There has been yet another study showing that what the popular media and diet industry tells us about weight loss is just so much bullshit. You know all those infomercials insisting that if you get a shake weight or whatnot you will quickly develop toned arms, or rock hard abs, or buns of steel, or whatever they are promising because fat people only need to eat less/better and exercise to become thin?
Yeah, not so much.
Researchers recently studied a small population of hunter-gatherers living in the East African country of Tanzania, called the Hadza, and found out that their active, non-processed-food-eating lifestyle meant that “their total energy output is almost identical to that of today’s pudgy Westerners. This counterintuitive finding is explained by the foragers’ lower basal metabolic rate: they expend less energy while at rest, even when we compare people of the same size and age.”
The article went on to marvel that the “new findings seem to contradict popular beliefs that weight management is simply a matter of balancing what we eat with enough purposeful physical activity.” Obviously the author of the article is unfamiliar with the shitload of other studies saying the same thing.
London Mable, one of my awesome readers, recently sent me a link to a blog called Junkfood Science, which quoted:
“one of the country’s foremost obesity researchers, Jeffrey M. Friedman, M.D., Ph.D., head of the Laboratory of Molecular Genetics at Rockefeller University, New York, the “simplistic notion” that obese individuals can ameliorate their condition by simply deciding to eat less and exercise more is “at odds with substantial scientific evidence illuminating a precise and powerful biological system that maintains body weight within a relatively narrow range.” Our body shapes and sizes are, to a most significant extent, genetically determined. “The heritability of obesity is equivalent to that of height and greater than that of almost every other condition that has been studied,” according to Dr. Friedman. Someone genetically predisposed to obesity will become obese independent of their caloric intake even when it’s restricted to that of thin counterparts, he’s said.”
The knowledge that for most people fat is not voluntary, nor a simple matter of calories v/s exercise, has been out there for a long time. Wonder when it will seep into the public mind? Maybe when the diet industry don’t have a more than $60 BILLION profit riding on keeping the myths going, is my guess.
Not holding my breath on this one.
I can’t help but wonder, then: why am I so heavy, but my mom is only moderately overweight, my dad is probably the larger side of “healthy,” an my grandparents were all fit as fiddles…it can’t be all genetics. There is some environmental factor that determined that my set body size should be really large. I don’t want to sound like I’m on the side of the vulture diet industry, but, as a scientist, I also find it unlikely that my genes alone determined I should be over 100 lbs beyond modern society’s understanding of healthy. The biological answer seems to me to rest not in one’s DNA, but in the switches that turn sections on and off, which appear to be quite susceptible to environmental factors. I’m not saying that I think I should just get off my ass and eat better and work out a bit, and then everything will be fine (although I should, if only because I feel better when I do). I’m just saying, it is far from being understood. I think environment plays a huge (dominant?) role in the whole shebang, and I wish they’d figure out what factors are having these influences.
I think there is clearly something activating a gene … or it may be a recessive. I look like my grandfather’s grandmother, only two of my great-grandparents were fat but all four of my grandparents were thin.
I will bet the farm that the crap they spray on our food and feed to our food animals is poisoning us.
don’t bet the farm – we’re gonna need it! (although it’s probably a safe bet…)
Some years ago a report came about the millions WW paid Jennifer Hudson to lose 80 lbs. Now they are reportedly paying Jessica Simpson millions to lose the lbs she gained while pregnant.
For me, I don’t even need to know anything else. Realize how much money they must be making to afford to pay these women this much money to lose lbs. And know that if WW is making it, so are they all.
I refuse to give any of them my money ever again.
Oh! I came looking for this post before and didn’t find it til now! lol Anyway–there are definitely a lot of misconceptions and myths out there that will take awhile to beat down.
Oh, and the other thing that could be affecting us in re obesity is bacteria. There seem to be more and more studies coming out about how bacteria change our bodies (my dad always sends them to me.)