Our culture is set up for obesity.

wisdomfromyou

Just so this dosen't get lost in a quote...if this is a cultural issue in the US and Canada explain how it is?????

There are so many cultures in Canada alone which culture do we blame????

The East Indians? the Philipinoes? The Germans? The Irish? The Native americans? The Chinese? Pakistani? Iranian? Egyptian? Cuban? (trust me this is just those that work in the company I do that have immigrated in the last 10 years) Caucasions born here with god knows how many cultures in their blood????

Which culture influence is to blame?

Did this sound like a good argument in your head before you wrote it out?

You gotta wonder....
:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

I think you all might have missed the point of this post...

S/he was making a point of asking "What is North American culture?" - Everyone here (myself included) are greatly generalizing what type of culture those of us living in the US and Canada. Just because North America was colonized and "founded" by whitey doesn't mean that its entire culture is "white." The "dominant" culture may be "white", but immigration has GREATLY increased the number of "minorities" in these countries, thus the culture of Canada and the US is much more complex than we are all making it out to be. And the poster was asking WHICH of these sub-cultures/ethnicities is really the one to blame if we are to blame culture on obesity.

And would all these hyphenated sub-cultures (ie. Somalian-American, Native-American, Irish-Canadian, Japanese-Canadian, etc.) fit into the category of overweight/obese individuals of which we are speaking? It all depends - but it is an important point to take into consideration.

This topic has nothing to do with who America was colonized by or how many people of what kind of specific origins live here. The bottom line is that there is an overall CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN WAY OF LIFE that is specific to people in the US (or people who come to live in the US!), and that affects most Americans, regardless of whether their ancestors came from England, Bangladesh or the North Pole.

This is the only thing that's relevant here.
This "way of life" includes having to drive everywhere, endless suburban land without sidewalks and public spaces, fast-foods every 3 yards, generally poor quality foods available at an affordable price, extremely fast pace of life which compels most people to be either at a desk or in the car for most of the day, etc.

If anyone thinks people can afford to preserve the lifestyles of the families they left in their home-country when they live here - just because they have said "ethnic origin" that makes America "oh, so diverse", then this is ignorance, confusion and brainwashing at dangerous levels.

The original ethnic diversity of Americans has squat to do with why US citizens get fat.

jcroszel

It would be nice if more restaurants provided a "half-portion" option. Some entrees are just not good for leftovers so its a big waste of money. And our culture isn't just set up for obesity, it's setup for waste all around. I looked back at all of the "unhealthy" changes in life from 20-30years ago and decided I was going to go back in time. We moved to a new state, got new jobs, changed our entire lifestyle. What a huge difference it has made: more walking, less gasoline, less eating out, more homecooked food, smaller grocery bills, more exercise, less stressful environment, more time with family. It's not for everyone, but it's been the best change we could have ever made.

bcattoes

Given how many people here argue that American culture has nothing to do with obesity (only poor individual choices do), then how in the world do they explain Americans on average being so fat compared to other parts of the world?

With this logic, we infer that Americans are much more likely to make poor choices (that is they are non-virtuous) compared to people in other parts of the world who must be so much more virtuous.

And if that is so, isn't this self-whipping and self-blame?

So you do believe that many Americans are inherently worse than other people elsewhere?

Um ... no.

Making poor food choices does not make one less virtuous or 'worse' than anyone else. Food aside, there are many other cultural aspects in America that set one up for obesity. Countries that are adopting our lifestyle are quickly following our footsteps to obesity.

Um...yes.
So it's culture. Other parts of the world adopt American culture - they get fat.

They start living in cars? Get fat.
They start eating more convenience foods due to lack of time? Get fat.
They allow the food industry giants to pollute their food with unorthodox chemicals and methods of growing? Get fat.
They get Coke and McDonalds in? Get fat.

Did they just suddenly start making "bad" choices? How come they were not making those choices before?

Because they were not there in the first place and they didn't have to depend on their "strong personal will" to NOT make them!!

Most people's "personal will" is neither strong nor personal. It usually doesn't work!!!! This is why so many Americans are fat and this is why everyone who starts adopting American-like lifestyle will eventually get fat.

Geez. You can twist it all you want but you will still get to the same p[lace.
IT IS CULTURE - and now we have to fight it to NOT get fat.

Good luck to all of us!
We will need lots of it because most will fail.

Yes, I agree it's culture. But it's not fate. We make our own choices. Obesity is NOT the American norm, you know. Less than 1/2 of all Americans are obese. The majority are not.

Everyone chooses what to do with that cultural influence. The only thing we have to fight in order to not get fat is ourselves. Our own desire to eat too much and move too little. It's quite simple to not be fat once you take psychology out of the picture.

Culture isn't destiny. Saying it's cultural is true. Saying you got fat because of culture is false. It just means you had an easier choice to get fat than people from other cultures. Easy or hard, it's still your choice.

wisdomfromyou

Wrong. Not two meals for the price of one. Two meals for the price of two. One of them stale.

If, I am to believe all other posters that food is a largest expense in a restaurant. Who do you think is paying for that portion?

Nice.

chandanista

I have all the kitchen gadgets I will ever need.
No nutritious and tasty meal for a family of four (that my kids would eat too!) is quick enough for me to leave me with ample time for all of my other commitments and obligations.

Let's leave it here, OK?

If you cannot do it in a reasonable amount of time, then maybe you should consider cooking courses.


And you keep talking about how constrained on time you are, yet you have been here for...two hours now? Could have done quite a bit of meal prep in that time. Just sayin'.

To be fair, this is the poster who, a few days ago, insisted she has no time to set up recipes and count calories in MFP and is frustrated because she isn't losing weight. Also, she buys shoes without laces, as tying a lace can take up too much time and seconds count in a day.

Personally, I've found (and added to my recipes) a variety of recipes that take <20 minutes prep time, and I can do a variety of things while the cooking part occurs. Last time we ate out I became frustrated because I could have actually made the same food for less money. My DH (yes a man who cooks!) made a big pot of chili from hard-bean scratch on Friday. Most of the time the beans were soaking; his total prep time over 12 hours was about 30 minutes of labor, broken up throughout. We've frozen some and are eating the rest this week. Cheap? Yes indeed. Healthy? Yup! Good with every reheat? You betcha--almost better with every day of age, actually.

PS--I too love the idea of bringing my own Rubbermaid "to-go" container. Next time I eat out, I will have to plan ahead to do that!

shannashannabobana

Then she couldn't be better than everyone else who just feeds their families crap that's quicker to make.

Like fresh fish and fruit - which takes approximately 10 minutes even if you make a sauce!

BeachIron

Just so this dosen't get lost in a quote...if this is a cultural issue in the US and Canada explain how it is?????

There are so many cultures in Canada alone which culture do we blame????

The East Indians? the Philipinoes? The Germans? The Irish? The Native americans? The Chinese? Pakistani? Iranian? Egyptian? Cuban? (trust me this is just those that work in the company I do that have immigrated in the last 10 years) Caucasions born here with god knows how many cultures in their blood????

Which culture influence is to blame?

Did this sound like a good argument in your head before you wrote it out?

You gotta wonder....
:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

I think you all might have missed the point of this post...

S/he was making a point of asking "What is North American culture?" - Everyone here (myself included) are greatly generalizing what type of culture those of us living in the US and Canada. Just because North America was colonized and "founded" by whitey doesn't mean that its entire culture is "white." The "dominant" culture may be "white", but immigration has GREATLY increased the number of "minorities" in these countries, thus the culture of Canada and the US is much more complex than we are all making it out to be. And the poster was asking WHICH of these sub-cultures/ethnicities is really the one to blame if we are to blame culture on obesity.

And would all these hyphenated sub-cultures (ie. Somalian-American, Native-American, Irish-Canadian, Japanese-Canadian, etc.) fit into the category of overweight/obese individuals of which we are speaking? It all depends - but it is an important point to take into consideration.

This topic has nothing to do with who America was colonized by or how many people of what kind of specific origins live here. The bottom line is that there is an overall CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN WAY OF LIFE that is specific to people in the US (or people who come to live in the US!), and that affects most Americans, regardless of whether their ancestors came from England, Bangladesh or the North Pole.

This is the only thing that's relevant here.
This "way of life" includes having to drive everywhere, endless suburban land without sidewalks and public spaces, fast-foods every 3 yards, generally poor quality foods available at an affordable price, extremely fast pace of life which compels most people to be either at a desk or in the car for most of the day, etc.

If anyone thinks people can afford to preserve the lifestyles of the families they left in their home-country when they live here - just because they have said "ethnic origin" that makes America "oh, so diverse", then this is ignorance, confusion and brainwashing at dangerous levels.

The original ethnic diversity of Americans has squat to do with why US citizens get fat.

You seem to now be saying the opposite of what the OP was arguing in regard to culture. If your bolded statement was, in fact, true then why the stark difference in obesity rates among U.S. ethnic groups?

And just a suggestion, but tone it down a bit on the attacks. There is enough room for disagreement in this debate without accusing anyone of being brainwashed.

k8blujay2

Given how many people here argue that American culture has nothing to do with obesity (only poor individual choices do), then how in the world do they explain Americans on average being so fat compared to other parts of the world?

With this logic, we infer that Americans are much more likely to make poor choices (that is they are non-virtuous) compared to people in other parts of the world who must be so much more virtuous.

And if that is so, isn't this self-whipping and self-blame?

So you do believe that many Americans are inherently worse than other people elsewhere?

Because we are lazy and full of excuses?

BinaryPulsar

Well, have fun being overweight, blaming everyone for it, and being entitled. I'm sure that will work out great for you.

Btw, there are constructive ways to look at and deal with problems and issues. And if you can't change the whole country, you can make changes for yourself and your own family.

Bernadette60614

Looking at more supportive cultures which aren't starving...

I have a friend who lives in Paris as an expatriate. Her ob warned her against gaining too much weight because it would be more difficult to get it off.

In Japan, doctors are penalized if their patients exceed a certain BMI.

As another poster stated, in many cultures kids are taught to eat only 80%...not till they are stuffed.

What kind of culture do we want to support a thinner society? Are we going to flock to restaurants which serve a European size portion of pasta (which is roughly 1/4 of what you get at the Olive Garden?)

Khelben75

It all depends on the choices you make. Is it easy in our culture to overeat and eat unhealthy foods? Absolutely! However we need to have the sense not too. And I've been as guilty as anyone could for most of my life. It is still somewhat of a struggle for me to eat until I am not hungry rather than eating until I'm stuffed.

Also helpful when eating out, don't be afraid to split a meal. I was worried that I would appear cheap but the wonderful woman I date suggested it. She is ridiculously healthy and fit and knows how hard I'm working to get back into shape. She wouldn't finish an entire entree anyway, so we typically get one appetizer and one dinner between us. I've always been more worried about appearances but being fit and healthy is much more important that a restaurant manager thinking I'm cheap.

shannashannabobana

They teach their children to eat until they are "80% full" and then stop eating.

I think that's a great thing to remember!

Guys, the whole thing about being sad that we drive places, it's because America is huge and not so densely populated as Europe. That's not all necessarily a bad thing.

And my neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks because it's old and there is no room but it doesn't stop anybody from walking. I've never seen a newer subdivision without sidewalks. I think that point is irrelevant.

wisdomfromyou

Given how many people here argue that American culture has nothing to do with obesity (only poor individual choices do), then how in the world do they explain Americans on average being so fat compared to other parts of the world?

With this logic, we infer that Americans are much more likely to make poor choices (that is they are non-virtuous) compared to people in other parts of the world who must be so much more virtuous.

And if that is so, isn't this self-whipping and self-blame?

So you do believe that many Americans are inherently worse than other people elsewhere?

Um ... no.

Making poor food choices does not make one less virtuous or 'worse' than anyone else. Food aside, there are many other cultural aspects in America that set one up for obesity. Countries that are adopting our lifestyle are quickly following our footsteps to obesity.

Um...yes.
So it's culture. Other parts of the world adopt American culture - they get fat.

They start living in cars? Get fat.
They start eating more convenience foods due to lack of time? Get fat.
They allow the food industry giants to pollute their food with unorthodox chemicals and methods of growing? Get fat.
They get Coke and McDonalds in? Get fat.

Did they just suddenly start making "bad" choices? How come they were not making those choices before?

Because they were not there in the first place and they didn't have to depend on their "strong personal will" to NOT make them!!

Most people's "personal will" is neither strong nor personal. It usually doesn't work!!!! This is why so many Americans are fat and this is why everyone who starts adopting American-like lifestyle will eventually get fat.

Geez. You can twist it all you want but you will still get to the same p[lace.
IT IS CULTURE - and now we have to fight it to NOT get fat.

Good luck to all of us!
We will need lots of it because most will fail.

Yes, I agree it's culture. But it's not fate. We make our own choices. Obesity is NOT the American norm, you know. Less than 1/2 of all Americans are obese. The majority are not.

Everyone chooses what to do with that cultural influence. The only thing we have to fight in order to not get fat is ourselves. Our own desire to eat too much and move too little. It's quite simple to not be fat once you take psychology out of the picture.

Culture isn't destiny. Saying it's cultural is true. Saying you got fat because of culture is false. It just means you had an easier choice to get fat than people from other cultures. Easy or hard, it's still your choice.

Let the culture you talk about continue at this pace (with all of its corporate interests intact, unaffected by any constraining laws) and keep counting EXCLUSIVELY on the ideology of "individual choice". Then check back here in a few more years with some statistics and trends and let us know how this solution has been working out for most people, overall: in America and elsewhere.

While your amazing sheer will, personal fortitude, crystal clear awareness, PhD-level nutritional knowledge and irreproachable choices may make you succeed in the weight department, most people will not be able to show off such God-like qualities.

Most people will continue to get fat, sick and miserable - crowding hospitals and increasing health insurance premiums because most people simply don't make irreproachable choices. Most humans are not "rational choice" creatures - as much as we want to believe otherwise.

Then, ALL of us will pay - including those of us participating in bikini contests. ;-)

BinaryPulsar

It all depends on the choices you make. Is it easy in our culture to overeat and eat unhealthy foods? Absolutely! However we need to have the sense not too. And I've been as guilty as anyone could for most of my life. It is still somewhat of a struggle for me to eat until I am not hungry rather than eating until I'm stuffed.

Also helpful when eating out, don't be afraid to split a meal. I was worried that I would appear cheap but the wonderful woman I date suggested it. She is ridiculously healthy and fit and knows how hard I'm working to get back into shape. She wouldn't finish an entire entree anyway, so we typically get one appetizer and one dinner between us. I've always been more worried about appearances but being fit and healthy is much more important that a restaurant manager thinking I'm cheap.

Yeah, my husband and children and I also share portions of our meals in restaurants.

wisdomfromyou

They teach their children to eat until they are "80% full" and then stop eating.

I think that's a great thing to remember!

Guys, the whole thing about being sad that we drive places, it's because America is huge and not so densely populated as Europe. That's not all necessarily a bad thing.

And my neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks because it's old and there is no room but it doesn't stop anybody from walking. I've never seen a newer subdivision without sidewalks. I think that point is irrelevant.

Believe it or not, but walking in a dry, empty, isolated suburb without sidewalks, heading nowhere, and walking just to be "good" and "dutiful" is a whole lot less attractive and enticing than strolling in a vibrant city with a sense of place where you end up exercising when you don't even mean to!

Result?
Most people would rather not walk under such austere conditions.
A few with sheer will - WILL. Most won't.

Next argument.

Bernadette60614

I don't know how to drive..and I walk everywhere including the burbs.

My mother went from 250 to 125 lbs, working a nightshift fulltime, keeping an immaculate house and making our clothes. How: She cut out sugar, fat, marched around our basement swinging free weights increasing the number of times she went around each week..... and she cooked in bulk on Sunday mornings, freezing the meals for the week.

She wanted it badly enough to find a way to make it work. I think that has been the key for me...it may be the culture's "fault" that I've struggled, but it my responsibliity to find my way if I want it bad enough.

bcattoes

While your amazing sheer will, personal fortitude, crystal clear awareness, PhD-level nutritional knowledge and irreproachable choices may make you succeed in the weight department, most people will not be able to show off such God-like qualities.

Thinking this ^^ is what is needed to maintain a healthy weight is likely more of a problem than cultural influence. Just don't eat more than you need and don't sit on your bum all day. It's not rocket surgery!

LAW_714

Why must these fights constantly swing from one extreme to the other?

In these pie fights it always tends to boil down to someone screaming that...

It's all on the individual (to magically know what a restaurant puts in its food and what it's caloric load and/or serving size might be. Can't you tell just by looking at it whether it's loaded with butter, sodium, sugar, etc. because of course we can easily judge with our eyes what ALL the ingredients in a prepared item might be, exacty how much it weighs (from sight) and how many calories that actually entails (from sight.) It's oh so obvious, you stupid consumer. How can you not magically intuit all of this? Bad consumer!)

Either that or...

You must be arguing that it's all on the restaurant to monitor the individual and how dare you!! Because freemdomz and capitalism and "my" (yours, mine, Ayn Rand's, whoevers) idiosyncratic definition of capitalism says more is always better and has more valuable and as long as they (whoever they may be) are making more profit there's no need to look at any broader impact because more is more important and people don't need to know anything beyond how much something costs (certainly not what's in what they purchase. That's proprietary info for the seller, consumers... not so much) because the ony thing that really matters is that there's profit to be made. Profit is the be all-end all, ya'll!


Why most it always seem to be argued in terms of polar ends of the spectrum as though there is not a vast array of possible (reasonable!) choices in between?

It's perfectly possible to say that the individual is in charge of what they choose to eat without ignoring that we are also subject of influences that -- duh! -- influence them. Being given information so that people may make informed decisions is not OMG teh evil! Nor is it OMG! teh socialismz, you commie, pinko hippies!

On the other hand, it's perfectly possible to say that restaurants/businesses are perfectly entitled to serve whatever the heck they wish to (given cleanliness and basic food safety, of course) such that if someone wishes to eat 3000 calories of pure Crisco covered with high fructose GMO corn syrup, they are perfectly entitled to do so. And someone else is perfectly entitled to sell it to them and to make a substantial profit while doing so. (Though it might be fair if all involved are equally informed on what they're doing.)

It's possible to believe that, given that the seller and the buyer exist within a community, that it's a civilized thing rather than immoral imposition to believe that sellers should adequately label what it is they are selling and how much consitutes a serving as a fair and reasonable business practice (and it would be great to believe they could do this out of the goodness of their hearts, but let's also be practical enough about human nature to admit that good hearts can be blinded at times when profit motive is involved, so setting it as an ethical practice isn't really OMG! how uncapitalist of you! How dare you have expectations of a corporation profiting within a community to have any oblgation to the society within which it exists... other than how much money they can profit from it! What could possible go wrong? (I mean, other than things like the fairly unregulated financial meltdowns like 2008, but other than that...) By this sort of line of thought they could sell you cow-dung pie under the title 'brown deliciousness!' and consumers would have no right to know what the content of 'brown deliciousness' actually might be, because apparently consumers have sold all of their rights to sellers with their coin the minute they choose to buy. Is that it..?)

Where's the middle ground? There are rights and obligations of the individual *and* the rights and obligations of the business community too...and there's the ability of any functioning civilization to negotiate reasonable ways to get along with one another such that there's room for both to exist without onerous exploitation. (And a grand tradition of it dating back more than 5000 years from the Hammurabi's code, to the ancient Egyptians, etc. It's almost always part of civilized society because anarchy and exploitation has a way of not working out for a lot of people...).

Why cannot there be a functioning middle ground, even in heated debate? Why must all arguments strive to stake out the most polarized position possible?

wisdomfromyou

I don't know how to drive..and I walk everywhere including the burbs.

My mother went from 250 to 125 lbs, working a nightshift fulltime, keeping an immaculate house and making our clothes. How: She cut out sugar, fat, marched around our basement swinging free weights increasing the number of times she went around each week..... and she cooked in bulk on Sunday mornings, freezing the meals for the week.

She wanted it badly enough to find a way to make it work. I think that has been the key for me...it may be the culture's "fault" that I've struggled, but it my responsibliity to find my way if I want it bad enough.

This is fantastic that sheer will worked for you and your mom.
You are both amazing persons! Could I shower any more praise than this?

My argument is simple: most people aren't as amazing :-)

k8blujay2

They teach their children to eat until they are "80% full" and then stop eating.

I think that's a great thing to remember!

Guys, the whole thing about being sad that we drive places, it's because America is huge and not so densely populated as Europe. That's not all necessarily a bad thing.

And my neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks because it's old and there is no room but it doesn't stop anybody from walking. I've never seen a newer subdivision without sidewalks. I think that point is irrelevant.

Believe it or not, but walking in a dry, empty, isolated suburb without sidewalks, heading nowhere, and walking just to be "good" and "dutiful" is a whole lot less attractive and enticing than strolling in a vibrant city with a sense of place where you end up exercising when you don't even mean to!

Result?
Most people would rather not walk under such austere conditions.
A few with sheer will - WILL. Most won't.

Next argument.

Speak for yourself...