Harvey 1 Omari Harvey

3/20/2013 Ms. Caruso Memo: In this letter I have written, I found a quote while researching the most active and inactive countries on the planet. This quote I disagreed with, and found it to be very questionable in its reliability, so I choose to respond to the author of it, through a letter, since I thought it would be the most direct way to talk to him. The context of this letter would be the stereotype that I was responding to. My audience is the author of the quote, who was Dr. Pedro C. Hallal. Then the purpose is to prove to him why the statement he made was not completely correct, and why he should not make such a generalized statement like that. Melnick, Meredith. "The Countries That Work Out The Most (And Least)." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 19 July 2012. Web. 03 Apr. 2013http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/19/exercise-countries_n_1683435.html Letter Dear Dr. Pedro C. Hallal, In your previous research The Countries That Work Out The Most (And Least) about which countries were the most physically active and inactive countries. In this study that you reported on, you were quoted as saying "In most countries, inactivity rises with age and is higher in women than in men. Inactivity is also increased in high-income countries", and I want to show you why that statement is not completely true. If you take a look at the list you compiled of the

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25 most inactive countries, only two truly "affluent" countries appear in the higher part of the list, which was Kuwait at number 7, and the United Arab Emirates at number 9, other than that none of the other countries are in the top 10 wealthiest countries list according to the International Monetary Fund. This is clearly the contrary of your statement, and one reason why you should not jump to conclusions so quickly. So with that being said I would like to go into detail as to why the generalized statement you used was incorrect, and that any other type of generalization should not be used for a survey like this. In the next part of your statement of inactivity increasing with age, if you take a look at the Euromonitor International World's Oldest Population's list, out of the top ten countries on that list only 3 of them appear in your top 25 list of inactive countries, with the highest appearance being Japan at number 11.This shows that the majority of the elders clearly must be participating in some form of physical activity, in order to help keep their country off of the top 25 most inactive list. In the last part of your quote of inactivity being higher with women as opposed to men, If you look at the statistics for the countries with the largest female populations, in the top 25, only 5 countries from that list appear on your list of inactive countries, with the highest being the United Kingdom at number 8. Once again this contradicts your statement, and shows that the majority of women are also getting the physical activity that is required for them to keep their respective countries off of the top 25 list. While there is some truth to the statement you made, I do however believe that there is not completely enough, in order to make a generalized statement like that, since there are plenty of other factors that could affect a countrys physical activity level, such as unemployment, the climate that the country is in, and many more. Plus the facts clearly show otherwise. So in conclusion, after being shown the statistics of how age, gender, and wealth do not necessarily

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affect how physically active or inactive a country is, I hope you will consider performing more extensive research before coming up with a statement like that in the future. Sincerely,

Omari Harvey

Works Cited Melnick, Meredith. "The Countries That Work Out The Most (And Least)." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 19 July 2012. Web. 03 Apr. 2013., "Special Report: The Worlds Oldest Populations." Analyst Insight from Euromonitor International. Euromonitor International, 9 Sept. 2011. Web. 03 Apr. 2013.

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"Top Ten Richest Countries of the World." Mapsofworld.com. Maps of World, 3 Jan. 2013. Web. 03 Apr. 2013.