Rather than conflating it all in a way that leads to misunderstanding, why not say "sure, calories in - calories out defines weight loss, but you need more than

Rather than conflating it all in a way that leads to misunderstanding, why not say "sure, calories in - calories out defines weight loss, but you need more than that to be healthy". The point stands that tracking calories gives you a defined goal. It's not the only goal for health, but that doesn't make it useless. The parent post you objected to was not claiming that what you ate didn't matter at all. You are 100% right that healthy, sustainable weight loss isn't all calories, but weight loss itself absolutely is - and breaking the problem down into parts so people understand how to achieve that weight loss rather than having this arbitrary "healthy eating" idea that is much harder to track is a good thing. No one is advocating for it in isolation.