To think 'big food' industry is to blame for the obesity epidemic, not individuals?

[aintnothinbutagstring]

When I read on MN, and when I talk to people IRL, there's an underlying attitude to obesity that it is all down to willpower, or lack of, and individual choice over whether to be fat or thin. If we all tried a little harder and were disciplined, everyone could be their ideal weight.

I recently got on to reading some books on processed food, they are not new concepts, the ideas have been around a while. Lots of scientists and MDs from the US, where the obesity epidemic is a little further down the road than in the UK, have written about the addictive nature of processed food, books such as 'Wheat Belly', 'The Dorito Effect', Robert Lustig has done many talks on it. In the UK, Joanna Blythman has wrote quite a bit on the UK food industry.

Some have linked processed food to activating dopamine receptors in the brain so it works like other addictions. Yet cannot escape it once we walk into a supermarket, most of what is for sale there is very highly processed food. It's all sugar, salt, wheat, the bad fats (processed oils like rapeseed, not natural fats which are healthy). Flavours created by amazing scientists so you'd rather eat the flavour chemicals than the actual food.

Yet we are telling obese people, some of whom may be using food addiction to deal with past trauma, lifestyle stress etc, 'it is your choice, what you eat, you need to try harder, have more self respect, more willpower'.

I see obese people now as 'you are a victim of 'big food', the companies (only a handful of global billion pound companies) that produce and cleverly advertise and use supermarkets to sell this highly refined, highly addictive processed food'. If they were educated and told it's not their fault, they might decide they don't want to play the 'big food' game anymore.

Eating habits have definitely changed over the last 50 years. When we were kids we had 3 meals a day and maybe a digestive biscuit with a glass of squash when we got home from school.

When DSis's kids were young, 20 years ago, they had 3 meals a day plus 2 or 3 snacks of yoghurt, fruit, dried fruit etc.

When BIL's kids were young, 10 years ago, they seemed to be eating constantly - I used to go out for a 2 hour walk with SIL and the kids and she'd be weighed down with cheese strings and crackers and boxes of juice and fruit bars so the kids weren't hungry, despite finishing breakfast 20 minutes before we went out and having lunch as soon as we got home.

Most children don't know what hunger is - they say 'I'm hungreeeee' and are immediately offered food. Some of the threads on here about feeding teenage boys are ridiculous - the excuse that teenagers need to eat so much is perhaps a bit daft - the problems arise when they don't need so much food anymore, but are used to eating huge amounts and it's a hard habit to break.

On the subject of crap ready meals etc, DMum eats quite a few ready meals as she can't stand for more than a few minutes, so it's easier for her to chuck a lasagne in the microwave. We had a look at the labels on this stuff and the lasagne, which weighed 400g had 11% minced beef, so just over 40g. You could certainly make lasagne from scratch much cheaper if you used the same ratio of ingredients - it's just not as convenient.

I write this as a lard-arse - I'm trying to lose 3 stones. I know what I need to do, I know I eat too much. I don't think it's fat shaming to point out that being obese is unhealthy. The government (any government) would walk a fine line between legislating on unhealthy food, encouraging people to be healthier and if necessary slimmer, funding the NHS to deal with the results of the obesity epidemic and being seen to be interfering in people's lives and choices.

I agree @aintnothinbutagstring, and also with food deserts playing a huge part. Also the fact that the vast majority of families don't have someone at home to do from-scratch cooking with fresh ingredients. My Granny remembers in the 70s when supermarkets, ready meals and processed food were really taking off, what a liberation it was for her to not have to cook from scratch 3 times a day for 9 people.

All these are obviously linked to capitalism, and i really feel that 'personal choice' is tied up with coercion from advertising and the diet industry, adjusted social norms and personal trauma. Much like plastic surgery is touted as a 'choice' existing in a seeming vacuum from the 1000s of images of 'perfection' we see every day and rising mental health issues attached to the resultant body dismorphia. I found 'Fat is a Feminist Issue' and 'First Bites' really enlightening as to how - particularly for women - those who have a healthy relationship with food are in the minority and how some serious examination of how we interact with food on a familial and societal level is needed to fully address that fact.

People make their own choices.

Yes, but the way people make their choices is influenced by a lot of things beyond their control as well as by things that are within their control. It is not easy to override the effects of genetics, upbringing or experience. That doesn't mean obesity can be blamed entirely on the food industry, but it does mean that it's a lot more complex than just telling people to 'eat less, move more' (which may be true in a physical sense, but does nothing to remove the many obstacles preventing people from doing it).

Ok, so if people make their own choices, how come so many people in the same geographical areas make the same choices as each other? How could governments encourage/ nudge them towards different choices?

We don't value self-discipline enough as a culture.
Now hang on, I'm not saying fat people have no self-discipline.
But SDisc is a very overlooked virtue in western societies, where most of the fat people are. I think there's a connection.
If you want to talk about how to 'nudge' people into healthier choices.

Ok, but I'm talking about different areas within countries, including Western ones. Do the residents of Richmond value self-discipline more that those of Rotherham? Did they just make a different choice? Why and how?

"But SDisc is a very overlooked virtue in western societies, where most of the fat people are. I think there's a connection."

I don't think that's why people in western societies are fatter though. When people from the east come here, they get fat as well. When poorer countries start adopting western foods, they also get fatter.

Did Asian folk who came to the west get fat because they embraced the western ideals of being avid consumers. Opulent loud public consumption and materialism were held up as exciting and admirable in how I was raised, too.

DD & DS are into the tv cartoon show Avatar. It's an American tv show but very oriental culture infused. There are many times so far when the Avatar learns a lesson where he gets the best outcome by using restraint, reflection, waiting, patience, simplicity, being calm. How many western tv shows have you seen that repeatedly extol those virtues?

There's supposed to be this common cultural thing in Japan about putting your fork down & stopping the meal the first moment you feel full. You can love your food but it's a huge publicly acclaimed virtue to only consume it moderately. Who among us was praised to do that at the dinner table?

uno there may be a bit of "herd mentality" crunchy granola type villages (more bike shops/bike riders/yoga shops) might promote a healthier lifestyle.
places where only french fries and soft serve ice cream are available in an indirect way are not promoting the healthier lifestyle.
places which have a pathway that encourages walking vs those by major road works which prevent strolling.

"Who among us was praised to do that at the dinner table?"

I was told to finish my plate and made to sit there until I'd finished (or managed to spit it into the toilet or whatever). That's seen as a no-no now, but there's a new emphasis on not wasting food, which I think is quite harmful to the aim of eating only what our body needs.