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Most people don't announce to scientists that they've lost weight. Lot's of people do lose weight and stay that way, it's just that there are even more who don'

Most people don't announce to scientists that they've lost weight. Lot's of people do lose weight and stay that way, it's just that there are even more who don't. Consider that the rate of obesity continues to increase in the US. This shows that people are simply eating more and doing less exercise. And of course those that are already obese are the least likley to consume healthy ammounts of food and exercise as needed. In other words, yes, the issue with overeating is in fact overeating. The only way to solve this problem for the whole population (as in, not for a single individual) is to change society and how it views unhealthy food. Off the top of my head, fast food advertisments should be made illegal. The entire point of those ads to get people to eat fast food. This single step could reduce obesity in the US by a noticable amount and requires no loss of freedom to any individual. A sugar tax or the like is a more extreme solution. But this idea is not unfounded: >Sugar, rum, and tobacco are commodities which are nowhere necessaries of life, which are become objects of almost universal consumption, and which are therefore extremely proper subjects of taxation. -Adam Smith Book V: On the Revenue of the Sovereign or Commonwealth Chapter III: On Public Debts https://www.adamsmithworks.org/documents/chapter-iii-of-public-debts https://www.adamsmithworks.org/documents/chapter-iii-of-publ...

kortilla 4y ago
> Off the top of my head, fast food advertisments should be made illegal This is ridiculous. Nearly everyone I know who is overweight eats hardly any fast food. What I do see is lots of snacking throughout the day on high carb things (chips, breads, etc) and just way too many calories due to large serving sizes in both regular “slow food” restaurants and meals made at home. Fast food meals if you skip the sugared soda tend to be closer to proper per meal calorie targets than sit down restaurants because of how cheap they are. At sit down restaurants the price is higher to support a wait staff and lower throughput so they compensate with ridiculously huge portions.
- hombre_fatal 4y ago
  Apparently one major issue with fast food is the hyperpalatability. For example, when I visited my family in the states, I ate two double cheeseburgers at a fast food joint at 1000+ calories per burger, and I figured I could probably eat two more in that sitting without issue. In other words I ate 2000+ calories in a few minutes and could have kept going. Even one burger has more calories than I eat in a single meal. Meanwhile, I couldn’t eat 15 medium sweet potatoes (1000 calories) in one sitting.
  - JamesianP 4y ago
    But why would you do that? I think it's just calorie density and behavior. You might just as well have eaten a bucket of ice cream as fast as you could. I.e. before your rising blood sugar has a chance to stop you. Though I do think the public would be better off if they replaced the bread with lettuce or something. It seems like they're willing to do that anywhere I've gone.
  - syliconadder 4y ago
    It doesn't help that these calorie dense food are hyperengineered to trigger our hunger more. A personal prohibition seems to be the only way to tackle this.
  - Scoundreller 4y ago
    > I ate two double cheeseburgers at a fast food joint at 1000+ calories per burger Where was this? A double quarter pounder BLT at McD with standard toppings is 830 calories. A McDouble is half that.
    - Auracle 4y ago
      I know there are people out there that could eat 2 double quarter pounders, but I doubt any of them are at a healthy weight - except for professional eaters and possibly teenage boys. One, along with fries, is enough to fill me up for practically the whole day. I think fast food gets a bad rap. It’s calorie dense but with all of the fat it keeps you pretty darn full. Compare that burger with a few candy bars or not all that much soda…
    - kortilla 4y ago
      Yeah, this doesn’t pass the smell test. I love cheeseburgers and would be borderline sick after two double quarter pounders.
- Vt71fcAqt7 4y ago
  You are right that I should not have singled out fast food. Included would be grain based desserts, soda, alcohol and maybe others. Grain based desserts and soda together make up 12% of caloric intake alone[0] and serve almost no nutritional value while providing little satiety. Another point, while I did say that "The entire point of those ads to get people to eat fast food" what I really meant is that they make people want to eat in general[note 1]. What this means is that fast food ads can be harmful even if they do not cause the viewer to buy fast food. What this does is contribute to a culture of consumption which is part of what I meant when I said "The only way to solve this problem for the whole population [...] is to change society and how it views unhealthy food." I did not mention sit down restaurants because they generaly do not advertise. My suggestion was "off the top of my head" and not fully thought out. I'm glad you made your comment because I did not express my reasoning clearly. [0]https://epi.grants.cancer.gov/diet/foodsources/top-food-sources-report-02212020.pdf https://epi.grants.cancer.gov/diet/foodsources/top-food-sour... page 77 [note 1] That is, the "point" of the fast food ads collectivly are to generate a demand for fast food from the point of view of the advertisers, but the effect, while more pronounced for fast food, generates a general demand for caloric intake.
  - kortilla 4y ago
    > I did not mention sit down restaurants because they generaly do not advertise. They do in the US. TV adverts are littered with ads for national chains (Olive Garden, Buffalo Wild Wings, Red Robin, etc). Media that allows more targeted local stuff (Facebook, billboards, newspaper, Google maps, etc) is plastered with ads for local sit down restaurants. If anything these ones advertise even more because they don’t have an established mindshare.

kortilla 4y ago

> Off the top of my head, fast food advertisments should be made illegal This is ridiculous. Nearly everyone I know who is overweight eats hardly any fast food. What I do see is lots of snacking throughout the day on high carb things (chips, breads, etc) and just way too many calories due to large serving sizes in both regular “slow food” restaurants and meals made at home. Fast food meals if you skip the sugared soda tend to be closer to proper per meal calorie targets than sit down restaurants because of how cheap they are. At sit down restaurants the price is higher to support a wait staff and lower throughput so they compensate with ridiculously huge portions.

hombre_fatal 4y ago
Apparently one major issue with fast food is the hyperpalatability. For example, when I visited my family in the states, I ate two double cheeseburgers at a fast food joint at 1000+ calories per burger, and I figured I could probably eat two more in that sitting without issue. In other words I ate 2000+ calories in a few minutes and could have kept going. Even one burger has more calories than I eat in a single meal. Meanwhile, I couldn’t eat 15 medium sweet potatoes (1000 calories) in one sitting.
- JamesianP 4y ago
  But why would you do that? I think it's just calorie density and behavior. You might just as well have eaten a bucket of ice cream as fast as you could. I.e. before your rising blood sugar has a chance to stop you. Though I do think the public would be better off if they replaced the bread with lettuce or something. It seems like they're willing to do that anywhere I've gone.
- syliconadder 4y ago
  It doesn't help that these calorie dense food are hyperengineered to trigger our hunger more. A personal prohibition seems to be the only way to tackle this.
- Scoundreller 4y ago
  > I ate two double cheeseburgers at a fast food joint at 1000+ calories per burger Where was this? A double quarter pounder BLT at McD with standard toppings is 830 calories. A McDouble is half that.
  - Auracle 4y ago
    I know there are people out there that could eat 2 double quarter pounders, but I doubt any of them are at a healthy weight - except for professional eaters and possibly teenage boys. One, along with fries, is enough to fill me up for practically the whole day. I think fast food gets a bad rap. It’s calorie dense but with all of the fat it keeps you pretty darn full. Compare that burger with a few candy bars or not all that much soda…
  - kortilla 4y ago
    Yeah, this doesn’t pass the smell test. I love cheeseburgers and would be borderline sick after two double quarter pounders.
Vt71fcAqt7 4y ago
You are right that I should not have singled out fast food. Included would be grain based desserts, soda, alcohol and maybe others. Grain based desserts and soda together make up 12% of caloric intake alone[0] and serve almost no nutritional value while providing little satiety. Another point, while I did say that "The entire point of those ads to get people to eat fast food" what I really meant is that they make people want to eat in general[note 1]. What this means is that fast food ads can be harmful even if they do not cause the viewer to buy fast food. What this does is contribute to a culture of consumption which is part of what I meant when I said "The only way to solve this problem for the whole population [...] is to change society and how it views unhealthy food." I did not mention sit down restaurants because they generaly do not advertise. My suggestion was "off the top of my head" and not fully thought out. I'm glad you made your comment because I did not express my reasoning clearly. [0]https://epi.grants.cancer.gov/diet/foodsources/top-food-sources-report-02212020.pdf https://epi.grants.cancer.gov/diet/foodsources/top-food-sour... page 77 [note 1] That is, the "point" of the fast food ads collectivly are to generate a demand for fast food from the point of view of the advertisers, but the effect, while more pronounced for fast food, generates a general demand for caloric intake.
- kortilla 4y ago
  > I did not mention sit down restaurants because they generaly do not advertise. They do in the US. TV adverts are littered with ads for national chains (Olive Garden, Buffalo Wild Wings, Red Robin, etc). Media that allows more targeted local stuff (Facebook, billboards, newspaper, Google maps, etc) is plastered with ads for local sit down restaurants. If anything these ones advertise even more because they don’t have an established mindshare.