Obesity is unhealthy, why is it being embraced?

^ These are some great ideas. I think targetting kids is important because once they get fat it's harder to address - better to prevent it in the first place. I feel sorry for fat kids, it's not their fault. They started doing a daily mile here. Not sure how successful it was. I do know they police what's in their lunch boxes a lot more which would have annoyed me if they did that while I was in school! I wonder how much worse this can get - can we end up with 90% of people obese?

Although I wouldn't prescribe weight loss to anyone for reasons I've detailed in this thread (statistically will probably result in weight gain), I agree that the way fad diets are constructed and marketed is a big part of why they lead to failure. People need to make small adjustments that they can sustain for their entire lives, and that won't lead to immediate impressive results that are getting sold to them at every corner. I also think you have to be a really special type of person to count calories and have it not affect your entire psyche. For me, it led to a devastating eating disorder that was really life-threatening. It took years to recover from. So I guess I'm saying I think most diets (including basic calorie restriction) result in weight gain, some diets result in disordered eating, and very few result in sustained weight loss.

I also understand that as your metabolism responds to reduced energy intake, the number of calories you need to maintain your current weight declines. So for example for a person who once maintained 150 lbs at 2500 calories a day, they will now maintain it at only 2000. Another big reason that any restriction often results in weight gain. - the more you restrict, the more your body will try to compensate by holding on to energy/sacrificing other functions such as blood circulation and temperature regulation.

I'm sorry to hear that apple. I think we're on the same page about the majority of diets being ridiculous. I find it sad that so much money is made out of it when they're purposely set up to fail. The diet industry is horrible really. I agree about the small changes long term/swapping things.

track chick wrote:

I'm sorry to hear that apple. I think we're on the same page about the majority of diets being ridiculous. I find it sad that so much money is made out of it when they're purposely set up to fail. The diet industry is horrible really. I agree about the small changes long term/swapping things.

That so many people are trying to lose weight contradicts the OP's claim that obese people are loving life. Overweight people can say whatever they want, but it doesn't mean they actually believe it and for youtube videos it's probably just for clicks. Not being busy on Saturday nights does not equal happiness.

track chick wrote:

^ These are some great ideas. I think targetting kids is important because once they get fat it's harder to address - better to prevent it in the first place. I feel sorry for fat kids, it's not their fault. They started doing a daily mile here. Not sure how successful it was. I do know they police what's in their lunch boxes a lot more which would have annoyed me if they did that while I was in school! I wonder how much worse this can get - can we end up with 90% of people obese?

That is really dumb for schools to be policing what is in lunch boxes. I find very often, it's the teachers and staff that are themselves obese and have no idea about what real exercise or calories are. They have a job because teachers are part of unions, not because they are good at fitness. They will think that "healthy" is only lettuce and carrots, far from it!

Yeah, they're obsessed with it and ban lots of items - it's crazy. My concern is for kids doing sport. For example, when I was in high school I took in a huge amount of food to eat because I was hungry from training and needed that much food. A teacher seeing that wouldn't really have a clue and would probably say it was too much.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

track chick wrote:

I'm sorry to hear that apple. I think we're on the same page about the majority of diets being ridiculous. I find it sad that so much money is made out of it when they're purposely set up to fail. The diet industry is horrible really. I agree about the small changes long term/swapping things.

That so many people are trying to lose weight contradicts the OP's claim that obese people are loving life. Overweight people can say whatever they want, but it doesn't mean they actually believe it and for youtube videos it's probably just for clicks. Not being busy on Saturday nights does not equal happiness.

Quote where I stated the obese love life or go blow. What I said is the attitude of acceptance towards obesity makes about as much sense as it does towards drug abuse. You don’t see any crack addicts dancing around in celebration of their weakness on Old Navy commercials.

Uh, no, knowing how many calories you take and expend and logging it is a very important aspect of being at a healthy weight and I do it daily. The act of logging it also teaches you to recognize how big a serving you are eating by eye instead of the grotesque portions obese Americans eat. It seems to me you are more a hobby joggers who have other disorders and not that logging calories is evil.

And you are supposed to exercise and weight lift to build lean body mass in addition to tracking calories. You are not supposed to be stupid and only restrict calories. Jesus, you sound like the know it all train wrecks I see in Reddit

You have complete autonomy over your food choices and decision to track your calories every day - I hope it's enriching to you somehow. I would never try and interfere with someone's food decisions without having a good idea of how it affects their daily life or being explicitly asked.

It's a practice that has been detrimental to me, former teammates, and non-runners in my life and an area where I've done plenty of academic writing and have also been exposed to every counter-argument in the book.

I don't know what qualifies someone as a hobby jogger, but I feel pretty secure in my running accomplishments and current training block.

appleapple wrote:

You have complete autonomy over your food choices and decision to track your calories every day - I hope it's enriching to you somehow. I would never try and interfere with someone's food decisions without having a good idea of how it affects their daily life or being explicitly asked.

It's a practice that has been detrimental to me, former teammates, and non-runners in my life and an area where I've done plenty of academic writing and have also been exposed to every counter-argument in the book.

I don't know what qualifies someone as a hobby jogger, but I feel pretty secure in my running accomplishments and current training block.

Jesus, you are a tool. Even tracking how much you eat is something you deem offensive! No wonder you are fat.

I'm sure you are proud of your Boston Marathon participation medal and jacket you bought and parade it everyday for everyone to see.

Vacilated wrote:

SDSU Aztec wrote:

That so many people are trying to lose weight contradicts the OP's claim that obese people are loving life. Overweight people can say whatever they want, but it doesn't mean they actually believe it and for youtube videos it's probably just for clicks. Not being busy on Saturday nights does not equal happiness.

Quote where I stated the obese love life or go blow. What I said is the attitude of acceptance towards obesity makes about as much sense as it does towards drug abuse. You don’t see any crack addicts dancing around in celebration of their weakness on Old Navy commercials.

I didn't reread your opening post so my apologies. However, there is a constant theme on LR that obese people are being celebrated which implies they must be happy about their physical state.

appleapple wrote:

I don't think this is a very accurate understanding of the issue. There is a movement to embrace all body types because we know that no weight loss intervention (with the exception of bariatric surgery, which is a different can of worms) has proven successful in more than 5% of those who attempt it - no other medical intervention with those results would be celebrated or prescribed. The majority of people can't just "choose" to lose weight, and their attempts to loose weight perpetuate a cycle of weight gain. These people will have better health outcomes if they focus on the things they can control and accept the things they can't.

There is tons (see what I did there?) of evidence that once you are obese it is hard to get to and stay at a healthy weight which is why it is more important to never get obese in the first place. As with just about everything in live prevention is better than cure.

That being said there are ways to improve your health, the problem is we (royal we) look for the quick and easy fix. It isn't quick or easy and it requires a permanent change to your life. Not just food or exercise but everything from stress management to sleep to budget allocation.

Obese people, again in general, are too lazy to do a complete over hall of their life from the ground up and forever. They want a pill or formula but that isn't the way it works.

Not quite but I'm loving the guesswork. Too young to have run Boston but I'm sure I'll get a jacket when I do :). You'll have to think of the NCAA equivalent.

We can lament lack of exercise, laziness, bad individual diets or "fat acceptance", but none of that gets at the real problem. The key to reducing obesity is simple: stop allowing multinational food companies to sell poison to the general public.

It is no accident that American obesity rates started to increase just as the fast food industry began to explode. We have allowed the companies that manufacture the food that a majority of Americans eat to prioritize profits over food quality. They're just like the cigarette companies in past. They know that they are killing people but continue to devote their energy towards bribing regulators, covering up the dangers of their products, and preventing healthier ones from cutting into their market share. I mean, the way we allow these people to advertise their nutritionally void sugar packages to children is completely sick, but we're so used to it that we think it's normal.

Of course, we're not allowed to regulate the food industry because our elected officials (mostly republicans) have been paid to ensure that doesn't happen. Lately, conservatives have been awfully worried about the consequences of putting a "foreign substance" into their bodies, but if Biden came out tomorrow with a proposal to better regulate the contents of their favorite yum-yum treats, all of them would cry and say something like "Goddammit, it is my RIGHT to eat hamburgers filled with unregulated chemicals and preservatives!"

Different strokes for different folks, I know. So, if someone WANTS to spend the time to figure out and log calories and/or calories expended, more power to them. But geez, to me, the only thing worse than having to eat considerably less than you want to (a reality for most non-overweight people for most of their lives, including me) is ALSO having to document it all !!

The reality is that one can lose weight without keeping track of everything. Eat less, START exercising. Or, eat less, exercise MORE. In weeks and months you'll see the impact, or not. Adjust as necessary.

Moreover, of course, telling or strongly suggesting to people that they have to carefully track calories in order to be successful is just a really great counter-productive idea. Eating less than you want to and/or exercising more than you'd like to is already hard enough for most people. Add "careful calorie tracking" and you'll get EVEN FEWER people willing to do it.

aoijf9paer8fujpdifja wrote:

There is tons (see what I did there?) of evidence that once you are obese it is hard to get to and stay at a healthy weight which is why it is more important to never get obese in the first place. As with just about everything in live prevention is better than cure.

This. When I'm not running as much, I tend to gain weight very quickly. I get on the scale at least once a week. Any time I go up more than 5-6 lbs, I realize it's time to run more and eat less. Even at my age (51), it's not very hard to lose 5 lbs. 50 lbs would be very difficult I think, but I don't plan on finding out.

Right now I'm 5"9" , 145 lbs with a 31 inch waist. That's not by accident. I've made a life long commitment to being healthy.

appleapple wrote:

I don't think this is a very accurate understanding of the issue. There is a movement to embrace all body types because we know that no weight loss intervention (with the exception of bariatric surgery, which is a different can of worms) has proven successful in more than 5% of those who attempt it - no other medical intervention with those results would be celebrated or prescribed. The majority of people can't just "choose" to lose weight, and their attempts to loose weight perpetuate a cycle of weight gain. These people will have better health outcomes if they focus on the things they can control and accept the things they can't.

This^

People are born different. Some are fat, some are skinny.

I don't think fat should be celebrated, no need to overcorrect just to make people feel better. We all know what the ideal male and female bodies are. No need to pretend otherwise.

I live in California and have Kaiser heath coverage. There are large numbers of employees there in scrubs and administrative garb that are fat. The doctors are not . Anyhow, if this is the situation in health facilities , how can we expect genuine public discourse on the issue of over fatness and obesity?

NPR is that worst, now saying people "have" obesity. This is nothing short or a social engineering campaign to indoctrinate on body norms, in service of what?