The Age of Fitness. Jürgen Martschukat

bodies and themselves. All of this became the hallmark of the good citizen in a liberal society. By 1976, writer Tom Wolfe was referring to the “Me Decade,” deploying capital letters to make his point. “Me and my hemorrhoids” was the acerbic heading of the first section of his famous article. He pointed out that people’s concern for their bodies had reached unprecedented levels, prompting them to attach a new and tremendous importance to their dietary habits and physical activity. Many consumption addicts converted to asceticism. “I was in such bad shape,” to quote one typical “confession” of the kind that now appeared in print so often; “I weighed 247 pounds and my heart would beat like a drum when I got up from my chair to go to the refrigerator.”⁴⁴

The concern for self and body in an alienated mass and industrial society was also fueled by the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s. That the cultures of emerging neoliberalism and the counterculture shared concerns and goals may seem contradictory. However, both were and are characterized by a predilection for individuality and self-determination, as well as a fundamental distrust of the political authorities. As far as nutrition was concerned, the counterculture called on people to eat a “more natural” diet and to eat more consciously from both a health and political perspective. Exponents of “countercuisine,” meanwhile, began to rail against the allegedly corrosive effects on body and society of industrially produced food. The imperative here was to cook for oneself and change how one shopped, that is, to patronize the cooperatives and health food stores established from the late 1960s onward. The first Whole Foods store opened in Austin, Texas, in 1980, embodying the then-new business idea of combining elements of a health food store with those of a conventional supermarket.⁴⁵ Whole Foods is now a global corporation, with several hundred stores in and beyond the United States, and has been part of Amazon since 2017. In Germany too, organic supermarkets in trendy neighborhoods are seen as markers of advancing gentrification.⁴⁶ People who record their body data are among those who shop in these stores. Meanwhile, organic farming has grown into a huge industry, one that has had a major impact on large areas of, for example, California and southern Spain, with working conditions that are often anything but fair or decent. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the organic sector is still chalking up growth rates of around 5 percent. Not everything sold in organic markets, however, can be straightforwardly described as healthy.⁴⁷

      Ultimately, it is not surprising that countercuisine and the pursuit of a healthier and more “alternative” diet were caught up in the wake of the Me Decade and an ever more widely recognized responsibility for one’s own wellbeing. The counterculture shared many of the goals and techniques of a health- and fitness-oriented society, one that valorizes individuality and self-reliance. Alternative dietary trends thus also succumbed to commercialization and the power of capitalism; that is, they became options for broader swathes of society. A healthy diet holds out the promise of “better” body data. In 1985, its discourse pervaded by notions of self-cultivation, self-discipline, and performance, the Handelsblatt business newspaper proclaimed that “greater enhancement” of the body would generate “more added value.”⁴⁸ Of course, the food industry too knows how to benefit from widespread anxieties about health. It never ceases to provide new products, with fewer carbohydrates, that are fat- and sugar-free and go easy on their consumers’ cholesterol levels. Rather than merely responding, the industry is proactive, launching research programs to conjure up the dangers and problems its products promise to remedy. The diet industry, with a turnover of approximately $150 billion worldwide in 2014 and projected sales of nearly $250 billion by 2022, would be worth a chapter in its own right.⁴⁹

To sum up, in recent history eating in a way conducive to one’s fitness has become an obsession and a powerful normative precept. By no means does this signify that people have lost their passion for candy, snacks, and fast food. On the contrary, the two phenomena depend on and reinforce each other. They typify a culture and a society that distinguish between “good” and “bad” eating habits and “good” and “bad” bodies, and that make them part of the political order. The individual who eats well seems to demonstrate an ability to take responsibility for themself, their family, and the collective, and for the latter’s health and performance. They seem to know what is important and right, and to be able to invest successfully in themselves while enjoying the process. Making the effort to cook, writer Barbara Kingsolver contends, is a practice of “good citizenship.” Since the 1970s, the interest in healthy food and a matching lifestyle has increasingly emerged as an engine of distinction, between those who are considered thoughtful and aware of their health and performance, and those who cannot claim these attributes. Their ignorance can seemingly be read off their bodies. In the United States, attention is focused not only on poorer and less educated demographics, but often on African Americans. Thus – yet again and despite the successes of the civil rights movement – African Americans are portrayed as incapable of living their lives autonomously. In this context, fast food is depicted as the nadir of thoughtless consumption, as detrimental to one’s potential and abilities; according to Paul Nolte with reference to Germany, fast food is the “counterpart of trash TV.” Whether this is believed to be the result of the wrong priorities and decisions (an HD television rather than good food, Burger King instead of carrots and potatoes), or lack of financial resources, usually depends on the commentator’s political position. Either way, the distinction between healthy and unhealthy, fit and unfit has become a class distinction. This is supposed to signal people’s capacity for sensible decision making and their sense of responsibility, for their family, society, and the environment, indeed the entire planet.⁵⁰

The “right amount” of exercise since the Me Decade

In the pursuit of fitness, the right amount of exercise goes hand in hand with eating right. Again, the 1970s were a decade of crucial acceleration in North America and Western Europe in this regard. In West Germany, the German Sport Association’s (Deutscher Sportbund or DSB) “Get Fit” (Trimm-Dich) campaign was launched in the spring of 1970, its declared goal being “sport for all” (see figure 3). Rather than competitive sport, the campaign promoted the very practices established in the following years in Germany under the English-language label of “fitness.” Previously, the term had barely been used in the German-speaking countries. The goal was for increased exercise to enable a greater number of people to achieve a fitter body and enjoy life more. In Germany, mass or popular sports (Breitensport) was the name given to this concept. In Austria, the term Fitsport was coined to refer to bodily practices directed solely at one’s own body and its performance (rather than scoring a goal or winning a race). Austrians also took part in fitness marches (Fitmärschen) and fitness runs (Fitläufen) inspired by the “Fit – Be in It!” (Fit-mach-mit) campaign, while keepfit trails were established in German and Swiss forests and parks.⁵¹ In German TV commercials from the middle of the decade onward, what viewers generally saw were average, middle-aged men exercising. The chubby “Karl Gustav” cycles happily through the countryside, while the voiceover explains that “The constant pedaling / keeps heart and circulation young for many years, / because to keep moving, / makes one fit and superior to others.” So, while fitness was not about improving one’s chances of winning sporting competitions, it was an attempt to outdo others in life as a whole, a life that was, more than ever, conceptualized in terms of competition and rivalry. “Mr. Oskar K.” demonstrates one facet of this superiority in another ad. Evidently, jogging is a boon not only to his health and zest for life, but also to his sex appeal. The body language of a statue of a naked woman next to the jogging track, who gazes after him and gives a thumbs-up, along with the mischievous voiceover, leaves us in no doubt about that. The fit body was now considered a beautiful, attractive body.⁵²

      Figure 3 Poster, DSB “Endurance” advertising campaign, 1975–1978

Sustained by the enthusiasm for sport that gripped West Germany after the 1972 Munich Olympics,