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The ‘food’ industry started the ‘exercise’ industry.
age_is_just_a_number
Posts: 631 Member
in Debate Club
Conspiracy theories are everywhere. I recently heard this one: “The food industry started the exercise industry to move the focus away from the ‘food’ being the source of the weight gain and increasingly poor health of Americans.
What do you think?
What do you think?
The ‘food’ industry started the ‘exercise’ industry. 28 votes
Hogwash — the exercise industry was started by Jane Fonda
42%
12 votes
Interesting idea — I can see how it could be possible
32%
9 votes
Perhaps true but not intentional
17%
5 votes
Wouldn’t put it past them
0%
Completely believe it is true
7%
2 votes
0
Replies
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We've been exercising longer than the general population has been intravenously taking in calories according to the guidelines set by the food gods. lol, cheers.1
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Haha, that's a fun one.
No...I don't think there's a direct connection, but there is a correlation.
The tactics of the food industry are a factor (I don't believe the sole cause) in the dramatic rise in obesity rates.
The exercise industry pounced on the obesity epidemic and tried to convince people that all they need is expensive equipment, gym memberships, and fashionable exercise attire to lose those extra pounds.
To address the comment by @neanderthin, yes, humans have been exercising longer than obesity has been a major problem. BUT, the phenomenon of corporate giant fitness centers, $2,000 tread mills, and boutique stores dedicated to workout fashion are a relatively new development. The OP is referencing the fitness INDUSTRY, not just individuals who participate in fitness activities.4 -
Hogwash — the exercise industry was started by Jane FondaI have nothing to say other than Jane Fonda and her leg warmers. 😀0
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Hogwash — the exercise industry was started by Jane FondaActually I think exercise and the exercise industry are two different things, but Jane Fonda rocks so I had to vote for her! (Especially the IG post where she slept in her evening dress after an awards show as she couldn’t undo it 🤣)0
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Perhaps true but not intentionalFood industry is fully embracing the weight loss industry - 'low fat' foods that are full of sugar, 'protein bars' that are basically cereal bars with some nuts in them, 'diet- ' everything, 'electrolyte' sports drinks or you'll fold over and die after your powerwalk. McDonalds sponsoring the Olympics... They hardly need to shift the focus to exercise to profit.0
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The "exercise industry" existed long before Jane Fonda. Jeesh.
Charles Atlas, Jack LaLanne, the ridiculous gyms full of vibrating belt/platform "exercise" machines for women of the 1950s, and more. (I remember going to one of those with my mother in 1950-something.) There was "industry" going back much further than that, too.
Did that exercise industry get bigger and more pushy? Sure, just like the food industry did. Lots of other industries likewise, too. Clothing, shoes? Yup, them, too. McMansion aspirations? Yupper. Consumerism, across the board, has burgeoned.
Do the fitness and food industries do things to exploit us? Well, kinda. But in the last analysis, they're both going to sell us the things that we prove, by voting with our dollars, that we want.
The obesity epidemic is on the one hand kind of complicated, and on the other kind of simple (in its genesis). Since roughly the 1970s/80s, the ubiquity and social acceptability of 24x7 food & drink has increased, and the average person's daily lifestyle has gotten much less active - not exercise so much as work, home life, hobbies, etc. It's pervasive and kind of insidious, and was so gradual it might be easy not to notice - the "boiling a frog" analogy applies here. But it has been dramatic in population-level effects.
If you look at the stats, all you need (on a population average level) to explain the obesity epidemic over these decades is an excess of in the low hundreds of calories per day per person. That's not a huge amount of additional eating, or subtraction of activity. It adds up, year by year, decade by decade. We're talking something like peanut butter sandwich excess, or 5000-10000 steps-equivalent less movement daily, or (more likely) a combination.8 -
Perhaps true but not intentional
I became obese during the combination of COVID lockdowns, finishing my bachelors degree and getting diagnosed with arthritis that left me bed bound for almost 2 months. I wasn't really surprised. I was however shocked to figure out I gained weight at the rate of about 7 grams (let's assume of pure fat) per day over the last few years. That's the calorie (63) equivalent of one small apple per day.If you look at the stats, all you need (on a population average level) to explain the obesity epidemic over these decades is an excess of in the low hundreds of calories per day per person. That's not a huge amount of additional eating, or subtraction of activity. It adds up, year by year, decade by decade.
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Ghosts always look like they’re hiding in pictures because if they get caught they Die 2.0 & they don’t know what happens the 2nd time.1
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Hogwash — the exercise industry was started by Jane FondaBoth the food and fitness industry try to appeal to consumers by giving them what they think they want. They can feed off each other, but both have the same goal.............get consumers to spend money on everything they offer.
A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
4 -
Hogwash — the exercise industry was started by Jane FondaI voted for "Hogwash" even though the exercise industry has been around a lot longer than Jane Fonda.
However, it is indisputable that some food conglomerates have certainly tried to shift the blame for obesity from their products to consumers' lack of exercise.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnmcquaid/2015/08/10/coca-cola-has-a-new-message-exercise-and-keep-drinking-cokes/1 -
Completely believe it is trueI voted I believe it, but felt I needed to specify: a lot of American businesses (especially fast food and soft drink companies) have shifted the conversation of 'good food equals health' to 'get moving and you can still purchase all the McDonalds you want'. These messages are then reinforced by 'get healthy' campaigns put on by those exact same food companies to look like they care when really it's to shift the criticism. This is something we frequently talked about in class (advertising/PR graduate here). It's not spoken about as a conspiracy, but talked about as just another public relations case study. So I'm inclined to believe that the American obsession with fitness might not have started because of the food industry, but they sure as heck built upon and expanded it to the monolith we have today.1
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I cannot vote, because there is not option that says "nonsense" without anything else.
Just because someone makes up a conspiracy theory does not make it true. I *do* use products from the food industry, and I like them very much: frozen broccoli+cauliflower, canned crushed tomatoes, canned sardines, frozen Brussels sprouts... need I go on? It beats going hungry.
I also *do* use products from the fitness industry: runners from New Balance, Asics, slippers from Adidas... same question. Would going barefoot really be that much better?
There is no conspiracy here, just a very strong desire to make money and to give the customer as little as possible for as much money as possible. That is not nice, not friendly, not caring, not philanthropic, not charitable, ... it is simply what companies are legally required to do in a capitalist society.
In conclusion: if there is a conspiracy, it is not one of "industries" it is one of "citizens" that created the system in which these industries operate and (occasionally) thrive.
In other words, if we don't like it, we should look in the mirror, that's where the problem lies, and make no mistake, other systems have their downsides too. Capitalism is not a good system, it is a bad system, but it is the least-bad system humans have come up with so far.1 -
Most of this is just misdirection from food to exercise by food manufacturers. Coca Cola is the 900 lb gorilla in this space. "Coke has provided financial and logistical support to a new nonprofit organization called the Global Energy Balance Network, which promotes the argument that weight-conscious Americans are overly fixated on how much they eat and drink while not paying enough attention to exercise."
Last week, the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Louisiana announced the findings of a large new study on exercise in children that determined that lack of physical activity “is the biggest predictor of childhood obesity around the world.”
The news release contained a disclosure: “This research was funded by The Coca-Cola Company.”
https://archive.nytimes.com/well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/coca-cola-funds-scientists-who-shift-blame-for-obesity-away-from-bad-diets/#:~:text=Critics%20say%20Coke%20has%20long%20cast%20the%20obesity,Dr.%20Freedhoff%20of%20the%20University%20of%20Ottawa%20said.
2 -
Agreed that food companies didn't start the industry, but are definitely trying to shift attention to exercise and away from their own products.
(mentioned here, for example - https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/public-health-nutrition/article/food-industry-sponsorship-of-academic-research-investigating-commercial-bias-in-the-research-agenda/A4D9C0DC429218D5EFDFBE80FAE5E087 )2 -
I completely agree with that. They are companies. In a capitalist system, they are not only allowed, but required to make as much profit as possible. What do we call a company that sells products people don't want, or that tells people its products are bad? Right, we call that a mismanaged company.Agreed that food companies didn't start the industry, but are definitely trying to shift attention to exercise and away from their own products.
(mentioned here, for example - https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/public-health-nutrition/article/food-industry-sponsorship-of-academic-research-investigating-commercial-bias-in-the-research-agenda/A4D9C0DC429218D5EFDFBE80FAE5E087 )
As consumers, we only have to look at food labels to see how miserably inadequate companies can be. In the case of food labels, there is probably no malice involved, just nonchalance, but that does not make it acceptable. Sometimes it is easy to know that something is amiss. Just look at this example:
0 g fibre in 100 g of dried lupini beans. Really? I think it is hard to argue that this company had malicious intent. This is simply because someone who does not know the first thing about nutrition has handled the situation and the company simply does prefers to invest more money in marketing and the third Rolls Royce for the boss than in decent information for its end customers.
It does not only happen in the food industry. It happens in all industries, and a lot of it is our own fault: we don't want to pay for independent research, so we force companies to fund the research while we demand insufficient guarantees they will not try to influence it.
One way to improve on the current situation, would be to require companies to put a percentage of their profits in a research fund manned or womaned by people who know what they are doing and that independently decides what to investigate, who to investigate and generally do what science requires. I can imagine other solutions as well, the current situation does not have to be as bad as it is.
2 -
BartBVanBockstaele wrote: »
I completely agree with that. They are companies. In a capitalist system, they are not only allowed, but required to make as much profit as possible. What do we call a company that sells products people don't want, or that tells people its products are bad? Right, we call that a mismanaged company.Agreed that food companies didn't start the industry, but are definitely trying to shift attention to exercise and away from their own products.
(mentioned here, for example - https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/public-health-nutrition/article/food-industry-sponsorship-of-academic-research-investigating-commercial-bias-in-the-research-agenda/A4D9C0DC429218D5EFDFBE80FAE5E087 )
As consumers, we only have to look at food labels to see how miserably inadequate companies can be. In the case of food labels, there is probably no malice involved, just nonchalance, but that does not make it acceptable. Sometimes it is easy to know that something is amiss. Just look at this example:
0 g fibre in 100 g of dried lupini beans. Really? I think it is hard to argue that this company had malicious intent. This is simply because someone who does not know the first thing about nutrition has handled the situation and the company simply does prefers to invest more money in marketing and the third Rolls Royce for the boss than in decent information for its end customers.
It does not only happen in the food industry. It happens in all industries, and a lot of it is our own fault: we don't want to pay for independent research, so we force companies to fund the research while we demand insufficient guarantees they will not try to influence it.
One way to improve on the current situation, would be to require companies to put a percentage of their profits in a research fund manned or womaned by people who know what they are doing and that independently decides what to investigate, who to investigate and generally do what science requires. I can imagine other solutions as well, the current situation does not have to be as bad as it is.
Or, the more likely culprit is that somebody made a mistake when creating the label and it didn't get caught in quality control... hint, this happens to other products as well. I think it the more likely scenario than attributing some nefarious attempt to mislead people on the part of the company.3 -
Actually, I thought that is what I wrote. There is no malevolence here, only nonchalance: they don't care. For the rest, I agree. There are tons of similar mistakes out there.BartBVanBockstaele wrote: »
I completely agree with that. They are companies. In a capitalist system, they are not only allowed, but required to make as much profit as possible. What do we call a company that sells products people don't want, or that tells people its products are bad? Right, we call that a mismanaged company.Agreed that food companies didn't start the industry, but are definitely trying to shift attention to exercise and away from their own products.
(mentioned here, for example - https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/public-health-nutrition/article/food-industry-sponsorship-of-academic-research-investigating-commercial-bias-in-the-research-agenda/A4D9C0DC429218D5EFDFBE80FAE5E087 )
As consumers, we only have to look at food labels to see how miserably inadequate companies can be. In the case of food labels, there is probably no malice involved, just nonchalance, but that does not make it acceptable. Sometimes it is easy to know that something is amiss. Just look at this example:
0 g fibre in 100 g of dried lupini beans. Really? I think it is hard to argue that this company had malicious intent. This is simply because someone who does not know the first thing about nutrition has handled the situation and the company simply does prefers to invest more money in marketing and the third Rolls Royce for the boss than in decent information for its end customers.
It does not only happen in the food industry. It happens in all industries, and a lot of it is our own fault: we don't want to pay for independent research, so we force companies to fund the research while we demand insufficient guarantees they will not try to influence it.
One way to improve on the current situation, would be to require companies to put a percentage of their profits in a research fund manned or womaned by people who know what they are doing and that independently decides what to investigate, who to investigate and generally do what science requires. I can imagine other solutions as well, the current situation does not have to be as bad as it is.
Or, the more likely culprit is that somebody made a mistake when creating the label and it didn't get caught in quality control... hint, this happens to other products as well. I think it the more likely scenario than attributing some nefarious attempt to mislead people on the part of the company.
Reading back what I wrote, I did indeed write that:In the case of food labels, there is probably no malice involved, just nonchalance, but that does not make it acceptable.0 -
BartBVanBockstaele wrote: »
...As consumers, we only have to look at food labels to see how miserably inadequate companies can be. In the case of food labels, there is probably no malice involved, just nonchalance, but that does not make it acceptable. ... I think it is hard to argue that this company had malicious intent. This is simply because someone who does not know the first thing about nutrition has handled the situation and the company simply does prefers to invest more money in marketing and the third Rolls Royce for the boss than in decent information for its end customers.
I totally agree that a lot of the companies can be inadequate re: labels. And also that this is likely not malicious intent, in the example you gave. Honest mistakes happen, yes?
But there is quite a bit of, let's call it profit-over-consumer-health shenanigans going on in the food industry that is 100% deliberate, and in some cases can cause serious harm, and they still do it. They work hard to argue and lobby for and against certain terms to be used on labels, and in many cases, these labeling choices make it hard for consumers to know what is in their food.
For example, if a company wants to add nitrates but wants their food to seem more 'healthy,' they can add nitrates extracted from celery or rosemary, rather than artificial nitrates. These typically are the same level of nitrates, but can not only be put on the label as things like rosemary extract, or celery powder, or natural flavoring, the company can legally put 'no nitrates added' on the label.'
Another example I run into as a celiac: gluten free food.
The terms "gluten-free,” “no gluten,” “free of gluten,” or “without gluten" are terms that a company can use if their food is legally gluten free - these foods have to have less than a very specific amount of gluten contamination to meet the regulations.
But the terms 'do not contain gluten' or 'no gluten ingredients' are not legal labels for regulated gluten free food. They don't mean gluten free at all. A company can say this when they have simply not added gluten, regardless of whether or not there is significant gluten contamination in the product.
No only have I seen this type of thing on the label, it will literally be used to deliberately obfuscate.
Since the GF label is voluntary, some companies will have unlabeled GF products, so you have to email the company and inquire about the GF status. I have asked them flat out, 'is X product gluten free?' And receive back responses that say 'X product does not contain gluten.' then long meandering paragraphs about how much they care about their allergic customers, and finally near the end, the email MIGHT mention what their gluten free requirements are, but usually in a way where you can't quite tell if they are saying their product is or is not gluten free. Repeated email inquiries rarely yield any more answers.
It will often require calling them up and speaking to a person, and they will STILL frequently just repeat 'this product contains no gluten' to your question, and you have to pin them down with an 'are you telling me that this product is gluten free?' to which the answer is invariably, 'no, this product is not gluten free, but it does not contain gluten.'
This isn't just one or two companies. It's probably about 1/2 of the companies I contact who do some version of this, and some of them are big name companies. It's hard to imagine that GF labeling is the only type of labelling issue that they fudge this way, you know?
So, yeah, I know there are honest mistakes, but when you start having to cope with finding out if a company contains X or Y thing, for health reasons, you find out that quite a lot of their labeling decisions are very much a conscious choice that puts customers at risk but minimizes their legal culpability.
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I wholeheartedly agree with that. I think it nicely shows, among other things, that certain claims should simply be disallowed. The ideal would be a system where objectivity reigns. There would still be gray areas because that is the nature of reality, but far fewer. I think your example of nitrite nicely demonstrates that.BartBVanBockstaele wrote: »
...As consumers, we only have to look at food labels to see how miserably inadequate companies can be. In the case of food labels, there is probably no malice involved, just nonchalance, but that does not make it acceptable. ... I think it is hard to argue that this company had malicious intent. This is simply because someone who does not know the first thing about nutrition has handled the situation and the company simply does prefers to invest more money in marketing and the third Rolls Royce for the boss than in decent information for its end customers.
I totally agree that a lot of the companies can be inadequate re: labels. And also that this is likely not malicious intent, in the example you gave. Honest mistakes happen, yes?
But there is quite a bit of, let's call it profit-over-consumer-health shenanigans going on in the food industry that is 100% deliberate, and in some cases can cause serious harm, and they still do it. They work hard to argue and lobby for and against certain terms to be used on labels, and in many cases, these labeling choices make it hard for consumers to know what is in their food.
For example, if a company wants to add nitrates but wants their food to seem more 'healthy,' they can add nitrates extracted from celery or rosemary, rather than artificial nitrates. These typically are the same level of nitrates, but can not only be put on the label as things like rosemary extract, or celery powder, or natural flavoring, the company can legally put 'no nitrates added' on the label.'
Another example I run into as a celiac: gluten free food.
The terms "gluten-free,” “no gluten,” “free of gluten,” or “without gluten" are terms that a company can use if their food is legally gluten free - these foods have to have less than a very specific amount of gluten contamination to meet the regulations.
But the terms 'do not contain gluten' or 'no gluten ingredients' are not legal labels for regulated gluten free food. They don't mean gluten free at all. A company can say this when they have simply not added gluten, regardless of whether or not there is significant gluten contamination in the product.
No only have I seen this type of thing on the label, it will literally be used to deliberately obfuscate.
Since the GF label is voluntary, some companies will have unlabeled GF products, so you have to email the company and inquire about the GF status. I have asked them flat out, 'is X product gluten free?' And receive back responses that say 'X product does not contain gluten.' then long meandering paragraphs about how much they care about their allergic customers, and finally near the end, the email MIGHT mention what their gluten free requirements are, but usually in a way where you can't quite tell if they are saying their product is or is not gluten free.
This isn't just one or two companies. It's probably about 1/2 of the companies I contact who do this, and most of them are big name companies. It's hard to imagine that GF labeling is the only type of labelling issue that they fudge this way, you know?
So, yeah, I know there are honest mistakes, but when you start having to cope with finding out if a company contains X or Y thing, for health reasons, you find out that quite a lot of their labeling decisions are very much a conscious choice that puts customers at risk but minimizes their legal culpability.
Another example, that is probably even better known, is the one of calorie-free oil sprays.
Or what to think of the "organic" industry that uses pesticides just as much as the "conventional" industry, just different ones?
Unfortunately, not only the companies are to blame, the consumers carry part of the blame. Examples of that would be the coconut oil craze, which people of my age remember as "tropical oil" and "bad for you" and used by "evil companies" such as McDonald's, which for no reason at all is now "natural" and "good for you" or high-fructose corn syrup which is "bad for you" and for no reason at all is "good for you" when much larger percentages of fructose are sold in "agave nectar" at ridiculous prices.0
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