Ok I know I am going to get hung drawn and quartered

[muckypup73]

But just lately I have been reading a lot of woman mags, ie Chat, Take a break ect and there always seems to be stories about large people dieting and losing loads of weight, now thats all well and good but dieting is like quitting ciggarettes or giving up choclate or giving up the booze or drugs or any other habbits you can think of.

So why I am reading lots of acheivments about the weightloss? never see any stories about anyone quitting fags, or wine or choclate or anything else?

They even had a bloody 4 page spread about weightloss, I mean come on would you have a 4 page spread about someone that quit fags? or booze ect showing how good they look? I wonder why they do it so much and so often?

Because being fat is visible. Being a smoker often isn't so nobody can see a great difference in someone that has quit smoking/drinking.

I do agree with you in principle though. The truth is most people don't want to be fat and a lot of people are struggling to lose weight so these articles are supposed to inspire them.

There loads about people quitting alcohol

1. There are loads of stories about people quitting alcohol which aim to show just how better/healthier they are than before.

2. The weight management industry is worth billions. Editors know weight-loss related content will sell.

YANBU. That's actually the reason I stopped buying magazines, too many articles on weight loss/gain. The final straw was a double page spread about some celebrity on a beach either losing/putting on weight and I just thought who the fuck cares?

There should be separate weight loss/diet magazines(maybe there is) and leave it out of the others. I used to buy the Celeb ones for the gossip , not to see who'd lost 3 pound.

Yes because these celebs often have an unlimited budget and a personal trainer as well as lots of time on their hands. Hardly comparable to your average woman in her 30s holding down a job, looking after the kids with a food budget and a work out DVD

they do it because it increases feelings of low self esteem in their readers, triggering them to continue hopeless yoyo diets and buy magazines with articles promising to show them the magic solution that will really work this time. its a win win for media sales. cigarette addiction is less tied up with self esteem issues and alcoholism is still a hidden problem.

It's because weight is visible and measurable. I've been addicted to before and after photos ever since I first read teen magazines decades ago. There's something compelling in seeing visible transformations.

I suppose the Before and After pictures of dramatic weight loss are a key part of it. Let's face it, these magazines are very focused on pictures and bright colours.

I see your point but agree with pps that an addiction to food is a more "acceptable" issue and less taboo than drugs or alcohol.

As someone who's lost a lot of weight, I think it's quite different to quitting smoking or alcohol. You can't just stop eating as you need to eat to live. With smoking/drinking, you can avoid both for the rest of your life. I'm not saying it's easy to stop if you've got an addiction, but it's definitely easier to avoid your addiction once you've quit. Imagine if you had to smoke a little bit in order to live, but can't have loads because it's bad for you. That's the same as trying to keep weight off once you've lost it IMO. Plus you have to go to supermarkets to buy food, where you constantly have unhealthy foods in your face that you have to consciously avoid. And you have to walk past restaurants and fast food places everywhere. Yes, there are pubs & shops selling cigarettes and alcohol, but it's less in your face IMO.

Because society deems it acceptable to be a smoker, or a drinker, and to some degree, to be taking drugs, and thus, when giving up those vices it is usually seen as being a boring old fart.

But my god...be overweight and you may as well be killing kittens. Therefore, society makes it into a huge deal when you lose weight, because being fat is worse than anything else, apparently.

I dont think being fat is worst than anything though.

I agree with you but I did quit smoking and felt I deserved several 4 page spreads and a few medals :) etc etc Not really I did it 6 years ago to try for children and now have two wonderful girls.

Because magazines like the "embarassing" before shots.

Hot woman with ciggies beside pic of same hot woman looking exactly the same except without ciggie doesn't exactly have the same effect! Remember that shit biker add that was supposed to show she could still look cool without the fabs she looked cooler smoking tho

Because, in general, people spend money on losing weight but save money by quitting alcohol, smoking or drugs.

I said the same to dh the other day.
There are groups for losing weight, giving up alcohol etc but nothing for smokers.

Those magazines are terrible - don't read them. They are filled with stories of other people's lives being shit to make you feel better about your own. Photos of famous people looking crap to try to make you feel better about being less successful than them.

They generally try to get you to wear clothes that will look fugly and follow recipes that sound vile.

Step away!

What Emma said. It's very hard to shift any addiction, but especially those where you still have to partake in your addictive habit to stay alive.

I used to buy those magazines too but I stopped as pp say - bad for your self esteem. I just read mumsnet instead and actually learn things from the fab posters here.

That sounds a bit like Mumsnet then Kitten
I'm joking of course..

More people have been fat or nearly fat, than have struggled with fags booze etc. So wider bunch of people will be interested and will have tried to change.

I can't ID with drug-booze-ciggie problems, but I totally can find interest in body reduction studies.

The fact that the weight loss industry is worth billions, year in and year out, just demonstrates to me that diets simply do not work in the medium to long term.

MaQueen, of course diets work if you follow CICO. It's physics. But unless you have the willpower to make sure you don't out it back on again, you're going to slowly get big again. It's constant and people make the mistake of thinking "right, I've reached my target, time to buy a new wardrobe and order a chinese".

Agree Joff. But you need to think in terms of changing your life, for the rest of your life. Rather than just changing your diet for 6 months, or whatever.

I think because dieting success stories can very clearly be portrayed in pictures, making them ideal for magazines. If you quit smoking/drinking you might well have an improved complexion and look healthier, but there wouldn't be anything to make a really dramatic photo-shoot.

I agree that these stories are popular because it's amazing to see the physical difference, people who have lost huge amounts of weight can look like a completely new person.

However I don't agree that dieting and loosing weight is the same as giving up smoking or drinking.
When you give up smoking or drinking you don't need to ever touch them again, you can't give up food. Every day you have to have a little bit of the thing you are addicted too, every day you have to control it and have just the right amount.
I say this as some who has not only given up smoking in the past but who has also lost almost 9st. Loosing weight is by far the hardest thing I've ever done and I'll have to work at it for the rest of my life.

Idont agree, yes you have to go out and buy food, but when you have stopped smoking you have to go out on the streets, where people are smoking all around you, even on the school run people walking down the road with a fag, the temptation is always there whever you to have to go buy them or not. The smell is always somewhere.