Exercise is more important than ever

It's Been a Minute

NPR

News Commentary, Society & Culture, News, Spirituality, Religion & Spirituality

4.6 • 8.8K Ratings

🗓️ 12 November 2025

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Have you picked up a couple weights recently? Started walking, or jogging, or doing pilates? So have a lot of other people.

You see the fitness Instagram accounts and gym tips all over TikTok, but how does exercise culture fit into our broader culture? And how does more enthusiasm for exercise square with the focus on fitness in our politics? Brittany gets into it with Jonquilyn Hill, host of Vox’s Explain it to Me podcast, and Shelly McKenzie, author of Getting Physical: the Rise of Fitness Culture in America.

(0:00) Americans are obsessed with exercise right now. Why?
(2:36) What exercise does for mental and financial health
(5:59) How exercise became a status symbol for young people
(10:13) Why gyms are seeking women over 65
(12:57) Why JFK and Trump both politicized fitness
(16:33) What the government and its citizens have in common: body shame?

Follow Brittany Luse on Instagram: @bmluse

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for NPR and the following message comes from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
0:05.4	RWJF is a national philanthropy working toward a future where health is no longer a privilege but a right.
0:12.1	Learn more at RWJF.org.
0:17.1	You know, in the post-World War II era, for a while, people thought exercise was bad for you.
0:25.2	That is absolutely true.
0:26.3	They used to think you had a certain amount of heartbeats for your entire life.
0:31.2	Yes.
0:31.6	Yes.
0:31.8	And it's like, why waste your heartbeats on running and exercising and lifting weights?
0:36.4	They were cooking with that one.
0:43.0	Hello, hello.
0:44.5	I'm Brittany Luce, and you're listening to It's Been a Minute from NPR, a show about what's going on in culture and why it doesn't happen by accident.
0:52.8	Thank you. culture and why it doesn't happen by accident.
1:03.9	Have you picked up a couple weights recently?
1:08.1	Started walking or jogging or doing Pilates.
1:09.6	Maybe you've joined directly.
1:14.2	Well, me too. I've dipped my toe into strength training. I started back in dance classes this year. And I am dedicated to taking at least one
1:20.0	hour long walk a day. And a lot of other people are getting active too. The Sports and Fitness
1:25.5	Industry Association surveyed 18,000 Americans in
1:29.2	24. They measure the lowest bar for activity and they found that 80% of Americans did one sport
1:36.1	or physical activity at least once that year. That's the highest level they've ever recorded.
1:42.5	It's 25 million more people than were active in 2019.
	...

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