8 ms·

The problem is that calling it a "crutch" is already presupposing a negative judgment of it. Use a neutral word; e.g. it is a weight loss aid.

tomrod 2y ago
Some things simply are negative, and masking behind a neutral word makes the neutral word perceived as negative over time. Masking reality is not a good way to work within it nor modify it.
- farrarstan 2y ago
  [dead]
- cthalupa 2y ago
  What's the explanation for why GLP1 medications are negative things? There are a very minor subset of people that have some medically significant adverse reactions, but it is VERY small. We don't have any evidence to my knowledge of any long term risks with being on it.
  - Alupis 2y ago
    > We don't have any evidence to my knowledge of any long term risks with being on it. Nobody has yet been on these drugs for an entire lifetime - which is what is being advocated in this thread.
    - cthalupa 2y ago
      Sure. But what's the proposed mechanism? For many - not all, obviously - medications, we have an understanding of potential long term risks. Animal studies catch some of them, others we know are potentially risky even without animal studies, e.g. drugs that increase angiogenesis have a risk of increasing tumor growth. But no one has proposed mechanisms for GLP1 peptides. Meanwhile, we know obesity is one of the largest long term risks to health in existence, and one of the most prevalent.
      - throwup238 2y ago
        > But no one has proposed mechanisms for GLP1 peptides. I'm worried about long term malnutrition leading to significant loss of muscle mass, osteoporosis, and other deficiencies that eventually lead to infirmity and brings forward the immobility death spiral much earlier in late age through weak muscles and bones. Most of the long term studies on GLP-1 agonists that I've reviewed have been on diabetic patients who already had to carefully control their diets and we still don't know what decades of poor diet on Ozempic will do. For very obese people the tradeoff is still pretty damn good though.
        DANmode 2y ago
        As long as they don't use their brains to any high performing degree.
        cthalupa 2y ago
        Probably more or less the same as to what happens with skinny people who have a garbage diet but just eat less or have significantly higher metabolisms. It's not great. The good news is it's quite commonly reported (and I can add my anecdotal experience to the chorus) that I don't crave the food that's worst for me in any real quantity anymore. Even if I'm busy and need to scroll through uber eats, I'm not using it as an excuse to get a delicious but large, fried, high in carbs, high in fat meal. It's way easier for me to say "yeah that tastes good, but I'll grab the grilled chicken wrap and brown rice." I'm not sure on what causes this - we have some preliminary studies around GLP1 peptides, dopamine, addiction, etc., so it might be something there. But the sheer number of people you hear talking about it makes me believe we'll have some studies that do look into it in the future. It might not happen to everyone, and some people might still just choose to eat poorly even if it does, but in both situations people's longterm health depends on them listening to advice on how to eat better and exercise, and I think most people would rather be average weight and metabolically unhealthy than obese and metabolically unhealthy.
      - __blockcipher__ 2y ago
        One obvious risk would be blunting of longer term GLP-1 receptor activation. Imagine type 2 diabetes but for ghrelin. To use an analogy amphetamines have a honeymoon period, and it feels like a lot of people on these weight loss drugs haven’t been on them long enough to get past the honeymoon period and see what the effects are after 10, 20, etc years
  - blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
    GI issues are fairly common and sometimes linger after stopping too. Loss of muscle mass is also common.
    - jart 2y ago
      Is there any evidence those things aren't just side effects of eating less food?
      - oatmeal_croc 2y ago
        This. You'll need studies to prove that semaglutide causes muscle mass -so you need to have a group that loses weight using semaglutide and another group that loses weight without it and compare the muscle loss. I'm willing to bet you'll see similar numbers. If you don't exercise, you will lose muscle mass when reducing weight - which is why trainers recommend resistance training and higher than usual protein while cutting.
    - cthalupa 2y ago
      The GI issues tend to be minor. Unpleasant, but not exactly any more debilitating than a lactose intolerant person deciding that they really really wanted that extra large milkshake. Some people have it worse - but those, to my understanding, very much are in the minority. Tirzepatide also has significantly fewer GI issues. Muscle mass loss happens in any sort of weight loss where you don't eat enough protein and get enough exercise. There's no current evidence that when you control for calorie deficit, diet macros, level of exercise, bmr, etc., that people lose more muscle mass on GLP1 agonists to my knowledge.
    - phil21 2y ago
      GI issues are almost always minor. Folks are used to zero discomfort in their lives so the social media reporting of such is wildly overdone. Tirzepatide is being investigated as a therapy for IBS. Within two weeks of being on the drug I was able to start living a life not scheduled around being near a restroom. This was suggested as a potential side effect by my doctor before taking it for weight loss, due to the GIP component in the drug which slows down your digestive track. It could be I’m eating less. However I have went on crash diets before with absolutely no change to my constant lifetime GI issues, and have eaten extremely clean the past half decade due to a partner who cooks amazing healthy meals that would exceed most definitions of the term. I’ve long since reached my goal weight and target body composition- but I plan on sticking to a low dose of Tirzepatide for the rest of my life since it gave me my life back. No more popping Imodium every few hours on vacation while simultaneously fasting. Just a normal life these days. I can enjoy a breakfast if I feel like it without it ruining the rest of my morning. Heck, I can even eat shitty greasy food at the state fair with only mild discomfort most folks would have from such poor choices. Every study (still limited in number) I’ve read more or less refutes all the social media hysteria. There is a whole lot of smoke but no fires yet to be seen. They may still be coming. The things that are not wholesale misinformation seem to be the requirement to cease use many weeks before going into surgery, potentially needing to be on it for your whole life, and the side effect it currently has on your finances. Nothing else seems to hold up under scientific scrutiny yet. Perhaps I will regret this decision in 20 years, but I’m willing to take that risk to have some of the best quality of life years I’ve had yet.
- unethical_ban 2y ago
  If someone has a broken leg, the word "crutch" isn't derogatory in the first place. Cessation tools are not negative. Yes, root causes of abuse should be addressed, but aids are aids.
  - CydeWeys 2y ago
    Crutch (n) a : a support typically fitting under the armpit for use by the disabled in walking b : a source or means of support or assistance that is relied on heavily or excessively Use a is a neutral, non-judgmental, literal use of the word. Use b is clearly a pejorative, judgmental, metaphorical use of the word. The two are not the same.
    - collingreen 2y ago
      Is this an argument that you should use crutch and everyone ever will always read it as version b? It might be more good faith to just pick language that is more clear. The alternative feels a lot like pretending to be one thing while trying to make people think something else - it rings just like a bad faith "Im just asking questions"
      - seadan83 2y ago
        I'm a bit confused. Would you mind clarifying whether you think using "crutch" is the more clear vocabulary, or whether alternative vocabulary would be more clear?
      - CydeWeys 2y ago
        To be clear, version a is referring to literal (non-metaphorical) crutches, and is not the version being used here because GLP-1 agonists are not literal crutches. Version b is the only possible use of the word being used in this conversation, and is always pejorative. "Oh, you broke your foot, you're getting around on a crutch" = Always version A, literal, non-pejorative. "Oh, you're obese, you're using medicine as a crutch to cure it" = Always version B, metaphorical, pejorative. There's no confusion.
    - 2y ago
- CydeWeys 2y ago
  Some things simply are negative, sure. I think we can all agree that murder is negative on the whole, for example. But you are making a HUGE leap here in assuming that GLP1 agonists "simply are negative". You have not remotely supported this logical leap. All studies in fact have shown that GLP1 agonists are significantly positive: That they improve health, reduce obesity, reduce all-cause mortality, etc. You are denying observed reality across a large number of double blinded, objective clinical trials.
  - jajko 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - borski 2y ago
      It is easy to call taking the medication easy, but nothing about it actually is. Eating right, lifting, trying to be active… all of that on top of the nausea created by the medication itself. Obesity is such a massive epidemic, and shaming people into feeling bad about it has clearly not worked. And that’s before you consider the genetic factors, environmental factors, food deserts, and the other dozen reasons it’s so hard to stay fit for some people. I am genetically gifted in some ways; an athlete’s metabolism was not one of them. I can be extremely disciplined, but the constant vigilance creates this “food noise” in your head that’s hard to explain, but extremely stressful, and causes you to constantly be seeking the next meal. It used to be that every single food I put in my mouth tasted amazing (within reason). Apparently this is not true for everyone, and they have a greater and sharper distinction between “foods that are amazing” and “foods that are just fine”. That distinction exists for me now, and never really did before this medication. There are so many ways it has helped me. My blood labs are perfect, and my liver was definitely not perfect before. My A1C was just on the cusp of prediabetic, at 5.7%. My triglycerides, ALT, AST… all were wayyyyy higher than they should have been. A1C at last test a few months ago was 5.0%, and all the other numbers are well within low-mid range of where they should be. Anyone that looks at someone using GLP-1 medications and thinks they’re “cheating” is a child. You still have to put in the work; you still have to eat right and work out and lift. It just makes it actually possible to do that for the first time in many people’s lives. I don’t know if you’ve ever put on a realistic “fat suit,” but trust me when I say that everything is harder when you’re heavier. A walk around the block is an insane workout if you are 450lbs and haven’t walked in years. It’s not where you should end, but it is a start, and if there is a medication that helps someone start… everyone else can fuck right off. You will never find me shaming someone else or judging them for getting healthy, which is the actual point more than just losing weight. There is one way to get off the medication in the future (or get on the lowest dose, etc): build significant muscle mass. That’s why it’s so important to lift. One common argument I’ve heard against GLP-1 meds is the idea that you’ll have to be on the meds forever. And for some people, maybe even most, that may be true. We don’t know yet. But you know what’s worse than being on a GLP-1 med forever? Being obese forever. We know precisely just how that kills so many of us. But you’re right, we should just go back to the way it was. That seemed to work just fine. :/
- nswest23 2y ago
  All these people are calling it a crutch are moralizing tongue clicking, holier than thou Calvinists who think you shouldn’t be able to be thin unless you bootstrapped yourself to thinness with your own blood sweat and tears, as though this viewpoint represents some abstract understanding of the world instead of merely a smug sense of self righteousness.
  - seadan83 2y ago
    Crutches allow broken legs to heal properly. It could be that some simply don't have that same strong negative connotation. What is more, getting hung up on the wording is missing the larger point.
- ab5tract 2y ago
  Is using glasses to see a crutch? Asking as someone who needs them as much as I need the prescribed-for-life medications I’ve been prescribed.
  - seadan83 2y ago
    Reflecting on this, I think that 'for-life' aspect is very key. A 'seeing aid' vs 'seeing crutch'. Crutches are usually meant to be temporary. A walking stick is the walking aid equivalent. Hence, for weight loss, is medication meant to be the life long solution? As a facilitator to move the needle for people - very helpful. The underlying question about lifestyle and habits never changing is where the life long crutch concern comes in.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
buzzerbetrayed 2y ago
Crutch and “weight loss aid” aren’t synonymous at all. You can’t ask someone to use a word that has a less negative connotation if they mean completely different things. They intentionally said crutch because they’re specifically talking about people who use it as a crutch. Not people who just use it as a weight loss aid.

tomrod 2y ago

Some things simply are negative, and masking behind a neutral word makes the neutral word perceived as negative over time. Masking reality is not a good way to work within it nor modify it.

farrarstan 2y ago
[dead]
cthalupa 2y ago
What's the explanation for why GLP1 medications are negative things? There are a very minor subset of people that have some medically significant adverse reactions, but it is VERY small. We don't have any evidence to my knowledge of any long term risks with being on it.
- Alupis 2y ago
  > We don't have any evidence to my knowledge of any long term risks with being on it. Nobody has yet been on these drugs for an entire lifetime - which is what is being advocated in this thread.
  - cthalupa 2y ago
    Sure. But what's the proposed mechanism? For many - not all, obviously - medications, we have an understanding of potential long term risks. Animal studies catch some of them, others we know are potentially risky even without animal studies, e.g. drugs that increase angiogenesis have a risk of increasing tumor growth. But no one has proposed mechanisms for GLP1 peptides. Meanwhile, we know obesity is one of the largest long term risks to health in existence, and one of the most prevalent.
    - throwup238 2y ago
      > But no one has proposed mechanisms for GLP1 peptides. I'm worried about long term malnutrition leading to significant loss of muscle mass, osteoporosis, and other deficiencies that eventually lead to infirmity and brings forward the immobility death spiral much earlier in late age through weak muscles and bones. Most of the long term studies on GLP-1 agonists that I've reviewed have been on diabetic patients who already had to carefully control their diets and we still don't know what decades of poor diet on Ozempic will do. For very obese people the tradeoff is still pretty damn good though.
      - DANmode 2y ago
        As long as they don't use their brains to any high performing degree.
      - cthalupa 2y ago
        Probably more or less the same as to what happens with skinny people who have a garbage diet but just eat less or have significantly higher metabolisms. It's not great. The good news is it's quite commonly reported (and I can add my anecdotal experience to the chorus) that I don't crave the food that's worst for me in any real quantity anymore. Even if I'm busy and need to scroll through uber eats, I'm not using it as an excuse to get a delicious but large, fried, high in carbs, high in fat meal. It's way easier for me to say "yeah that tastes good, but I'll grab the grilled chicken wrap and brown rice." I'm not sure on what causes this - we have some preliminary studies around GLP1 peptides, dopamine, addiction, etc., so it might be something there. But the sheer number of people you hear talking about it makes me believe we'll have some studies that do look into it in the future. It might not happen to everyone, and some people might still just choose to eat poorly even if it does, but in both situations people's longterm health depends on them listening to advice on how to eat better and exercise, and I think most people would rather be average weight and metabolically unhealthy than obese and metabolically unhealthy.
    - __blockcipher__ 2y ago
      One obvious risk would be blunting of longer term GLP-1 receptor activation. Imagine type 2 diabetes but for ghrelin. To use an analogy amphetamines have a honeymoon period, and it feels like a lot of people on these weight loss drugs haven’t been on them long enough to get past the honeymoon period and see what the effects are after 10, 20, etc years
- blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
  GI issues are fairly common and sometimes linger after stopping too. Loss of muscle mass is also common.
  - jart 2y ago
    Is there any evidence those things aren't just side effects of eating less food?
    - oatmeal_croc 2y ago
      This. You'll need studies to prove that semaglutide causes muscle mass -so you need to have a group that loses weight using semaglutide and another group that loses weight without it and compare the muscle loss. I'm willing to bet you'll see similar numbers. If you don't exercise, you will lose muscle mass when reducing weight - which is why trainers recommend resistance training and higher than usual protein while cutting.
  - cthalupa 2y ago
    The GI issues tend to be minor. Unpleasant, but not exactly any more debilitating than a lactose intolerant person deciding that they really really wanted that extra large milkshake. Some people have it worse - but those, to my understanding, very much are in the minority. Tirzepatide also has significantly fewer GI issues. Muscle mass loss happens in any sort of weight loss where you don't eat enough protein and get enough exercise. There's no current evidence that when you control for calorie deficit, diet macros, level of exercise, bmr, etc., that people lose more muscle mass on GLP1 agonists to my knowledge.
  - phil21 2y ago
    GI issues are almost always minor. Folks are used to zero discomfort in their lives so the social media reporting of such is wildly overdone. Tirzepatide is being investigated as a therapy for IBS. Within two weeks of being on the drug I was able to start living a life not scheduled around being near a restroom. This was suggested as a potential side effect by my doctor before taking it for weight loss, due to the GIP component in the drug which slows down your digestive track. It could be I’m eating less. However I have went on crash diets before with absolutely no change to my constant lifetime GI issues, and have eaten extremely clean the past half decade due to a partner who cooks amazing healthy meals that would exceed most definitions of the term. I’ve long since reached my goal weight and target body composition- but I plan on sticking to a low dose of Tirzepatide for the rest of my life since it gave me my life back. No more popping Imodium every few hours on vacation while simultaneously fasting. Just a normal life these days. I can enjoy a breakfast if I feel like it without it ruining the rest of my morning. Heck, I can even eat shitty greasy food at the state fair with only mild discomfort most folks would have from such poor choices. Every study (still limited in number) I’ve read more or less refutes all the social media hysteria. There is a whole lot of smoke but no fires yet to be seen. They may still be coming. The things that are not wholesale misinformation seem to be the requirement to cease use many weeks before going into surgery, potentially needing to be on it for your whole life, and the side effect it currently has on your finances. Nothing else seems to hold up under scientific scrutiny yet. Perhaps I will regret this decision in 20 years, but I’m willing to take that risk to have some of the best quality of life years I’ve had yet.
unethical_ban 2y ago
If someone has a broken leg, the word "crutch" isn't derogatory in the first place. Cessation tools are not negative. Yes, root causes of abuse should be addressed, but aids are aids.
- CydeWeys 2y ago
  Crutch (n) a : a support typically fitting under the armpit for use by the disabled in walking b : a source or means of support or assistance that is relied on heavily or excessively Use a is a neutral, non-judgmental, literal use of the word. Use b is clearly a pejorative, judgmental, metaphorical use of the word. The two are not the same.
  - collingreen 2y ago
    Is this an argument that you should use crutch and everyone ever will always read it as version b? It might be more good faith to just pick language that is more clear. The alternative feels a lot like pretending to be one thing while trying to make people think something else - it rings just like a bad faith "Im just asking questions"
    - seadan83 2y ago
      I'm a bit confused. Would you mind clarifying whether you think using "crutch" is the more clear vocabulary, or whether alternative vocabulary would be more clear?
    - CydeWeys 2y ago
      To be clear, version a is referring to literal (non-metaphorical) crutches, and is not the version being used here because GLP-1 agonists are not literal crutches. Version b is the only possible use of the word being used in this conversation, and is always pejorative. "Oh, you broke your foot, you're getting around on a crutch" = Always version A, literal, non-pejorative. "Oh, you're obese, you're using medicine as a crutch to cure it" = Always version B, metaphorical, pejorative. There's no confusion.
  - 2y ago
CydeWeys 2y ago
Some things simply are negative, sure. I think we can all agree that murder is negative on the whole, for example. But you are making a HUGE leap here in assuming that GLP1 agonists "simply are negative". You have not remotely supported this logical leap. All studies in fact have shown that GLP1 agonists are significantly positive: That they improve health, reduce obesity, reduce all-cause mortality, etc. You are denying observed reality across a large number of double blinded, objective clinical trials.
- jajko 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - borski 2y ago
    It is easy to call taking the medication easy, but nothing about it actually is. Eating right, lifting, trying to be active… all of that on top of the nausea created by the medication itself. Obesity is such a massive epidemic, and shaming people into feeling bad about it has clearly not worked. And that’s before you consider the genetic factors, environmental factors, food deserts, and the other dozen reasons it’s so hard to stay fit for some people. I am genetically gifted in some ways; an athlete’s metabolism was not one of them. I can be extremely disciplined, but the constant vigilance creates this “food noise” in your head that’s hard to explain, but extremely stressful, and causes you to constantly be seeking the next meal. It used to be that every single food I put in my mouth tasted amazing (within reason). Apparently this is not true for everyone, and they have a greater and sharper distinction between “foods that are amazing” and “foods that are just fine”. That distinction exists for me now, and never really did before this medication. There are so many ways it has helped me. My blood labs are perfect, and my liver was definitely not perfect before. My A1C was just on the cusp of prediabetic, at 5.7%. My triglycerides, ALT, AST… all were wayyyyy higher than they should have been. A1C at last test a few months ago was 5.0%, and all the other numbers are well within low-mid range of where they should be. Anyone that looks at someone using GLP-1 medications and thinks they’re “cheating” is a child. You still have to put in the work; you still have to eat right and work out and lift. It just makes it actually possible to do that for the first time in many people’s lives. I don’t know if you’ve ever put on a realistic “fat suit,” but trust me when I say that everything is harder when you’re heavier. A walk around the block is an insane workout if you are 450lbs and haven’t walked in years. It’s not where you should end, but it is a start, and if there is a medication that helps someone start… everyone else can fuck right off. You will never find me shaming someone else or judging them for getting healthy, which is the actual point more than just losing weight. There is one way to get off the medication in the future (or get on the lowest dose, etc): build significant muscle mass. That’s why it’s so important to lift. One common argument I’ve heard against GLP-1 meds is the idea that you’ll have to be on the meds forever. And for some people, maybe even most, that may be true. We don’t know yet. But you know what’s worse than being on a GLP-1 med forever? Being obese forever. We know precisely just how that kills so many of us. But you’re right, we should just go back to the way it was. That seemed to work just fine. :/
nswest23 2y ago
All these people are calling it a crutch are moralizing tongue clicking, holier than thou Calvinists who think you shouldn’t be able to be thin unless you bootstrapped yourself to thinness with your own blood sweat and tears, as though this viewpoint represents some abstract understanding of the world instead of merely a smug sense of self righteousness.
- seadan83 2y ago
  Crutches allow broken legs to heal properly. It could be that some simply don't have that same strong negative connotation. What is more, getting hung up on the wording is missing the larger point.
ab5tract 2y ago
Is using glasses to see a crutch? Asking as someone who needs them as much as I need the prescribed-for-life medications I’ve been prescribed.
- seadan83 2y ago
  Reflecting on this, I think that 'for-life' aspect is very key. A 'seeing aid' vs 'seeing crutch'. Crutches are usually meant to be temporary. A walking stick is the walking aid equivalent. Hence, for weight loss, is medication meant to be the life long solution? As a facilitator to move the needle for people - very helpful. The underlying question about lifestyle and habits never changing is where the life long crutch concern comes in.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

buzzerbetrayed 2y ago

Crutch and “weight loss aid” aren’t synonymous at all. You can’t ask someone to use a word that has a less negative connotation if they mean completely different things. They intentionally said crutch because they’re specifically talking about people who use it as a crutch. Not people who just use it as a weight loss aid.