The Washington Post gives us 1000 words about a really smart guy with the
“kind of discipline that enabled him to earn a law degree from the University of Chicago while attending Harvard Medical School” who turns to dumpster diving in order figure out how Chili’s is making him (an us) fat.
At 5-foot-11, Kessler’s weight has swung from 160 pounds to 230 pounds and back, many times over. He owns pants in sizes ranging from 34 to 42.
“I was a fat kid,” he said. “I grew up in the world of Entenmann’s cakes. I was pretty much of a science nerd. If you looked in my refrigerator in college, it was Entenmann’s.”
Every few years, Kessler would go on a diet and apply the kind of discipline that enabled him to earn a law degree from the University of Chicago while attending Harvard Medical School. “I’d lose weight and over time gain it back,” said Kessler, who also completed a medical residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore at the same time he worked as a staffer to Sen. Orrin Hatch. “I couldn’t control it.”
The man who took on Big Tobacco was helpless when confronted with a plate of chocolate chip cookies. He couldn’t focus on anything else until he had eaten them all.
“My weight was yo-yoing all the time,” said Kessler, who estimates that 70 million Americans struggle with conditioned hyper-eating. “And I never understood why.”
(More…)
Five paragraphs from the bottom the author finally mentions that that this highly disciplined guy has finally started exercising for the first time in his life. “I hated physical activity, all of my life, mostly because I was fat and it was hard to do.”
So in other words, it could be the fat, salt and sugar in the Chili’s eggroll.
Or, it could be the lack of exercise.
Nothing is anyone’s fault, unless you mean a corporation, and then they’re responsible for everything that might go wrong with anything they have any association with.
We as individuals have no control whatsoever in our lives. We are all just awash on the sea of temptation and gratification, riding the waves wherever they take us, with no ability to make a decision to the contrary.
Whatever we do is simply a biological response that we have no control over. And even if I’m forced to cede that we DO control ourselves, or that we DO have the ability to act contrary to such motivation, we certainly don’t have the responsibility to do so.
Nothing that a little government regulation can’t cure….
Exactly what I’m afraid of. Then where will I get my Krispy Kremes!? Where will I get my other-foods-that-substitute-Ks-for-Cs?!??!?
Klearly, Kuba after Kastro will turn into a sugar/tobacco narco-state if Obama normalizes relations. We’ll all go there for vacation to have cigars and pop rocks on the beach.
Does it surpise you that there’s a concerted effort on behalf of the food industry of america to sell as much food as possible and minimize the amount of information they put on packages provided to their consumers (and competitors)? I guess the FIA just trying to protect themselves the same way the dumpster divers are trying to protect themselves.
Brian, I know you like to avoid foods with high fructose corn syrup. How did you know that you should avoid eating that stuff? You probably educated yourself by finding information available on the internet. Certainly the FIA wasn’t going to tell you that it wasn’t helpful to your body. I think a raising public awareness is a better approach, but many people just don’t understand anyway.
Although I don’t yo-yo like Kessler and many other overweight folks, but I do tend to go through cycles of eating more and less junk food such as ice cream, frozen pizzas, chips, sugary cereals, etc., I usually begin to feel sluggish and lazy, more irritable and pack on a few extra pounds. When I switch to eating yogurt, fruits, vegetables, rice, my body feels much better and lose a little weight.
Are people still talking about High Fructose Corn Syrup? I thought that meme had died a long time ago.
As for the labeling. I love it. I like being able to know what I’m eating. But yeah, it’s no surprise companies don’t want to tell us how much nasty stuff is in the food they make.
I was reading in the local paper not long ago about some new program Hy Vee was participating in called NuVal where the foods would have a rating, 1-100 on a healthiness scale. 100 being something like raw broccoli and 1 being something like deep fried egg roll sauce. It was all based on some metric designed by a nutritional specialist from calculations of fat, fiber, calories, sugar, etc. It sounded like a great plan. I’d love to see that implimented all over. I can only imagine it leading to healthier foods as companies try to get their cookies to clock in at a 20 instead of a 10 because the competitor does or whatever. Anyone else seen this popping up?
http://www.hy-vee.com/health/nuval.asp
Joe,
My main concern here is intellectual honesty and the failure of a venerable old newspaper like the Washington Post to present the facts in an even-handed manner. I certainly am not relieving the food industry of their part of the blame. But the failure to reveal until the last few paragraphs of your article that the subject of your “why am I fat” story hasn’t exercised for the first 50 or so years of his life is not an honest contribution to the public discourse.
It certainly doesn’t surprise me that the FIA’s goal is to sell food and make a profit. The same as with the alcohol industry, the tobacco industry, the gun lobby, drug dealers or any other lobby you care to associate them with. Its what they do. Its my choice whether to consume it or not.
I absolutely agree with you that the first solution is greater dissemination of information by the food industry. One of my very first articles here addressed the Coca-cola company’s ridiculous and artificial attempts to give consumers nutrition information. In case you don’t recall, they don’t list sugar on the chart for any of their sodas, but do list it for water.
It was only after much frustration that I came to realize that “carbs equal sugar” when it comes to soda. But now, if you do a google search for “sugar can coke,” the first thing that pops up is my article, laying out the information in as plain a detail as I can.
I’ve done a lot of research over the last few years regarding the best ways to live a long, healthy life. I try to share that information. I hope that the people that are close to me and who read it take it to heart. I certainly try to follow it, even though it can be difficult.
But in the overall scope of things, I can honestly say that I don’t think its any of my business if every other person in America is a big fatty. I tend to believe that people should be left alone to make their own decisions.
Like I said, I’m all for making the information more readily available, but after a certain point, what good is more information? Does your opinion of Chili’s egg rolls really change if you know exactly how much crap they shove into it? Don’t you already know that too much of it is unhealthy for you?
By this point, saying that you didn’t know that eating too much McDonald’s or too much Chili’s is bad for you is like saying that you didn’t know that smoking can give you cancer.
” Don’t you already know that too much of it is unhealthy for you?”
A guy made a movie probing this very delicate and confusing issue. It was called “Supersize Me”. Just going off a miraculous hunch, he discovered that if you eat McDonalds every meal of every day, and Supersize the fries and Soda on every meal, you’ll gain weight and be really unhealthy. He also discovered that McDonalds makes an actual effort to get people to buy their food (the nerve!). What a revelation. I never in a million years could have figured that out without the aid of a major motion picture.
Brian, the “I havent exercised part in 50 years” didnt strike me the same way as it did you, but yeah that is rather noteworthy.
I would argue that you dont really need to exercise to maintain a normal weight or state of health. Assuming I eat normally, my typical daily activities should keep me at a somewhat reasonable weight.
I am aware of what is and whats not good for me, but there are many, many, many, many, many, many, people out there that don’t understand that an apple is lot better for them than a apple toaster struddle. And Mike, you certainly learned somewhere at sometime what is good and bad you.
I just wonder why nearly every school has vending machines filled with sugary drinks and junk food but few schools sell fresh fruit or vegetables. Where’s the farmer’s lobby!!!!
I still do find it amazing that you can actually cram 12 tsp of sugar into a can of coke. Pretty amazing.
Mike,
I read an article about Nuval or a competitor a few months back. I didn’t realize that they were in the implementation stage already. I agree that it is a good thing. Especially as you say if it causes the FIA to compete against one another on the basis of nutrition.
Some not-random scores after scanning through the scores on their website:
Tortilla Chips
100% Whole Wheat Bread
(Source)
Some Random thoughts:
“All other sources of expert guidance?” Canada, the U.K., and Australia set no recommended limits for cholesterol intake. The Harvard School of Public Health says that “For most people, the mix of fats in the diet influences cholesterol in the bloodstream far more than cholesterol in food does.”
I also question the relatively low score given to avocados. Are they being penalized for the high mono-unsaturated fat content?
(Btw, Mike it looks like you have the answer to your “where to I go for my K’s that should be C’s.)
Overall, I think its definitely a step in the right direction. Maybe not so much for the ratings of natural, unprocessed foods, but rather simply for highly processed stuff.
And either way its probably a big step up for a lot of people who aren’t really interested in researching about a healthy diet.
For the first time in a long time I actually have sugar in the house. I think I’m going to take some pictures and add them to the page.
Hopefully I’ve got twelve spoons.
“I question how well these scores translate between categories. Can you really compare bread to meat?”
I think this question is pushing the limits of such a system.
It’s by no means flawless, as you’ve pointed out, but like you say, a step in the right direction.
I just like the idea of basically “judging” processed foods in a way that the public might notice (i.e. you don’t have to know that 20gm of fat per serving is bad, or that 5gms of fiber per serving is good) and the manufacturer will almost certainly have to deal with. I guarantee you, if lays original potato chips have a score of 20, then pringles will make sure they have a 25. I can see them going back and forth and even using this number in advertising (or more likely negative ads against a competitor).