Better sit down when I tell you this: Sitting is bad for you

Yeah, tell him that. (Image via Wikipedia)

This is the worst health news ever. It’s worse than eating and drinking things you like will kill you. It’s worse than smoking will kill you. (mainly because I don’t smoke) Now they’re telling us sitting will kill you.

Sitting is what I do best. And most.

I sit to eat. I sit to read and write. I sit in cars, taxis, trains and planes. I sit to nap. I sit to …OK, there’s no need to go there.

Sitting is what I’m doing right now and what I will be doing later and what I’ll be doing after that.

And when I’m finally done, I plan to sit down and rest for a while.

The sitting story is No. 1 on today’s New York Times most-read list. It is headlined “Stand Up While You Read This!” Well, I refused to and I hope you did too.

I am taking a strong stand position against the no-sitting extremists. I ask for your support, my fellow sitters. And I know there are millions of you. I’ve seen you on your sofas, your couches, your love seats and divans; I’ve seen you leaning back in your Aeron chairs, your feet up on the desk.

We will organize a sit-in. Maybe even a national sit-down strike.

Our slogan: Sit happens.

Our icons: Sitting Bull and Whistler’s Mother. Someone start making posters.

This isn’t just about laziness, although laziness is underrated. It’s about our economy. Just for two examples, what happens to the chair industry? What happens to baby sitters?

I’ll probably be accused of conspiracy-theory-mongering but it seems to me a question has to be asked: Might not the podiatry lobby be behind this thing?

Now I believe in freedom of the press as much as anyone but I tell you that this article in the Times goes too far and the writer should have been executed upon submitting it.

Or at least chastised. An editor should have told her: “Siddown, you’re rocking the boat.”

What she did is almost literally like crying fire in a crowded theater. Because when you do that, what happens is people stand up, the precondition to panic and mayhem.

When people remain seated, they don’t commit as many wrongs. If you want to kill or rob someone, you usually have to stand up first. History tells us that sooner or later, standing will lead to a fall, especially in winter, with all that ice around.

Sitting, on the other hand, is restful and nice.

The idea of giving it up, even for a few minutes…well, I just can’t stand it.