There's something very wrong here...

shabaity

Glad you posted this. There seems to be a chunk of people who like to pin obesity on singular things outside of thermodynamics and this post is a pretty good example of the problem. We're eating more and moving less. Period.

I'm just waiting for someone to say "yeah, but the increase in calories was mainly due to increased carbs" and then it will become about insulin and metabolic advantage and the tooth fairy....

well the diabetic has to cut back the carbs it converts to sugar in the blood to fast specially potatoes... high school biology was amazingly useful those are the simplest forms of sugar its why if you chew a fry long enough it actually starts to taste sweet... but it wasnt the carbs that got me here it was the soda addiction and the sweet tea at work i miss my cherry cokes so much sigh oh well atleast i can drink diet doctor pepper

michelleyounger

So, after a wonderful couple of weeks watching the Olympics I was inspired to research the training schedules of the athletes and see how they compared with my own. This lead me to seeing what an average person would do in general as well.

I couldn't find a lot of readily accessible data about the UK where I live but there was a fair amount of data from the US floating around which honestly shocked me. Given the UK is similar to the US I believe we are probably much the same.

In 1971, the average US woman consumed about 1,542 calories per day. In 2000, this had risen to 1,877 a difference of 335 calories per day. This is equivalent to 122, 275 calories a year or an extra 35lbs of fat...

For men the numbers rose from 2,450 to 2,618 an increase of 168 calories per day. This is equivalent to an extra 17.5lbs of fat.

80% watch TV every day, with the average person watching a whopping 5 hours per day or 35 hours per week. Only 5% were engaged in vigorous exercising daily, with 16% engaging is sports or exercise per day.

This doesn't even factor in increasing automation meaning we are more sedentary and engage in less physical activity.

Our perception of what is normal has become hugely distorted with time. Is it any wonder our respective nations are getting fatter and fatter? I wager if people reverted to a 1970 calorie intake and devoted a meagre 1/5th of the time they spent watching TV on average to exercise then our obesity problem would rapidly diminish.

We have become pampered, complacent and self delusional. No wonder our waistlines are expanding...

myofibril

This post doesn't take into account the special snowflakes.

You are right.

Caveat: it applies to the vast majority of the general population and does not take into account the minority of people who have some sort of medical condition etc.

weemawhit

Healthy, quickly prepared food can be pretty difficult to find. If you put in the time and effort to research it and join this kind of website, you can figure out how to incorporate healthy foods into your diet, sure. However, food in general is a lot less healthy now than it was in 1971. Obviously our TV habits contribute, as well as fast food and serving sizes. I definitely agree with you, but I do place part of the blame on the food industry as well as related education. I went to one of the best public school systems in the US, but even still, no one ever told me about the basics of being healthy. We had sex ed, but nothing about how many calories you should eat a day (aside from the 2000 calorie daily value on labels--too much!), how to eat cheap AND healthy food (vs one or the other), that sort of thing. Vitamins = good, carbs = bad, that's the extent of the health based education I received. (And I actually paid attention in school, so who knows what other people took from it!) They also told us about the food pyramid, but according to that, we are supposed to eat more grains than anything else. Just fill up on those carbs! There are a lot of things that have contributed to our nation's weight gain.

jkleon86

Carbs, NO.....its John Wayne's fault

titianwasp

Thank you so much...I see people blaming the food, blaming their genes...but if you look back a few generations, when people had to regularly get off their bums to do most things and eating out was a rare treat, people weighed less. Here in America, people love to blame their genetic makeup for their size, but if you look at the countries that their ancestors emmigrated from, they are a lot less heavy, ironically.

Carbs, protein, high fructose corn syrup...whatever. Some things are harder to burn than others, but the fact is, if you burn off more than you eat, you will lose weight. If you consume more than you burn, you will gain weight.

We are all, genetically predisposed to eat as much of salty, fatty, sweet things because those things historically held hard-to-obtain minerals or calories. Sorry...but that's the truth. At the end of the day, those that can through sheer force of will say no, will succeed in keeping their size down, or through even greater force of will reduce what they've already put on.

Here's to hoping for daily re-fortification of our force of will. :P

Brunner26_2

The problem is that, since 1971, we've gotten farther from our caveman roots. Everything will be fine if we all go on the paleo diet.

Cait_Sidhe

This thread started out using wonderful logic and everything made sense. I appreciate that. People need to stop blaming everything else like carbs, sugar, and processed food. Yes, I'm sure the women in Ruebens paintings ate too many Twinkies. There may be an increase in obesity now, but there have always been obese people. Queen Hapsetsut's (first and only female Pharaoh) mummy was recently discovered and she was obese. Henry VIII? Most artwork dating back thousands of years unless the figures are idealized, depict fat people. And they didn't get there from processed food.

Edited because I'm on my phone and it messed up and my post made no sense.

Ohwhynot

I am overweight, have always been overweight (minus a small stint on adderall in the late 90s), and I can tell you without a doubt that it is not from carbs, juice, fruit, soda, super sizing, fast food, chips, twinkies, stress, cortisol, metabolic syndrome, obamacare, gay marriage, or tax increases on the rich. It is simply because I STRONGLY dislike exercise, and I STRONGLY love food. My ins have never equaled my outs.

AtticusFinch

Interesting stats.

The only thing I'd add is that although average calorie intake might have been better in the 1970's there's a lot more opportunity to eat selectively these days, even if people ignore that in favour of quick fix calorie laden fastfoods. In the UK my diet in those days, (and I wasn't even slightly overweight), included lots of deep fried, fat and sugar heavy foods, desserts with cream, etc.

Even if I was better informed I wouldn't have really had the chance to buy healthier foods in the supermarket unless I concentrated on fresh veg and salad. These days practically everything, including processed items, comes with a breakdown of nutritional values.

I think people have become lazy and it's an attitude change that's needed. Look how public opinion has changed about things like drink and smoking, it can't be beyond the wit of our respective governments to make a concerted effort for food stuffs too.

hotjacki85

Ya.... when i was at my heaviest i was eating a whopper with chesse 3-4 times a week... and fast food EVERYDAY! No working out AT ALL It was MY fault and definitely cant blame it on anyone else but myself. LOL

IntoTheSky

Glad you posted this. There seems to be a chunk of people who like to pin obesity on singular things outside of thermodynamics and this post is a pretty good example of the problem. We're eating more and moving less. Period.

I'm just waiting for someone to say "yeah, but the increase in calories was mainly due to increased carbs" and then it will become about insulin and metabolic advantage and the tooth fairy....

Effin tooth fairy gets me every time!!!!!!!!

haleydself

You are absolutely right.. I think the more technology advances, the lazier we get..

jennkain97

Glad you posted this. There seems to be a chunk of people who like to pin obesity on singular things outside of thermodynamics and this post is a pretty good example of the problem. We're eating more and moving less. Period.

I'm just waiting for someone to say "yeah, but the increase in calories was mainly due to increased carbs" and then it will become about insulin and metabolic advantage and the tooth fairy....

well the diabetic has to cut back the carbs it converts to sugar in the blood to fast specially potatoes... high school biology was amazingly useful those are the simplest forms of sugar its why if you chew a fry long enough it actually starts to taste sweet... but it wasnt the carbs that got me here it was the soda addiction and the sweet tea at work i miss my cherry cokes so much sigh oh well atleast i can drink diet doctor pepper

hmmm... soda & sweet tea = carbs

BerryH

The calorie numbers you quote are the same as in this Wiki article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diet_and_obesity

Which then goes on to say: "Most of these extra calories came from an increase in carbohydrate consumption rather than an increase in fat consumption. The primary sources of these extra carbohydrates were sweetened beverages, which now accounts for almost 25 percent of daily calories in young adults in America."

Interestingly, the average woman eating 1877 calories would lose weight. I wonder if this is under-reporting?

ChgingMe

Saw a TV show once where a guy bought an old house. When he moved in his dishes didn't fit in the cabinents. They were too big. He said that was a huge wake up call for him about how much our eating had evolved in the 50 or so years since that house was built.

I totally agree that a huge percentage of the obesity issues lie in lack of movement and over eating. I have a friend who is obese, her kids are morbidly obese and she blames it on genetics. Yes they are genetically predisposed to overeat, based on what they are being taught by the parents. Its a mind game. Until one is ready mentally to make a change they will not...

Plates559

The problem is that, since 1971, we've gotten farther from our caveman roots. Everything will be fine if we all go on the paleo diet.

Obvious troll is obvious, paleo isn't the end all eating style, and if you were actually up to date on your paleolithic research you would see that they DID in fact eat grains.

lizw123

I agree many people have become lazy. Not only too lazy to exercise, but too lazy to cook their own food properly. Instead, using ready made pies etc that are simply put on a tray in the oven, then transferred to a plate and eaten. No thought or effort goes into it and it's eaten with no thought for the nutritional content. My husband and I both love to cook and try new recipes. We adapt them to our own tastes and dietary requirements.

My husband struggles to exercise as he has MD but he works hard even so. I work out daily at the gym now too.

secretlobster

There's been a steady increase in the amount of people joining gyms and regularly participating in competitive sports (i.e. distance running)
Teen smoking is down
Awareness of good nutritional habits is increasing
Organic farming and natural food awareness is up

We may turn things around.

hotjacki85

Self control is the problem for most... I do get medical issues... i understand that....but for instance... i have friends who have never made their own homemade mashed potatoes...nope theyd rather do the quick 3 minute method out of the box. We need to take the time to eat healthier and cook healthier

Regarding the quality of our food.... including grocery store items!!! Watch Fast Food nation or any of those other documentaries... will make u sick to your stomach at how they manipulate DNA, inject chemicals, just to make products produce faster, bigger, tastier. Chickens so large they cant even STAND!!!! and their legs buckle underneath them!!!


We have Amish near where we live.... If i dont grow it myself i get it from them... including pultry and beef... atleast I KNOW it isnt a chemically mutated dinner.