You know, I'm not even sure that's true, anyway? It reminds me of a few years back when some dumb assholes claimed that the word "picnic" was racist because it stemmed from slaveowners wanting slaves to carry their food for them, so they'd "pick a nigger" to do that. Which is of course total bullshit ("picnic" is a French word) but there are still dumbshits out there who believe it. Aaaaand what do you know! It's bullshit:  obese (adj.) "exceedingly fat," 1650s, back-formation from obesity and in part from Latin obesus "fat, stout, plump," literally "that has eaten itself fat," past participle of obedere "to eat all over, devour," from ob "about; because of" (see ob-) + edere "eat" (from PIE root *ed- "to eat"). According to OED, "Rare before 19th c." Related: Obeseness. Latin obesus was translated in Old English as oferfæt "overfat." As Latin obesus also could be read as "eaten up," it also was used in a passive sense, "wasted away, lean."  So if anything, its Latin roots are closer to "because of eating," than "eat everything." (Notice, too, when it was "rare before"--rare before the 19th century, which is to say the 1800s. NOT the late 1900s as pigs like to claim.) That never sounded right to me--there are too many words (obstinate, obstructing, obstetrics, frex) starting with "ob" which have nothing to do with eating or "everything," so I couldn't see where that claim about the Latin root came from--but I can't believe it took me this  2093   long to look it up. I can't wait until the next time I see a fat making that dumbshit claim. Please take this info and use it, friends!