[CountingDown]

I have found this to be very true for me. Once I went to a whole food, minimal processed food way of eating, my cravings and my "out of control" episodes virtually disappeared.

I love the way I eat now. I enjoy food more than I ever did before this journey. I enjoy the act of eating more.

I agree with Rosebud - those foods are actually poison to my body now. When I do eat them, I feel rotten for days.

Well, with the exception of cheesecake

[JulieJ08]

Originally Posted by Ailidh

I'm only going on this video clip - very interesting, thankyou - but I think he's asking the wrong people to take responsibility. AFAIK there is no one "The Food Industry" - it makes it sound like a group of evil scientists sitting round going, 'How are we going to enslave the fools today?'

Every individual purveyor of anything tries their best to sell the most they can. So it is not unreasonable for, say, burger manufacturers to do everything they possibly can to make their product as attractive as possible to sell as much as possible.

I think I somewhat disagree, but I think it's more semantics

First, although there isn't "The Food Industry" there are some pretty dang big players. Many brands that seem to be different brands are actually owned by one company.

Second, I refuse to say it's OK for corporations to do whatever is best for the bottom line, ethics be damned. That doesn't mean I think the government should, or indeed can, regulate ethics. And I don't think there's any black and white way to define what's ethical for someone else. But yeah, I do think it's reasonable for companies, no matter how large, to be 100% ethical , fair, compassionate, honest, everything we expect from individuals. Because they *are* made of individuals, and individuals take home the profits. And those individuals are human beings.

[Rosinante]

I agree that we probably agree! Mostly.

I think those involved in food industries who are tasked with trying to make their product as irresistible as possible must have to have a cold, cold outlook that I don't at all condone. I do think regulation is the way to go, though, because otherwise they can continue to self-justify.

A hundred years ago when I left university, I was up for 2 jobs, one with the government and one with a well known chocolate manufacturer. As part of the wkcm's interview process, I had to go to a dinner and talk in a hotel. That very morning, the job offer from the govt. arrived, and I took it - but went and had the dinner anyway..... well, it was booked already. I don't remember the dinner but I do remember the talk, it was about little chocolate sweeties in multi-coloured candy shells. In those days, blue was not available in the UK - but it could be sold in, I think, Saudi Arabia.... and I came away knowing I'd made the right decision, I could never get that excited about coloured chocolate.

AFAIK, the product was safe (or believed to be safe) but to be successful in the company, you had to be obsessive about its marketing. I guess burger/other fast crp purveyors have to be that obsessive, and I think only regulation will stop them.

[rockinrobin]

Originally Posted by CountingDown

I have found this to be very true for me. Once I went to a whole food, minimal processed food way of eating, my cravings and my "out of control" episodes virtually disappeared.

I love the way I eat now. I enjoy food more than I ever did before this journey. I enjoy the act of eating more.

I agree with Rosebud - those foods are actually poison to my body now. When I do eat them, I feel rotten for days.

Well, with the exception of cheesecake

Sign my name to this post. Word for word - right down to the cheesecake.

It's so easy following CountingDown when responding to a post. She does all the thinking for me. Writes it out so articulately and I just have to ditto it.

[kiramira]

Manufacturers want us to buy their products. They make their products as appealing as possible. They hire advertisers and lobbyists to create the desire.

Advertisers and lobbyists present these products to us.

We have the CHOICE whether or not to purchase them. Period.

This is the essence of a free market. Whether the product in question is a car, a tv, an iPod, fabric softener, or food.

I am just SO. TIRED. of listeneing to "experts" place the "blame" for the current obesity epidemic on the manufacturers of crap, or the advertisers of crap, or the sellers of crap, or the government for NOT PREVENTING its sale.

Are we all THAT helpless in the face of our tvs and radios? Are we all puppets that can be manipulated into stuffing our collective faces with crap because the evil corporations and the governments "want" us to?? Do we go out and buy EVERYTHING that is advertised? Are we REALLY mindless robots who believe that "we deserve a break today" because a guy dressed up like a CLOWN TELLS us so??? Are there NO healthy options that you can purchase IF YOU CHOOSE TO???

My GOD, people, let's stand up and acknowledge that we have FREE WILL. NOONE puts a gun to our head and orders us through the DRIVETHROUGHS. NOONE says "eat these Cheetos or I'll kill your mother"...
HONESTLY.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: this isn't the fault of the corporations or the government or some evil plot to enslave the people with the bonds of convenience food. It IS the fault of the right hand that hold the fork.

And if you choose to assume OWNERSHIP of your own darn weight problem, you'll be able to address it that much more effectively than if the issue is externalized...

-rant over-

Kira

[CountingDown]

Thanks Robin!

I often ditto your posts as well. You are such an inspiration - I can't tell you how much your posts over the last 20+ months have guided my journey

[Glory87]

Originally Posted by kiramira

Manufacturers want us to buy their products. They make their products as appealing as possible. They hire advertisers and lobbyists to create the desire.

Advertisers and lobbyists present these products to us.

We have the CHOICE whether or not to purchase them. Period.

This is the essence of a free market. Whether the product in question is a car, a tv, an iPod, fabric softener, or food.

I am just SO. TIRED. of listeneing to "experts" place the "blame" for the current obesity epidemic on the manufacturers of crap, or the advertisers of crap, or the sellers of crap, or the government for NOT PREVENTING its sale.

Have you read Food Politics or In Defense of Food yet?

It is absolutely maddening what special interest groups did to the "Food Pyramid." Infuriating. The food industry did crazy stuff like not allow the government to include words like "eat less!" It's NUTTY stuff, it should make your blood boil. Forget the government not "preventing its sale" the government is in BED with these special interest groups - the government isn't looking out for YOU or ME or anybody. Preventing the sale, heck, they are ENCOURAGING, they are having parades! The government and the "food industry" are having a PARTAY at the expense of our health and waistlines.

***
Nestle -- who is now the chair of New York University's Department of Nutrition and Food Studies -- managed the production of the first (and only) Surgeon General's Report on Nutrition and Health in 1988. She chronicled the food industry's influence on government dietary guidelines in her book Food Politics, writing, "My first day on the job, I was given the rules: No matter what the research indicated, the report could not recommend 'eat less meat' as a way to reduce intake of saturated fat....The producers of food that might be affected by such advice would complain to their beneficiaries in Congress, and the report would never be published."
***

You say people should be smart enough to make healthy decisions, but when the American government publishes a FOOD PYRAMID for healthy eating (heck, I remember drawing it as a kid in school!!) - why shouldn't they trust it? How much research is the typical American supposed to do to find what constitutes eating healthy? Why shouldn't they eat the recommended ELEVEN servings of grains every day (which included rice, pasta and cereal with no mention of whole grains?).

I had to do a damn lot of research - and I'm still learning stuff all the time. Does the typical person want to? Should they have to?

[rockinrobin]

Originally Posted by CountingDown

Thanks Robin!

I often ditto your posts as well. You are such an inspiration - I can't tell you how much your posts over the last 20+ months have guided my journey

Not to hijack the thread, but I can't begin to tell you how much I admire you and what you have accomplished. Whenever I see that you have posted, I can't wait to read it, that's just how much I enjoy your posts.

And now, from Glory:

I had to do a damn lot of research - and I'm still learning stuff all the time. Does the typical person want to? Should they have to?

Me too. To a "T". Ha, another poster I love to follow! Anyway, this was the case with me. I had to do my own research. And I still am learning. Not only are most people not willing to do this, they don't even realize that they HAVE to.

[CountingDown]

Glory - you are so right! Research and continually tweaking our plans is critical to our success. Like you, I am angry and frustrated with what special interest groups and lobbyists have done to government recommendations.

The pyramid is much better than the 4 food groups with which I grew up, even with its flaws.

The book More with Less was an eyeopener when I first read it back in the 80s. It is mostly a cook book (Mennonite), but the narrative portion of the book hit the nail on the head. Unfortunately, they had to site research from other countries since so little research was published here in the United States.
Until I read that book, the idea of eating lower on the food chain and avoiding processed and frankenfoods, was an idea that never crossed my mind.

[WarMaiden]

Having read In Defense of Food and other research on the topic, I'm with Glory and Robin et al on this issue. What our government has done and continues to do to create the conditions for American obesity, in the name of profit for private corporations, is utterly shameful.

Ranting about how obesity is only the fault of the person holding the fork is a vast oversimplification. And it's obviously possible to take personal responsibility, lose a substantial amount of weight, and still recognize that the institutions which shape our world should share blame for the problem.

[kaplods]

I've always been very bright. I learned to read before kindergarten, and was counting calories, and reading in the adult section of the library (usually weight loss books), by eight. In essence, I've been researching and attempting weight loss with limited success for the last 35 years. I've put a lot more energy into researching weight loss than I did either of my psychology degrees (bachelors and masters). In graduate school, I wanted to do my thesis on morbid obesity and weight loss, but I was too embarassed to write on such an obviously personal topic, especially when I hadn't had the success I was hoping to have had by graduation. If I had lost 150 lbs before finishing the thesis, that would have been ok. I ended up choosing the exam option so I wouldn't have to write a thesis at all, because I was so afraid to have to defend it (especially since the psychology professors I'd be defending it to were not overweight, and most were men).

There are a lot of factors that contribute to obesity, and I don't think research is even scraping the surface. Only some of those factors are under the conscious control of the obese person. Acknowledging that is NOT absolving the person of responsibility, rather it gives the obese person and their support system knowledge, and knowledge is power. Learning that obesity might not be entirely my fault, or entirely under my control, did not make me say "great, I don't even have to try to lose weight, because it's not my fault."
On the contrary, it inspired me to say, "No wonder I've had such a hard time with this. It isn't that I'm lazy, crazy, or stupid, this stuff is really hard, and if I have to work a lot harder and learn a lot more - that's just the luck of the genetic, socio-cultural draw."

I think one of the main reasons that I didn't learn much sooner, is that I did believe "it's just the person with the fork." When a diet didn't work, I told myself the cliche' "any diet works if you work it," and when I failed I told myself "the diet didn't fail me, I failed the diet." In essence, I was ramming my head against a brick wall, and returning repeatedly to just go at the wall with more speed, and wondering why I ended up with a headache and the wall was still there.

When I first started reading the research that many people so often claim encourages people to avoid taking personal responsibility, I felt guilty for even reading the research (was I subconsciously trying to absolve myself of the blame?), but that wasn't my experience. The more I read, the more tools I had to fight, and the more committed I became to doing so. I still didn't have a lot of success, largely because there's a lot more misinformation out there than good information on weight loss. Most researchers (it's starting to change, but just) were trying to find THE cause of obesity or THE best treatment, and in my opinion weren't asking the right questions. A person who, like me, was underweight until almost 5 and obese by kindergarten may be a very different person than a person who started gaining weight after menopause. And, if the causes of obesity can be very different, maybe the treatments have to be too (yes, they almost all incorporate eating less and moving more, but factors that make it easier or harder to do may be different, and knowing those factors can be half the battle).

I'm so tired of people telling me that I "finally decided to do it," believing that motivation is the primary and ONLY factor in weight loss. Oh how I wish that was true. I certainly had a lot more motivation and energy to implement that motivation when I was younger. I didn't have to work harder, I had to work smarter. I had to understand why I felt like I was starving 24/7, and felt a drive to eat even after having eaten a large meal, and why right before and during TOM it got so bad that I felt like a starving, caged, animal (when hubby called me werewolf, it wasn't too far from accurate. Sometimes he was very lucky that I only figuritively bit his head off).

I firmly believe that if I had not changed my bc to skip periods, and had not found low carb eating, I would weigh more than 400 lbs, by now. They were both, essentially factors outside myself, and I didn't start losing weight permanently until I addressed them. And it wasn't easy, because although I had been asking doctors since my mid 20's about using bc to skip periods, I was always discouraged from doing so. Assuming they knew best, I didn't push it.

And as for low carb, my only experience with it was that I knew it was unhealthy (everyone knows that, right?) and that when I was desperate enough to try low carb diets the first phase always made me extremely ill (now, I recognize those symptoms, which the books always attributed to "carb-withdrawal, as symptoms of low blood sugar - It's possible that I was insulin resistant for decades). It took not only my doctor recommending low carb for me to try it, but a second opinion from another doctor before I even considered giving it a try. Even my doctor's suggestions not to "go to low carb" (even though admitting he didn't know what "too low" was) helped me to understand that there may be an optimal carb-level for me, and I might have to experiment to find it.

I'm starting to rant and ramble, but it just drives me absolutely insane when people tell me "it's only a matter of willpower." Willpower is the least effective of all my weight loss strategies. Sometimes willpower is almost as inefective on eating as it is for holding one's breath. Oh sure, you're not going to pass out and start eating while unconscious, but the instinct to eat can be almost as overpowering as the instinct to breathe. Outsmarting the primitive brain can be quite a challenge, and assuming that fat people are lazy, crazy, bad, or stupid if they haven't mastered their body weight is just plain wrong, morally and factually.

Is the "food industry" to blame entirely for all obesity? Of course not, but they do take a share. Maybe it's only 3% of the problem, maybe the percentage differs for each person. There are so many factors, that if they all are just 1% of the problem, they can add up pretty quickly. There's still plenty of "blame" for the individual to accept, and that too may vary from person to person.

The thing is we can't SEE those factors, so we don't know whom and to what degree, they are affecting any individual, so it's easiest to lay all of the blame at the feet of "the person with the fork." If only it were that simple.

[Me23]

The thing is, there's a difference between fault and responsibility.

[kiramira]

It IS that simple. It IS simply a matter of lifestyle and food choice. If it WEREN'T as simple as calories in/calories out, then obesity surgery would not be a treatment option as it would NOT have a reliable outcome. And it DOES have a predictable and measurable outcome. Regardless of the genetics of the individual, and regardless of the Hamburgler, and regardless of the evil government who wants us enslaved to corporate interests and regardless of the medications that a person is on. Obesity surgery helps a person restrict their calories: result --weight loss. The PRIMARY factor for NOT proceeding with obesity surgery once it is determined that a person will most likely survive the surgery is the evaluation of an individual's readiness to change their diet and lifestyle habits. This is why the surgery is a TOOL, not a CURE. It is STILL up to the individual to maintain the small size of their pouch and therefore restrict their food intake. And the maintainers have showed us that this is indeed possible -- rockinrobin OFTEN makes the point about making the CHOICE to change...

And at the end of the day, who CARES who shoulders the blame? At the end of the day, weight issues are an indiviudal issue and one either chooses to deal with it or not. Blame-laying doesn't help. It really is up the an individual and individual responsibility to control what one chooses to put into ones body. Period. And how much MORE money do we as a nation want to pour into books and give to wealthy authors to explain the WHYS -- how about taking that money and funding a decent breakfast/lunch program to give kids a fighting chance at healthy living early on in life? How about taking money from the research that pharamaceutical companies pour into finding an obesity "cure" and fund recess and sports activities instead?

JMHO..

Kira

[kaplods]

Saying it is "simply" a matter of eating less and moving more (calores in/out), is a bit like saying that the solution to poverty is a matter of poor people "choosing" to earn more and spend less. While it may be "true," saying that to anyone in a financial crisis, provides absolutely no useful information or tools to assist a person in poverty in implementing that "truth."

The same is true of obesity. It isn't that "eating less and moving more," isn't the solution, rather that finding ways to make it doable, for many people, is neither simple nor easy.

A "calorie is a calorie," is misleading. Firstly, there are calories (those from fiber, and perhaps partially sugar alcohols) that human bodies cannot digest (some nutrition labels include these calories, some do not). Also, lower carb eathing for some folks (especially those with blood sugar issues) can be much more successful than higher carb eating. When I first started following lower carb eating, I thought the much more rapid loss was due to the caloric restriction (mostly because of the reduction in hunger) and water weight (I still find that I retain less water, eating low carb). However, I learned by months of food journals, that I lose more weight on 1800 calories of low carb than on 1800 calories of high carb. I'm also less hungry so calorie restriction is easier, and have more energy so exercise and daily activity is easier.

And that's why, while it is "just lifestyle," it's necessary to find ways to make the lifestyle more acheivable.

I can't fully describe what it was like before I found the hormonal and carbohydrate connection (and I would have never found that connection if I hadn't been able to think outside of the "it's just a lifestyle choice, eat less and exercise more" box). Telling me "just eat less," was like telling a starving person to "use willpower," and not eat anything while setting a banquet buffet before them.

I wasn't physically starving, of course, but my body chemistry was telling me that I was. Believing it was "just my choice," didn't help me any, it slowed me down, because it blinded me to finding tools to make that choice possible in the long term. I was only able to use "willpower" to lose weight, if I sacrificed virtually everything else in my life, and I mean that literally. In order to keep from eating, I had to use an insane amount of effort - and there was little time for anything else - even my job performance would suffer while I was dieting, because I couldn't concentrate (I was too busy thinking about food and/or not eating it). I was also exhausted all of the time, and felt terrible.

We do need the information on why weight loss is so hard, in order to make it easier. Because while "exercise more and eat less," is the answer, making it more acheiveable is going to be the key to more people achieving it.

You can't underestimate the role of societal convention. As my husband is so fond of saying "people are sheep." We are taught by society how to "diet," and mostly we're taught to diet ineffectively and temporarily. To lose weight, a person has to unlearn much of what they didn't even know they were taught, and needs to be able to think and act outside of the box, and that's often very difficult, because more often than not, they aren't even aware of the box.

[Liliann]

Thank you for sharing..Very interesting!