The Obesification of the U.S.

Its also scary to think that these numbers are 1) obese and 2) adults.

No mention of overweight. No mention of children.

I live in a tourist town an hour away from one of the biggest cities in America. I rarely see a thin person. Almost everyone has a gut of some type; enough of one to make them uncomfortable, slow, and unhealthy.

There's probably 20 combined reasons why this has happened. And as much as most people dislike being fat, they much more enjoy the conveniences that have led to their fatness. I don't see a radical change ever taking place. These numbers will continue to get worse.

exercise works for people like us. running 50 miles plus per week is effective. but what most people do for exercise is not going to hit them half as much as what we do.

Agreed, and it's also NOT only the US. I've traveled all over the world in recent years and people EVERYWHERE are much heavier than they were even a couple of decades ago. This includes Europe even in the toniest cities, including Paris, where I was just last year and was awestruck at the size/girth of many, many French, German and British walkers on the streets. Alabamans have nothing on Germans in the belly size department, I'll tell you that right now.

This is not an American problem, but a problem for humanity at large.

It's also clear that nobody genuinely has any idea why exactly it's happened, nor what to do about it. Everyone has their villain, be it sugar, corn, meat, or any number of other aspects of diet. I don't believe we really have any hold on why humans have grown so fat but assume it's a complex mix of factors that includes epigenetics and a species that is fundamentally different than it was in earlier times. Of all the problems humanity could face, a lack of food scarcity leading to fatness is probably one that would historically be wished for by almost any human who lived before 1900.

The thing I notice most about kids in the last twenty years is their lack of physical movement. Look at ANY young kid in most countries these days and you'll see kids sucked into an online world that keeps them hyper focused and immobile much of every day. If you aren't genetically predisposed to being skinny, sitting motionless for hours every day must do bad things to your developing body.

YMMV wrote:

https://thescienceofnutrition.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/obesity-trends-cdc-2009-chartbook.jpg?w=800https://www.meatpoultrynutrition.org/sites/default/files/web/o-MEAT-CONSUMPTION-570%20trends%20NPR%20chart.jpg

The "1980" point on the graph is actually from the NHANES 1976-1980 survey, with midpoint year of 1978-- two years before the Guidelines were published.

(actually, the Atkins books were published before the guidelines)

I'm sure a sedentary work/life style has nothing to do with it. Shame on you desk jockeys. Go get a real job hunting buffalo on the open plains.

The main culprits are sugar and laziness. If you add in the people that have a little too much fat but aren't obese you have a very high number. Dr. Maffetone has numbers over 80% and I believe him.

More movement and more real phone that isn't in a box are two easy steps that would drastically improve our health. Even runners are not immune to eating too much bad food. I suspect a lot justify their poor eating with the large amount of calories they burn but that really isn't a recipe for health.

The real question is will we, as a society, demonize obesity or victimize it? I tend believe that it will be victimized.

After seeing this, I stepped onto the scale. Age 60. Male. 5'10".

I weigh exactly 190 pounds.

Yesterday I ran 5K in 27:55.

Probably puts me in classic hobby jogger territory.

This is a good thread and an important topic, one that is costing us millions of lives, dollars etc. per year.

-I believe the issue is caused by a multitude of factors broader than what can attributed to any single dietary guidline or diet trend.

-The cheapness of unhealthy food caused by the industrial farm-ag complex--Sure, modern farming has done great things, but when something is cheaper (and subsidized in many countries) it's going to lead to more consumption. And where there is profit to be made, big corporations are going to push, push, push and sell, sell, sell.

-The rise of the restaurant and decline of family dinner--People use to eat their dinners at home as a family. Now, everyone is running around with their "busy" lives and so each member of the family grabs their own dinner at a quick, casual place instead of a homemade meal. Some of this is probably caused by the rise of two parent working households (nothing wrong with it, just pointing it out.) Have you ever seen the calorie comparison between a fast, casual joint meal and a relatively large homemade meal? It's astounding.

-Sit on our ace syndrome. Much of the workforce sits in front of a computer for 8+ hours/day. At night, we stare at phones and watch netflix.

-Helicopter parenting and the digitization of childhood.. I know this is really just anecdotal but it seems kids use to be outside doing unstructured activities A LOT more just a few decades ago. Kids use to go to parks, ride their bikes all over the neighborhood. Now their driven everywhere for "structured" activities and aren't allowed to be outside without parent supervision. And they have phones. Running around the track today I saw a 10 year old walking her dog--well, "walking" in the sense that she would walk 3 steps/minute while texting on her phone.

This may be a fringe theory but I'll just throw this out there...what affect has the decline in smoking amongst middle class adults had on this? Call it vice switching perhaps. Also, nicotine is an appetite suppressant.

-

Oh, forgot to mention one thing. As we get fatter and fatter, it becomes normalized. It's not just the instagram divas saying fat is beautiful. It's the subconscious stuff. When kids are walking around and seeing that everyone else is big (in real life and on the TV shows they watch), they normalize it and tend to think that being chunky is just status quo.

Most fat people have eating disorders. Eating disorders, though very real, are symptoms of other problems. Most people don't want to or can't deal with the other problems. They appear extremely unmotivated to normal weight people , they probably aren't on average. Normal weight people mostly just have different problems and even some of us have eating disorders.

CancellLRC wrote:

The thing I notice most about kids in the last twenty years is their lack of physical movement. Look at ANY young kid in most countries these days and you'll see kids sucked into an online world that keeps them hyper focused and immobile much of every day. If you aren't genetically predisposed to being skinny, sitting motionless for hours every day must do bad things to your developing body.

Probably the most popular reason for letsrunners is the laziness angle. But as someone who was fit before now going towards obesity, I firmly believe its all diet. Something turned on in me, and I just voraciously eat everything in sight. I still exercise but I can't beat back the buldge. Video games, online stuff, physical exercise these were all and still part of my life from day 1, but the change was the diet.

Regarding sitting in our @$$e$ which I believe to be one of the 2 biggest issues, I was informed that in one of my kids schools the students will sit in the same room all day (even for lunch)and the teachers will move from classroom to classroom.

Sitting in one position for 6 hours is horrible for weight and metabolism as well as for our back and other muscles, tendons, bones etc...

I might as well keep him home.

hi there you wrote:

This is a good thread and an important topic, one that is costing us millions of lives, dollars etc. per year.

-Helicopter parenting and the digitization of childhood.. I know this is really just anecdotal but it seems kids use to be outside doing unstructured activities A LOT more just a few decades ago. Kids use to go to parks, ride their bikes all over the neighborhood. Now their driven everywhere for "structured" activities and aren't allowed to be outside without parent supervision. And they have phones. Running around the track today I saw a 10 year old walking her dog--well, "walking" in the sense that she would walk 3 steps/minute while texting on her phone.

-

Don't want to sound like a geezer, but this gets to the core of the problem when establishing habits as a child that are carried into adulthood. There was constant physical activity from pick up games when I was a boy in the 1960s & 70s. While I am encouraged by the increasing recognition that helicopter parenting has gone too far, we are a long way from the return to free range kids who make their own unstructured activities.

I was looking back at my HS and MS yearbooks a few years ago. Everyone was skinny back in the 80s. Overweight kids were maybe one in a hundred. We drank coke, ate garbage whenever we had the chance and spent plenty of time in front of the TV and playing video games. In the 90s, I was teaching drum lines at high schools and was shocked at how many kids were overweight and how many kids who put on weight over the course of their years in HS. I really think something has happened to change kids' metabolism over the years that we just do not understand yet.

For adults who put on weight as they get older, it is typically the failure to deal with a declining metabolism that gets everyone. When I was in my 20s, I would have a bowl of ice cream for desert every night and wouldn't gain an ounce. Now, pushing 50, I will gain two pounds if I go out and eat a three course meal at a nice restaurant. People have no time to exercise, work desk jobs they hate and meals are often the only time of day they have to enjoy something. So, the eat and eat and gain weight.

1234321234 wrote:

fisky wrote:

I researched obesity about 15 years ago for a book project. I found a curious phenomenon. Once a group reaches the first stage of obesity, a certain percentage... it's a guess, but maybe 30%... DO NOT STOP GAINING WEIGHT. They continue to become severely obese and then morbidly obese.

At the time, I was looking at the long term effects on Medicare since obese seniors have... I forget the exact percentage and it's probably changed anyway... about 60% higher Medicare annual expenses than non-overweight weight seniors.

What % of the obese actually make it to medicare age?

Surprisingly, it's almost all. Obesity reduces life expectancy as an adult by 8 years for men and 6 years for women, which is to age 74 and 78 respectively. What obesity really does is lengthen the number of years in morbidity... multiple chronic illnesses that reduce the quality of life and greatly increase medical expenses.

hi there you wrote:

-The rise of the restaurant and decline of family dinner--People use to eat their dinners at home as a family. Now, everyone is running around with their "busy" lives and so each member of the family grabs their own dinner at a quick, casual place instead of a homemade meal. Some of this is probably caused by the rise of two parent working households (nothing wrong with it, just pointing it out.) Have you ever seen the calorie comparison between a fast, casual joint meal and a relatively large homemade meal? It's astounding.

-

sugar tits wrote:

kalory wrote:

This has nothing to do with diet and EVERYTHING to do with exercise.

Myth. Clearly debunked.

Short answer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Arfwf2Ba_JU

Long answer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7FK8noIc5I

Caloric intake has gone way up over the past 60 years. Has almost nothing to do with exercise.

Precious Roy wrote:

I was looking back at my HS and MS yearbooks a few years ago. Everyone was skinny back in the 80s. Overweight kids were maybe one in a hundred. We drank coke, ate garbage whenever we had the chance and spent plenty of time in front of the TV and playing video games. In the 90s, I was teaching drum lines at high schools and was shocked at how many kids were overweight and how many kids who put on weight over the course of their years in HS. I really think something has happened to change kids' metabolism over the years that we just do not understand yet.

So I went back and looked at my yearbooks to and everyone was skinny, the fat kids would be considered normal today. What is terrifying is I graduated high school in 07. This has been a massive shift over the last 15 years.

The exercise is a big factor, we played video games, but our parents also let us roam more and be active. Now parents won't let their kids out due to fear of abduction and other things, where if we spent to much time in front of the TV we were literally kicked out of the house.

I think food has gotten progressively unhealthier. A coke from when you were a kid was not the same as a coke now. Ground beef from 2020 is not the same as what we had in the mid 90 as industrial food has progressively made food worse and worse in its chase of increased profits.

But I think there are also cultural shifts in not overeating and genuine education on the issues associated with obesity. Its well documented how seemingly harmless things like increase in plate sizes have increased food consumption.