Everyone here is so mean

MFP - the hungriest forum on the Internet.

"I'm not mean, you're just a sissy"

Stop making me laugh!

AND STOP SHOUTING

Grrrrr!!!

Hello new years resolvers of 2013.

You might notice that people here seem maybe mean sometimes, or snarky, or say things that make you sad.
Before you decide that these people are trying to make you sad, please consider that they may be trying to help you:

"TRY HARDER" is more motivating than "take it easy"
"YOU NEED TO LOSE WEIGHT" is more motivating than "you already look great"
"STOP WHINING" is more more motivating than "there there, bubula, cry on my shoulder"
"GET STARTED NOW" is more motivating than "spend a week coming up with a plan and see if you lose weight planning."

The journey of 1,000 miles starts with but a single step . . . in the right direction . . . and you'll get there faster if you run.

NAW THOSE KIND OF PEOPLE GET DELETED FROM MY FRIENDS LIST FOR BEING NEGATIVE. i
'M NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO THNKS THAT WAY!! I DO A HELL OF ALOT BETTER WITHOUT NEGATIVITY
[/quote

Stop Shouting - you are so MEAN!!!

I've only been here about a month and I have to say, I am a little leery of being honest with people (or making suggestions). I really don't know my "friends' at all here, and we try to encourage each other, but I don't feel I know them well enough to offer advice other than "Nice burn" or "Great effort". I know it seems lame, but that's pretty much the only kind of comments I see people giving/getting.

If you aren't mean then you aren't as awesome as the people on my Fl.. just saying.

I agree 100% with the original poster and have to point out that I have noticed a certain mathematical correlation:

legitimate question/comment = legitimate(ish) response (unless someone is trolling or attempting to be funny)

Otherwise it seems to be on an axis, the more ridiculous or whiny the post, the more sarcastic and snarky ("mean") the responses.



I think if I get too many snarky responses to my post I need to re-evaluate where I fell on the y axis

I have been told on numerous occasions I have no heart. So I tend to be known for my meanness. With some people the meaner I am the more they keep coming back. Brutal honesty tends to be my motto. It's cliche, but if you want to buy a dress, and the one you think you like makes you look fat... do you really want me to tell you its gorgeous, or do you want me to help you find the one that drops 10 lbs off you instantly, and actually does make you look gorgeous? This is not mean.

If you make a mistake I'll call you out, but if you've been wronged I'll call them out. Nasty is not productive, and putting them on the defense will only hurt the issue. Cursing is unnecessary and name-calling is cruel. Telling someone they won't loose weight sitting on the couch eating junk food is true. Calling them fat & lazy is mean.

It's true; there are a few meanies around here. I had an account from Sept to Nov but deleted it when somebody hurt my feelings (wah; boo-hoo). Then I started gaining weight and opened a n ew account. I feel rather foolish for letting one ill-chosen remark get me down. The poster may not have even meant it the way I took it.

My advice: take advantage of all the help and support you can get and let the rest evaporate. Chances are that the "mean" poster immediately forgot what he or she said, and you might as well do the same.

Same thing happened to me. I deleted when I got attacked on here. I do find this place to be rather "immature" compared to other weight loss/body building/health sites I've participated in. I have asked questions and tried to help on here and I have been attacked or worse they say really "foolish and childish things" which make no sense, just to be "funny". I honestly think it is a younger crowd here. I am in my upper forties and probably need to find a group closer to my age. I know when I was in my twenties my body was so different and responded so differently to things than now. It's a whole new world now with my body and it's confusing and frustrating. Such as, you can eat and drink stuff in your twenties and still lose weight, look great, feel great, survive on little sleep, with no affects. And then one day all that crap gets to its maxed out level in your body and you're loaded with toxins and bloat and health issues and you can't do any of the stuff you did when you were younger. As much as the younger crowd wants to help, they can't TRULY "get it" bc they aren't there yet. Been there and done that. It's so frustrating to eat the healthiest you ever have in your life, get more sleep than you ever have in your life, workout better, more intense and with the best of the best more than you ever have in your life and not see results. And then there is trying to fix the junk you did to yourself when younger (bc you got away with it when younger). Not to mention your metabolism slows down, you are losing muscle. Still, I can deal with some of the, "tough love" comments but not the "stupid comments" which are hurtful and pointless. The other day I posted about something I thought was helpful and some guy told me to "go eat a donut". Really? Why?

Only time I ever got called mean here was when a woman "pal" claimed to have lost 14 lbs in 5 days eating nothing but 300 calories a day of buscuits and tea. I told her (by a private message mind you, not in a public post) that she was either an anorexic in serious need of professional help or she was full of crap and what she was claiming was a game to get attention and was disrespectful to all the hard-working folks here who have real food and weight issues they are trying to overcome. She called me mean and unfriended me. If that was mean, so be it.
Newbie advice: This is a life changing decision. Do it with all your heart and dedication and you'll get the respect and attention you want. If you whine and complain, expect to be called to task for it.

BTW: I'm accepting serious friends, new or not.

I think it just depends on each individual.
I would never be mean & I hope I never post something that someone THINKS is mean.

"I'm not mean, you're just a sissy"

Only time I ever got called mean here was when a woman "pal" claimed to have lost 14 lbs in 5 days eating nothing but 300 calories a day of buscuits and tea. I told her (by a private message mind you, not in a public post) that she was either an anorexic in serious need of professional help or she was full of crap and what she was claiming was a game to get attention and was disrespectful to all the hard-working folks here who have real food and weight issues they are trying to overcome. She called me mean and unfriended me. If that was mean, so be it.
Newbie advice: This is a life changing decision. Do it with all your heart and dedication and you'll get the respect and attention you want. If you whine and complain, expect to be called to task for it.

BTW: I'm accepting serious friends, new or not.

I like your last comment, it's good advice. I lost 9 lbs in three days doing something radical like this. Had I gone another two days, I may have lost another 5 lbs. You really don't think it is possible?

Sorry. Clicked the wrong button.
Whether it was possible or not, it certainly wasn't healthy and shouldn't be encouraged. She was also the type who felt the need to change her profile picture every 4 hours to some new provocitive pose.
The critisim was in private, where it should be.

A thought:

For all the people who say "caloric deficit, nyah nyah nyah" - there ARE other factors to calorie burning, including when you eat, and when you exercise, and whether you are already insulin resistant. Metabolic rate blah blah blah. So don't get on your high horse when people find your comment unhelpful.

As a thumb rule, OF COURSE cutting calorie intake and/or upping calorie usage is how fat loss occurs. For most of us who are fatter, the tangle comes from the psychological side, not ignorance of how caloric a particular food is. How did we learn to eat? what did we learn to eat? how did food and emotions get stuck together over the course of our lives, and how do we unstick them? what do we USE FOOD FOR besides fuel (cultural connection, family connection, "treats"?) and how are we going to fill those functions in other ways? A subset of us have experienced people yelling at us about our weight a lot already; further "yelling" is NOT motivation for us. For those of us who need a fierce coach or a drill sergeant, the tough advice is great. Their psychological hang-ups with food are totally different from mine. For some of us, a friend and some unearned sympathy are exactly what we need to forgive ourselves and keep going.

Personally, I have to alternate between the two. Some days, it's "no excuses!" all the way. Other days, depression gets the better of me and every well-meaning mantra or communication advising me to suck it up, put on my big girl pants, and do what I need to do makes me feel hopeless and worthless about my perceived failure, and triggers a "can't do it, might as well say eff it" response. You can call it being lazy; I understand it as a reflection of my mental health. I have to work with it to win. Pretending I don't have depression is a one way trip to 400 pounds.

Whatever, tl:dr. Point is, different things motivate different people, different people have different things stopping them, and what makes people bristle is the idea that your advice, not-mean-person, is universally helpful to everyone, at every time. It might very often be true, in the literal sense (yes, if I went for a run instead of having some mashed potatoes, I would lose calories instead of gaining them! THANK YOU, HELPFUL GENIUS); it won't address whatever is keeping my *kitten* glued to the couch. Sometimes that's a simple revelation that some kick-in-the-pants advice can trigger (omg, I totally have the power to just stand up and run!); other times, it is honestly not that simple.

A thought:

For all the people who say "caloric deficit, nyah nyah nyah" - there ARE other factors to calorie burning, including when you eat, and when you exercise, and whether you are already insulin resistant. Metabolic rate blah blah blah. So don't get on your high horse when people find your comment unhelpful.

Weight loss is all about a calorie deficit .

Calorie burning and weight loss are two different things. All the rest of what you said....:huh:.