Social Why Americans are so Fat

a combination of deep fried salt and fat items at drive thrus, video game consoles, and cable/satellite tv/streaming
 
Kowboy On Sherdog said:
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I wonder how much dopamine that releases in the brain
 
For one thing, PFAS are altering/have altered of our genes and that's certainly contributing. But it boils down to Americans eat like shit. I'm not talking about the low hanging fried food, fast food and pizza diets. I see a lot of Americans who actually think they have a healthy diet and lifestyle, who eat like total shit.

Completely absurd levels of unhealthy protein based foods, fats, carbs, salt, sugar, processed food with tons of harmful additives, way too few fruits and veggies. Sucking down coca cola, snacks, candy as if they are harmless, drinking way too much booze. Telling themselves they're doing good because they eat a little side salad fitted for a rabbit once or twice a week. I used to be a victim of this myself, and its easier to get away with when you're young and have a humming metabolism, but that turns on you quick by mid 20's for most people.

I fell into the same trap everyone does. I was a workout and exercise fanatic, I grew up skinny and could eat anything so I had no concept of what was healthy and what wasn't, didn't even matter for a long time cuz I was rail thin regardless, consumed so many calories that it was like a sport of how much I could eat, and made the bogus assumption that maintaining a healthy weight is half exercise and half diet while lying to myself that I had a good diet for an active lifestyle. truth is its closer to 90% diet, 10% exercise for weight management. tbh it's pretty much all diet. Matter of fact, putting your body in a state where it craves calories is almost a guaranteed recipe to overeat.

When I ruined my leg and ankle and had to significantly decrease my activity levels, that was when curbing cravings and caloric intake got much easier. But I also got smarter about eating. Like I was one of many people who thought you could just have coffee and skip breakfast as if this is a cheat for weight loss, then I would wonder why by the end of the day I was so hungry I could eat an entire cow and had to go on late night binge fests. Something as simple as a couple eggs and homefries for breakfast vastly curbed my satiety for the rest of the day. Just a small breakfast made a huge difference.

People who realistically need 2500-4000 calories a day (depending on size) are eating double that. Motherfuckers going to the gym then eating a lg steak and cheese with 3000 mg of sodium, 8 slices of cheese honestly thinking "this is a great protein rich meal!". And then horking down half a bag of chips and soda with it. like wth are you doing. And then doing the same thing every day. Protein, fat and carb overload. It's a recipe for lifelong obesity.

And again, I've been there. I chalk it up to plain dietary ignorance and "not me" syndrome. I won't get fat, I work out. I'm not a fat person. When working out is the only thing keeping you from becoming obese. And then you get a little older, your metabolism slows down more and and here you are, 30-40 years old and you haven't even begun to learn about healthy foods and diet. Then its an uphill battle that many lose. Check out how many 20somes who play sports (or maybe not so much anymore) and are otherwise active and live in the weight room, are 20, 30 lbs overweight. Exercise regimen, on point. Diet, fucking terrible.

In this day and age, the only truly healthy foods are organic fruits and veggies and then you have to be smart about your proteins and carbs. Hardly anyone I know gives any consideration to how much salt they put in their body. Procesed meats long term are as bad as a meth habit, yet people eating deli meat think this is a nice a healthy meal. They just aren't educated on whats healthy. Hard to adjust something you aren't aware of. I said my piece Chrissy.
 
During grad school I took a Nutrition Epidemiology class and we deep dived into the Obesity Epidemic. All I can say is that it's a very complex multifactorial disease and it's not just the U.S. It's worsening globally and if you take into consideration of "hidden obesity," it's much worse.
 
Processed foods. Sugar. Salt. Lazy. Eat bc they feel unfulfilled in life.
 
One factor has to be almost all North American and even North European people I know can't cook for shit. It's not hard to learn at all but seems they don't even try. Most one can do is jack a lot of shit in an oven or crock pot with 2kg of butter and call it a day.
 
In the old days we had the necessary evil of fat shaming but nowadays we tell kids they're perfect even if they have the BMI of a sumo wrestler. Start encouraging the kids to insult their fat classmates again and you'll see a return to normalcy.

We could also try putting all the cheap processed foods at the end of strenuous obstacle courses.
 
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Well your "friend's cousin" is either hood as fuck or that's a fake story. Been American my whole life, and I have never met anybody who wouldn't be able to identify a pear or have only eaten "candied versions of fruit". I'm sure there are a couple people in the straight up ghetto or a trailer park who might not have seen a pear before, but pretty much nobody who wasn't on food stamps. In fact, the only people I've met who had never seen a fruit of any kind were foreign friends when it was a fruit they didn't have in their country.

Not sure what country you're from or if you've traveled much, but basically every country that isn't in Asia has a shitload of fat people. Most developed countries land somewhere between 30-45%. The US is probably at the higher end, but the trade off is that we also have more fit people and people who still take care of themselves after 30, while in Europe there are fewer big fat people, but like every single person over 35 looks like they've never exercised once in their life and they all have the same kind of mushy body and narrow shoulders and droopy skin. Poor people in Northern Africa and South America aren't fat, but it's fucking crazy going to some market and seeing their poor people that have like hunch backs, boyles on their skin, and missing teeth.

Like everything else foreigners claim about "Americans" when they don't actually know what they're talking about, you're probably confusing poor people with the whole country. Middle class and up are normal to fit, with a few fat people, but mostly normal weight to fit. Our poor people have most of the obesity, commit most of the crime, are bad drivers who smash into things and still drive around in a car with the door caved in or bumper hanging off, most of them have pit bulls, can't seem to hold down a job for any extended period, and they're mostly single moms and deadbeat dads who keep having like 9 kids with several people when they couldn't even afford the first one.
 
The poisons they put in our food. The erosion of the nuclear family means less are learning how to cook so they eat out. Over reliance on fast and easy. Uneducated after being conditioned with harmful propaganda from the government.
 
Ima drop it down. Whole foods. The further you can get from processing the better. Load up on bogo chicken breast. Load up on sales on lean beef. Load up on bogo yogurt. I piss chickens and shit cows.
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pugilistico said:
I haven't been to the states in some time and I forget how bad it is in the states in regards to health and obesity.

One of my good friends who's also lived abroad for years and recently moved back to Virginia has been telling me what it's like and I'm vicariously getting reverse culture shock with the shit she's telling me about how people eat and live.

One of the most shocking things my friend told me was she went out grocery shopping with her friend and friend's cousin, and the cousin who's in her mid 20s, picked up a fruit and said, "What's this?" It was like a pear or something common, not a rare exotic fruit. This grown woman only ever ate candied versions of fruit that she never seen what they actually look like.

It seems Americans have totally different conception of what "healthy" eating is. People eat shit like chicken tenders and fries all the time and think their obesity is genetic. I've met people who think I'm some kind of health freak because I eat vegetables. I even knew a guy in his 30s who had scurvy for Christ's sake.

Americans are the only group of adults I've met who have discussions about which fast food place is better.

There's no two ways about it: Americans are fat as fuck. Obesity rates in other countries are increasing but I haven't seen the giant behemoths in other countries like I have in the states. It's an entirely different class of "fat."

This must have something to do with education (or lack thereof) and laziness, to tie it in with my other thread, but I wonder if mental health plays a part as well. Why else would anyone give up on themselves to the point they can't fit in a car or need a mobility scooter? Why are we turning into depressed, low IQ, fat lazy fucks?

Other factors like lack of public transportation and over reliance on cars. Nobody walks or bikes anywhere because of the lack of infrastructure.
There really isn't a wider culture of walking or hiking or generally being active. It seemed to me that people in general were outside more in other countries, even in countries that get cold.

There also seems to be a weird extreme where people are either obsessed with fitness and looking jacked (which isn't necessarily healthy either), or they're just fat slobs.

Maybe it's because it's so much easier in the US to order something cheap and shitty than to go out to a restaurant where it'd be more expensive and you'd have to tip on top of it. Definitely easier than buying groceries and cooking yourself.

I know sherdoggers aren't the best sample size since we're all jacked 6'6 +220 lbs of muscle, but I can't be the only one who's disturbed by this?
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It's simple. Americans are addicted to junk and fast food and most don't exercise.
 
nostradumbass said:
Well your "friend's cousin" is either hood as fuck or that's a fake story. Been American my whole life, and I have never met anybody who wouldn't be able to identify a pear or have only eaten "candied versions of fruit".
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Living in Florida at the time. I'm eating an avocado walking and inspecting the production line. One of my operators comes up and asks, what the fuck is that? Had never seen or heard of an avocado. Early 20s white dude.
 
I’ve been doing a lot of research on this lately. Everything people in the states eat has a laundry load of ingredients and chemicals in it, and the body can’t run and burn the calories like it should because of the effects.

Chinese annd Italians only eat a few hundred less calories than Americans do, but they eat more naturally. The Chinese only have a 9% Obesity rate compared to the nearly 50% obesity rate here. And it’s not because Americans are getting lazier; from what I’ve read in the literature; activity and caloric rates haven’t changed much since 1990, but the obesity rate has soared over 30%.
 
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We don't walk and we drive everywhere. Our portions are also rather big. Even appetizers are the serving sizes of a meal.
 
Travis Alexander said:
Real Sherdogger checking in. Also I live in LA health and beauty are commonplace here. There’s a gym and Pilates studio every 5 feet. TS you said your friend moved to Virginia but if you go to SoCal, Miami, NY you will see scores of people in incredible shape.
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LA is a different world. I feel my attractiveness points go down whenever I go to LA haha. I can definitely feel that people are much more concerned with their looks over there.

Osculater said:
Yeah even vegans are hella fat now hahaha
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A lot of vegan products are junk too now.

Renard said:
Imo food culture is a big aspect of it. It's something that people don't think about because it's in the background. North American parents in general don't know how to cook or prepare anything and they don't appreciate good food because they've never had any. They raise their kids on processed food, fast food, packaged meals, with a bland homecooked meal sprinkled here and there (half-made from packaged ingredients). The kid grows up as a fat ignorant adult who thinks packaged meals for every meal is the norm and the cycle repeats. Society as a whole is like that too, it's not set up for people who want quality ingredients and products, everything is low quality and full of additives.

In some European countries like France or Italy even people who say they "can't cook" know a lot. They say that because in their mind knowing how to cook is a high bar. From childhood they were given an informal education on how food should be prepared, what quality ingredients are, how food should taste, how food should be eaten (at mealtimes, not in front of the TV), etc, by their family. The whole of society is like that, and there's a robust backbone of farmers and artisans who produce quality food that people want. Even McDonalds is forced to sell good shit over there, otherwise they'd shut down because the locals wouldn't put up with it.

As a North American even if you went on a health kick and started eating protein, reading labels and pumping iron your brain is still running the idiot software. You'll never know as much as the Europeans do without even trying. The Euros don't even care about gym culture or "working out" because they've got nothing to compensate for. They're already slim and sort of in shape from walking all day.
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I agree. The concept of food is entirely different. As you said, for many people packaged meals and fast food is what people consider to be food. For me fast food is no more a meal than eating a bunch of candy bars would be a meal; it's the occasional self-indulging "treat" but for a lot of people it's a daily staple. And that's one of the biggest factors. There's a cultural element to it and Americans don't even know what "healthy" is. It's like people really can't put two and two together. "Why can't I lose weight? I'm only eating one serving of burgers or frozen pizza every meal!"

One of the most profound differences I noticed when I dated European women vs Americans is what we would tend to eat and how much we cook. Totally different attitude and tendencies towards food.
 
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