Food Addiction: Could It Explain Why 70 Percent of Americans Are Fat?

Gormur said:
A lot of it's a lack of exercise due to the culture & urban sprawl. Go anywhere else in the world & you see people walking everywhere. While here, unless you live in NYC, you probably have a car and don't walk more than a few hundred ft a day
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I agree. But just like drug addiction, not being fit doesn't typically have one cause. It's often a combination of causes, some of which, but not limited to, are: a sedentary lifestyle, eating too much, bad nutrition, genetics, underlying (mental) health issues, etc.

But yes, eating right and doing a good amount of physical activity will be very beneficial to a lot of people. And I think a good start is to get them educated early about such things...
 
This really does make sense though, given that drugs utilise the same pleasure pathways in the brain, that developed to 'reward' people when they do self sustaining things like eat and fuck. Like slimvictor said, it's just a matter of degree, because if eating was as rewarding as say, meth, it'd never be evolutionarily sustainable. And that's the problem with processed foods - in evolutionary terms we're designed for food scarcity, or cycles of famine and feast, which is why we see obesity rates soaring when our circumstances change.
 
I know some people who crazily enough do consider food to be like a drug for themselves.

The one guy knows it and works on not overeating or binge eating like he used to, but the other guy is out of control and has major health problems because of it. :\
 
greed and too much access to food and fuck all exercise is why american's are fat.

also dont pump your beef full of growth hormones, is bound to have an impact in the food chain
 
slimvictor said:
Nobody chooses to be a heroin addict, cokehead, or drunk. Nobody chooses to be fat, either.
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I don't see how this lack of personal responsibility helps anybody. Yeah, some fat person might read this and feel better because now they have something to blame, but really all it does is add to the sense of helplessness. If we keep telling people it's not their fault they're fat then they won't see the point in trying to change it. While I understand that some people really do have bad genes that make it impossible or very difficult to lose weight, most people don't. Most people can lose weight if they eat right and exercise, they're not helpless to some "food addiction".
And I feel the same way about most drug addictions. It seems whenever I tell someone I used to have a problem with coke they feel bad for me and I don't understand why. It was my choice to continue using, every time I made that decision. If I was truly helpless to a drug, I wouldn't have been able to stop when I did. It was just at that time I valued the high more than any negative aspects of drug use. The same thing applies here, instant gratification over long-term results. And that's fine, but take some responsibility for it.
 
Sorry, I meant the alcohol turning into sugar part. I'm no expert on alcohol, but I don't think I've heard that before.
 
Where's the sugar part, though?


That's what I thought happened, once you drink you'll use that as fuel before anything else, which of course can lead to weight gain. I never heard that it turns into sugar.
 
Maybe he got it confused with the fact that sugar turns into alcohol and meant it the other way around? (Fruit fermenting, etc.)
 
ok thanks for clearing that up

in any case, anything that alters the mind, people crave and withdrawal from is a drug..so that would include theobromine, sugar, artifical sweeteners, caffeine etc..

the abundance of processed foods and BGH (bovine growth hormone) in peoples' diets certainly doesn't help matters either

nobody is taught proper nutrition in school. everything spouted in the mainstream is based on outdated food pyramids and trendy diets that usually do nothing but starve people
 
Gormur said:
ok thanks for clearing that up

in any case, anything that alters the mind, people crave and withdrawal from is a drug..so that would include theobromine, sugar, artifical sweeteners, caffeine etc..

the abundance of processed foods and BGH (bovine growth hormone) in peoples' diets certainly doesn't help matters either

nobody is taught proper nutrition in school. everything spouted in the mainstream is based on outdated food pyramids and trendy diets that usually do nothing but starve people
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I would agree that theobromine, sugar, caffeine etc. are drugs.
There is a recent article describing music as a drug as well.
It is interesting to think that, if food and music are "drugs", then where exactly does the category "drug" end?
What about exercise? It releases the same chemicals in the brain.
What about riding roller coasters?

What, exactly, is a drug?
 
I dont want to see americans getting slimmer and healthy, because when the aliens come, they are going to eat all the fat people first.
 
slimvictor said:
I would agree that theobromine, sugar, caffeine etc. are drugs.
There is a recent article describing music as a drug as well.
It is interesting to think that, if food and music are "drugs", then where exactly does the category "drug" end?
What about exercise? It releases the same chemicals in the brain.
What about riding roller coasters?

What, exactly, is a drug?
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I would say, at least, that all food would fall into the drug category..since it affects mood, energy level and hormones
 
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