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That doesn't mean it's not true, though. Obese people do lose a lot of weight when they undereat and depressive people do profit from outside activity, sports,

That doesn't mean it's not true, though. Obese people do lose a lot of weight when they undereat and depressive people do profit from outside activity, sports, etc. It's just that life often looks like you cannot do it for various reasons. The complicated thing is of course to find a tiny crack in that bubble of constraints where you can force a change. Just an example: For many people it would be beneficial to ride a bike to get to work. This alone won't change your body completely, but it is a great start, losing you a couple of hundreds of kcal per day and encouraging more bike tours. But that's obviously not possible for everyone and it is difficult to tell from the outside whether someone just rejects this approach because they are lazy or for valid reasons.

ben_w 5y ago
The problem is the word “just”, not the rest of the advice. “‘Just’ eat less” has been straightforward for me when my scales tell me I needed to do that, but it clearly isn’t for most people else obesity wouldn’t be one of the single biggest issues in western healthcare.
- andi999 5y ago
  Same with climbing everest without oxygen bottles, 'just' use less air.
  - ekster 5y ago
    Is choosing to eat less really analogous to choosing to be able to breathe without oxygen?
    - ben_w 5y ago
      Climbing Everest without supplemental oxygen is possible and has been done[0], and isn’t the same thing as “breathing without oxygen”. [0] e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner
      - ekster 5y ago
        Ok interesting, but I still wonder if that’s really analogous to choosing to eat less food? That the person who did it has their own Wikipedia page makes me think it is probably harder.
        andi999 5y ago
        It seems 200 people did it so far, around 4% of all climbers (at some point of time) :https://www.mensjournal.com/adventure/climbing-everest-adrian-ballinger-without-oxygen/ https://www.mensjournal.com/adventure/climbing-everest-adria... probably more of the 5k could have done it if they wanted to do it (and prepare longer for it).
        ekster 5y ago
        Also interesting! I am still unsure though how losing weight is like climbing mount everest without supplemental oxygen. Can you clarify that part?
        andi999 5y ago
        It is about the usage of 'just'. So while in the first case people think the just is justified, the before mentioned data indicates that only a few people manage to 'just' do it. The order of percentage of ppl beeing able to do it is the same as something which seems very hard to do (the everest thing). So while objectively they are comparable it shines light on that the usage of 'just' is bad in both cases while the subjective perception is very different. Not sure if I can make it clearer. Edit:maybe I was thinking to complicated in this reply. The analogy is: you have two different things which can be achieved through doing a specific thing, but doing this thing is hard in both cases so using the word 'just' is not appropriate which is easier to see in the example.
        tfigueroa 5y ago
        Yes. The odds of someone climbing without supplemental oxygen vs achieving and maintaining weight loss are comparably low, presumably because they are very difficult, and cannot “just” be chosen so simply.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- roenxi 5y ago
  Changing habits is hard, making choices is hard, doing things that feel uncomfortable is really hard. I have a lot of sympathy, for the idea and we all struggle with stuff like that. But unfortunately this isn't a complicated subject. Weight is controlled by diet and standard healthy diets are very well known. Nearly everyone can keep their weight down. Even if people don't, it is objectively not that hard to do. A lot of people don't accept the rewards are worth the discomfort.
  - balfirevic 5y ago
    > doing things that feel uncomfortable is really hard > [keeping their weight down] is objectively not that hard to do Would you mind picking one?
    - roenxi 5y ago
      They're both true. One is subjective experience, the other is objective experience.
watwut 5y ago
It is bad advice, because if you just randomly restrict calories, you will run into other issues. One problem is that calorie restriction itself is modifying how your body works. So, the weight lost in diet is typically gained back super quickly. And if you repeat the cycle, your body also adjusts by spending less calories. The other problem is that it just lowering calories easily leads to nutritional deficiency of some sort. Which leads to feeling bad all the time, being tired and passive, unable to perform as previously. So the diet will eventually fail for that reason - because you will be more dysfunctional and breaking it will paradoxically make you more functional.
- xvilka 5y ago
  Unless you follow the diet to the maximum - eat only compatible food and skip incompatible (according to the chosen diet), calculate calories every single day. In my case keto diet worked the miracle. Maybe other people could be successful with other, different diets. But it does work if done properly. Same with exercise. Random exercise can be just as bad as restricting calories. Exercise should be systematic and balanced, as well as a diet.
  - SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
    Keeping track of macronutrients and carb counting sounds significantly harder than “just eat less” and I think bolsters the argument that it may in fact be hard to lose weight.
loves_mangoes 5y ago
I don't like how people, still, treat lazyness as a root cause, not as an effect. Lazyness is a bug, it's a failure state, it's a medical condition. Much like depression, psychology cannot treat it in all cases, but taking the approach that people are just born lazy and iredeemable seems like the most unscientific, least promising, and most likely to annoy your devoted commenter.
- NateEag 5y ago
  In my experience, people who focus on laziness are NOT saying the lazy person is irredeemable - they're usually saying precisely "You're choosing to be lazy and you don't have to. Choose to be different!" Granted, they often don't think through how to do that, or why the person might be struggling to perform, but it's not usually a belief that the person is incapable of doing better.
  - RobertoG 5y ago
    In my experience, people who focus on the laziness of others are trying to bring the focus at how they themselves are not lazy. There is something similar going on with overweight. What's so difficult? just eat less! look at me! It's a status game, instead of trying to help. Anyway, to say to somebody "don't procrastinate" is like given a guitar to somebody and tell them "just play!". Sure man, how?
    - loves_mangoes 5y ago
      That's hard to want to believe. The problem is if you assume they're not trying to help, then either they need help (too), or there's not much we can do about it. I feel like a whole lot of people are trying to help, they're just really bad at it and they need help themselves. . Thankfully, psychiatry! Read a book, boys & girls & enby friends.
      - NateEag 5y ago
        > I feel like a whole lot of people are trying to help, they're just really bad at it and they need help themselves. Yes. This is exactly what I was trying to get across. Thanks.
atoav 5y ago
The issue e.g. with obese people isn't that they didn't have the bright idea that they could "just" eat less or "just" move more — the issue is that there are very often underlying paychological reasons for the way people take decisions. This is not laziness, this is having a personality structure that makes it harder for you to stay healthy. We all want to be happy, if for some reason happiness for you is tied a lot more to eating than to being healthy and fit, you can try all you want it just wont make you happy if you do. That means tackling obesity means also asking yourself hard questions about what food does for you, how it got that way (e.g. having grandparents which nearly starved can have an severe effect on the food habits for a few generations down the line, sometimes parents can only express their affection through food which means now you equate food with existential parental love). Changing habits is hard, understanding your own psychological drivers and doing something about it against the resistance of your brain is way harder. Never underestimate the struggles other people have to take in order to do the thing that is easy for you.
- ekster 5y ago
  Some people preferring being obese because they are happy about eating lots of food isn’t really a counterargument to the fact that losing weight is as simple as eating less.
  - danieldisu 5y ago
    And getting rich is as simple as earning more and spending less, why are you not rich already?
    - ekster 5y ago
      Honestly I am doing quite well by following those simple practices. But creating wealth out of nothing is surely more difficult than eating less of what you already have access to. Anyway, the point was that being ok with being obese because you are happiest eating a lot doesn’t make eating less any more complicated. It’s just choosing to do something different, which everyone is free to do.
amanaplanacanal 5y ago
Have you ever been obese and lost a lot of weight and kept it off for a long period? I'm wondering if you are speaking from personal experience, or just repeating things you have heard from other people.
elliekelly 5y ago
I would encourage you to track your steps for a week and then get two 50lb bags of sand from Home Depot and carry them around with you everywhere you go for a week. Compare the steps you took in week #1 to the steps you took in week #2 to see how “lazy” you’ve become from carrying around all the extra weight. It’s hard work being fat. Literally. “Just ride your bike” is an easy solution for someone who is already normal weight but it’s not nearly as easy for someone who’s overweight.
- kamaal 5y ago
  This is a very valid point. A few days back I had to rearrange my kettlebells to a different place at home. So I just carried them. Given how difficult it was walking while carrying them(Heck it was even hard getting up lifting them), I went like There is no way Im carrying this kind of weight on my body. The example of a person with a musculoskeletal system conditioned to carrying around a 60 kg body, but weighs 120 kgs is basically competing in a Olympic powerlifting competition like situation to just do basic tasks(Using toilets, walking for everyday life tasks). I can only imagine how hard and near impossible task it is for some one to be exercising everyday.

ben_w 5y ago

The problem is the word “just”, not the rest of the advice. “‘Just’ eat less” has been straightforward for me when my scales tell me I needed to do that, but it clearly isn’t for most people else obesity wouldn’t be one of the single biggest issues in western healthcare.

andi999 5y ago
Same with climbing everest without oxygen bottles, 'just' use less air.
- ekster 5y ago
  Is choosing to eat less really analogous to choosing to be able to breathe without oxygen?
  - ben_w 5y ago
    Climbing Everest without supplemental oxygen is possible and has been done[0], and isn’t the same thing as “breathing without oxygen”. [0] e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner
    - ekster 5y ago
      Ok interesting, but I still wonder if that’s really analogous to choosing to eat less food? That the person who did it has their own Wikipedia page makes me think it is probably harder.
      - andi999 5y ago
        It seems 200 people did it so far, around 4% of all climbers (at some point of time) :https://www.mensjournal.com/adventure/climbing-everest-adrian-ballinger-without-oxygen/ https://www.mensjournal.com/adventure/climbing-everest-adria... probably more of the 5k could have done it if they wanted to do it (and prepare longer for it).
        ekster 5y ago
        Also interesting! I am still unsure though how losing weight is like climbing mount everest without supplemental oxygen. Can you clarify that part?
        andi999 5y ago
        It is about the usage of 'just'. So while in the first case people think the just is justified, the before mentioned data indicates that only a few people manage to 'just' do it. The order of percentage of ppl beeing able to do it is the same as something which seems very hard to do (the everest thing). So while objectively they are comparable it shines light on that the usage of 'just' is bad in both cases while the subjective perception is very different. Not sure if I can make it clearer. Edit:maybe I was thinking to complicated in this reply. The analogy is: you have two different things which can be achieved through doing a specific thing, but doing this thing is hard in both cases so using the word 'just' is not appropriate which is easier to see in the example.
        tfigueroa 5y ago
        Yes. The odds of someone climbing without supplemental oxygen vs achieving and maintaining weight loss are comparably low, presumably because they are very difficult, and cannot “just” be chosen so simply.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
roenxi 5y ago
Changing habits is hard, making choices is hard, doing things that feel uncomfortable is really hard. I have a lot of sympathy, for the idea and we all struggle with stuff like that. But unfortunately this isn't a complicated subject. Weight is controlled by diet and standard healthy diets are very well known. Nearly everyone can keep their weight down. Even if people don't, it is objectively not that hard to do. A lot of people don't accept the rewards are worth the discomfort.
- balfirevic 5y ago
  > doing things that feel uncomfortable is really hard > [keeping their weight down] is objectively not that hard to do Would you mind picking one?
  - roenxi 5y ago
    They're both true. One is subjective experience, the other is objective experience.

watwut 5y ago

It is bad advice, because if you just randomly restrict calories, you will run into other issues. One problem is that calorie restriction itself is modifying how your body works. So, the weight lost in diet is typically gained back super quickly. And if you repeat the cycle, your body also adjusts by spending less calories. The other problem is that it just lowering calories easily leads to nutritional deficiency of some sort. Which leads to feeling bad all the time, being tired and passive, unable to perform as previously. So the diet will eventually fail for that reason - because you will be more dysfunctional and breaking it will paradoxically make you more functional.

xvilka 5y ago
Unless you follow the diet to the maximum - eat only compatible food and skip incompatible (according to the chosen diet), calculate calories every single day. In my case keto diet worked the miracle. Maybe other people could be successful with other, different diets. But it does work if done properly. Same with exercise. Random exercise can be just as bad as restricting calories. Exercise should be systematic and balanced, as well as a diet.
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
  Keeping track of macronutrients and carb counting sounds significantly harder than “just eat less” and I think bolsters the argument that it may in fact be hard to lose weight.

loves_mangoes 5y ago

I don't like how people, still, treat lazyness as a root cause, not as an effect. Lazyness is a bug, it's a failure state, it's a medical condition. Much like depression, psychology cannot treat it in all cases, but taking the approach that people are just born lazy and iredeemable seems like the most unscientific, least promising, and most likely to annoy your devoted commenter.

NateEag 5y ago
In my experience, people who focus on laziness are NOT saying the lazy person is irredeemable - they're usually saying precisely "You're choosing to be lazy and you don't have to. Choose to be different!" Granted, they often don't think through how to do that, or why the person might be struggling to perform, but it's not usually a belief that the person is incapable of doing better.
- RobertoG 5y ago
  In my experience, people who focus on the laziness of others are trying to bring the focus at how they themselves are not lazy. There is something similar going on with overweight. What's so difficult? just eat less! look at me! It's a status game, instead of trying to help. Anyway, to say to somebody "don't procrastinate" is like given a guitar to somebody and tell them "just play!". Sure man, how?
  - loves_mangoes 5y ago
    That's hard to want to believe. The problem is if you assume they're not trying to help, then either they need help (too), or there's not much we can do about it. I feel like a whole lot of people are trying to help, they're just really bad at it and they need help themselves. . Thankfully, psychiatry! Read a book, boys & girls & enby friends.
    - NateEag 5y ago
      > I feel like a whole lot of people are trying to help, they're just really bad at it and they need help themselves. Yes. This is exactly what I was trying to get across. Thanks.

atoav 5y ago

The issue e.g. with obese people isn't that they didn't have the bright idea that they could "just" eat less or "just" move more — the issue is that there are very often underlying paychological reasons for the way people take decisions. This is not laziness, this is having a personality structure that makes it harder for you to stay healthy. We all want to be happy, if for some reason happiness for you is tied a lot more to eating than to being healthy and fit, you can try all you want it just wont make you happy if you do. That means tackling obesity means also asking yourself hard questions about what food does for you, how it got that way (e.g. having grandparents which nearly starved can have an severe effect on the food habits for a few generations down the line, sometimes parents can only express their affection through food which means now you equate food with existential parental love). Changing habits is hard, understanding your own psychological drivers and doing something about it against the resistance of your brain is way harder. Never underestimate the struggles other people have to take in order to do the thing that is easy for you.

ekster 5y ago
Some people preferring being obese because they are happy about eating lots of food isn’t really a counterargument to the fact that losing weight is as simple as eating less.
- danieldisu 5y ago
  And getting rich is as simple as earning more and spending less, why are you not rich already?
  - ekster 5y ago
    Honestly I am doing quite well by following those simple practices. But creating wealth out of nothing is surely more difficult than eating less of what you already have access to. Anyway, the point was that being ok with being obese because you are happiest eating a lot doesn’t make eating less any more complicated. It’s just choosing to do something different, which everyone is free to do.

amanaplanacanal 5y ago

Have you ever been obese and lost a lot of weight and kept it off for a long period? I'm wondering if you are speaking from personal experience, or just repeating things you have heard from other people.

elliekelly 5y ago

I would encourage you to track your steps for a week and then get two 50lb bags of sand from Home Depot and carry them around with you everywhere you go for a week. Compare the steps you took in week #1 to the steps you took in week #2 to see how “lazy” you’ve become from carrying around all the extra weight. It’s hard work being fat. Literally. “Just ride your bike” is an easy solution for someone who is already normal weight but it’s not nearly as easy for someone who’s overweight.

kamaal 5y ago
This is a very valid point. A few days back I had to rearrange my kettlebells to a different place at home. So I just carried them. Given how difficult it was walking while carrying them(Heck it was even hard getting up lifting them), I went like There is no way Im carrying this kind of weight on my body. The example of a person with a musculoskeletal system conditioned to carrying around a 60 kg body, but weighs 120 kgs is basically competing in a Olympic powerlifting competition like situation to just do basic tasks(Using toilets, walking for everyday life tasks). I can only imagine how hard and near impossible task it is for some one to be exercising everyday.