Posted on 05/14/2003 3:02:34 AM PDT by kattracks
Well, the changing definition of "obesity" is a pretty good place to start with explaining why the obesity rate has increased...
Indeed. Their mothers would feel betrayed, unfulfilled, and unloved by their sons....
Ironically, Dr. Atkins died from injuries he sustained when he slipped on a discarded bagel and hit his head....
The BMI stats are BS.
According to the govt scales, I was "overweight" at 175lbs during high school. 175 pounders are defensive backs on the football team.
I filled out to 190 and I'm 1/2 way up the 'overweight' chart according to that. The CDC would consider Ahnold or The Rock obese.
I totally agree. Too many people are looking for a "quick-fix" solution to the problem. That is why bookstores devote huge amounts of space for diet and nutrition books. People just don't want to accept the fact that they need more exercise and to watch what they put in their mouths. They want to just drink a special milkshake, pop some pills, or go on some other "fad" diet and see the pounds melt away. Well, it just doesn't work like that.
The problem is simple. The human body was designed (and/or evolved) to do a lot of walking. Within the space of a few generations, humans went from walking 10-15 miles a day on average to pretty much not walking at all. You now see young, healthy people cruising the shopping mall parking lots for that coveted "close" space. God forbid they should park in the back of the lot (where there is always ample parking) and have to walk an extra 200 yards to the doors. We now use escalators and elevators instead of stairs in most public buildings. Even in private homes, many homebuyers seek properties that do not require stairs. I can understand this for a handicapped person, but not for one who is just too lazy to tackle of set of stairs. It's really getting ridiculous.
That's it. It's really not that complicated to understand. We need to exercise our bodies to burn off as many or more calories than we take in for food. Otherwise, we gain weight. Most people with basic metabolisms burn an average of about 100 calories an hour if have a sedentary lifestyle (I believe it is 60 calories an hour while sleeping and 120 calories an hour sitting at a desk, etc.) That's about 2,400 calories a day. So if your diet exceeds 2,400 calories a day, guess what? You are going to gain weight over time unless you burn off additional calories through exercise. (Or cut your food intake but what fun is life if you have to spend the rest of it counting calories?)
Some people are blessed with high metabolisms (rate of which calories are burned) and can seemingly eat whatever they want without gaining weight. Others are cursed with slow metabolisms in which they seemingly gain a pound just by smelling a freshly baked pie. But many of us are in the middle and can lose the weight relatively easily through walking - though it still takes discipline.
Now many people will say "I don't have time to walk, my life is so busy." Well I found the time to walk 7 miles a day on average, which is what my body apparently needs in order to not gain weight. I get up an hour earlier in the morning than I used to and walk 3 miles in my neighborhood - about a 45 minute walk. Then at lunchtime, I walk another 3 miles in the neighborhood around my office. After dinner, I'll take a 15-minute walk around the block which is just a mile. (On rainy days, I either take a break from the routine or I use the treadmill.)
I try to stick to this regimen every day and I usually do it. But yeah, things sometimes come up where I can't do a particular walk. But I always do my morning walk anyways because at 5AM (when I get up), there's just not much else going on.
You only have to look at the size of a soft drink glass to "get it". The 8oz coke fountain glass of the '50s is now replaced by the 32oz Super Big Gulp, (with the vanilla, cherry, or other flavor Squirts to enhance your drinking experience).
Of course the same is true of all food portions. I remember when the White Castle burger which was about the size of a Silver Dollar. Compare that to the WHOPPER, DOUBLE WHOPPEER, etc and Super Size it please and you can see where the amount of ounces/pounds of intake have increased significantly.
It's not the Food or Beverage Industry! It's Madison Avenue!!!
It's the Man in the Gray Flannel Suit! Hang em all!!
Sorry, Mr. Glassman. Anybody who has been fat as a kid or has known someone like that doesn't need you to preach to them about "huge spotlights" (ha-ha) or scapegoating. They will already know plenty about both.
Sure enough, personal responsibility is the key in the present state of medical art. But not because it's costing society some irresponsible amount of resources. A study done for Philip Morris showed that smokers save the taxpayers money, by dying sooner and not making claims for old age pensions.
The same should hold true for fat people. So fat people are probably actually saving society money, by dying sooner. Social Security should be handing out cigarettes and Big Mac coupons, and making sure there are no sidewalks for people to walk to where they're going. Oh, wait a second, local zoning boards and developers already do that. Anyway, there are plenty of reasons for fat people to lose the fat - for their own benefit, period.
I'm more interested in why a significant number of people get so gratuitously abusive and psychotic about fat people, in a way that can't possibly be explained by direct or indirect impact on their own lives, especially when compared with everything else that goes on. It's like they're reliving a wet dream from the grade school playground.
And of course the liberals love it because it's another villain class, like smokers, that it's safe to blame.
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