Posted on 08/29/2025 10:01:21 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
The percentage of the U.S. population that smoked tobacco in 1975 was 40%. That figure has declined steadily in the intervening years, and today, only 11% of the population are smokers. Knowing what we do about tobacco’s risk to health, we can confidently identify the decline in smokers as progress in the realm of public health. However, over the same period, the percentage of the U.S. population defined as obese has climbed from 12% of the U.S. population to 42%. Rarely, does one find a correlation as striking as the inverse correlation of -.98 between the smoking and obesity rates over this 50-year period. Might our public health officials be celebrating their victory over tobacco smoking prematurely?
Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman in 2024 drew people’s attention to the subject of increased obesity when he tweeted the following.
He points an accusing finger at the “food and soft drink industrial complex and our government’s oversight of our citizens’ health.” He may be right in doing so, but he may also be overlooking other significant factors. The obvious one is tobacco smoking. Beyond the empirical data that shows an almost perfect (-.98) inverse correlation between smoking and obesity, there is the well-known effect that smoking has on reducing one’s appetite. On an anecdotal level, I witnessed it with several close relationships in my life. However, like many things in our society, it is taboo to imply that the public health campaign to stamp out tobacco use was not a resounding success. Whereas an earlier generation glamorized smoking in film and print, the present generation is repulsed by those earlier images.
This all reminds me of the concept of Chesterton’s fence, coined by G.K. Chesterton, which emphasizes the importance of understanding the history and purpose...
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
I have long said that we traded the health problems of smoking for the health problems of obesity. And we got additional layers of government over-reach in the bargain.
Then we got legalized cannabis (who cares about any health problems there??) and we got a lot of placid people who are easily controlled.
The flaw in this argument is obese children.
Children didn’t smoke in 1970 so the explosion of obese children can’t be blamed on them smoking less.
It’s the food and the chemicals. The food and the mass produced goods are poisoned.
“progress in the realm of public health”
The Nudge works.
When it’s propaganda that you agree with, is it wrong?
People are malleable as tin.
Cooking Breakfast for the One I Love--Fanny Brice (1930)
High-fructose corn syrup is probably the worst: high-calories, produces insulin spikes and carries estrogen-like chemicals from corn. Studied independently under current guidelines it would probably be banned.
Portion size: there was plenty junk food in the 60s like soda, chips, etc. But no ginormous sodas and bags of chips. Restaurant portions were also much smaller. You were full easting an ordinary meal, but now we train ourselves to overeat big portions and still feel hungry after eating an adequate meal.
Most importantly is exercise: kids were encouraged to go out and play and there were no video games, computers, and smart phones. I am often in Europe and you can see European kids are catching up with obesity now, too, despite the fact that food quality in Europe is much better than here.
Whether it’s smoking, obesity, or something else, the government will find a way to dictate your life as long as you have government paying for health.
When we were kids, we walked to school, played outside and rode our bikes all over the neighborhood. Today, we set our kids down in front of computer screens, never let them out of our sight, then scratch our heads and wonder why they become flabby and obese.
Very excellent point.
The growth in obesity can’t be blamed on any one thing. There are multiple factors. Sedentary lifestyles due to changes in workplace, transportation, entertainment, increased leisure time. The price of food has fallen drastically as a percentage of income while it’s availability has risen. And the big focus on cheap carbohydrate and seed oil heavy processed foods and beverages drives an unhealthy insulin response that packs on the pounds.
Indeed, there was plenty of junk food in the 1950s. Cereal companies emphasized the sugar content of their products—Sugar Smacks, Sugar Pops, Rice Honeys, etc. And as the voice of Tony the Tiger, Thurl Ravenscroft, whom my mother knew in his later years, admonished America that “Sugar Frosted Flakes are great!”
“High-fructose corn syrup”
fructose - fruit sugar
Fruit juice probably should be removed from the federal nutrition programs.
Fruit often is produced for a short time each year.
Human biochemistry probably favors storing up its once annual bounty in some manner.
Even with seasonal fruit, our ancestors would have gotten very little fructose until the advent of agriculture, and even then since fruit couldn’t be stored for long, only locally or in small expensive quantities in cities. The exception being conversion to alcohol, like wine. Our metabolism needs glucose, so the constant conversion of high amounts of fructose to glucose sets up a bunch of hormonal imbalances.
And while it's true that nicotine does suppress appetite to some extent, so do cocaine and amphetamines - are we supposed to advocate their use as well? Even if you can lose a few pounds by smoking, I think most people would take a few extra pounds over lung cancer or emphysema later in life.
Dried fruit is probably one of the first foods we learned to process to store long term.
Exactly. The difference between the past decades and today is that people were more physically active. Adults worked more physically demanding jobs rather than being sedentary office drones. They engaged in sports or outdoor pastimes rather than watching Netflix. Kids played sports or at least played outside rather than playing computer games. Smoking had nothing to do with either - the whole article is based on the author's inability to distinguish correlation and causation, or else he's simply being dishonest in order to advocate for smoking.
I have a pretty libertarian attitude towards drug use - someone is free to smoke like a chimney until they get emphysema, or drink until their liver fails. As far as I'm concerned they should be free to use meth or heroin until they overdose as long as they aren't pushing it on kids, or go around dishonestly telling people that any of the above are good for them.
In 2024, approximately 15% of Americans reported smoking marijuana, a figure consistent with combined 2023-2024 data, showing an upward trend in recent years. An estimated 64.1 million people used marijuana in the past year in 2024, according to Statista. These figures highlight increased marijuana use, which has been growing since 2021 and is now more common than alcohol use, with 18 million people reporting daily or near-daily marijuana use compared to 15 million for alcohol in a study from November 2024, notes The New York Times.
People forget that we had mealtimes, we sat down and ate 3 meals a day at set times.
Having mother set the table for 3 meals a day now without all the snacking and tween meals, and random eating, night time TV eating, and soft drinks, fattening coffee drinks, fruit drinks, all those 100 calories here, 300 there, all day, everyday would have a massive effect on obesity.
People and kids did not have the money for snacks during the day and there were very few snacks to tempt them, now snacks are everywhere, and loaded with calorie enhancements like cheese, literally everywhere, and we all have the pocket change to buy them without thinking, and then we consume them while walking or driving, or on the electronic device, or even at our work desks.
There is a really good documentary “Addiction” on the streaming services about cigarettes. It’s about a research biologist who was hired by a cigarette company to develop nonaddictive cigarettes. In the course of research, tinkering with the tobacco recipe, he accidently discovered how to make cigarettes 100% more addictive. When called to an executive meeting to report on the progress of his research he told them about the 100% more addictive recipe. The execs stood up and applauded him.
So, yes, dates grown on palms in the desert can be dried. I can't even recall that the Romans, who had a mainly dry climate in the Med, had much dried fruit. They did use honey as a preservative for some fruit I think, but then the cost would have been enormous. Widespread consumption of dried fruit is mainly a modern phenomenon I think.
Dried plums being one of the biggest.
Apples of course store for a long time naturally so they probably were not dried as often but certainly some.
Cherries, berries, grapes, any small fruit was dried routinely.
I am not sure where you are getting this big "cost" idea. Fruit plus sun, dried fruit.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.