you want to eat more of what you like.

In fact, some scientist just wrote a book -- "The End of Over-Eating"? -- that makes clear that eating certain foods that contain way too much fat/salt/sugar actually changes the pathways in your brain, making you want more and more of those foods. Hello? Addiction?

Which brings up the point of addiction. Most of us who are addicted to drugs or alcohol don't appear that way to our friends and/or family. We may be in good shape, the right size, and able to carry on a reasonable conversation and hold a job, but we may -- in our own brains, in our own lives -- be struggling mightily against something that is about to claim its final prize: our lives, us. We may know that we're out of control, barely holding a marriage or that job, or sanity, but we keep up the appearance of a normal person.

Fat people can't do that. Their excesses are on display for all of us to observe. When you see a fat person, you know things are out of control in that person's life. "Things" meaning their diet. That fat person is giving himself or herself over to the easy condolensce of food, probably fast food or sugary stuff. And he/she can't hide the consequences.

The rest of us can. I may be a compulsive gambler, but if I don't lose the family fortune, no one will ever know. I may be a drug addict, but if my face doesn't fall into my dinner plate some night -- as happened to a friend of mine -- I may never be detected. I may be an alcoholic, but if I never get stopped by the cops and hauled to jail, most people I know will never suspect that I had that problem. They might have sensed it but, because they liked me, denied it.

But let's suppose you aren't addicted to something but are just hiding a secret. At the worst, you murdered someone you thought needed to be murdered. No one has fingered you yet. You're living with that awful secret. Or let's suppose you've been taking money from your company. Maybe just a little at first, then more. It made your life easier, but you know it's wrong and that sooner or later you're going to be found out. Does anyone who deals with you on a day to day basis suspect anything? Of course not. You're polite, even helpful. Your secret is your own.

What if you've been committing adultery? Not even your best friends know, unless you've told them. But it could mean the end to a whole way of life, an end to your family, to what your kids thought of as stability. It's a big deal, but it's invisible. Like most of our sins.

Not so with fat people. Their sins of the flesh are on display all the time. And doesn't that make them actually more honest than the rest of us? Oprah keeps coming on her show talking about her battles with her weight. I give her credit for being honest.

Fat people get a bum rap because, to repeat myself, their vices are visible. I think about the story of Jesus, who said, when a "fallen" woman was brought before him, "Let he among you who is without sin cast the first stone." (Or something like that.) He knew that most of us have secret sins that aren't apparent to the rest of the world but that we know exist in our own lives, our own hearts. (I remember a joke about that, wherein Jesus got a rock thrown against his brow and said, "Mother!")

When you look at a fat person and are tempted to pass judgment, look inside and be sure you're pure of any over-indulgence that doesn't happen to show itself so clearly. I'm betting not many rocks would be thrown.

But you have to be honest with yourself -- and that's a whole different matter, isn't it?