# Why Are We So Fat? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 22, 2009, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917 "2009-02-22T03:59:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![MichaelJohnBertrand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dfb087/32.png) [@MichaelJohnBertrand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelJohnBertrand)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/101 "2009-02-26T17:25:15Z")
[A size 10 female reporter dons a fat suit and goes to Fashion Week](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1155735/What-happened-sent-fattie-London-Fashion-Week-Kate-Faithfull-reports-week-fatwalk.html) No surprise, she fidns the experience quite horrible, and ends up leaving in tears. This is what it’s like, folks. I know that as a man, I don’t have it nearly as bad as a woman. But it’s still pretty damned bad. People who don’t even know you will laugh at you and think nothing of it. They’re judge you by the worst of stereotypes and dismiss you with the casual callous cruelty of person selecting produce at the supermarket. But hey, our lives must be so great, right? ---
**Author:** ![HumanMonkeyGod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c67d28/32.png) [@HumanMonkeyGod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HumanMonkeyGod)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/102 "2009-02-26T18:05:40Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Not necessarily. Reasonable changes in diet and exercise will probably affect BMI by 1-2 points, not the 5-10 a person needs to truly address obesity. Considering that obesity implies having a BMI at least 5 points above 25 and/or being 20% above your body weight, its really not going to work. > > There is no evidence anywhere that (aside from a tiny minority, maybe 5%) of person can lose 20% of their bodyweight and keep it off indefinately with lifestyle changes alone. It will require lifestyle changes plus medications or surgery. > > Go find a peer reviewed, double blind, replicatable study that finds reasonable lifestyle changes lead to permanent weight loss of more than 5%-ish of bodyweight. There likely aren’t any. This is garbage. Unless a body somehow naturally defies the laws of physics, including and notably the second law of thermodynamics, the excess stored energy has to go. If a person maintains a “reasonable” diet\*, one below their basal metabolic rate, and exercises regularly, their bodyfat will not reach a magic hovering point where no more can be lost if there is still more fat (energy) available. Why there likely aren’t any experiments like you requested is because there simply hasn’t been enough time. Same reason we don’t know what 50 years of Prozac use might lead to. \*diet here referring to the lifestyle eating habits, not the 2 month fad thing Although I think the OP question has been answered I’ll offer another stab: Obesity has become a major problem because there is simply too much variety of **cheap** highly energy-dense foods. This sort of caloric gluttony was previously available only to the very rich and powerful, kings and lords and whatnot, and even then they didn’t have the astounding range of high calorie combinations available to the modern consumer. Corporations quickly learned that people can be manipulated via their tongues -as long as something tasted good for the short time it was in the mouth, the fact that this something might well become a part of them (in the form of fat cells) until death was no consideration. Instant gratification and all that. And so a food industry based on taste alone took over common sense. Million dollar ad campaigns scream and shout to ensure that people are intrigued enough to try the taste, while the silence of vegetables and basic grains is deafening, and once you’ve tried the taste you’re hooked. Perhaps that will change when all crops are GM proprietary and corporations can make a profit by shilling fruit and vegetables. In the meantime, our minds are manipulated and our bodies fooled… we can eat a 100g bar of chocolate and hardly feel satiated, despite the fact that consuming that many calories in the form of fruit or lentils or even plain meat would leave us tired of chewing and bloated. We can eat a quick “snack” containing more calories than a full meal for the average peasant 500 years ago, and it won’t register for much longer than it takes to swallow. I think curing the obese has no quick or simple solution… but preventing it can be. Let governments tax food according to calorie value. You want to eat a deep-fried candy-bar covered in goose-fat-and-lard gravy, start saving. When people can walk through a supermarket and pick out an assortment of fruit and veg equal in caloric value but cheaper than a bar of chocolate, obesity will be a problem of the past. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/103 "2009-02-26T18:26:18Z")
> [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > Seems to be we had pretty much the exact same diet and exercise levels back then. Not to me, and I’m a child of the 80’s. #1) Kids used to be more active. You didn’t have every videogame from A-Z keeping you occupied on the couch. You also didn’t have 100 some-odd cable channels. Recess periods and PE were in relative abundance. #2) Portion sizes used to make more reasonable. Supersized fries didn’t exist in 1984. Convenience stores didn’t sell fructose corn syrup in almost liter-sized cups. #3) Baby boomers were relatively young in 1984. Now they’re older, with slower metabolisms. So you’re left with proportionately more fat people now than in years past. (I see you mentioned this, but you seem to laugh it off as meaningless. Why?) #4) The yo-yo dieting craze in the 80’s and 90’s (remember when Atkin’s was all the rage?) has screwed up a lot of people’s metabolisms. The glurge of fat-free snack foods that are loaded up with sugar doesn’t help people monitor their caloric intact either. #5) Every decade it seems as if social isolation increases. The less people interact with others, the more likely they’ll seek comfort from food. If none of this resonants as true for you, we must be living in two separate worlds. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/104 "2009-02-26T20:04:28Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Unless you can show that these groups are eating the same foods, in the same amounts, and getting the same exercise, you can’t leap to the conclusion that biochemistry is to blame. Blacks and latinos are more likely to be of low SES than Asians and whites, for one thing. Culture also tracks closely to diet. > > Is your position that there are no fundamental differences in caloric input between obese and non-obese people? That we’re all eating the same thing but some people, through no fault of their own, gain weight while others don’t? I’m scratching my head, trying to figure what your larger point is, and I’m not getting it. I posted a study showing how overfeeding by 1000 calories a day results in massive variance in weight gain. I have seen studies showing underfeeding have the same results. Obesity is not a simplistic physics equation where people can voluntarily limit food intake to lose weight. That is like saying ‘If I put 10 gallons of gas into a vehicle, it should go 200 miles’. That is way too simplistic. There are too many variables other than the energy you put into the vehicle that factor into its mileage. Same with obesity. That is why people currently and have always been different weights and sizes. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/105 "2009-02-26T20:10:57Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > Furthermore, he has failed to explain why this all of a sudden happened in the last 25 years. Sure, there has been obesity forever. But never on the scale that we see today. Did our “get fat” genes suddenly get activated? > > Or could there maybe be some correlation with the changes in the American diet and physical activity levels that directly correlate with the changes in our obesity rate? You haven’t either. The reality is we don’t know what to do about obesity. The fact that we are smoking less could be behind 10% of the obesity jump. [http://gateway.nlm.nih.gov/MeetingAbstracts/ma?f=103624106.html](http://gateway.nlm.nih.gov/MeetingAbstracts/ma?f=103624106.html) Like I said, sleep deprivation also plays a role in obesity. We really don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/106 "2009-02-26T20:18:49Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > There are thin people in 2009 because the 1) exercise is not an impossibility for everyone, 2) not everyone is compelled to eat more than they burn, and 3)some people have naturally faster than average metabolisms just as they did back in 1850. Virtually nobody can voluntarily change their weight long term, no matter their initial weight. Not unless they use drugs or surgery. > [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > I don’t get this conclusion. First of all, how can you explain how so many people have managed to do this, if it’s so impossible? Secondly, why do think having this ability would mean we’d die out as a species? The inability to control one’s energy use does not enhance fecundity. It hurts it, actually. Whats not to get? Where is your evidence that people can do that? Go find me studies where people have lost large amounts of weight and kept it off long term via willpower. > [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Why not? Do you have data to support this conclusion? What data do you like. Look out the window. People are not all the same weight and never have been. Yes we are getting fatter as a whole but we don’t know how to fix it and we don’t know why some are affected more than others. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/107 "2009-02-26T20:21:53Z")
> [@HumanMonkeyGod](#): > > This is garbage. Unless a body somehow naturally defies the laws of physics, including and notably the second law of thermodynamics, the excess stored energy has to go. If a person maintains a “reasonable” diet\*, one below their basal metabolic rate, and exercises regularly, their bodyfat will not reach a magic hovering point where no more can be lost if there is still more fat (energy) available. > > Why there likely aren’t any experiments like you requested is because there simply hasn’t been enough time. Same reason we don’t know what 50 years of Prozac use might lead to. > . Good job of proving my point. You have no evidence that anything you say is true, and it is all just supercilious moralistic arguments that have been constantly proven to fail back here in reality. here are a short list of factors that affect body weight that are independent of obese people being lazy gluttons Bacteria in the digestive system enzymes in the digestive system number of fat cells endocrine system signaling pathways between the stomach and brain neurotransmitters in the brain How can we use lifestyle changes to ignore them? ---
**Author:** ![katannah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a5b964/32.png) [@katannah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/katannah)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/108 "2009-02-26T20:42:50Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Virtually nobody can voluntarily change their weight long term, no matter their initial weight. Not unless they use drugs or surgery. > > Whats not to get? Where is your evidence that people can do that? Go find me studies where people have lost large amounts of weight and kept it off long term via willpower. > > What data do you like. Look out the window. People are not all the same weight and never have been. Yes we are getting fatter as a whole but we don’t know how to fix it and we don’t know why some are affected more than others. [Weght-Loss Program Results](http://www.weightwatchers.com/about/prs/wwi_template.aspx?GCMSID=1003061) I can’t copy from this particular link and paste here, but it basically says that a third of their membership has maintained ideal/goal weight after 5 years on the program. And that’s a lot of people. [National Institute of Health Results](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16002825) > [@](#): > > There is a general perception that almost no one succeeds in long-term maintenance of weight loss. However, research has shown that approximately 20% of overweight individuals are successful at long-term weight loss when defined as losing at least 10% of initial body weight and maintaining the loss for at least 1 y. The National Weight Control Registry provides information about the strategies used by successful weight loss maintainers to achieve and maintain long-term weight loss. **National Weight Control Registry members have lost an average of 33 kg and maintained the loss for more than 5 y.** To maintain their weight loss, members report engaging in high levels of physical activity ( approximately 1 h/d), eating a low-calorie, low-fat diet, eating breakfast regularly, self-monitoring weight, and maintaining a consistent eating pattern across weekdays and weekends. **Moreover, weight loss maintenance may get easier over time; after individuals have successfully maintained their weight loss for 2-5 y, the chance of longer-term success greatly increases.** Continued adherence to diet and exercise strategies, low levels of depression and disinhibition, and medical triggers for weight loss are also associated with long-term success. National Weight Control Registry members provide evidence that long-term weight loss maintenance is possible and help identify the specific approaches associated with long-term success. [Book I found by Googling Results 😃](http://www.atkinsexposed.org/atkins/35/Long-Term_Weight_Loss_Secrets.htm) > [@](#): > > Permanent weight control is difficult to achieve. Up to approximately 95% of repeat dieters fail, regaining the weight that they initially lost. What about the other 5% though? Has anyone studied them and found out their secret? In her book Eating Thin for Life, award winning[228] journalist and dietician Anne Fletcher delved into the habits of a few hundred folks who had **not only lost an average of 64 pounds but also maintained that loss for an average of 11 years.** What did she find? > “\*\*asically, they’re eating the opposite of a high-protein, low carbohydrate diet,” Fletcher reported. When she asked them to describe their eating habits, the top responses were “low-fat” followed by “eating less meat.” > > These dieters with long-term success also told her they ate “more fruits and vegetables.” Research seems to support this notion. One research study showed, for example, that significant weight loss could be triggered in people just feeding them extra fruit–3 added apples or pears a day.[229] Harvard studied 75,000 women for a decade and the results suggest that the more fruits and vegetables women eat, the less likely they will become obese.[230] A 2004 review of the available research suggests that in general “increasing fruit and vegetable intake may be an important strategy for weight loss.”[231] I can’t access the citations. ☹ But… It appears it can be done. Why are we fat? I gave my personal history as an example of someone whose lifestyle changes inexorably packed the pounds onto a previously healthy and active frame. We have fewer sidewalks and more “pay-to-play” skate parks. We have fewer free public parks and more expensive gym memberships. We have more sedentary work and less time to dig in a garden or tend to our own lawns (when we have them). We are getting less sleep, which (according to my D.O.) tells our bodies to conserve fuel because hard times are ahead. From the other side of the argument, [Genetic Stuff from Science Daily](http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090118200638.htm) > [@](#): > > Together with existing research, the new findings should ultimately provide the tools to predict which young children are at risk of becoming obese. Health professionals could then intervene to help such children before they develop weight problems, say the researchers from Imperial College London, the French National Research Institute CNRS and other international institutions. > > In the UK, one in ten children under the age of six is obese, according to the Department of Health’s National Child Measurement Programme 2007/08. > > For today’s ten-year study, scientists looked at the genetic makeup of obese children under six and morbidly obese adults, most of whom had been obese since childhood or adolescence, and compared this with age matched people of normal weight. The study reveals three previously unidentified genetic variations that increase the risk of severe obesity significantly, giving new insight into the reasons why some people become obese and others do not. > > The gene variant most strongly associated with childhood obesity and adult morbid obesity in the study is located near the PTER gene, the function of which is not known. This variant is estimated to account for up to a third of all childhood obesity, and a fifth of all cases of adult obesity. > > The second variant associated with child and adult obesity is found in the NPC1 gene. Previous studies in mice have suggested that this gene has a role in controlling appetite, as mice with a non-functioning NPC1 gene suffer late-onset weight loss and have poor food intake. This gene variant accounts for around 10 per cent of all childhood obesity and about 14 per cent of adult morbid obesity cases. > > The final variant is found near the MAF gene, which controls the production of the hormones insulin and glucagon, as well as chains of amino acids called glucagon-like peptides. These hormones and peptides are known to play key roles in people’s metabolisms by metabolising glucose and carbohydrates in the body. In addition, glucagon and glucagon-like peptides appear to have a strong effect on people’s ability to feel ‘full’ or satiated after eating. This variant accounts for about 6 per cent of early-onset obesity in children, and 16 per cent of adult morbid obesity. > > Further research is needed to determine whether the gene variants are acting independently, but if they are, then together these three new variations may account for up to half of all cases of severe adult and child obesity. > (excerpt from full article) Reasons beyond lifestyle change, disease, injury, laziness, or apathy exist. There is no one answer to the question. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/109 "2009-02-26T21:35:46Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Virtually nobody can voluntarily change their weight long term, no matter their initial weight. Not unless they use drugs or surgery. Dude, I’m as irritated as anybody by those who seem to think that all it takes to drop a couple hundred pounds is to swing by the gym once or twice a month and turn down a second hamburger now and then, but you are spouting insane hyperbole here. “Virtually nobody”? You are sweeping tens or hundreds of thousands (millions?) of people under that “virtually”. And, worse, you’re not saying "virtually nobody _does_ lose weight, you’re saying virtually nobody _can_ lose weight - which is nuts. You’re trying to elevate weaknesses and lapses of willpower to an Unstoppable Law Of Nature ™. Now, it’s one thing to insist that it’s really _hard_ to lose weight, but _impossible_? Good lord, man. Get a hold of yourself. You’re making even _me_ think you’re just whining and trying to blame anything else but yourself for your problem. Jeez. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/110 "2009-02-26T22:02:28Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > I posted a study showing how overfeeding by 1000 calories a day results in massive variance in weight gain. I have seen studies showing underfeeding have the same results. You posted a study that essentially showed that some people gain less weight than others despite both being on a high caloric diet. Sorry, but this is not all that shocking to me. Metabolism levels vary between individuals (age, sex, and genetics have a lot to do with this), therefore 2000 calories may be too much for one person and not enough for another. But what does that have to do with ethnic group differences? You can’t use the results of a study composed of 24 male subjects to conclude that obesity disparities between groups of people that differ across almost every strata is all–or even partically–the result of biochemistry. > [@](#): > > Obesity is not a simplistic physics equation where people can voluntarily limit food intake to lose weight. That is like saying ‘If I put 10 gallons of gas into a vehicle, it should go 200 miles’. That is way too simplistic. There are too many variables other than the energy you put into the vehicle that factor into its mileage. Same with obesity. That is why people currently and have always been different weights and sizes. No one is saying if you put 10 gallons into any given vehicle, it **should** go 200 miles. We’ve all driven the gas-guzzling jalopy that requires 10 gallons of gas for every 10 miles traveled, so we know this would be silly to say. And it’s no secret that some people run like those jalopies and others run like Honda hyrids. No one is saying that everyone who eats X amount of calories should weigh 150 lbs. But this doesn’t mean the principles of thermodynamics are non-applicable. At the end of the day it is a simple physics equation. To lose weight, calories in has to be less than calories burned (or excreted). It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about 1000 calories or 10,000. The math is the same. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/111 "2009-02-26T22:09:32Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > To lose weight, calories in has to be less than calories burned (or excreted). It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about 1000 calories or 10,000. The math is the same. [Pretty much](http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1881795,00.html?imw=Y). > [@](#): > > As for the secret to losing weight? There is none. “It’s basic physiology,” Loria says. “Eat fewer calories than you expend.” Interesting article, though, and very current. ---
**Author:** ![LonesomePolecat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a88e57/32.png) [@LonesomePolecat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LonesomePolecat)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/112 "2009-02-26T23:43:27Z")
[Here’s Penn and Teller’s take on it.](http://www.fancast.com/tv/Penn-%26-Teller%3A-Bullshit!/92985/759516672/Showtime---Penn-%26-Teller/videos;jsessionid=B8945CEC3EFC1C709FADD792B41A5BB4?autoPlay=false) Those of you who think losing weight is just a matter of will power, of eating less and exercising more, will not be pleased at all. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelJohnBertrand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dfb087/32.png) [@MichaelJohnBertrand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelJohnBertrand)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/113 "2009-02-27T00:10:29Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Not to me, and I’m a child of the 80’s. > > #1) Kids used to be more active. You didn’t have every videogame from A-Z keeping you occupied on the couch. You also didn’t have 100 some-odd cable channels. Recess periods and PE were in relative abundance. > > #2) Portion sizes used to make more reasonable. Supersized fries didn’t exist in 1984. Convenience stores didn’t sell fructose corn syrup in almost liter-sized cups. > > #3) Baby boomers were relatively young in 1984. Now they’re older, with slower metabolisms. So you’re left with proportionately more fat people now than in years past. (I see you mentioned this, but you seem to laugh it off as meaningless. Why?) > > #4) The yo-yo dieting craze in the 80’s and 90’s (remember when Atkin’s was all the rage?) has screwed up a lot of people’s metabolisms. The glurge of fat-free snack foods that are loaded up with sugar doesn’t help people monitor their caloric intact either. > > #5) Every decade it seems as if social isolation increases. The less people interact with others, the more likely they’ll seek comfort from food. > > If none of this resonants as true for you, we must be living in two separate worlds. 1. I don’t think kids were that much more active back in 1984. I could be wrong, the news sure seems to think so. Bur my neighborhood rings with the sounds of kids outside, having fun, when the weather allows. Normal kids go out and play. Shy bookish types like myself stay inside and do whatever they can inside. Watch TV, or play video games, or before that, read books. 2. They had “super size” fries back then, they just called them a “large”. That’s all it is, a large fries, same as McD’s has always had. And I sure as heck remember Big Gulps from 711 back then, though for me, that was always a Slurpee. 3. Yes, baby boomers are slowing down etc. Why I laughed that off is, if that’s all this “obesity epidemic” is, why are we so surprised? Surely this was predictable for decades. It’s hardly an “epidemic”, any more than winter is a “natural disaster”. And if it’s just baby boomers get old and fat, they why are they blaming video games and text messaging and TV? Are the baby boomers really that incapable of accepting that they’re getting old? They have to blame that on their kids as well? "No, see, it’s our KIDS getting old and fat, that’s the problem. " 4. I can’t imagine yo-yo dieting has had a lasting effect on the metabolisms of a signifigant portion of the populace. 5. The increase in social isolation is a tricky one to gauge. Myself, because of my mental health issues, I’ve tended to isolate myself for my entire life. It’s sort of hard to see, from my POV, whether there’s more people isolating themselves because I’m not out there to miss them. 🙂 But from what I pick up through popular culture, it seems to be that people still go to bars, hang out at coffee shops, and do all the usual social activities. The cell phone would be a useless invention if we all stayed home all the time. 🙂 Honestly, it’s seeming like your arguments amount to (please forgive me for this) what I call “old-fartism”. Oh, things were different back in my day, why people did right and lived right and didn’t have any of this high fructose corn syrup and super size this and that and Twitter this, whatever the hell that is, by gum… ---
**Author:** ![MichaelJohnBertrand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dfb087/32.png) [@MichaelJohnBertrand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelJohnBertrand)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/114 "2009-02-27T00:20:25Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > Dude, I’m as irritated as anybody by those who seem to think that all it takes to drop a couple hundred pounds is to swing by the gym once or twice a month and turn down a second hamburger now and then, but you are spouting insane hyperbole here. “Virtually nobody”? You are sweeping tens or hundreds of thousands (millions?) of people under that “virtually”. And, worse, you’re not saying "virtually nobody _does_ lose weight, you’re saying virtually nobody _can_ lose weight - which is nuts. You’re trying to elevate weaknesses and lapses of willpower to an Unstoppable Law Of Nature ™. Now, it’s one thing to insist that it’s really _hard_ to lose weight, but _impossible_? Good lord, man. Get a hold of yourself. > > You’re making even _me_ think you’re just whining and trying to blame anything else but yourself for your problem. Jeez. I think we’re having a communication failure here, and as usual, it has to do with the language we use. I think when he said “vritually impossible” and “virtually nobody” he was speaking in terms of statistics, percentiles, not absolute numbers. Take getting stuck by lightning. It would be valid to say that “almost nobody” gets hit by lightning in their entire lives. The percentage of people in a population who have been or will be hit by lightning is miniscule. Stastically insignifigant. BUT, if you say it’s “virtually impossible” to get hit by lightning, someone might well say “Impossible? What about the thousands of people hit by lightning every single year? What about them?” Well, they’re why we say VIRTUALLY impossible. ALMOST nobody gets hit by lightning. You have to be careful of how you interpret the langage used. Hope this clears things up a little. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/115 "2009-02-27T00:44:51Z")
> [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > I think we’re having a communication failure here, and as usual, it has to do with the language we use. > > I think when he said “vritually impossible” and “virtually nobody” he was speaking in terms of statistics, percentiles, not absolute numbers. > > Take getting stuck by lightning. It would be valid to say that “almost nobody” gets hit by lightning in their entire lives. The percentage of people in a population who have been or will be hit by lightning is miniscule. Stastically insignifigant. > > BUT, if you say it’s “virtually impossible” to get hit by lightning, someone might well say “Impossible? What about the thousands of people hit by lightning every single year? What about them?” > > Well, they’re why we say VIRTUALLY impossible. ALMOST nobody gets hit by lightning. You have to be careful of how you interpret the langage used. > > Hope this clears things up a little. Now convince me how “virtually nobody _can_ lose weight” really means “virtually nobody _does_ lose weight”, because frankly that was the more ridiculous part of your statement. It asserts that even if somebody were to _lock you up and give you barely enough calories to power the movement of your bowels_, you would not lose weight. Which is obviously ridiculous. It’s one thing to say that there are numerous factors making it very, very difficult for an overweight person to by self-management become one of the stick people, and to say that you think (quite rightly, I think) that many of these factors could be mitigated at the biological level with a magic pill. It’s quite another to say that it’s _impossible_ for the average scrawniness-impaired person to twiggify himself through lifestyle changes and masochistic self-discipline. The sad truth is, no matter _who_ you are, you can make yourself thinner, if you don’t mind torturing yourself horribly to do it (and possibly having to keep torturing yourself indefinitely to keep it off). Arguing it’s not possible is a great way to not have to feel guilty about it, but the simple fact is it’s bunk. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/116 "2009-02-27T00:54:32Z")
> [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > 1. I don’t think kids were that much more active back in 1984. I could be wrong, the news sure seems to think so. Bur my neighborhood rings with the sounds of kids outside, having fun, when the weather allows. Normal kids go out and play. Shy bookish types like myself stay inside and do whatever they can inside. Watch TV, or play video games, or before that, read books. Most kids are not inclined to read if TV and videogames are around. The kind of kids that used to pass time playing ball in the street are the same kind of kids that “play ball” now, except they do it virtually through the playstation. They were never the ones reading. I was actually a bookworm as a kid, and during much of the summer I had my face buried in an encyclopedia when I wasn’t watching cartoons and 3-2-1 Contact. But most kids in my neighborhood weren’t like me. They were at the city pool or hanging out at the park. If my parents had kept the house stocked with snacks, I’d probably be fat right now. Fortunately they didn’t. > [@](#): > > 1. They had “super size” fries back then, they just called them a “large”. That’s all it is, a large fries, same as McD’s has always had. And I sure as heck remember Big Gulps from 711 back then, though for me, that was always a Slurpee. You really don’t think portion sizes have grown in the last 30 years? You think McDonalds just relabled their large fries as super-sized and hoped no one would notice? Come on now. Today’s [supersized](http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/news/20040303/mcdonalds-halt-supersized-food-portions?src=rss_foxnews)fries are not eqivalent to yesterday’s larges. And those vats passing themselves off as beverage cups weren’t around either. > [@](#): > > Honestly, it’s seeming like your arguments amount to (please forgive me for this) what I call “old-fartism”. Oh, things were different back in my day, why people did right and lived right and didn’t have any of this high fructose corn syrup and super size this and that and Twitter this, whatever the hell that is, by gum… So what do you think explains what we’re seeing? The OP posits that genes have something to do with it, right? But unless you’re arguing that our genetic makeup has changed significantly in the last 30 years, I can’t figure out what you think is to blame. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/117 "2009-02-27T00:56:31Z")
Sorry, I should be talking about the last 35 or so years. Just take a look at [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity#Diet). [QUOTE=wikipedia] In the period of 1971–2000, obesity rates in the United States increased from 14.5% to 30.9%.[71] During the same time period, an increase occurred in the average amount of calories consumed. For women, the average increase was 335 calories per day (1542 calories in 1971 and 1877 calories in 2004), while for men the average increase was 168 calories per day (2450 calories in 1971 and 2618 calories in 2004). Most of these extra calories came from an increase in carbohydrate consumption rather than an increase in fat consumption.[72] The primary sources of these extra carbohydrates are sweetened beverages, which now accounts for almost 25 percent of daily calories in young adults in America [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/118 "2009-02-27T02:28:52Z")
Wesley Clark, here is my response to your general philosophy on weight and the losing thereof: 1. I believe you are fallaciously arguing from the general to the specific. That is, you argue that obese people as a whole cannot eat healthily and exercise, so you therefore conclude that telling a fat person to eat healthily and exercise will not be effective to get them to lose weight. 2. It absolutely is what you call “a moral issue” when viewed from the perspective of an individual obese person. They can lose the weight (barring unusual circumstances); if they don’t, then it is their fault. It is a “moral failing” if that’s the term you want to use. 3. Your analogy to abstinence-only sex eduction does not hold. Abstinence-only sex eduction fails because it does not give any facts or knowledge to the student, it just says “don’t do it.” Telling a fat person how to eat healthily and exercise and that they absolutely must lose weight if they do so gives them all the knowledge they need. It’s the equivalent of teaching about pregnancy and contraception and STDs etc. etc. 4. You seem to like viewing obesity from a public health viewpoint. If the goal of using that viewpoint is to help reduce the incidence of obesity, then why is that your goal? If you believe that obesity imposes costs on society as a whole, then maybe we should look at why those costs are imposed on society and try better to impose them on the obese individual instead. I realize the above is not well argued, I don’t have a lot of time here. I’m happy to expand on the above if you ask a specific question. ---
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/119 "2009-02-27T04:23:07Z")
If I may be a spoilsport and get back to the OP: I think the main point being raised might be better stated, “Why, in the present time and place, is it so difficult for so many people to avoid being fat?” Given: Many people are not fat, and don’t find it difficult to stay fit and healthy. Or they do find it difficult, but do what’s necessary anyway. To which I say, “Bravo! Keep it up!” Given: A major cause of being overweight, for most people, is simply that they eat too much and do not engage in enough physical activity. They would be better off if they could change one or both of those facts. That said, the OP was to the effect that tending to eat a lot when food was available, and storing excess as fat, were a good thing, a set of survival traits that would help keep people alive to reproduce through lean times. Here and now, not so much. We have access here and now to more than is good for us. Furthermore, things that are very good in the quantities available to a hunter-gatherer, are not so good in excess. Sweet things, for example, and fats, are difficult to acquire in nature, but are readily available to us. So when today I perceive a gorgeous glazed doughnut, or a sweet beverage, my mind tells me, “You don’t need that.” But the ghosts of my primordial ancestors so deep within that I don’t even know they are there say, “Oh, yes, you do. If not now, later. Eat the sugar! Eat the fats!” as surely as zombies say “Braaaaiiiins!” Just as, for example, the ghosts of the primordial ancestors say to the typical pubescent male, “Must make babies! Now! Is good!” We still expect that male to follow certain societal standards, at least in most places and times. Of course, it is possible for an individual to abstain from sex, and most of us keep to the societal standards, most of the time. But you can’t abstain from eating, at least not for long. It’s also an evolutionary advantage not to waste energy. In a hunter-gatherer time and place, you might need that energy to chase down some food or to run from a predator. The problem is that here and now, we never have to chase down the food, and we rarely need to run from a predator. But we have this tendency to relax when we can. All of this becomes ever more true as we age. It was an advantage in earlier times to store food as fat more and more readily the older you got, because it would become more and more difficult for you to get any. Now, of course, an old lady like me can get all the doughnuts she wants. The basic body metabolism doesn’t “know” that, of course, and keeps storing up that energy for the famine that never arrives. ---
**Author:** ![Seven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-we-so-fat/486917/120 "2009-02-27T08:22:30Z")
> [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > I suppose you heap scorn on those other addicts too. Yes, in fact I do. But not all. The junkie that cries and says “I’m sick of being sick.” and does nothing to kick heroin. The drunk who spends everyday at the bar and complains about all the crap going wrong in his life because of his drinking. The smoker who coughs up half a lung and always has lung problems and never tries to quit. Yes, all those people piss me off. Just like the obese person who comes up with every excuse why they can’t lose weight. I’m just built this way. It’s genetics. Exercise is hard. etc.etc. > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > Actually, I never said I didn’t want to exercise, nor that I was content being fat. I said exercise hurts a hell of a lot more when you’re fat, which is true. Thus, an obese person faces a much larger disincentive to exercise than a thin person. I’ve just spent over two years in some pretty severe pain, yet I managed to do it. > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > Nor am I content being fat. I don’t want to be fat. I don’t want to die before I’m 50. I don’t want to be a member of the last group it is still perfectly acceptable to publically abuse and mock and hate and make all kinds of assumptions about. > > Doesn’t mean it’ll change any time soon. It’s not that easy. So the question is: “What ARE you doing about it?” How many calories did you consume today/this week? How many calories did you burn today/this week? Are you matching or burning more calories then you consume? What are you giving up? What rewards are you giving yourself for reaching milestones? > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > I would not expect pity from the likes of you. I would doubt you are capable of it. Fine. In fact I hope I piss you off enough to get in shape and come kick my ass. I will more then willingly take a beating from an averaged sized **MichaelJohnBertrand**. Hell, I’d even buy you lunch after (sensibly sized portions of course) > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > What, exactly, is a “medical” reason for being overweight? Please explain. Hypothyroidism > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > And I’m as disabled as an alchoholic with a failing liver, a smoker with lung disease, or a crack addict with a heart condition. > > But i suppose you have no pity for them, either, or really for anyone. Ever. Self-induced disabilities are not **real** disabilities. They are the side effect of self-destructive behaviour. If a man cuts off his own leg then he shouldn’t get a handicap parking permit. > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > “How dare he assumes that about me!” you rage. No, not at all. > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > “Get motivated”? Tell me, are all your emotions an act of will? Can you simply decide to be happy and boom, you’re happy? It’s a wonder you get out of bed at all. You can just sit there and be happy forever. Of course not. Yes, I can slip into depression like anyone else. Most recently after the car crash. It was a life changing event with pain that seemed to have no end. I HAD to snap myself out of it if I wanted to continue my life. I could have chosen to take handfuls of pain pills. I could have chosen to get a doctor to prescribe something for depression. There were lots of roads I could have taken. Instead I “got motivated”. The pain wasn’t going to run my life. I wasn’t going to get overweight. I was going to work to improve how I felt. My “get motivated” is not some infomercial type of getting motivated. It is deciding to take control of those things you do not like and fixing them no matter how hard. For me, I feel there is nothing I can not change about things I do not like in my life. Some can be very difficult. Some, not so much. Look. There are a million things people don’t like in their lives. Some choose to change them, some complain about them. There is a third type who make half-assed attempts and shrug it off saying “eeeh.. I guess that’s the way it is.” For me there is either do it or deal with it and STFU. And, for the record, I have a medical report from a doctor from about 6 months ago. His diagnosis was I would see little if any improvement on the condition of my injuries. I proved him wrong. Granted I believe I will forever have chronic back pain but I’m taking the Laurence of Arabia approach. It’s not that it doesn’t hurt,.. “The trick.. is not minding that it hurts.” THAT, my friend, is motivation. > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > As for “getting myself off the Paxil”, I take that because without it, I am insane. I suffer from chronic deep depression and social anxiety. No Paxil and I would likely kill myself or lose my grip entirely. > > But I suppose you’re one of those angel of compassion that doesn’t really beleive in mental illness either, right? After all, it’s all in your head. Crazy people are just lazy. They could get better if they wanted to. > > They just need to “get motivated”. In a way, yes. I would guess 75% of those on anti-depressants are wrongly medicated. People, mostly in American culture, would rather take a “happy pill” then deal with the ups and downs of life. I read a thread here written by a member that was about some sort of semi-traumatic event that happened in their life. They went to take one of their anti-depressants but couldn’t find any. Lucky for them their teen child had some and shared. This means both of them have been prescribed anti-depressants. Read the threads here about medications. It seems 50% or more of the members are on some form of mood-changing medication. When I lived in the States tons of seemingly normal people took medications because it “took the edge off”. For most of these people it’s just a crutch. Yes. Some people really need these things. Most I don’t think do. > [@MichaelJohnBertrand](#): > > And how, pray tell, do you know this about me? > > Same way I know you’re a pitiless, morally retarded jackass, I suppose. A belligerent, bludgeoning, brutal bastard with the heart of a schoolyard bully and the soul of a cranky infant, careening through life drunk on hate, rage, and testosterone, who thinks himself more of a man for preying on the weak and can only feel superior when making another feel inferior. Anything grander and more subtle than that stands no chance of making it through the tiny gate into your microscopic mind, and so your only response to the pricking of compassion is to blame the victim and club him. "Urr, fat man make brain hurt. " > > Funny how we know each other so well, hmm? Ok. 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