on chunkiness
The whole obesity thing reeks of pseudo-science and media sensationalism. I haven't seen one thing yet that would lead me to believe that BMI isn't a useless, made-up number. Yet people seem to follow along, not questioning what it actually means when somebody says "60% of people are obese!" or something equivalent statistic and lays out the catastrophic consequences of that statement. You think you know what it means, but when you start to look at it critically, it kind of falls apart.
So I was glad today when Neil Gaiman pointed out an article that voices my disdain for the anti-fat jihad. I'd like to pick a quote and paste it, but there are a lot of good ones. I can't decide. It makes more sense than most of the health segment news reports. Go read. Enjoy.
I've been a little on the chunky side since puberty. I'd prefer not to be, but I also don't really care enough to do much about it. I kind of instinctively know that I'll never be able to keep to an "ideal" BMI of 25 or whatever. The only time (since puberty) I've come closest was when I has my near-nervous breakdown in college and pretty much stopped eating. That wasn't terribly healthy. I am, however, concerned about health consequences. I have diabetic grandparents on both sides of the tree and my mother is diabetic as well. I'm also considering the diet and excercise thing more nowadays.
Diet I'm less concerned about. For one thing, I like food. I don't see anything wrong with treating myself occasionally. It's the habitual stuff I'm more concerned about. My regular diet isn't really that bad, with a couple of exceptions I'm working on dealing with: snacking and drinking pop at work, most notably. Free pop is tempting. But 3-5 cans of Coke a day can't be good. So I've been cutting that back to one at most.
Work's kind of a problem. I have a sedantary job and a sedantary lifestyle. If anything, I need to get out and do more. At the end of the summer I biked to work at least twice a week, I felt better than I had since highschool at least. Then I bought a car. Biking is harder than driving. Still, there's some incentive there. And people have stopped caring whether I'm late for work again. So that's doable. I just wish we still had the showers here.
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writes:
Interesting article that makes quite a few good points. It would be better if the author didn't resort to sensationalistic phrases, the last paragraph that bashes America in particular (these views are fine to have but they have no business in an article dicussing fat, especially one touting science), and actually pointed to more studies to support his point.
Here's a great book you may want to check out. "The Testosterone Advantage Plan" by Schuler, Volek, Mejia, and Campbell. The book actually follows along the lines that the article was talking about, it's not about getting thin but about becoming more fit. It has the additional advantage of being a plan specifically designed for men. If nothing else it is an interesting read. I just started rereading it the other day.
If you're going to drink soda, drink the diet stuff. 12 oz. of regular Coke has 155 calories, and those calories are all coming from High Fructose Corn Syrup, which studies are showing is not broken down in the body as well as regular sugar (I believe the studies say that it is more readily transformed into fat). The diet stuff may take awhile to get used to but once you get used to it regular sodas start tasting disgusting (feel like you just drank a can of syrup). It is actually best to get rid of any daily soda drinking, which I have done over the past month or so, and drink water. Juice is good but they also contain a lot of calories.
Truthfully though, a person's weight, actually fitness, only matters in how one feels both mentally and physically about it. People can complain about society but it's the environment one had to contend with. You either have to accept it, change it, or ignore it (I prefer the last two) but you always have to deal with it.
One of the big things men in America, and in Europe also (I believe), should know about our society is that psychological studies have shown that the most common physical feature that women find attractive is a man's waist to hip ratio (waist shouldn't be bigger than the hips). Right or wrong, doesn't matter it's the way it is. I for one would rather increase my chances of finding a woman to share my life with than decrease it, especially when it already coincides with my own attitude of fitness.
Check out the book, it's worth taking a look at. It also has good information if diabetes is a concern.
Submitted 2004-04-26 09:08:46
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tinkerer
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Oh, hey--best way to stay active, burn calories and keep those muscles working? Acquire a small child who wants to be involved with *everything*! After several years of 14-16 hour days, you'll either be incredibly fit or dead from stress. lol!
Submitted 2004-04-29 19:58:49
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flying squirrel
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I think, for the time being, I'd rather get an exercise bike or something... :P
Submitted 2004-05-04 18:34:35
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