I’ve come up with an idea to solve the nation’s obesity issue: outlaw all newspapers and magazines, including their online versions.
As the experts behind Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” campaign have informed us, too many Americans are fat because they spend too much time just sitting around — and let’s face it, reading newspapers and magazines is a sedentary pursuit. Those greedy publishers, thinking of nothing but their own profits, are encouraging people to sit on their fat butts when they should be outside taking a walk or playing with their kids.
Predictably, the publishers will condemn my plan and insist that I haven’t produced any proof whatsoever that taking away newspapers and magazines will solve the obesity problem. That may be true, but any measure that incentivizes consumers to spend less time reading and more time moving can only help.
I came up with my plan while reading an online article from TIME magazine explaining how some nanny-state politicians in New York City plan to follow the lead of nanny-state politicians in San Francisco by banning Happy Meal toys. (I was, of course, jogging in place while reading the article, but I know better than most magazine readers.)
Well actually, they’re not banning all Happy Meal toys — only toys accompanying Happy Meals that don’t meet with the nanny-state politicians’ approval:
New York City Council member Leroy G. Comrie Jr. of Queens is leading the charge to ban kid-friendly toys from any fast-food meal that doesn’t meet certain nutritional standards, arguing that the plastic playthings serve to reward children for making poor food choices and undermine parents’ attempts to steer kids toward healthful options.
Mr. Comrie’s bill, which he is to introduce in the City Council on Wednesday, would restrict toys to meals that contain fewer than 500 calories and 600 milligrams of sodium, and in which less than 35 percent of the calories come from fat (making exceptions for nuts, seeds, peanut butter or other nut-based butters). In addition, the meal would have to contain a half a cup of fruit or vegetables or one serving of whole-grain products.
Awesome. Fabulous. Terrific. Let’s use the coercive power of government to remove more brain-building saturated fat from Happy Meals and replace them with more gluten and lectins — and of course, some vegetables the kids can enjoy throwing in the garbage.
As a parent, I still haven’t figured out how including a toy with a Happy Meal undermines my attempts to steer my kids toward healthful options. When my girls whine for a treat I don’t think they should have, I employ a technique passed down from my grandparents, to my parents, to me: I say no. I thought that’s what most parents do. But apparently I was wrong about that:
“I think it’s important to find a way to make a healthy lifestyle palatable and exciting,” Comrie told the New York Times’ City Room blog, acknowledging that he was motivated to write the bill out of guilt for “grabbing Happy Meals” for his own kids.
Ah, I see. Mr. Comrie wasn’t intelligent or disciplined enough to make smart choices for his own kids, so naturally this qualifies him to make decisions for mine. Clearly the best way to prevent McDonald’s from undermining my parental authority is to have the government beat them to it. Please, Mr. Comrie, stop me before I engage in another voluntary exchange.
The proposed law is a tribute to the idiocy of nanny-state politicians, but the article itself is also a tribute to the idiocy of the rah-rah journalists who cheer them on. As evidence, I present these closing sentences:
Predictably, McDonald’s condemned the proposed measure. An executive for the company’s New York region said: “Taking away toys from kids’ meals won’t solve childhood obesity.”
That may be true, but any measure that incentivizes food makers to offer healthier options for consumers can only help.
Got that? Taking away toys may not solve childhood obesity, but it can only help. That’s all you have to say to convince a rah-rah journalist that restricting freedom in a supposedly free country is a good idea: By gosh, it might just help … even if it probably won’t.
Outlawing newspapers and magazines may not make people leaner, that’s true … but anything that incentivizes them to be more active can only help. Let’s get ‘er done!
While reading the article (and trying very hard not to bang my head on my desk), I followed a link to another article about a new report that ranks the nation’s counties in terms of health. Here are some choice paragraphs:
A comprehensive survey of overall health county-by-county in the U.S. confirms a few things we already know to be true: being poor is bad for your health. So is having low education, not having a job and having less access to grocery stores and farmer’s markets for fresh food.
The County Health Rankings report, available online, ranks the health of more than 3,000 counties based on a wide variety of social, physical and environmental measures including but not limited to: adult smoking and obesity, premature death, numbers of uninsured, violent crime, car accident deaths, single parenthood, mammography screening rate, sexually transmitted disease, air pollution, numbers of low-birthweight babies born, income and education.
“It’s hard to lead a healthy life if you don’t live in a healthy community,” Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), which collaborated with the University of Wisconsin’s Population Health Institute on the report, said in a statement. “We hope that policymakers, businesses, educators, public health departments and community residents will use the Rankings to develop solutions to help people live healthier lives.”
Oh, I see … people engage in unhealthy behaviors because they live in unhealthy communities. Glad we got the cause and effect straightened out. Now the policymakers and public-health departments can jump in there and develop solutions to help people live healthier lives. Maybe they’ll start by outlawing Happy Meal toys.
Out of curiosity, I followed the links to the county-by-county rankings in California and Tennessee. In California, we lived in Los Angeles County, which is ranked number 26 out of 56 in the state. Well, that explains a lot … I still have painful memories of my mediocre health back then. Fortunately, we now live in Williamson County, which is ranked number 1 out of 95 counties in Tennessee. Man, has my health ever improved. As soon as we moved here, I started adopting the healthy habits of my new neighbors.
Strangely, though, there’s no shortage of McDonald’s restaurants around here that sell Happy Meals. We’d better do something about that. I’d hate to lose our number 1 ranking.
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Gather round, kids. Grandpa’s got a story to tell you about hamburgers that came with toys.
Boy, grandpa sure does tell some whoppers.
“Toys, Grandpa?! How did any of you live to tell about it?”
I love this quote from Nigel Latta, a very cool psychologist is NZ. In his little book “How to have kids and stay sane” he says “All kids want is to rule the world.. they don’t want much – just total world domination” I remind myself of this when kids ask for stuff, and it is very easy to say NO. If they keep harping I just get louder (nothing more embarrassing for a kid) “no you can’t have that – it’s chemicals and sugar!”
Here’s an idea, why don’t McD’s give away a toy with a fruit veggie and meat meal.
Nigel is spot-on. Something I learned years ago, before I even had my own: the worst move you can make is to give in after a long whining session. All that does is teach kids that long whining sessions work. My girls know that long whining sessions result in sitting in a bedroom, alone.
I heard that a law was passed to stop restaurants from using trans fats. But didn’t you say you were eating trans fats on your fast food diet?
Also is McDonalds still using beef tallow on their fries? Do you know if any other companies are using meat products like that? I’m an ovo-lacto vegetarian and I’d like to know…where can I find the ingredients on stuff like this?
McDonald’s gave up frying in beef tallow years ago, after being harassed by CSPI. They were still using trans fats when I was on the fast-food diet, but have since switched to some other vegetable oil.
You can find ingredients for all the fast-food chains online.
As my dad said, since most accidents happen within a few miles of your house, you ought to move away from there. But I see from the map that if I moved two blocks down the street to Denver County, I’d be far worse off. Not that there are any differences between Denverites who are clients of the CPA firm where I work and Denverites who’ve never filed a tax return–hey, that could be whole new demographic. Want to be healthier? Start filing a 1040, an 1120, Schedules A, B and C, a gift tax return, and returns for all 50 states.
The “it can only help” line reminds me of a boss from long ago who wanted me to spend a chunk of change to go to some conference in another city. I asked him if it would help me in my job, and he said, “It couldn’t hurt.” I didn’t go: for a chunk of change, it had to do more than not hurt. It’s easy to say “it can’t hurt” or “it can only help” when it isn’t your time or money.
I’m an s-corp, so I believe I file just enough returns to be healthy.
I love this: “As a parent, I still haven’t figured out how including a toy with a Happy Meal undermines my attempts to steer my kids toward healthful options. When my girls whine for a treat I don’t think they should have, I employ a technique passed down from my grandparents, to my parents, to me: I say no. I thought that’s what most parents do. ”
It blows my mind that people actually feel the need to look to the government for help in making healthy choices for their kids. I pass a McDonalds at least once a day with my kids (ages 4, 2.5 and 1) and never once have had an uncontrollable urge to stop and feed my kids fast food. (of course, they are too busy eating beef jerky and cashews in the backseat, or are still full from their 3-egg omelet breakfast).
Lawmakers are forgetting a small detail in making laws like this: children don’t buy their own fast food, and most often don’t even order it! If they actually wanted to change what kids eat, they should change the options for adults so that the kids will see their parents making healthy choices and learn by example. Better idea… they should stay out of parenting decisions altogether!
I like your proposed idea! I’ve imposed a self ban on almost all regular news sources anymore to save myself the stress. I prefer to hear about news like this from people like you anyway 🙂
That’s what drives me nuts. Since when can kids buy a Happy Meal without a willing parent?
Seriously, these people just over-estimate this toy. It’s never a good toy, just a cheap little gimmick to help promote the latest cartoon. Has anyone’s kid actually started throwing a tantrum “I want a talking shrek thing that I’ll forget about once we get back in the car!!!!”
And once the toy goes away, my daughter may well lose her zeal for the happy meal and start asking for the regular combos instead….because we go to Mcdonald’s when I decide I want to go there, not when she wants to go.
Good point. I think the average lifespan of the toys my girls received at McDonald’s was about 30 minutes. They don’t even ask for them anymore.
It’s funny that they pick on Happy Meal toys as a culprit to the ever stagnant (or increasing) rate of child obesity. If politicians such as Mr. Comrie want to regulate food when it relates to toys, they should be focusing more on the candy aisles that you must go through to purchase anything when at a Toys ‘R Us, Wal-Mart, Target, virtually any toy retailers in the US.
I don’t want them regulating any of our choices, but yes, I see people buying sugar all over the place. Picking on McDonald’s is just grandstanding.
My son loves Mcdonalds for the playspace which is something that certainly does not cause obesity. In McDonalds that have a playspace, the toy is even more disregarded. Should we allow toys if the McDonalds has a playspace? Or remove the playspace all together because children like to go to McDonalds just to play on the equipment.
My girls barely touch their meals then run off to play. I don’t think I’ve ever seen either of them actually finish a Happy Meal.
Just finished watching Fathead. First and foremost: your wife is ridiculously hot. And the rest of the movie was good too (haha). Seriously, I was a lactose intolerant carpal tunnel syndrome vegetarian for nine years. Ended up on a high meat diet as a result of a two-year Peace Corps stint in the Pacific — and instead of having some sort of stroke/constipation/impotence-based health meltdown, I ended up feeling better than ever. Quite a blow to my whole hippy image, but I couldn’t bullshit myself — I’ve been a meat/milk/eggs/cheese/fruit/vegetable man ever since. Thanks for putting all the facts together into an easy to follow package. Now if I can just get my (also ridiculously hot) girlfriend to watch it, maybe we could finally eat a steak together! Thanks again.
The ridiculously hot wife was also in the Peace Corps. She’d just gotten back when I met her.
Tom – You are awesome! The way that our lives are manipulated these days by govt and various pseudo-scientific pressure groups (I’m looking at you ‘Guy from CSPI!) really sucks we need more people like you to call them on it!
Thanks.
In other news: Living is dangerous – it has a 100% mortality rate!
Frankly, it amazes me that more people aren’t up in arms about this kind of nonsense. I guess they see it as the government going after the big, rich corporation, when they should be seeing it as the government telling you what you can and cannot buy for your kid.
I would have commented on this but I am walking over to McDonalds to buy some fries and a large coke. I need to “Move” so I don’t get fat.
I saw the County article when it came out last week. I feel lucky to live in the 4th healthiest county in my state !! Now if I work in the next county over which is clearly not as healthy (based on ranking) I wonder where that puts me? Gosh, is my health in jeopardy everyday that I go to work? And I don’t even want to talk about how many Mickey D’s I pass on my daily commute !!
Try to spend less than half of your waking hours in the unhealthy county. We’d hate to see you come down with a disease.
Tom, I just ranted about this on my blog last night. I am really angry that the government feels the need to save us from our children. And the fact that any of my tax dollars go to researching or wasting even a breath on passing this is really irritating.
That’s a good rant.
Most of the people I know that struggle with their weight are aware of the nutritional guidelines presented by the government, and simply choose to ignore them, even when they believe that following those guidelines would improve their health. I think that’s what this comes down to for the “nanny-statists”. They are a lot like that Nigel Latta quote that Julianne mentioned- their list of demands is short, in that they only want one thing; to run the world. Which makes them just like any other extremist– they try really hard to strip away our rights and freedoms and enjoyment of life while constantly reminding us that it’s for our own good.
PS- thanks for making Fat Head, I watched it last week and have started reading from your list of recommended books. Having lost about 13 pounds over the past three weeks via “conventional” methods, I’m transitioning to a more balanced diet and am excited to see how things develop.
I think the nanny-statists put people who eat at McDonald’s into one of two categories: 1) People too stupid to know the food is bad for them, and 2) People too stupid to stop eating food they know is bad for them.
Either way, their belief that we need their help is paternal and elitist.
Tom, this is a classic and continuing example of what I call a “lever-jerk” reaction — it’s worse than a knee-jerk reaction, because at least a knee-jerk is simple reflex to stimulus, generally blind, conditioned, or instinctive. “Lever-jerk” reactions are typical of politicians, who respond to a “DO SOMETHING!” demand with some kind of “feel good” legislation. It usually is something that will not solve a damned thing, or even may make matters worse, but that’s not the intent. The intent is to mollify the people demand that “something be done” so they will remember the valiant efforts of said politician, and jerk the appropriate lever come election time.
These lever-jerk reactions never do any damn good, except to help keep precinct parasites in office longer.
Bingo. Meanwhile, they’ll force McDonald’s to jump through a lot of hoops so the politicians can feel good about themselves. Can you imagine the logistics of producing lower-sodium Happy Meals just for New York City?
@Mike
Thanks for the complement. My Peace Corps food experience was unfortunately different from yours. In West Africa we lived on millet and leaf sauce and sometimes rice and meat sauce. The ‘meat’ sauce averaged about three 1 inch cubes of meat for each person. Except for the female volunteers who had contracted some illness, ALL the women gained weight over the two years (myself included) and the men lost weight! And I wasn’t eating large portions. In fact, when you are sharing food from a common bowl with several skinny children, you make darn sure not to take more than necessary. I was the heaviest I’ve ever been when I lived in Africa.
You were still ridiculously hot when I met you shortly after you returned home.
There are not many good reasons to pass legislation, but out of all the bad ones, the one that perhaps aggravates me the most is “guilt”. A couple years ago, I saw a tv piece about a woman who felt guilty that she didn’t have time to “bake cookies with her kids” so she got legislation passed banning all organized activities on Sundays in her town. The final shot showed her smiling, in the kitchen with her kids, slicing Pillsbury cookie dough rolls onto a cookie sheet.
My head still hurts remembering it.
Oh my … nothing like passing laws to change your own behavior.
Some more for the this is what we are up against file:
http://manofthehouse.com/health/nutrition/small-changes-big-results?utm_source=Outbrain&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Outloud-Outbrain
http://www.oralcareandhealthdaily.com/momszone/feature/foods_that_wreck_teeth/index.html?source=Outbrain
The second one is just plain funny. Healthy foods that wreck your teeth? Hey, maybe they’re not so healthy …
“Healthy foods that wreck your teeth? Hey, maybe they’re not so healthy …”
Ironically, I heard this philosophy insinuated by a dentist. “I’m not a dietician, so I can’t give advice, but if it rots your teeth, what is it doing everywhere else…?”
Tom, you can’t tell your children ‘no.’ Imagine the ego bruising you’re doing. This is America. Everyone can do whatever they want, as long as they wish upon a star. Don’t crush that mentality. Foster it. Make sure you never deny your children anything, and blame the authorities when something goes wrong. Look how well it worked out for this mom! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTFO-xZ7pyc
Oh, lordy. Based on the short scene at home, I’m guessing this boy isn’t consuming a great diet, either.
I watched Fathead on Hulu a couple of weeks ago. You did a great job. I am a RN, and just started my VLC journey…And I feel better than I have in years! Oh, and Mike is right, you have a beautiful wife!
Thanks!
Thank you.
I don’t see the problem, according to most school lunches potatoes are considered a vegetable so seems like all of the meals should work as long as they make a calorie smart choice for their drink and skip the milk or apple juice.
As for the toy most of the time my kids are too busy to getting back to being active (home or play area) to even open the toy.
I think McDonald’s should just declare meat a vegetable.
““I think it’s important to find a way to make a healthy lifestyle palatable and exciting,” Comrie told the New York Times’ City Room blog, acknowledging that he was motivated to write the bill out of guilt for “grabbing Happy Meals” for his own kids.”
This really sums up the idiocy and hypocrisy of this sort of thinking. A politician feels guilty about buying Happy Meals so he wants to make them illegal for everyone.
There’s so much stupid there I’m simply at a loss for words.
It’s amazing the doofus wasn’t laughed out of a job. That’s why I’d never live in a city like New York … people actually voted for this guy.
“I think the nanny-statists put people who eat at McDonald’s into one of two categories: 1) People too stupid to know the food is bad for them, and 2) People too stupid to stop eating food they know is bad for them.”
And what is supposedly “bad for them” is determined by the nanny-statists! I don’t want them determining that the fries are “bad” or the meat, or the buns!
I’d be against having them regulate what we eat even if they picked on the right foods … but of course, they don’t.
Angrier than usual today! It truly is ridiculous to think that taking the plastic toys out of a meal filled with addictive substances is going to stop kids wanting it.
I’ve been reading The Vegetarian Myth at your recommendation (or was it Taubes? Hard to say.) Mind. Blown. Perhaps blown a bit too much… I feel the need to fact-check assertions as serious and surprising as the ones she makes. Tremendously passionate and persuasaive book, nevertheless. I’m now in danger of becoming a tree-hugging environmentalist.
Nothing wrong with hugging a tree. Just don’t eat the bark.
Great, my county is ranked 14/15 healthiest in my state…. Funny how the color seems to lighten as you go north, probably because all the farms are up there? 🙂
I think you’d better move north as soon as possible. Your life may depend on it.
i’ve jumped onto the daily mail (commonly referred to as daily fail) site and it is quite worrying the amount of stuff thrown out.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1374235/Tangerines-tonic-heart.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1374672/Alcohol-causes-cancer-drink-safe-amount.html
epidemiological info again!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1373425/Could-white-bread-soon-toast-Healthy-living-means-demand-brown-loaves-jumps.html
sigh
Good grief. They find an association, then declare that alcohol “causes” cancer.
“Healthy foods that wreck your teeth? Hey, maybe they’re not so healthy …”
Ironically, I heard this philosophy insinuated by a dentist. “I’m not a dietician, so I can’t give advice, but if it rots your teeth, what is it doing everywhere else…?”
Tom, you can’t tell your children ‘no.’ Imagine the ego bruising you’re doing. This is America. Everyone can do whatever they want, as long as they wish upon a star. Don’t crush that mentality. Foster it. Make sure you never deny your children anything, and blame the authorities when something goes wrong. Look how well it worked out for this mom! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTFO-xZ7pyc
Oh, lordy. Based on the short scene at home, I’m guessing this boy isn’t consuming a great diet, either.
Many years ago when my girls were ages 2 and 4 we visited my grandparents in Sarasota, Florida. My 4-yr-old called all McDonald’s type places “hamburger houses”. After driving to my grandparents retirement home in downtown Sarasota from the airport my daughter shook her head sadly and said “there are too many hamburger houses in this town!”
That’s funny.
Tom,
You anti-carb crusade is incredibly bias. I don’t know if you just hate vegans or love eating dead animals, but your theories in your movie are way off. According to you, everyone must have been incredibly obese in Ireland between 1700-1900 because their main diet consisted of potatoes. Potatoes are good for you, vitamin rich (assuming you eat the skin) and very filling. Yea, if you have metabolic syndrome, high carb foods are bad for you. Just like if you have Crohns Disease you probably shouldn’t eat a lot of fatty food. The American Medical Association defines one of the symptoms of metabolic syndrome as having over a 40 inch waste for an adult male. That’s rather large. Yes, we know Michael Jordan is considered obese by the government’s stupid BMI. But Michael Jordan doesn’t have a 40 inch waste. If you are that large, then you have bigger issues than cutting down on potatoes and wheat bread.
Your movie seems to act like everyone has metabolic syndrome and some type of insulin resistance, and that’s why all of a sudden there’s a ton of fat people, so let’s all throw our arms in the air declare carbs to be evil! Even if that is true, that doesn’t explain why more people seem to be insulin resistant now that say, 25 years ago. There were way less obese/fat people walking around 25 years ago than there are now. And yes, the low fat/oats craze was at its peak in the 80’s, yet not nearly as many obese people as you see today. Hard to fight that fact. And you’re blaming this on whole grains? LOL.
My film is not bias. You may consider it biased, but it’s not bias, since “bias” is a noun or occasionally a verb.
We do have a large and growing problem with insulin resistance. Some fat people aren’t insulin-resistant, and some insulin-resistant people aren’t fat, but insulin resistance is a primary driver of both obesity and type 2 diabetes.
The Irish back in the day lived on near-starvation rations of potatoes. They also didn’t consume sugar, which was a luxury for rich people at the time. If you don’t make yourself insulin-resistant with sugars and other refined carbs, you can probably eat potatoes and other starchy vegetables without doing any damage, as I’ve said in several comments. But if have a damaged metabolism, as so many overweight and obese people do, white potatoes (or any other foods that deliver a large glycemic load) can be a real problem.
The low-fat craze may have peaked in the 1980s (I don’t think so, but let’s suppose it did for the sake of argument), but carb consumption certainly didn’t. It’s been going up and up, and we’re seeing the results today. Insulin resistance doesn’t develop overnight.
And yes, I enjoy eating dead animals very much. The live ones are too troublesome.
“The Irish back in the day lived on near-starvation rations of potatoes. They also didn’t consume sugar, which was a luxury for rich people at the time. If you don’t make yourself insulin-resistant with sugars and other refined carbs, you can probably eat potatoes and other starchy vegetables without doing any damage, as I’ve said in several comments.”
But, according to your documentary, a food that is so high on the glycemic index (higher than pure sugar actually) such as potatoes should spike your blood sugar levels and make you retain fat due to the spike in insulin. So the fact that poor people in Ireland ate potatoes instead of sugar like the rich is irrelevant, according to your documentary. Why didn’t the Irish develop insulin resistance and become obese if they were eating such a food so high on the glycemic index as one of their staples? After all, you don’t need fat in your diet to become fat right?
Also, many countries who’s staple foods are potatoes or rice have some of the lowest rates of type two diabetes in the world.
No, it’s not irrelevant. Starvation rations of high-glycemic foods don’t deliver much of a glycemic load. Even if they did, it’s not the temporary rise in insulin after meals that puts us into fat-accumulation mode; it’s chronically elevated insulin that prevents fat from being easily burned between meals and while sleeping. That’s why most of us could eat plenty of sugar and starch as kids without gaining weight … we hadn’t yet reached the point of having chronically elevated insulin. If you saw Fat Head, you’ll recall the section in which I said if you have a healthy metabolism, it only takes a little bit of insulin to bring your blood sugar down, and then everything goes back to normal … but over time, that can change. The change is insulin resistance.
There are two theories about how foods can cause insulin resistance. One, promoted by Dr. Robert Lustig, is that excess fructose is the primary driver because of how fructose affects the liver. The other is that if we’re constantly jacking up our blood sugar while our glycogen stores are full, insulin is trying to push glucose into cells that can’t take any more glucose, so they eventually become insulin-resistant to protect themselves. If you are constantly undernourished, your glycogen stores are rarely full. If you’re consuming 350 carbohydrates per day on a diet that keeps you full while also leading a sedentary life, you could easily be trying to push glucose into cells that can’t take any more.
The two theories are not mutually exclusive. Either or both processes could occur.
The countries where potatoes and rice are staples have largely fallen into the undernourished category. Now that the Chinese and Indians and other Asians are more prosperous, they are developing screamingly high rates of diabetes. Some people have of course immediately blamed the introduction of western foods, and that no doubt plays a part. However, I also read an interview with someone who lived in China and said the Chinese haven’t started living primarily on western foods just because those foods are available. They eat some of it, but mostly they’re just eating more of their traditional foods while no longer laboring in fields and therefore depleting their glycogen on a daily basis.
Whichever theory is correct, whatever it is that causes insulin resistance to develop, the fact remains that most obese people in America are insulin-resistant and therefore don’t tolerate the high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet that’s supposed to help them lose weight.
The NY Post has an article about this including a picture of Mr Comrie showing he’s morbidly obese. And this great quote from his vegetarian wife:
“Unfortunately, no man can live on salads and water alone, and he ends up going in for those quick meals — which I hesitate to even call meals.”
If only he had the self-discipline to stick to salads and water.
The solution is obviously to make salads and water (or better yet, subsidized unicorn tears) the only thing available to people like him, well, everyone actually. Once the whole world consumes only salads and unicorn tears, disease and obesity will fade away and a new age of health and prosperity will dawn.
I get all weepy just thinking about it.
Another obese guy who wants to pass laws telling other people how to eat. Perhaps he studied under Kelly Brownell.
Thank you for another interesting post. I can never understand how the brains of food evangelists work. Why do they care so much about our food habits?
Regarding your debate with cocoCrisp, I have something to add to the discussion. There are some arguments out there by smart people like Chris Masterjohn that insulin resistance is not the main reason why we are obese. He observed that that traditional cultures living on unrefined carbs are doing fine but In came refined foods, and voilà they became vulnerable to all of these diseases.
Like Stephan guyenet, he argued that leptin (a hormone that controls our appetite) resistance has a much more prominent role in causing obesity and that insulin resistance without leptin resistance may not cause obesity at all.
in fact, mouse experiments has in a way proven this finding. They found that ob/ob mouses that don’t produce leptin and the db/db mouses that have defects in the leptin receptor become insulin resistant and fat.
Regarding the mechanisms, he also argued that extreme refined fructose intake may inhibit leptin receptors and high blood triglycerides may block the passage of leptin to the brain. So I agree with you that sugar may be the main culprit in causing obesity in the modern population.
Another interesting hypotheses (by Dr. Staffan Lindeberg) is that lectins from cereal grains are the direct causes of leptin resistance. He observes that wheat germ agglutinin, or WGA, actually binds directly with the leptin receptor
Stephan Guyenet thinks that the inflammation of the hypothalamus (where there are leptin receptors) by eating lots of refined food and vegetable oils may cause leptin resistance.
The evidences seems to point that leptin resistance precede glucose intolerance or insulin resistance. So it’s important to know why the Irish were not leptin or insulin resistant.
It’s likely that large intake of modern food like refined cereals, sugar and vegetable oil(inflammation) causes leptin resistance. The Traditional Irish were healthy because they ate less of this modern food, they worked hard for their food (exercise improves glucose sensitivity) and they ate less than us (it’s boring to eat starch without the fat and sugar (fructose!!)).
So you are right to say that “most obese people in America are insulin-resistant and therefore don’t tolerate the high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet that’s supposed to help them lose weight”. Most likely they started becoming fat from their the leptin resistance (by large intake of refined food) and that causes them to be intolerant to a high carbohydrate diet.
That’s an interesting chicken-or-egg question. Dr. Robert Lustig said in an interview with Jimmy Moore that it’s elevated insulin that prevents us from sensing rising leptin levels, but I don’t remember if he explained it more fully. Either way, we know what to do: avoid processed carbs and avoid cereal grains.
Potatoes and weight loss.
What was the life expectancy in Ireland at the time? Not great I suspect. As life expectancy goes up, so do mortality associated with chronic diseases, such as diabetes.
As for declaring meat a vegetable, I got a flyer in the post once. Without a trace of irony, it was headed “you are what you eat” and was basically saying you need to eat less meat, more vegetables and take these pills (which, if you order before the end of the month, you can buy two for the price of one). I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
And Nigel Latta is a legend.
So we could tell the people who fall for the ad, “You’re a pill.”
The NY Post has an article about this including a picture of Mr Comrie showing he’s morbidly obese. And this great quote from his vegetarian wife:
“Unfortunately, no man can live on salads and water alone, and he ends up going in for those quick meals — which I hesitate to even call meals.”
If only he had the self-discipline to stick to salads and water.
The solution is obviously to make salads and water (or better yet, subsidized unicorn tears) the only thing available to people like him, well, everyone actually. Once the whole world consumes only salads and unicorn tears, disease and obesity will fade away and a new age of health and prosperity will dawn.
I get all weepy just thinking about it.
Another obese guy who wants to pass laws telling other people how to eat. Perhaps he studied under Kelly Brownell.
Thank you for another interesting post. I can never understand how the brains of food evangelists work. Why do they care so much about our food habits?
Regarding your debate with cocoCrisp, I have something to add to the discussion. There are some arguments out there by smart people like Chris Masterjohn that insulin resistance is not the main reason why we are obese. He observed that that traditional cultures living on unrefined carbs are doing fine but In came refined foods, and voilà they became vulnerable to all of these diseases.
Like Stephan guyenet, he argued that leptin (a hormone that controls our appetite) resistance has a much more prominent role in causing obesity and that insulin resistance without leptin resistance may not cause obesity at all.
in fact, mouse experiments has in a way proven this finding. They found that ob/ob mouses that don’t produce leptin and the db/db mouses that have defects in the leptin receptor become insulin resistant and fat.
Regarding the mechanisms, he also argued that extreme refined fructose intake may inhibit leptin receptors and high blood triglycerides may block the passage of leptin to the brain. So I agree with you that sugar may be the main culprit in causing obesity in the modern population.
Another interesting hypotheses (by Dr. Staffan Lindeberg) is that lectins from cereal grains are the direct causes of leptin resistance. He observes that wheat germ agglutinin, or WGA, actually binds directly with the leptin receptor
Stephan Guyenet thinks that the inflammation of the hypothalamus (where there are leptin receptors) by eating lots of refined food and vegetable oils may cause leptin resistance.
The evidences seems to point that leptin resistance precede glucose intolerance or insulin resistance. So it’s important to know why the Irish were not leptin or insulin resistant.
It’s likely that large intake of modern food like refined cereals, sugar and vegetable oil(inflammation) causes leptin resistance. The Traditional Irish were healthy because they ate less of this modern food, they worked hard for their food (exercise improves glucose sensitivity) and they ate less than us (it’s boring to eat starch without the fat and sugar (fructose!!)).
So you are right to say that “most obese people in America are insulin-resistant and therefore don’t tolerate the high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet that’s supposed to help them lose weight”. Most likely they started becoming fat from their the leptin resistance (by large intake of refined food) and that causes them to be intolerant to a high carbohydrate diet.
That’s an interesting chicken-or-egg question. Dr. Robert Lustig said in an interview with Jimmy Moore that it’s elevated insulin that prevents us from sensing rising leptin levels, but I don’t remember if he explained it more fully. Either way, we know what to do: avoid processed carbs and avoid cereal grains.
These politicians trying to fix our food choices are like dogs chasing their tails. It gives them something to do but they don’t get anywhere, even if they catch it.
As for Ireland, I could give a rats rear-end what they ate back then. The hard truth is NOW, I and many others, can’t eat starches, sugars or grains without gaining weight and destroying our health. And I’ve been very healthy the last 10 years eating meat. No amount of debate is going to change that fact.
Yes, I’m always bemused by people who try to convince me starches don’t put weight on me. Apparently they think I’ll ignore my own experience and be persuaded by the experience of a spokesman from the potato industry who lost weight eating them.
Re: becoming insulin resistant, there’s a whole school of thought that it’s lack of nutrients that causes it. Grains, beans and nuts have antinutrients that bind to various minerals and keep us from absorbing them. As Lierre Keith put it, just because plants don’t have teeth and claws doesn’t mean they don’t fight back against being eaten. Sprouting, soaking and fermenting help reduce some of the antinutrients, but those practices are absent from almost all grain products out there. Furthermore, gluten damages the intestines of celiacs and nonceliacs alike, further preventing us from absorbing nutrients.
In some people, all those carbs we’re encouraged to eat give us acid reflux, so we take acid blockers….which further inhibit nutrient absorption. Those acid blockers are huge sellers.
It’s probably not too far off to say that the English speaking world is full of malnourished yet overfed people.
I’ve read speculation that even type 1 diabetes may be caused by a reaction to grains.
Didn’t the Eades say in Protein Power of PPLP that the ancient Egyptian mummies were fat and the first diabetes epidemic was in ancient Egypt and that we have written records of it? I’m suspicious of the it takes refined sugar to make everything go bad argument.
It may go bad faster and farther and more often, I have no issue with that.
I don’t have my copy of that book sitting around, but I believe he (or someone else) mentioned how much the wealthy classes enjoyed their desserts sweetened with honey. I don’t think sugar has to be refined to cause problems.
These politicians trying to fix our food choices are like dogs chasing their tails. It gives them something to do but they don’t get anywhere, even if they catch it.
As for Ireland, I could give a rats rear-end what they ate back then. The hard truth is NOW, I and many others, can’t eat starches, sugars or grains without gaining weight and destroying our health. And I’ve been very healthy the last 10 years eating meat. No amount of debate is going to change that fact.
Yes, I’m always bemused by people who try to convince me starches don’t put weight on me. Apparently they think I’ll ignore my own experience and be persuaded by the experience of a spokesman from the potato industry who lost weight eating them.
The chicken/egg, does leptin resistance lead to insulin resistance or vice versa question sounds a lot like Taubes’ contention that we don’t get fat because we eat too much; we eat too much because we’re fat.
Except in this case, the advice is pretty much the same either way: skip the processed carbs and the grains.
Re: becoming insulin resistant, there’s a whole school of thought that it’s lack of nutrients that causes it. Grains, beans and nuts have antinutrients that bind to various minerals and keep us from absorbing them. As Lierre Keith put it, just because plants don’t have teeth and claws doesn’t mean they don’t fight back against being eaten. Sprouting, soaking and fermenting help reduce some of the antinutrients, but those practices are absent from almost all grain products out there. Furthermore, gluten damages the intestines of celiacs and nonceliacs alike, further preventing us from absorbing nutrients.
In some people, all those carbs we’re encouraged to eat give us acid reflux, so we take acid blockers….which further inhibit nutrient absorption. Those acid blockers are huge sellers.
It’s probably not too far off to say that the English speaking world is full of malnourished yet overfed people.
I’ve read speculation that even type 1 diabetes may be caused by a reaction to grains.
Didn’t the Eades say in Protein Power of PPLP that the ancient Egyptian mummies were fat and the first diabetes epidemic was in ancient Egypt and that we have written records of it? I’m suspicious of the it takes refined sugar to make everything go bad argument.
It may go bad faster and farther and more often, I have no issue with that.
I don’t have my copy of that book sitting around, but I believe he (or someone else) mentioned how much the wealthy classes enjoyed their desserts sweetened with honey. I don’t think sugar has to be refined to cause problems.
More for the this is what we are up against file:
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/blogs/healthcare-headaches/2010/09/28/thinking-of-trying-a-low-carb-diet-plan-3-things-to-consider
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/diet-fitness/diet/articles/2010/03/19/weighing-the-evidence-on-6-popular-diet-programs?PageNr=1
Oh, boy. Same old nonsense about Atkins:
“Atkins is hard to stick with in the long run. The problem is that people who do it for a long time really start craving carbs, and [Atkins] doesn’t encourage a balanced kind of eating.”
I guess I haven’t met those people. The longer I’m away from sugar and starch, the less I miss it. But man, I was sorry to hear that meats, eggs, seafood, nuts, vegetables, fruit, and full-fat dairy isn’t a balanced kind of eating. I’d best add some sugar and wheat to get some balance.
The chicken/egg, does leptin resistance lead to insulin resistance or vice versa question sounds a lot like Taubes’ contention that we don’t get fat because we eat too much; we eat too much because we’re fat.
Except in this case, the advice is pretty much the same either way: skip the processed carbs and the grains.
More for the this is what we are up against file:
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/blogs/healthcare-headaches/2010/09/28/thinking-of-trying-a-low-carb-diet-plan-3-things-to-consider
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/diet-fitness/diet/articles/2010/03/19/weighing-the-evidence-on-6-popular-diet-programs?PageNr=1
Oh, boy. Same old nonsense about Atkins:
“Atkins is hard to stick with in the long run. The problem is that people who do it for a long time really start craving carbs, and [Atkins] doesn’t encourage a balanced kind of eating.”
I guess I haven’t met those people. The longer I’m away from sugar and starch, the less I miss it. But man, I was sorry to hear that meats, eggs, seafood, nuts, vegetables, fruit, and full-fat dairy isn’t a balanced kind of eating. I’d best add some sugar and wheat to get some balance.
This one will set the libertarian in you off:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/04/10/boston-mayor-thomas-menino-kos-soda-oks-alcohol/
It’s a useless gesture, but believe it or not, it doesn’t rile the libertarian in me. If government wants to ban sodas in government buildings so government workers who choose to work there don’t buy them, well … it’s stupid, but property owners can be stupid on their own property and it’s fine by me.
Now, if they walk into my restaurant or bar and tell me what I can serve, that’s a whole ‘nuther animal.
This is not apropos of any one post, but just a huge thank you for making the movie, the Fig Fat Fiasco Speech, and providing all your very helpful links on this site. I just enjoyed my version of “bacon slab” from one of the LC recipe sites linked (I made it with onions, garlic, jalapenos, and cheddar and pepper jack cheese, rather than bacon and spinach, but will try the original version one of these days. I just happen to like the Mexican flavors and adapted a quiche I used to make to the recipe for bacon slab.) I’ve been on board–theoretically, anyway–with the idea that mainstream nutritional guidelines (and the lipid hypothesis) are wrong for at least 6 years, since I first read the books by Sally Fallon and Mary Enig, Gary Taubes, Uffe Ravnskov, and many others, but found it hard to implement in my own life and family. Your site helps and I thank you for the time and effort you put into keeping it up. I’m a newbie to your site and am still exploring and going through the archives, but find it all very informative and helpful. Thank you.
Thank you for reading.
I can see it now. You’ll have to show an ID to buy a happy meal.
I had planned once to write a little parody in which people have to step on a scale before being allowed to high-calorie meals, but then some legislators proposed pretty much the idea. That’s the trouble with trying to use comic exaggeration to poke fun at nanny-state types: no matter how ridiculous you make your parody, they eventually catch up.
This one will set the libertarian in you off:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/04/10/boston-mayor-thomas-menino-kos-soda-oks-alcohol/
It’s a useless gesture, but believe it or not, it doesn’t rile the libertarian in me. If government wants to ban sodas in government buildings so government workers who choose to work there don’t buy them, well … it’s stupid, but property owners can be stupid on their own property and it’s fine by me.
Now, if they walk into my restaurant or bar and tell me what I can serve, that’s a whole ‘nuther animal.