Awesome insight Crystal! 100% correct on the decline in the nutritional value of our foods now.

We should also consider socioeconomic factors in this too. It's friggen expensive to eat healthy! I bet we would see a high correlation between poverty and obesity. Those with little money can't afford to buy high quality food. Try to buy organic meats, fruits and veggies on a meager grocery budget. You can buy Twinkies and soda with food stamps, but not vitamins even though you ingest them too. What kind of sense does that make?

You're also correct in that there are no profits for the healthcare industry, to include Big Pharma, if we're all healthy. I believe in my heart that they know how to cure cancer (and probably lots of other diseases!) but that wouldn't be economically beneficial for them, they make so much more off continuing care. Sad but true.

There are so many factors that come into play when trying to explain the epidemic of obesity that has swept our nation. The OP's simplistic observation that fat people are fat because they overeat consistently and take in more calories than they burn is not only insensitive but ignorant in my opinion.

I HAD TO COME BACK DIDN'T I!!! I totally agree with you misswright, very insensitive and the OP needs to get the facts!!!

I didn't read the whole thread didn't anyone mention meds? I'm overweight because of them. I gained 50 lbs I went of behind my doctors back and lost the weight but my health got bad again and just started back 2 months ago and gained 10 lbs each month so far and I watch what I eat everyday

Thank you for revisiting against your wishes just to post about my post!

I almost wish the OP would get some weird medical problem that made him blow up like an elephant for a few months just so he could see what it's like to gain weight through no fault of his own. But that would be cruel to wish hardship on anyone no matter how insensitive and ignorant they are, so I'll refrain from doing so. Doesn't mean I can't give him a piece of my mind though!

Oh yes. Many of us gave examples of medical problems or medication that contributed significantly to weight gain. To save you from reading all the posts, suffice to say the OP denies this is a valid argument for people being overweight. He has convinced himself that fat people are fat because they overeat...period...no other 'excuses', as he puts it, are an acceptable reason for not being his imagined proper size.

I'm in agreement with those who mention that there can be other reasons for weight gain/weight loss. One time I had lost so much weight due to getting an infection. In fact, getting ill, is far more effective to losing weight, than any bs diet milkshake, or other false nutritents that claim to work but really don't. lol. I've never lost so many pounds in a week. I wasn't looking to lose weight anyway. Just saying that sometimes a virus can be more effective for that reason. lol. Some of our bodies will react differently to stuff. Not forgetting allergies. I've noticed more and more people complain about how high-fibre diets, made them more "sorer", in a certain part of their body. Fibre is just making the colon worse. It's bulky, so how was adding MORE bulk ever gonna work? They need something to loosen it to get it out. Victorian fibre myths are so out-dated.

well I don't even want to look back and see who or I'd have to unload on him

I wouldn't even bother worrying about it, because absolutely nobody is all that. Nobody is seemingly perfect. Apologies to supermodels, but not even THEY have that extra oomph, or attractiveness ;) Anyway, people who think they're so special tend to be up their own ***.

Agreed!

Brings to mind many quotes:

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder"
"There but for the grace of God go I"
"Judge not lest ye be judged"
"Until you've walked a mile in their shoes"

What's perfect for one is not perfect for another. So who is to say what perfect is...there is no definition for perfection when referring to human beings. We come in all different shapes, sizes, colors, styles, and thank God for that! How boring would life be if we were all perfect? Dating would sure be simpler though!

Of course the general consensus MUST be right.

1) It is not possible in our culture to obtain healthy locally grown, organic, or healthy food. All food must come from the supermarket.

2) Being overweight is beyond the control of the individual because it occurs without eating more than the body requires under existing conditions.

3) Medications can cause weight gain without eating more than the body requires under existing conditions

4) The OP is ignorant and insensitive for insisting that human bodies cannot gain adipose tissue without ingesting more food than their body needs under existing conditions.


Edited to add to 1) All food available in our culture is genetically modified, laden with chemicals and devoid of nutrients. There are no options. This unhealthy produce and meat is what cause overweight – not overeating.

1. Nobody said it was NOT POSSIBLE to obtain healthy food. Some of us stated it was difficult to find since quality of food has deteriorated with the introduction of HMOs, toxic pesticides, growth hormones, etc. It's also much more expensive to buy healthy organic foods and way less accessable. Negate that!

2., 3., and 4. "under existing conditions"...hmmm, let me see here. So people should just automatically know when their body is not in homeostasis and how to adjust caloric intake for that, right? For those not as brilliant as the OP, homeostasis refers to balance in our bodies. We have an optimal level for functioning and our bodies naturally try to compensate when something throws that balance off. The problem is that many things can throw the balance off...disease, medications, foods, injury, stress, illegal drugs, the list is endless. It would be IMPOSSIBLE to monitor exact caloric requirements for homeostasis under EVER-CHANGING existing conditions.

The insensitivity, IMO, glares from your one statement that I placed in bold previously, and I quote: "the condition of overweight represents a choice – a choice to overeat consistently". You can state your 'facts', add the "under existing conditions" now as your saving grace disclaimer if that makes ya feel better about yourself, but I ain't buying it. You know much about the human body but nothing about human beings. You're not dating just a mechanical body, you're dating a person with feelings no matter what size jeans they wear! But no, you are right sir and we are all wrong. Puh-leaze!

You're awfully whiny when not everyone is agreeing with you. I'm not sure why weight is an issue for you, though. Clearly, you're not attracted to women who are overweight. Perhaps stick to women who are within your preferred weight range?

By the time I got off prednizone I was up to 300 lbs and a 48 pants.
Now, I am 250 and in a 40 pants. Took a whole year.

Yep! Some meds put on weight.

I agree that it may be difficult and perhaps expensive to obtain healthy food. As I said, healthy food IS available -- for those willing to brave the difficulty and expense. Many option for what is convenient and cheap. That is their choice and their priority.



A common and economical device for monitoring the balance of food intake and bodily requirements that is available to almost everyone is a scale. If weight consistently increases or stays high that gives SOME indication that intake exceeds requirements.

More involved or expensive tests (such as a Body Fat Analysis � calipers) may provide greater accuracy for those so inclined. However, we don't need a detailed knowledge of what our pituitary or thyroid are doing in order to observe that our clothes have gotten too small.



Is it possible for people to gain body fat without eating more than their body requires? Of course that implies "under existing conditions" � not what they were twenty years ago or last year. Requirements change with time and circumstances and food intake should be adjusted accordingly.



How I feel about myself is not dependent upon agreement from anonymous people on the Internet.

I understand that people get their feelings hurt when it is suggested that weight control is a personal responsibility.

It hasn't seemed to hinder my dating experience in any way but then again, I am attracting men who like my body type.

And girls, there are lots of good looking men out there that do.

Perhaps expensive? Go compare prices and tell me eating healthy is not MUCH more expensive. To eat healthy, you best be able to double if not triple your current less healthy food budget! In a perfect world good healthy food should cost less and junkfood should cost an arm and a leg. You want an organic apple? $1.00 You want an apple danish? $5.00 But it doesn't work that way does it?



But we do need to know what are pituitary and thyroid are doing to adjust our intake accordingly. If they're not working properly, the requirements will change, and one won't know until the scale has tipped up, at which point you've become overweight, not by choice, but because you were unaware that something in your body had malfunctioned. Does that make sense? It's not necessarily a person's choice to gain weight!



No it's not, but it is impossible to know what your body requires under existing conditions because you just said requirements change with time and circumstances. Your doctor gives you steroids for instance, and this is obviously a major circumstance change. You take your meds and continue eating as you had been, doing the same things that you had been, but suddenly you're gaining weight like you'd just tripled food intake. Do you think people just somehow know intuitively that they have to reduce intake to compensate for the effects of the steroids? They don't realize it until after the weight gain occurs, so again it's not a choice they make to become overweight. And we both know gaining weight is a whole lot easier than losing it!

My feelings personally aren't hurt. I'm actually pretty healthy at 5'7" and 155 lbs, give or take. But I've taken meds and blown up like a balloon before and had to work damn hard to lose the weight. I think feelings get hurt when you simplify the issue into saying that ALL people CHOOSE to be overweight. I don't dispute the science behind your logic, just your presentation of it in saying it's a choice for everyone. Just strikes me as particularly insensitive to people who struggle with weight issues.

OP, what's the point of this thread?

Apparently he wanted people to say that it's a problem so that he could deliver a lecture about healthy eating.

Nobody here seems to be complaining that it effects their love life though and this thread belongs in another forum methinks.

Yeah, I don't think he wanted to hear that it doesn't necessarily affect someone's love life. It just made him more whiny.

The point, as I read it, is to throw out a blanket reason for obesity by blaming it on eating too much and exercising too little because he sees himself as an authority on the subject....Truth is, he is only addressing the tip of the iceberg while appearing pretty ill informed on the "whole" subject....I notice in his profile he says he is an occasional smoker...So much for our fitness guru...