Obesity: Why are we getting fat? :epizza:

[Mister Agenda]

Why are most Americans who are fat, fat? Mostly lifestyle. Why are populations with different lifestyles and even some wild animal species getting faster? It can't be an American lifestyle, by definitiion.

[Gregb]

Why are most Americans who are fat, fat? Mostly lifestyle. Why are populations with different lifestyles and even some wild animal species getting faster? It can't be an American lifestyle, by definitiion.

Because the world is becoming more globalized, lifestyles start melding together and the American lifestyle is very popular. Overseas there are now tons of fast food places. That didn't exist 30-40 years ago.

[labelwench]

Why are most Americans who are fat, fat? Mostly lifestyle. Why are populations with different lifestyles and even some wild animal species getting faster? It can't be an American lifestyle, by definitiion.

 

Which wild animal species are you referring to as getting 'fatter', Deanjay, for I am assuming that is the word you meant to use? I can certainly rationalize that rats, ravens, foxes and raccoons, to name just a few species, would be the beneficiaries of the wasteful lifestyle of many North Americans.

 

I work in the retail grocery industry and it is enough to make you cry to see how much food goes into the dumpster because health and safety regulations are very stringent and prohibit us from giving a lot of this food to agencies which could put it to use.

 

The matter of liability forces agencies to err on the side of caution and contributes largely to this waste. We had a display case go down the other night, resulting in the immediate disposal of two pallets or 160 cubic feet of food.

[Gregb]

I work in the retail grocery industry and it is enough to make you cry to see how much food goes into the dumpster because health and safety regulations are very stringent and prohibit us from giving a lot of this food to agencies which could put it to use.

 

The matter of liability forces agencies to err on the side of caution and contributes largely to this waste. We had a display case go down the other night, resulting in the immediate disposal of two pallets or 160 cubic feet of food.

 

That is a shame and I hear you can't even donate it to charity food pantries or homeless shelters.

[ErlyRisa]

That's cool as...

 

so if I'm thin I can bulk up just by doing it with a fattie!!

 

is there a thin Virus  ---> nah that would be bad.

[arissa]

If you live everyday you are more than likely eating every day too. When you eat and get calories in without doing anything to get those calories out you gain weight. It is pretty simple and I don't get why so many people are stuck on this. If you don't like the size you are now, do something about it. A virus more than likely did not make someone fat, they did this either through fault of their own or due to a health issue (possibly caused by something medical but not guaranteed).

[ErlyRisa]

If you live everyday you are more than likely eating every day too. When you eat and get calories in without doing anything to get those calories out you gain weight. It is pretty simple and I don't get why so many people are stuck on this. If you don't like the size you are now, do something about it. A virus more than likely did not make someone fat, they did this either through fault of their own or due to a health issue (possibly caused by something medical but not guaranteed).

Ieat enough for a Small asian family, and do absolutely nothing all day - no weight gain.

[Abe40]

I have read all the replies to this poser: "Why are we getting fat?" The simple answers appear to be: we don't take enough exercise and we eat too much fatty foods. Take a look at pictures of East African runners at both the Olympics and Marathons. Do you see any fatty among them? in the distant past, Americans used to dominate both the sprints and the marathons, but alas! our growing obesity has made us give way to the Jamaicans and Kenyans.  

[labelwench]

Pet obesity has also been on the rise, for presumably similar reasons. The majority of pets are fed 'processed foods' which are unlike what they would have eaten in the wild and most also are limited in their opportunities for exercise.

 

In response to this, we now have 'Weight Control' food for cats and 'Seniors' food for inactive dogs. Horses, also, are prone to becoming overweight, and in some cases, it leads to founder, a painful condition which can result in the animal needing to be put out of it's suffering.

[arissa]

Ieat enough for a Small asian family, and do absolutely nothing all day - no weight gain.

 

Sorry, but, no. When you get into that mode you are just going to kill your metabolism faster than blinking an eye. Eat as little as possible, be as lazy as possible just proves that you are lazy. I would rather eat healthy, have a healthy weight (after two kids it is perfect) and not starve myself.

[ErlyRisa]

Sorry, but, no. When you get into that mode you are just going to kill your metabolism faster than blinking an eye. Eat as little as possible, be as lazy as possible just proves that you are lazy. I would rather eat healthy, have a healthy weight (after two kids it is perfect) and not starve myself.

Sorry, my english bad...

 

I eat enough to feed 1 asian FAMILY.... ie I eat Twice a day and both are large meals, and I do nothing, I also drink beer...

 

What I was stating, is that metabolically, sometimes some people fall into a good pattern and can do anything they want and not have to lift a finger.

 

Most of what I eat gets flushed down the toilet - hardly utilised.

[labelwench]

CBC news has been reporting on a matter that some of us in the retail food industry have been aware of for a long time. The amount of research that goes into designing processed food is staggering and I do not doubt that it is also one of the contributing factors to the spread (pun intended) of obesity. Some people are able to ignore, avoid or indulge these commodities in moderation while others become literally addicted to these foods because they are designed to not satiate you and to leave you craving another 'fix'.

 

Health be damned, it's profits that matter and there's good profit in the medical business as well.

 

Food cravings engineered by industry

How Big Food keeps us eating through a combination of science and marketing

And to understand the research, you need to speak the language. There's 'mouth feel,' 'maximum bite force,' and the important concept of 'sensory specific satiety,' the rate at which a food product loses its appeal as it is being eaten.

"That's an expression that says when food has one overriding flavour, if it’s attractive, it will be really attractive to us initially, but then we'll get tired of it really fast," Moss said. "And so these companies make a concerted effort to make their foods not bland, but really well blended."

That's so people don't get too full too fast, and stop eating too soon. "If the taste builds too much, consumption will stop … and snacks need to be eaten non-stop until the packet is finished," Thorton Mustard wrote, back in 2002. He was a food industry consultant who revealed, early on, some of the secrets of the food industry, in a book called The Taste Signature Revealed. He wrote that fullness or satiety, is "quite a serious enemy for a product."

Mustard claimed he could help food companies design foods that were guaranteed to be "more-ish," which he defined as a quality that made a consumer want to eat more. It helped, he advised, if the food was easy to chew.

"If people had to chew the food to extract the flavour enjoyment, it would take longer to eat, be better digested, and the feeling of being full reached far sooner. People would need to consume less," he wrote.

Thornton Mustard has retired and couldn't be reached for comment, but Chris Lukehurst is continuing his work through The Marketing Clinic, the consulting company that Mustard founded.

"So people read that book, and we've been contacted by people saying, can you really do this? Because we’ve got a problem and we think you can solve it," Lukehurst said.

On the art of "more-ishness," Lukehurst explained it this way. "Some products, like most savoury snack products, want to be continually more-ish, so at the end of each product, they want you to reach out for the next product and put it in again, and they often achieve that by having an intense taste at the front of the mouth, and that dies off quickly, and so by the time you’ve finished each mouthful, you're looking to re-taste what you've lost."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/food-cravings-engineered-by-industry-1.1395225

 

 

[pagetheoracle]

I found an article by somebody called Caitlin Lodge+ about colon cleansing,* in Paradigm Shift magazine (UK, July, 2012, issue 57), which showed before and after pictures of people who'd gone through the process.  Mucoid plaque had been dislodged, which there were pictures of, plus liver stones discharged through this method.  A gentleman was also shown, who had lost considerable weight.

 

My question is - could it be poor digestion causing obesity as this material would stop absorption of nutrients, which might lead to backlogs of food being stored as body fat?

 

+ http://www.trillgate.co.uk

 

* Andreas Moritz, manufacturer but maybe other people around who produce the same thing

Edited July 29, 2014 by pagetheoracle

[Chemical]

I really find it hard to believe that it's a virus. It's our lifestyle, diets, excercise habits and sleeping patterns. I'm speaking for myself. I've never been obese but I had a few pounds that I wanted to shed, and I know that since  I started exercising regularly I saw a huge difference.

If I believed that it was a virus, I would probably not do anything about it and it would just get worse.

[pagetheoracle]

I really find it hard to believe that it's a virus. It's our lifestyle, diets, excercise habits and sleeping patterns. I'm speaking for myself. I've never been obese but I had a few pounds that I wanted to shed, and I know that since  I started exercising regularly I saw a huge difference.

If I believed that it was a virus, I would probably not do anything about it and it would just get worse.

I agree.  I think saying it is a virus is a cop out, which stops people being responsible for their own condition (hence this thread going on literally for years).  Diets do work but I think people put the weight back on because they are addicted to food (we can't live without it after all and advertising, cheap deals, fast food etc makes it a bargain worth having in our 'minds' and that is where the problem may lie in my opinion (except the monstrously overweight, which may be glandular, in reaction to steroids pumped into beef nowadays and all the additives, which may cause reactions too and lead to toxin storage in the cells).

[arissa]

ErlyRisa thanks for breaking that down for me, I really was confused by it but now it makes sense.

 

Does anyone here know the deal between testosterone levels and weight gain? I overheard a couple talking about it at the doctors office this week and I was curious if anyone has information on it, or has maybe dealt with it first hand.

[InfinityLoopz]

Very interesting. Not sure what to say, would love to see more on this tbh.