There are factors, but I bet the majority of people it is as simple as eating less/better and exercise. There's a reason this is a problem now with a predominantly sedentary lifestyle/jobs.
Again its not just straight "eat this many calories" its what goes into making up those calories between sodium, carbs, and fats, and also things like caffeine, alcohol, and water consumption.
And you are going to have to exercise and not just walking on a treadmill at a 1/1 for thirty minutes.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
I see the causality on this as somewhat different. I think it is mostly just another byproduct of our consumer culture. Most Americans don't do shit for themselves anymore.
Think of everyone you know who owns a car. How many of them fix their own car? 1-2 'car guys' and everyone else just takes it to a shop.
Who do you know who knows how to do any electrical work in their house besides changing a light bulb, any plumbing besides using a plunger?
All this talk about corn subsidies is misguided on two levels.
First, is the classic 'French Paradox', or the Italians eat so many carbs paradox, or the X group eats tons of trendy bad food Y paradox. Americans just eat too much of everything. Unless you a raising the prices of foods to the point where people can't afford to buy all the food they want to eat, and good luck finding any point that will make that work for both the guy digging ditches for $9 an hour, and the $9/hour call center sits-on-ass worker, people will still eat too much.
Two, cooking for yourself is cheaper than fast food or prepackaged food.
And this is where the normal "poor people don't have time to cook" line comes out. NOT TRUE
Hours of TV watched per day vs income.
spoiler huge.
There are tons of things you can make in 30m-1 hour, and a lot of the foods that take longer take longer because you 'let it braise for 45m, or roast in oven for 1:15' not like making a meringue or something actually labor intensive.
A 2011 study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, “Fast Food Restaurants and Food Stores,” used 15 years of data on more than 5,000 survey participants to examine the relationship between access to food resources (i.e., what food is available near homes) among young adults 18 to 30 years old and consumption patterns.
The study’s findings include:
Higher levels of fast food consumption were strongly correlated to fast food availability, particularly among low-income men with fast food restaurants within 1 to 2.99 km of their homes. A 1% increase in fast food availability within 1 km and 3 km of the home was associated with a 0.13% and 0.34% increase in fast food consumption, respectively.
Greater proximity to supermarkets was not correlated in any consistent fashion with diet outcomes, nor was it associated with fruit and vegetable intake levels.
There were no consistent or strong correlations between neighborhood fast food availability and individual consumption of fast food for women of any income level.
On average, men of all income levels consumed fast food 2.1 times a week, while their female counterparts consumed such food only 1.6 times.
In my experience the best grocery stores in cities are in the not exactly affluent latin neighborhoods. Is their organic, GMO free, free trade quino? Nope, but there are tons of produce and other stuff to actually make food with.
The thing most people also get hung up with becoming healthier is they look at how much they need to lose and give up before they ever try. Much like having an extremely dirty house and feeling you can't clean it all up at once so there is no point in trying to clean up any of it. You can do things gradually, change your diet in healthy ways to start, start working out at a lower volume and work your way up.
You didn't get fat eating one meal, you won't lose all the weight with one exercise session. The important part is admitting you have an issue, and working to correct it in healthy and helpful ways.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
There's also the part where being overweight is a complex issue that is not always directly attributable to "won't stop eating the McStuffs," so yeah, fat shaming is stupid and awful in about 36 different ways.
For being such a major issue there really seems to be very little knowledge of the details surrounding body weight. Most people act as if it is always as simple as "calories in vs calories out" when there are many more details at play. I doubt I can find the link, but I read one in-depth article a few months ago that cited several of these complexities. For example, the children of obese parents are often obese themselves, even when they have been adopted and raised by normal weight parents.
There is a large heritable component, yeah. It's a mistake to attribute the issue to any one cause.
It's also my understanding that the risk of developing diabetes drops dramatically with even small decreases in weight, which I would think would be attributable to increased physical activity. That means that even an overweight person who has difficulty dropping down into the "normal" range could benefit. However, people who try to lose weight and fail to accomplish whatever weight loss goal they had set often give-up on exercising since it did not give them the superficial results they were looking for (furthermore, many common weight loss strategies are fad diets, unsustainable in the long run). This fixation of physical appearance could cause someone to ignore the more important benefits of exercise.
So, basically, this issue has a very significant social component as well.
I've been calorie counting and calorie density is such a goddamn problem in our packaged foods. WHY THE HELL DOES THIS TINY BAR HAVE FIVE HUNDRED CALORIES.
We should probably do less shaming, and more looking at what the fuck we're subsidizing and why. We spend an awful lot of money to support corn and beef farmers, giving us red meat and foods stuffed with corn syrup at a much lower price than they should be. But I don't see us spending much on farms growing kale or spinach. Poor people don't have much of an option to buy healthy foods when the foods that are subsidized are the crap ones.
I think we'd have to do more than just cut the subsidies here. As suggested earlier, the companies would just resort to the new cheapest unhealthy option. Part of the problem with a fair chunk of our food industry, is that many companies have abused scientific knowledge, like we're hardwired to to crave certain things, to make it so that people want to continue buying their product. Also doesn't help that many have gotten use to eating food with too much sugar, fat and salt, so that healthier food ends up tasting bland to them (it takes time to get use to food having less of those). Anyways, we'd have to subsidize healthier options and make it easier for low socioeconomic families to afford such food, in addition to cutting some of the stupid subsidizes. Otherwise, you just end up increasing food prices, which both causes hardship for people who aren't wealthy and people to bitch, without really accomplishing anything.
I grew up eating home cooked meals and vegetables, so a fair bit of processed food tastes awful to me aka most of it either tastes like pure salt, sugar, fat or grease. So I agree, if we could make the healthier options more affordable and the shitty options not cheaper than them, it would help. I also think it goes without saying, that all things are good in moderation and that vegetables are the things you'd really want to make accessible. Otherwise you run into the issue, that I see with my old man, where he doesn't do himself any favors by eating an unhealthy amount of fruit in one sitting and tends to dump shit that adds even more sugar to the snake. Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar; possibly more, if in the process of eating to many, one decides it needs a ton of whip cream or sugar added to it. Plus, if you're way overweight, taking in a bunch of unneeded calories is still an issue, even if those calories are from something other than a bag of chips.
I'd say that the US also has other factors feeding into this problem besides making it too easy to buy shitty food. We had all the assholes who decided, "hey in suburbia you shouldn't walk, you must drive everywhere!" So it gets harder for people to find ways to sneak in activity, when the store is a 15+ minute drive away, going being 30-55mph, you're stuck spending 15+ minutes sitting behind a wheel of car and can't substitute walking or riding a bike in there. Plus, in such areas, it seems like the assholes that decided one must drive everywhere, go out of their way to make walking and bike riding a non-option ("fuck sidewalks, fuck bike trails and fuck shoulders on roads, it's not like people use those!). Sure I could be fair and admit, that in some cases even when walking is an option, sometimes the environment just doesn't make it feasible (plenty of times, when I lived in Norfolk, where it was so fucking hot and humid out, that it was a better option to drive a short distance and the 30s walk from a air conditioned building to the the car, in those cases, was a fucking awful experience).
Then there is also how our work culture for many of the non-wealthy doesn't do people favors. Many cases of people stuck sitting behind something for hours on end. Plus, if you're one of the poor bastards that gets stuck working an unreasonable number of hours and having to sacrifice sleep for the miserable experience, then that's another factor that can result in becoming obese, which in turn ups the chances of getting some sort of diabetes.
In short, shaming ain't going to do shit here. Plenty of factors still in place, that will feed into the problem, that will remain untouched until the powers that be acknowledge that they are an issue (that can be them willingly acknowledging they exist without any prodding or begrudgingly acknowledging them because the voters will fucking kick their asses out of power, if they continue to ignore them).
(as a side not, it's very frustrating that when searching for that paper, the first results I got were "we should be shaming people more to combat obesity)
Yeah, fat shaming is extremely counterproductive. How many overweight and obese people have thought about taking up a sport or starting jogging only to abandon the idea for fear that they'll be publicly ridiculed? I've heard before of private swim classes only for overweight and obese people; maybe we need to have more things like that?
People who fear that are just hung up on their school days (this certainly happens in school). *Actual* gyms contain mainly people who are entirely lost in their own heads. There's no gym clique. Fat guys might get a stare or two, but the starers are more likely to be thinking "Good luck to him, he's got a lot of work ahead of him" not "Ugh, a fatty in my Zone of Beautiful people."
Need to get away from this idea that sugars/fats/carbs/whatever are unhealthy or are the cause of the problem. Chairs don't make you fat, but spending the majority of your life sitting will contribute. Overconsumption, imbalanced diets, and low levels of physical activity are the culprit.
Positive messaging, availability of resources (good food and access to safe play areas) across the socioeconomic spectrum, and consistent information are the best tools against what is a social ill.
Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar
I'm not as knowledgeable about this as I could be, but from what I understand the sugar present in an apple isn't as harmful as it is in a form that takes the body longer to break down and is also ingested alongside fiber, which slows down sugar absorption even more.
Honestly, I really wonder if a lot of America's medical woes aren't primarily due to the improper ingestion of sugar and its overconsumption. For eample, in addition to diabetes sugar has also been implicated in encouraging the development of heart disease and cancer.
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HakkekageSpace Whore Academysumma cum laudeRegistered Userregular
you know what else is a myth? That time spent in low-income people's lives on leisure activities proves that they aren't suffering enough to exclude them from doing this one extra easy thing that will make this whole issue go away if only they could properly motivate themselves.
I'm just very frustrated when someone drags this out.
Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar
I'm not as knowledgeable about this as I could be, but from what I understand the sugar present in an apple isn't as harmful as it is in a form that takes the body longer to break down and is also ingested alongside fiber, which slows down sugar absorption even more.
My understanding is part of this is that the apple also comes with fiber which helps you self regulate how much you eat.
Still, some fruits are fucking horrible for sugar. Go look up grapes sometime.
(as a side not, it's very frustrating that when searching for that paper, the first results I got were "we should be shaming people more to combat obesity)
Yeah, fat shaming is extremely counterproductive. How many overweight and obese people have thought about taking up a sport or starting jogging only to abandon the idea for fear that they'll be publicly ridiculed? I've heard before of private swim classes only for overweight and obese people; maybe we need to have more things like that?
People who fear that are just hung up on their school days (this certainly happens in school). *Actual* gyms contain mainly people who are entirely lost in their own heads. There's no gym clique. Fat guys might get a stare or two, but the starers are more likely to be thinking "Good luck to him, he's got a lot of work ahead of him" not "Ugh, a fatty in my Zone of Beautiful people."
It takes a while to learn this, and then to actually believe it, and then to make it an effective habit.
Other fears: That I'll look stupid trying to attempt this exercise I don't know how to do; that I'll never look the way I want, and all this effort is wasted; that I'll have to make cutbacks in other things I enjoy in life to make room for this; that I don't know how to make adjustments when life stuff happens; that I feel like shit and I hate feeling like shit and I don't understand why people say this is good for me because it feels like shit.
Actually recent studies have shown that the american population consumes about the same as they did 50 years ago caloric wise so its a bunch of other factors including obesogens.
Actually recent studies have shown that the american population consumes about the same as they did 50 years ago caloric wise so its a bunch of other factors including obesogens.
I honestly find that a bit hard to believe considering how massive fast food portion sizes have become (not to mention movie theater portions, where a medium drink is almost too big to hold with one hand). However, I do think I recall hearing claims that Americans get the same amount of physical activity now as they did prior to the extreme growth of obesity and diabetes incidence, which I'd be more likely to believe.
Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar
I'm not as knowledgeable about this as I could be, but from what I understand the sugar present in an apple isn't as harmful as it is in a form that takes the body longer to break down and is also ingested alongside fiber, which slows down sugar absorption even more.
Honestly, I really wonder if a lot of America's medical woes aren't primarily due to the improper ingestion of sugar and its overconsumption. For eample, in addition to diabetes sugar has also been implicated in encouraging the development of heart disease and cancer.
Moderation in everything. If you do what my old man does and eat three to four apples in one sitting as a snack, minus loading it up with sugary crap, that still isn't healthy. That is still eating to much and ingesting too much stuff that the body isn't going to use. It's like water, one needs a bare minimum to live, but it's better to drink more than the bar minimum; however, it's possible to drink too much and kill yourself.
I see the causality on this as somewhat different. I think it is mostly just another byproduct of our consumer culture. Most Americans don't do shit for themselves anymore.
Agreed. Too many people have this idiotic notion that they have to go to the gym to loose weight. I'm skinny and I can't remember the last time I've been in a gym. My mom is skinny as well, drinks a bunch of soda and has never been to a gym, as far as I know. Yeah, some of the skinniness is likely genetic, but we don't sit on our asses all day in front of a monitor or have our noses stuck in book, like my old man does. Doing house work will burn off calories. A fair bit of yard work will also suffice. Gardening can also burn off calories. There is a fair bit of things can accomplish the goal of burning off calories. Hell, I have a huge problem where I'll pace back and forth in my room because I get hyper if I stay put in a spot too long (I use to agonizing over this a little, but honestly, it's hell of a lot better than always sitting on my ass for long periods of time doing nothing).
Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar
I'm not as knowledgeable about this as I could be, but from what I understand the sugar present in an apple isn't as harmful as it is in a form that takes the body longer to break down and is also ingested alongside fiber, which slows down sugar absorption even more.
Honestly, I really wonder if a lot of America's medical woes aren't primarily due to the improper ingestion of sugar and its overconsumption. For eample, in addition to diabetes sugar has also been implicated in encouraging the development of heart disease and cancer.
Moderation in everything. If you do what my old man does and eat three to four apples in one sitting as a snack, minus loading it up with sugary crap, that still isn't healthy. That is still eating to much and ingesting too much stuff that the body isn't going to use. It's like water, one needs a bare minimum to live, but it's better to drink more than the bar minimum; however, it's possible to drink too much and kill yourself.
I see the causality on this as somewhat different. I think it is mostly just another byproduct of our consumer culture. Most Americans don't do shit for themselves anymore.
Agreed. Too many people have this idiotic notion that they have to go to the gym to loose weight. I'm skinny and I can't remember the last time I've been in a gym. My mom is skinny as well, drinks a bunch of soda and has never been to a gym, as far as I know. Yeah, some of the skinniness is likely genetic, but we don't sit on our asses all day in front of a monitor or have our noses stuck in book, like my old man does. Doing house work will burn off calories. A fair bit of yard work will also suffice. Gardening can also burn off calories. There is a fair bit of things can accomplish the goal of burning off calories. Hell, I have a huge problem where I'll pace back and forth in my room because I get hyper if I stay put in a spot too long (I use to agonizing over this a little, but honestly, it's hell of a lot better than always sitting on my ass for long periods of time doing nothing).
This is skinny folk lore and not grounded in science.
you know what else is a myth? That time spent in low-income people's lives on leisure activities proves that they aren't suffering enough to exclude them from doing this one extra easy thing that will make this whole issue go away if only they could properly motivate themselves.
I'm just very frustrated when someone drags this out.
Yeah, it's mentally and physically draining to spend 12 hours working, shuttling the kids around, getting home, getting settled, and so on. After all that, yeah, I'm keen to kinda veg for a few hours. I technically have a good 5-6 hours in between getting home from work and going to bed, but I don't have the energy to spend a lot of it being productive.
And to someone unfamiliar with a kitchen, cooking sounds fucking hard. And if you don't know what you're doing, it kinda can be. I can knock out a healthy and tasty meal in 45 minutes no prob, faster if I'm feeling lazy, but you stick someone in a random kitchen, where they might not even own a viable set of cooking gear, and give them a pile of ingredients and say, "Here cook something healthy," and that's going to sound terrifying.
And hey, you know what one of the easiest dishes to cook is, conceptually? A big pile of pasta. And if you get fancy, let's throw some sausage or ground beef in there and cover it with cheese.
We need some sort of comprehensive educational campaign to teach people that healthy cooking is not difficult, here is how you do it. Maybe subsidize a decent set of cookware. I do wonder what effect you'd see from free cooking classes aimed at low-income families that teach how to make some basic protein+veggie+starch dishes.
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Actually recent studies have shown that the american population consumes about the same as they did 50 years ago caloric wise so its a bunch of other factors including obesogens.
I honestly find that a bit hard to believe considering how massive fast food portion sizes have become (not to mention movie theater portions, where a medium drink is almost too big to hold with one hand). However, I do think I recall hearing claims that Americans get the same amount of physical activity now as they did prior to the extreme growth of obesity and diabetes incidence, which I'd be more likely to believe.
There was a Stanford study this summer. They acknowledge that participants may have underreported calories but the clear factor was lack of physical activity and an increase in sedentary behavior. This was a meta-study of CDC data over multiple decades.
Actually recent studies have shown that the american population consumes about the same as they did 50 years ago caloric wise so its a bunch of other factors including obesogens.
I honestly find that a bit hard to believe considering how massive fast food portion sizes have become (not to mention movie theater portions, where a medium drink is almost too big to hold with one hand). However, I do think I recall hearing claims that Americans get the same amount of physical activity now as they did prior to the extreme growth of obesity and diabetes incidence, which I'd be more likely to believe.
I seriously doubt this.
Hell, I can see a difference from when I was a kid to now.
My activities as a young adult were climbing trees (7 or so) to walking 4 miles to the comic book shop (till age 17 when I could drive).
If given the choice, my kids would sit around all day and play video games (not blaming games, but they would). I have to get them outside (and I do a lot). I wonder how many other parents don't.
also, given the fact that nearly everyone walks around with the means to view every single TV show and movie or read every single book, it's no wonder people move around a lot less.
We need some sort of comprehensive educational campaign to teach people that healthy cooking is not difficult, here is how you do it. Maybe subsidize a decent set of cookware. I do wonder what effect you'd see from free cooking classes aimed at low-income families that teach how to make some basic protein+veggie+starch dishes.
We had those classes in my local high school. I'd bet something like that is available at the local community colleges as well, but if so it's not well advertised.
Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar
I'm not as knowledgeable about this as I could be, but from what I understand the sugar present in an apple isn't as harmful as it is in a form that takes the body longer to break down and is also ingested alongside fiber, which slows down sugar absorption even more.
My understanding is part of this is that the apple also comes with fiber which helps you self regulate how much you eat.
Still, some fruits are fucking horrible for sugar. Go look up grapes sometime.
Yes, this is essentially correct. The fiber in the apple helps you to feel full and therefore not eat the second apple. So, while they contain similar calorie amounts, the apple is nutritionally dense, while the soda has almost no nutritional value whatsoever.
The other thing to remember, as some people have touched on, is that weight gain/loss is about a lot more than calories in vs. calories out. Yes, it is ultimately the final determining thing, but there's a lot more that goes into the calories in number and the calories out number than just how much you eat and how long you spend exercising. Hormonal swings due to stress or similar issues have a huge impact on how tightly your body holds on to calories. Poor nutrition, even in a calorie light diet, can really make it tough to loss weight. This is really where the Apple vs. Soda battle shifts, because, again, while providing similar amounts of calories, the apple gives you the aforementioned fiber, vitamins, minerals, etc. that your body needs and the soda will never have. Not getting enough Calcium, as another example, can really inhibit weight loss, because Calcium is the primary catalyst in the chemical reaction that happens in your muscles when your body is trying to pull energy from your reserves top power your activities. No Calcium means your body gets that energy from a different source (likely the protein in the muscles themselves), which doesn't help you when you're trying to get rid of body fat.
Last point, yes, fruits can have a ton of calories. I think it's instructive to note that in many European countries, "desert" is a piece of fruit and some cheese
Apple Sugar vs Soda sugar is also just liquid versus solid. Solids take longer to break down, liquids not so much. Its the difference between a protein shake directly following exercise and a steak. Both contain protein one will be put to use faster than the other.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
HakkekageSpace Whore Academysumma cum laudeRegistered Userregular
Losing weight in a way that gets you at least observable results is far more dependent on food--intake and nutritional value-- and much, much less so on exercise. It takes a long time to get from couch potato to regular gym rat, and even longer to get to the point where calories burned during exercise is worth a damn in your daily cal in/cal out equation.
A fitness base will make it easier to manage food, not only because muscles take more energy and you're going to be spending a lot of actual time exercising and not eating, but also because sticking to an exercise plan also helps train you mentally to stick with plans/delay gratification and promote healthier activities in the rest of your life so as not to negatively impact your gainz. However, it still has a much more delayed effect than getting on a diet, and can often present as a much more disruptive intrusion in your life ("aww, that sucks I'd love to eat that " vs "OMG IM DYING THIS IS HORRENDOUS ABORT ABORT")
I think one myth that would be helpful to debunk is the "Biggest Loser," competitive mindset--You have to lose a fuckton and fast! It's not really weight loss if someone with a six pack isn't calling you a fucking maggot on a treadmill while you huff and puff! You're going to look like a model but only if you really, really want it!
What was helpful to me was: Some minor activity is better than no activity. You are allowed to reward yourself with a snack if you go to the gym. Don't overstrain and if you feel like butts, take a break and make it up later. Hey, nice gains. Your gains could be better if you ate more protein. Do you like your poops to come out smooth? Celery's good for that. It doesn't matter if you don't look any different from your exercising--do you feel better? Give it at least six months, then let me know.
But that kind of response isn't how you respond to a "crisis," i suppose.
Fruit holds calories, but you have to work pretty hard to overeat on fruit.
My fruit today is grapes, they come in at 76cal/100g. That's 300cals for a pound. If you ate a pound of grapes you won't be eating much else for a while. The worst I am aware of is dates, which come in at around 200cal/100g.
The contrast with sodas (or fruit juice!) is that you don't really feel full on it. Your body doesn't register the sugar intake much at all.
A very interesting documentary on the subject is 'The men who made us fat' which aired on the BBC a few years ago. It lays part of the blame with the food industry and its lobbyists, advertisements and business models.
Well the thing with exercise is you didn't get fat from one meal, you won't lose weight from one exercise session. Its a lifestyle choice, you either lift, or you don't, BRO!
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
Apple Sugar vs Soda sugar is also just liquid versus solid. Solids take longer to break down, liquids not so much. Its the difference between a protein shake directly following exercise and a steak. Both contain protein one will be put to use faster than the other.
While probably true, I don't think this is a significant factor in weight loss/gain. Your teeth do a pretty good job of turning that solid apple into something decidedly less solid before it enters your digestive system proper. Also, while your body does need to convert the Fructose in the Apple into Glucose that your body can process and the soda starts already with the simplified Glucose, the time difference there isn't really meaningful on a long term scale. Same with the Shake vs. Steak, I think the big factor with the Shake is that it's much easier to transport and consume within the 30 minute window following your workout than the Steak is. The Shake also probably doesn't have the extra fat, cholesterol and other stuff the steak has, which is probably a bigger factor in long term nutrition than solid vs. liquid.
Well the thing with exercise is you didn't get fat from one meal, you won't lose weight from one exercise session. Its a lifestyle choice, you either lift, or you don't, BRO!
Well its more about that you can drink a lot more sugar in soda than you can eat in an apple. The protein thing was just an example of why you drink protein post work out so it can be delivered faster.
I've found also a snack of cottage cheese before I go to bed helps me sleep better during the night, and not wake up famished in the morning, and cuts down on muscle pain (slower release protein, there is a powder for this but that shit is like eighty bucks a bottle and cottage cheese is cheap if sort of flavor neutral).
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
I think we'd have to do more than just cut the subsidies here. As suggested earlier, the companies would just resort to the new cheapest unhealthy option.
Which would not have the same price:calories ratio because it wouldn't be a subsidized sugar.
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
- Make it more expensive to put sugar in processed food
- Make it more expensive to fatten large populations of cows
Both of these would reduce the amount of cheap high-calorie foods available in the US, and consequently reduce the aggregate number of calories consumed by Americans.
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
I wish people viewed the gym as a supplement to healthy living rather than the only means of losing weight. Any activity is better than no activity. If it's burning off calories, then it's a good activity, even if it isn't at the gym.
Also people need to loose the whole, "I must loose a fuckton of weight really fast and look like a professional model." That is just setting oneself up for failure because for most, this is a process that takes time and even then, there are many of people that will reach a fit and healthy state, but they aren't going to look like models. People need to gradually work towards the goal and find a way that will work for them long term, which means making sure the act of physical activity is fun. I was on the varsity team for cross country and swimming in high school, I didn't get there quickly and I got there because I found those fun. I also did track, but I didn't make varsity because I ended up not enjoying it (fucking tedious IMO).
It would also help if people understood what a reasonable diet is. I think for most, it's not that they need to go on a special diet. They just need to cut down on total intake of calories and maybe weight that more heavily against certain foods. I also suspect that this follows the same rule as exercise. It's going to fail if one does it too fast because the body has gotten use to the excessive calorie intake. So gradually work towards a goal.
Ah, gotcha Preach. Totally agree on that. I can definitely chug a case of soda faster than I can eat the equivalent number of apples
God I'd hope so, because I want to sleep at night and not think of some human great white shark.
But Soda is also bad calories because people don't think about it as calories. People don't think of drinks in general as calories, like they'll drink 700 cal's from starbucks and not even bat an eye.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
The point with going to the gym* is that you build muscle. The passive burn rate on muscle is higher than fat. "Any activity is better than no activity" is technically true, but doing something that builds muscle is such a massive force-multiplier calling it a complement to a healthy lifestyle is almost misleading.
*You don't actually have to go the gym though. Any form of exercise that will build muscle works. Personally, I'm a Big Fan of swimming because it uses a fuckton of muscles you don't really realize that you have until they're all that stands between you and drowning.
In addition to that, exercise - and I mean actual, "why is my body crying?" exercise - has a number of additional sideeffects. You feel better, because endorphins. It helps with general hormonal balance. It actually reduces feelings of hunger. Physical exercise is like a pill that makes you feel better, which for obvious reasons makes it easier to cope with life, even the parts that are about eating less.
Adjusting your diet to lose weight without making sure you're getting a proper amount of exercise is the hard and incredibly unpleasant way to lose weight. It'll be much slower and you'll feel much worse. Let's not even get into the fact that being skinny and under-excercised can still leave some parts of your body less functional than if you'd been slightly overweight but exercised regularly.
And if they've invented a soda that tastes good enough to be worth learning more about the connection between the four types of gangrene and diabetes, I sure havn't tasted it.
Yeah, the "best" diet, is whichever one you can stick to long term. Crash diets are often counterproductive because your body goes into survival mode, since it is unable to know you are intentionally starving yourself, thus making it that much harder to actually lose weight, or, more accurately, to reduce your body fat % (which is what your actual goal should be anyway).
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HakkekageSpace Whore Academysumma cum laudeRegistered Userregular
The point with going to the gym* is that you build muscle. The passive burn rate on muscle is higher than fat. "Any activity is better than no activity" is technically true, but doing something that builds muscle is such a massive force-multiplier calling it a complement to a healthy lifestyle is almost misleading.
*You don't actually have to go the gym though. Any form of exercise that will build muscle works. Personally, I'm a Big Fan of swimming because it uses a fuckton of muscles you don't really realize that you have until they're all that stands between you and drowning.
In addition to that, exercise - and I mean actual, "why is my body crying?" exercise - has a number of additional sideeffects. You feel better, because endorphins. It helps with general hormonal balance. It actually reduces feelings of hunger. Physical exercise is like a pill that makes you feel better, which for obvious reasons makes it easier to cope with life, even the parts that are about eating less.
Adjusting your diet to lose weight without making sure you're getting a proper amount of exercise is the hard and incredibly unpleasant way to lose weight. It'll be much slower and you'll feel much worse. Let's not even get into the fact that being skinny and under-excercised can still leave some parts of your body less functional than if you'd been slightly overweight but exercised regularly.
And if they've invented a soda that tastes good enough to be worth learning more about the connection between the four types of gangrene and diabetes, I sure havn't tasted it.
This is undeniable. It is also not evident to anyone who is a beginner, who has understandable hangups about exercising, and to whom the prospect of getting used to "my body is crying!" is repulsive enough that all the promised benefits are so far away that they seem unattainable. No one is saying diet + exercise isn't the best way to lose weight, but it is evident that getting people to make a permanent change isn't to demand a result of "A++ purge all vices endure all pains" right off the bat. Too many people are disdainful of psychology's role in this endeavor. Those people are making it harder for people who genuinely want to do something, but feel helpless and stigmatized.
In the beginning, exercise is a complement. Start slow, do only what you're comfortable with, spend maybe 20-30 minutes in the gym learning forms, getting comfortable with machines, with the atmosphere--that's how you get the average person to stick with something, instead of screaming about sweet gainz and "force multipliers" and demanding huge amounts of time right away. Only when a habit is established does pushing the limit bring those emotional and physical returns you've outlined above. The problem is that it takes time, and the amount of time varies greatly person to person.
That is why, in the beginning before healthy habits are formed, diet is much more apparently impactful on weight than exercise. Without an existing base of fitness, there a lot of new territory to explore, practices to learn, and spaces to become comfortable with--it's a steep curve. Eating less, or eating healthier, or whatever form of diet is being pursued involves a less-steep learning curve and more observable results, although of course mild activity + better eating is better together than either on their own.
I never would have stuck with exercising if I was obsessively standing on a scale and pushing myself to exhaustion every single time. Some people really like that. Chances are those people already incorporate it as a habit. They are not the people who are being addressed in this discussion of how to encourage healthy habits in people at risk of developing or already suffering from obesity/diabetes.
I only wish that people who are motivated to keep fit and eat healthy purely through spite and contempt for fatties keep their damn opinions to themselves on the internet though, because they only contribute to the problem, but we're dealing with practicalities here and that will also never happen. They haven't appeared in this thread yet, but I'm holding my breath.
- Make it more expensive to put sugar in processed food
- Make it more expensive to fatten large populations of cows
Both of these would reduce the amount of cheap high-calorie foods available in the US, and consequently reduce the aggregate number of calories consumed by Americans.
Well obviously then, the fastest solution to the problem of obesity/diabetes among the impoverished-who are disproportionately obese- is simply to cut food stamps by $5/month.
Clearly stupid.
What you are positing is only true if the thing limiting calorie consumption is cost, but obesity and diabetes rates track negatively with income. And once again, fast/processed food is not cheaper than making your own food.
- Make it more expensive to put sugar in processed food
- Make it more expensive to fatten large populations of cows
Both of these would reduce the amount of cheap high-calorie foods available in the US, and consequently reduce the aggregate number of calories consumed by Americans.
Well obviously then, the fastest solution to the problem of obesity/diabetes among the impoverished-who are disproportionately obese- is simply to cut food stamps by $5/month.
Clearly stupid.
What you are positing is only true if the thing limiting calorie consumption is cost, but obesity and diabetes rates track negatively with income. And once again, fast/processed food is not cheaper than making your own food.
1) Not what Feral was saying.
2) You're assuming the impoverished or hell, even the average American, know that fast food / processed food is more expensive than making your own food.
3) Fast food is cheaper than produce + meat like all the time.
4) Fast food is convenient for busy families that don't have time to cook involved meals.
A big part of eating right and eating healthy is planning meals out in advance. Like I make two days of lunch in advance and plan out my meals including snacks for the entire week. It doesn't even take that long to do.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
- Make it more expensive to put sugar in processed food
- Make it more expensive to fatten large populations of cows
Both of these would reduce the amount of cheap high-calorie foods available in the US, and consequently reduce the aggregate number of calories consumed by Americans.
Well obviously then, the fastest solution to the problem of obesity/diabetes among the impoverished-who are disproportionately obese- is simply to cut food stamps by $5/month.
Clearly stupid.
What you are positing is only true if the thing limiting calorie consumption is cost, but obesity and diabetes rates track negatively with income. And once again, fast/processed food is not cheaper than making your own food.
1) Not what Feral was saying.
2) You're assuming the impoverished or hell, even the average American, know that fast food / processed food is more expensive than making your own food.
3) Fast food is cheaper than produce + meat like all the time.
4) Fast food is convenient for busy families that don't have time to cook involved meals.
1)clearly it is, the point of ending the subsidies is to cause prices to rise.
2) If the people consuming the food are incapable of comparing prices, what does raising the price do?
3) No it isn't. I can get ground beef for $3 a pound at a grocery store. Mcdonalds wants $4.80 for a BigMac.
4) is directly the point I was making. If people aren't choosing it because it's the cheapest option, then raising the price isn't going to change anything.
If I am feeding myself and my kids McDonalds 4 nights a week because I can't/won't cook, does raising the price of a Big Mac 5c change that?
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Again its not just straight "eat this many calories" its what goes into making up those calories between sodium, carbs, and fats, and also things like caffeine, alcohol, and water consumption.
And you are going to have to exercise and not just walking on a treadmill at a 1/1 for thirty minutes.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Think of everyone you know who owns a car. How many of them fix their own car? 1-2 'car guys' and everyone else just takes it to a shop.
Who do you know who knows how to do any electrical work in their house besides changing a light bulb, any plumbing besides using a plunger?
All this talk about corn subsidies is misguided on two levels.
First, is the classic 'French Paradox', or the Italians eat so many carbs paradox, or the X group eats tons of trendy bad food Y paradox. Americans just eat too much of everything. Unless you a raising the prices of foods to the point where people can't afford to buy all the food they want to eat, and good luck finding any point that will make that work for both the guy digging ditches for $9 an hour, and the $9/hour call center sits-on-ass worker, people will still eat too much.
Two, cooking for yourself is cheaper than fast food or prepackaged food.
And this is where the normal "poor people don't have time to cook" line comes out. NOT TRUE
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/wealth-poverty/income-upshot/behind-data-tv-viewing-and-income
Hours of TV watched per day vs income.
spoiler huge.
There are tons of things you can make in 30m-1 hour, and a lot of the foods that take longer take longer because you 'let it braise for 45m, or roast in oven for 1:15' not like making a meringue or something actually labor intensive.
Also food deserts are basically a myth.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/health/research/pairing-of-food-deserts-and-obesity-challenged-in-studies.html?_r=0
http://www.npr.org/2010/12/15/132076786/the-root-the-myth-of-the-food-desert
In my experience the best grocery stores in cities are in the not exactly affluent latin neighborhoods. Is their organic, GMO free, free trade quino? Nope, but there are tons of produce and other stuff to actually make food with.
You didn't get fat eating one meal, you won't lose all the weight with one exercise session. The important part is admitting you have an issue, and working to correct it in healthy and helpful ways.
pleasepaypreacher.net
It's also my understanding that the risk of developing diabetes drops dramatically with even small decreases in weight, which I would think would be attributable to increased physical activity. That means that even an overweight person who has difficulty dropping down into the "normal" range could benefit. However, people who try to lose weight and fail to accomplish whatever weight loss goal they had set often give-up on exercising since it did not give them the superficial results they were looking for (furthermore, many common weight loss strategies are fad diets, unsustainable in the long run). This fixation of physical appearance could cause someone to ignore the more important benefits of exercise.
So, basically, this issue has a very significant social component as well.
I think we'd have to do more than just cut the subsidies here. As suggested earlier, the companies would just resort to the new cheapest unhealthy option. Part of the problem with a fair chunk of our food industry, is that many companies have abused scientific knowledge, like we're hardwired to to crave certain things, to make it so that people want to continue buying their product. Also doesn't help that many have gotten use to eating food with too much sugar, fat and salt, so that healthier food ends up tasting bland to them (it takes time to get use to food having less of those). Anyways, we'd have to subsidize healthier options and make it easier for low socioeconomic families to afford such food, in addition to cutting some of the stupid subsidizes. Otherwise, you just end up increasing food prices, which both causes hardship for people who aren't wealthy and people to bitch, without really accomplishing anything.
I grew up eating home cooked meals and vegetables, so a fair bit of processed food tastes awful to me aka most of it either tastes like pure salt, sugar, fat or grease. So I agree, if we could make the healthier options more affordable and the shitty options not cheaper than them, it would help. I also think it goes without saying, that all things are good in moderation and that vegetables are the things you'd really want to make accessible. Otherwise you run into the issue, that I see with my old man, where he doesn't do himself any favors by eating an unhealthy amount of fruit in one sitting and tends to dump shit that adds even more sugar to the snake. Sure an apple is healthier than a can of a soda, but it still has sugar, so if one eats too many, they are taking in just as much sugar; possibly more, if in the process of eating to many, one decides it needs a ton of whip cream or sugar added to it. Plus, if you're way overweight, taking in a bunch of unneeded calories is still an issue, even if those calories are from something other than a bag of chips.
I'd say that the US also has other factors feeding into this problem besides making it too easy to buy shitty food. We had all the assholes who decided, "hey in suburbia you shouldn't walk, you must drive everywhere!" So it gets harder for people to find ways to sneak in activity, when the store is a 15+ minute drive away, going being 30-55mph, you're stuck spending 15+ minutes sitting behind a wheel of car and can't substitute walking or riding a bike in there. Plus, in such areas, it seems like the assholes that decided one must drive everywhere, go out of their way to make walking and bike riding a non-option ("fuck sidewalks, fuck bike trails and fuck shoulders on roads, it's not like people use those!). Sure I could be fair and admit, that in some cases even when walking is an option, sometimes the environment just doesn't make it feasible (plenty of times, when I lived in Norfolk, where it was so fucking hot and humid out, that it was a better option to drive a short distance and the 30s walk from a air conditioned building to the the car, in those cases, was a fucking awful experience).
Then there is also how our work culture for many of the non-wealthy doesn't do people favors. Many cases of people stuck sitting behind something for hours on end. Plus, if you're one of the poor bastards that gets stuck working an unreasonable number of hours and having to sacrifice sleep for the miserable experience, then that's another factor that can result in becoming obese, which in turn ups the chances of getting some sort of diabetes.
In short, shaming ain't going to do shit here. Plenty of factors still in place, that will feed into the problem, that will remain untouched until the powers that be acknowledge that they are an issue (that can be them willingly acknowledging they exist without any prodding or begrudgingly acknowledging them because the voters will fucking kick their asses out of power, if they continue to ignore them).
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
People who fear that are just hung up on their school days (this certainly happens in school). *Actual* gyms contain mainly people who are entirely lost in their own heads. There's no gym clique. Fat guys might get a stare or two, but the starers are more likely to be thinking "Good luck to him, he's got a lot of work ahead of him" not "Ugh, a fatty in my Zone of Beautiful people."
Positive messaging, availability of resources (good food and access to safe play areas) across the socioeconomic spectrum, and consistent information are the best tools against what is a social ill.
I'm not as knowledgeable about this as I could be, but from what I understand the sugar present in an apple isn't as harmful as it is in a form that takes the body longer to break down and is also ingested alongside fiber, which slows down sugar absorption even more.
Honestly, I really wonder if a lot of America's medical woes aren't primarily due to the improper ingestion of sugar and its overconsumption. For eample, in addition to diabetes sugar has also been implicated in encouraging the development of heart disease and cancer.
I'm just very frustrated when someone drags this out.
NNID: Hakkekage
My understanding is part of this is that the apple also comes with fiber which helps you self regulate how much you eat.
Still, some fruits are fucking horrible for sugar. Go look up grapes sometime.
Other fears: That I'll look stupid trying to attempt this exercise I don't know how to do; that I'll never look the way I want, and all this effort is wasted; that I'll have to make cutbacks in other things I enjoy in life to make room for this; that I don't know how to make adjustments when life stuff happens; that I feel like shit and I hate feeling like shit and I don't understand why people say this is good for me because it feels like shit.
NNID: Hakkekage
I honestly find that a bit hard to believe considering how massive fast food portion sizes have become (not to mention movie theater portions, where a medium drink is almost too big to hold with one hand). However, I do think I recall hearing claims that Americans get the same amount of physical activity now as they did prior to the extreme growth of obesity and diabetes incidence, which I'd be more likely to believe.
Moderation in everything. If you do what my old man does and eat three to four apples in one sitting as a snack, minus loading it up with sugary crap, that still isn't healthy. That is still eating to much and ingesting too much stuff that the body isn't going to use. It's like water, one needs a bare minimum to live, but it's better to drink more than the bar minimum; however, it's possible to drink too much and kill yourself.
Agreed. Too many people have this idiotic notion that they have to go to the gym to loose weight. I'm skinny and I can't remember the last time I've been in a gym. My mom is skinny as well, drinks a bunch of soda and has never been to a gym, as far as I know. Yeah, some of the skinniness is likely genetic, but we don't sit on our asses all day in front of a monitor or have our noses stuck in book, like my old man does. Doing house work will burn off calories. A fair bit of yard work will also suffice. Gardening can also burn off calories. There is a fair bit of things can accomplish the goal of burning off calories. Hell, I have a huge problem where I'll pace back and forth in my room because I get hyper if I stay put in a spot too long (I use to agonizing over this a little, but honestly, it's hell of a lot better than always sitting on my ass for long periods of time doing nothing).
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
Yeah, it's mentally and physically draining to spend 12 hours working, shuttling the kids around, getting home, getting settled, and so on. After all that, yeah, I'm keen to kinda veg for a few hours. I technically have a good 5-6 hours in between getting home from work and going to bed, but I don't have the energy to spend a lot of it being productive.
And to someone unfamiliar with a kitchen, cooking sounds fucking hard. And if you don't know what you're doing, it kinda can be. I can knock out a healthy and tasty meal in 45 minutes no prob, faster if I'm feeling lazy, but you stick someone in a random kitchen, where they might not even own a viable set of cooking gear, and give them a pile of ingredients and say, "Here cook something healthy," and that's going to sound terrifying.
And hey, you know what one of the easiest dishes to cook is, conceptually? A big pile of pasta. And if you get fancy, let's throw some sausage or ground beef in there and cover it with cheese.
We need some sort of comprehensive educational campaign to teach people that healthy cooking is not difficult, here is how you do it. Maybe subsidize a decent set of cookware. I do wonder what effect you'd see from free cooking classes aimed at low-income families that teach how to make some basic protein+veggie+starch dishes.
I seriously doubt this.
Hell, I can see a difference from when I was a kid to now.
My activities as a young adult were climbing trees (7 or so) to walking 4 miles to the comic book shop (till age 17 when I could drive).
If given the choice, my kids would sit around all day and play video games (not blaming games, but they would). I have to get them outside (and I do a lot). I wonder how many other parents don't.
also, given the fact that nearly everyone walks around with the means to view every single TV show and movie or read every single book, it's no wonder people move around a lot less.
We had those classes in my local high school. I'd bet something like that is available at the local community colleges as well, but if so it's not well advertised.
Yes, this is essentially correct. The fiber in the apple helps you to feel full and therefore not eat the second apple. So, while they contain similar calorie amounts, the apple is nutritionally dense, while the soda has almost no nutritional value whatsoever.
The other thing to remember, as some people have touched on, is that weight gain/loss is about a lot more than calories in vs. calories out. Yes, it is ultimately the final determining thing, but there's a lot more that goes into the calories in number and the calories out number than just how much you eat and how long you spend exercising. Hormonal swings due to stress or similar issues have a huge impact on how tightly your body holds on to calories. Poor nutrition, even in a calorie light diet, can really make it tough to loss weight. This is really where the Apple vs. Soda battle shifts, because, again, while providing similar amounts of calories, the apple gives you the aforementioned fiber, vitamins, minerals, etc. that your body needs and the soda will never have. Not getting enough Calcium, as another example, can really inhibit weight loss, because Calcium is the primary catalyst in the chemical reaction that happens in your muscles when your body is trying to pull energy from your reserves top power your activities. No Calcium means your body gets that energy from a different source (likely the protein in the muscles themselves), which doesn't help you when you're trying to get rid of body fat.
Last point, yes, fruits can have a ton of calories. I think it's instructive to note that in many European countries, "desert" is a piece of fruit and some cheese
pleasepaypreacher.net
A fitness base will make it easier to manage food, not only because muscles take more energy and you're going to be spending a lot of actual time exercising and not eating, but also because sticking to an exercise plan also helps train you mentally to stick with plans/delay gratification and promote healthier activities in the rest of your life so as not to negatively impact your gainz. However, it still has a much more delayed effect than getting on a diet, and can often present as a much more disruptive intrusion in your life ("aww, that sucks I'd love to eat that
I think one myth that would be helpful to debunk is the "Biggest Loser," competitive mindset--You have to lose a fuckton and fast! It's not really weight loss if someone with a six pack isn't calling you a fucking maggot on a treadmill while you huff and puff! You're going to look like a model but only if you really, really want it!
What was helpful to me was: Some minor activity is better than no activity. You are allowed to reward yourself with a snack if you go to the gym. Don't overstrain and if you feel like butts, take a break and make it up later. Hey, nice gains. Your gains could be better if you ate more protein. Do you like your poops to come out smooth? Celery's good for that. It doesn't matter if you don't look any different from your exercising--do you feel better? Give it at least six months, then let me know.
But that kind of response isn't how you respond to a "crisis," i suppose.
NNID: Hakkekage
My fruit today is grapes, they come in at 76cal/100g. That's 300cals for a pound. If you ate a pound of grapes you won't be eating much else for a while. The worst I am aware of is dates, which come in at around 200cal/100g.
The contrast with sodas (or fruit juice!) is that you don't really feel full on it. Your body doesn't register the sugar intake much at all.
A very interesting documentary on the subject is 'The men who made us fat' which aired on the BBC a few years ago. It lays part of the blame with the food industry and its lobbyists, advertisements and business models.
pleasepaypreacher.net
While probably true, I don't think this is a significant factor in weight loss/gain. Your teeth do a pretty good job of turning that solid apple into something decidedly less solid before it enters your digestive system proper. Also, while your body does need to convert the Fructose in the Apple into Glucose that your body can process and the soda starts already with the simplified Glucose, the time difference there isn't really meaningful on a long term scale. Same with the Shake vs. Steak, I think the big factor with the Shake is that it's much easier to transport and consume within the 30 minute window following your workout than the Steak is. The Shake also probably doesn't have the extra fat, cholesterol and other stuff the steak has, which is probably a bigger factor in long term nutrition than solid vs. liquid.
Bro's aside, this, 1000x this.
I've found also a snack of cottage cheese before I go to bed helps me sleep better during the night, and not wake up famished in the morning, and cuts down on muscle pain (slower release protein, there is a powder for this but that shit is like eighty bucks a bottle and cottage cheese is cheap if sort of flavor neutral).
pleasepaypreacher.net
Which would not have the same price:calories ratio because it wouldn't be a subsidized sugar.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
- Make it more expensive to put sugar in processed food
- Make it more expensive to fatten large populations of cows
Both of these would reduce the amount of cheap high-calorie foods available in the US, and consequently reduce the aggregate number of calories consumed by Americans.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Also people need to loose the whole, "I must loose a fuckton of weight really fast and look like a professional model." That is just setting oneself up for failure because for most, this is a process that takes time and even then, there are many of people that will reach a fit and healthy state, but they aren't going to look like models. People need to gradually work towards the goal and find a way that will work for them long term, which means making sure the act of physical activity is fun. I was on the varsity team for cross country and swimming in high school, I didn't get there quickly and I got there because I found those fun. I also did track, but I didn't make varsity because I ended up not enjoying it (fucking tedious IMO).
It would also help if people understood what a reasonable diet is. I think for most, it's not that they need to go on a special diet. They just need to cut down on total intake of calories and maybe weight that more heavily against certain foods. I also suspect that this follows the same rule as exercise. It's going to fail if one does it too fast because the body has gotten use to the excessive calorie intake. So gradually work towards a goal.
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
God I'd hope so, because I want to sleep at night and not think of some human great white shark.
But Soda is also bad calories because people don't think about it as calories. People don't think of drinks in general as calories, like they'll drink 700 cal's from starbucks and not even bat an eye.
pleasepaypreacher.net
*You don't actually have to go the gym though. Any form of exercise that will build muscle works. Personally, I'm a Big Fan of swimming because it uses a fuckton of muscles you don't really realize that you have until they're all that stands between you and drowning.
In addition to that, exercise - and I mean actual, "why is my body crying?" exercise - has a number of additional sideeffects. You feel better, because endorphins. It helps with general hormonal balance. It actually reduces feelings of hunger. Physical exercise is like a pill that makes you feel better, which for obvious reasons makes it easier to cope with life, even the parts that are about eating less.
Adjusting your diet to lose weight without making sure you're getting a proper amount of exercise is the hard and incredibly unpleasant way to lose weight. It'll be much slower and you'll feel much worse. Let's not even get into the fact that being skinny and under-excercised can still leave some parts of your body less functional than if you'd been slightly overweight but exercised regularly.
And if they've invented a soda that tastes good enough to be worth learning more about the connection between the four types of gangrene and diabetes, I sure havn't tasted it.
This is undeniable. It is also not evident to anyone who is a beginner, who has understandable hangups about exercising, and to whom the prospect of getting used to "my body is crying!" is repulsive enough that all the promised benefits are so far away that they seem unattainable. No one is saying diet + exercise isn't the best way to lose weight, but it is evident that getting people to make a permanent change isn't to demand a result of "A++ purge all vices endure all pains" right off the bat. Too many people are disdainful of psychology's role in this endeavor. Those people are making it harder for people who genuinely want to do something, but feel helpless and stigmatized.
In the beginning, exercise is a complement. Start slow, do only what you're comfortable with, spend maybe 20-30 minutes in the gym learning forms, getting comfortable with machines, with the atmosphere--that's how you get the average person to stick with something, instead of screaming about sweet gainz and "force multipliers" and demanding huge amounts of time right away. Only when a habit is established does pushing the limit bring those emotional and physical returns you've outlined above. The problem is that it takes time, and the amount of time varies greatly person to person.
That is why, in the beginning before healthy habits are formed, diet is much more apparently impactful on weight than exercise. Without an existing base of fitness, there a lot of new territory to explore, practices to learn, and spaces to become comfortable with--it's a steep curve. Eating less, or eating healthier, or whatever form of diet is being pursued involves a less-steep learning curve and more observable results, although of course mild activity + better eating is better together than either on their own.
I never would have stuck with exercising if I was obsessively standing on a scale and pushing myself to exhaustion every single time. Some people really like that. Chances are those people already incorporate it as a habit. They are not the people who are being addressed in this discussion of how to encourage healthy habits in people at risk of developing or already suffering from obesity/diabetes.
I only wish that people who are motivated to keep fit and eat healthy purely through spite and contempt for fatties keep their damn opinions to themselves on the internet though, because they only contribute to the problem, but we're dealing with practicalities here and that will also never happen. They haven't appeared in this thread yet, but I'm holding my breath.
NNID: Hakkekage
Well obviously then, the fastest solution to the problem of obesity/diabetes among the impoverished-who are disproportionately obese- is simply to cut food stamps by $5/month.
Clearly stupid.
What you are positing is only true if the thing limiting calorie consumption is cost, but obesity and diabetes rates track negatively with income. And once again, fast/processed food is not cheaper than making your own food.
2) You're assuming the impoverished or hell, even the average American, know that fast food / processed food is more expensive than making your own food.
3) Fast food is cheaper than produce + meat like all the time.
4) Fast food is convenient for busy families that don't have time to cook involved meals.
Proper Preperation Prevents Piss Poor Performance.
A big part of eating right and eating healthy is planning meals out in advance. Like I make two days of lunch in advance and plan out my meals including snacks for the entire week. It doesn't even take that long to do.
pleasepaypreacher.net
1)clearly it is, the point of ending the subsidies is to cause prices to rise.
2) If the people consuming the food are incapable of comparing prices, what does raising the price do?
3) No it isn't. I can get ground beef for $3 a pound at a grocery store. Mcdonalds wants $4.80 for a BigMac.
4) is directly the point I was making. If people aren't choosing it because it's the cheapest option, then raising the price isn't going to change anything.
If I am feeding myself and my kids McDonalds 4 nights a week because I can't/won't cook, does raising the price of a Big Mac 5c change that?