Topic split from another one. Merri wrote in this topic (we need post numbering..) :

Ah, I have to halt you there for a second IN my eyes you are sideways concluding that the fat Americans are being caused by fattened up cows. Now this fattening up is commonplace these days, all around the world, yet I have just watched a documentary/movie (Supersize me, go see it) and Americans on average are the biggest people in the world if I remember correctly, and that the preparation of the food is a very big cause of the problems. THAT aside...

In my eyes the supersize problem boils down to this simple matter: should we blame the industry (the fattened up cows one), or should we blame ourselves for letting ourselves go so much?

Hmm.. a whole new topic arises at the blink of an eye

Topic continued from here


It isn’t the US’s problem alone:

That comes, in my honest opinion, not from GM food sources. The trend has its roots far before the GM debate even came around. It stems more from the replacement of proper foods with ‘fast’ foods. The death of the ‘family meals’ which would be prepared from scratch with grown produce in favour of foods mass produced in factory like conditions.

These foods tend to be filled with chemicals that are not natural to the human diet, complex sugars that break down into larger quantities of simple sugars and are stored for later use as well as a whole range of chemicals that don’t naturally occur in the quantities we see in food produced in factory conditions.

The sad part is this includes factory farming, which even plant based farms are going through. Plants are grown in the same way battery hens produce eggs, and it isn’t healthy at all for the crop and yet the only way to produce enough food to feed us all! So even people who eat ‘wholesome home cooked meals’ are being affected by massive amounts of unnatural chemicals. It might not be to the same degree as scoffing down food laced with chemicals directly but it isn’t as healthy as our grandparent’s times…

Yes, you are correct there. In the documentary Supersize Me you can see that at McDonalds, when you say I'll just order a salad and think you are being healthy?... there is SUGAR in the salad! No kidding.

So.. yes you are correct that it isn't solely the fact that we are overeating. The food itself is also not the same as it used to be. However, it is not the WHOLE cause, there is still the personal responsibility. I mean.. otherwise everyone would turn out big, if you catch my drift.

Oh no no no! I didn't mean to say that fat Americans are the result solely of food manipulation! My point for that post was that due to food altering, there is a cause and effect result. Little Dragon pointed this out very well.

Of course there is personal responsibility involved. Fat Americans are the result of fast food (which is misrepresented food as you saw in Supersize Me), stressful lifestyle, inactive lifestyle, increased technology (riding lawnmowers instead of the old manual push mowers, for example), lack of nutritional savvy, processed instant foods, and a host of advertising that says "buy me!". Even the grocery stores are set up for you to buy the processed foods over the natural foods because advertising. High calorie items are placed in the front and center of the store. You have to travel through those foods to get to the vegetables, fresh meat, and dairy, etc. (I noticed at Deen in Holland it is like that too). Going through the drive through at McDonalds (easy, you don't even have to get out of your car to get your food) you will be asked "Do you want to supersize this?" Always I tell them no, only to find that when I drive away, many times it has been supersized anyway!

But in all of these situations, there is the matter of personal responsibility. I can choose not to eat ALL the fries (which are also dipped in sugar...you don't taste it, but it makes a crisper fry and you get the calories from the sugar), I can choose not to go to Micky D's to begin with. I can choose to get off the couch and be active. (When I was in Holland I could eat anything I wanted and was losing weight. Why? I didn't have a car and I either rode my bike or walked to get to where I wanted)
Fat Americans are the result of so many things. Some can be controlled, others cannot.

Hear hear! Exactly the way I feel things are. Many causes alright! Thanks for clarifying

There is a matter of personal responsibility, I would never sympathize with people that sue McDonald's for getting them fat.

HOWEVER: as Eadwine already said the environment makes it very hard to eat (or drink) healthy, let me give you an example about drinks, if you look at any normal vending machine in US and a normal vending machine in Japan you'll notice that in US you find drinks with corn syrup (which from what I heard is even worse that sugar) and every drink is huge and it contains about 50g of sugars inside. In Japan drinks are a little bit smaller and there are many teas most of then unsweetened. Now, if I get thirsty and I want a drink from the vending machine in US I will most likely end up drinking something hyper-sweet (I hate the taste of sugar replacements) while in Japan I would most likely get an unsweetened tea. Same for food, if I get hungry and I don't have anything prepared from home I need to get something from the first place I see... in US that might be very well a McDonald's in Japan it might be a sushi place.

So the point is about availability, which is unfortunately coupled with people unawareness, many don't know how bad is to drink a Coke everyday day. (By the way, a Coke a day = you'll end up 10 Kg fatter at the end of the year). This is a bad combination, people will eat and drink what they see it's available, if 99% of the food is unhealthy they will end up eating that.

Gotta correct you on that one hon, it is NOT true.

Eadwine - avid coke drinker

It's true, there have been medical studies, besides, how do you know you'd not be 10 kg (I think it was Kg not pounds) lighter if you didn't drink Coke? Of course that doesn't mean that you'd lose 10 Kg every year, the body compensates and you'll most likely eat more, the study in case showed that people who started to drink Coke everyday gained 10Kg in a year, that's pretty much scientific fact... sorry I can't find the link and don't remember the exact weight.

I really like Coke, but it's very unhealthy, I gave it up and it was much easier to lose the weight I wanted to lose.

Well.. when I was not drinking it I weighed the same.

Maybe I am the proverbial exception to the rule

Who knows, your experience was not a controled experiment and it might not have much relevance. Nobody does scientifical experiments on one person and draws conclusion out of it, that's why they usually -*test*-('") on hundreds or thousands of subjects... I mean, I think it's pretty relevant if Coke makes fat 90% of the people who drink it. (that 90% is invented by me for the sake of example).

(not related but this is about "exception proves the rule": http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_201.html )

*laughs* I really said it for fun sake I have been thinking about this and cannot find an explanation. I used to be heavier in fact in the past (now around 70kg, was 83 at the heaviest) and I barely drank coke at all then.

It COULD be that my body handles sugars better, if so, then I am lucky. Everyone's internals are different, I want to bet there were people in that study there who didn't gain weight either.

I guess one can say on that Coke thing: IN GENERAL etcetc. However, one cannot state it is a matter of fact though, since there are the exceptions around, like me. I find myself a valid enough person to -*test*-('"), since when I was living at my dad I was having a very stable diet.


However.. we are straying from the topic a bit here. The bad thing really is the KIND of sugars used in foods, as Draggy already pointed out as well.

This is with special dedication for Eadwine
http://axiomsun.com/home/video/how_much_su...an_of_soda.html

Kind of a moot point since I actually watched Supersize Me I know how much sugar is in it.

And with that, let's get back to the topic instead of the personal spygame

Far reaching implications of the American diet, from today press: "bad diet spurs Gitmo detainee weight gain" -- "human rights groups say high-calorie meals, little exercise to blame".

So... it looks like they try to Americanize the poor guys.

I let my dad read the article and his reply was: "het lijkt Hans en Grietje wel"

or, in English "it is like Hansel and Gretel"