Parrot

Here's an article that I think illustrates sensationalism and food scares very clearly: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/stor...0424?hub=Health Excerpt: Betsy, you should enjoy picking on this one. I've read at least one blogger ranting about how the effects were probably due to carbohydrates instead of fat. I don't know about that, but it is one of the things that indicates to me a lack of consideration for all confounding factors. It seems that the only confounding factors they even considered were Sodium and Potassium. Couldn't they have put a little more effort into this? What would be more convincing is if they made some sort of special breakfast nutritional bar. Make 2 kinds, with the same level of nutrients and everything - the only variation being the amount of fat in each. And seriously, this study SHOULD have been double-blind! That's just common sense! Neither the researchers nor the participants should have known whether they were testing the high-fat breakfast or the low-fat breakfast. Science has constantly shown us that health affects can be severely affected by the psychosomatic effect. If people know that the experiment is about the negative effects of a high fat meal, and they know that they've just had a high fat meal.... well, you do the math! Here's another cute trick: They tested the High Fat breakfast first! Why didn't they think to at least randomize the order for each participant? Of course the stress tests are going to yield completely different results the second time around simply because the participants have experienced it before and know what to expect! And then they come out and say that an average of 25% increase in blood pressure is "a whopping effect". News Flash: Blood Pressure can vary by as much as 40% during the course of a day! This 25% increase is statistically insignificant! This study is clearly deeply, deeply flawed. And yet just about everybody has been re-printing it without question! These scientists should know better.... but they don't. Journalists should be more critical.... but they aren't. Doesn't this clearly illustrate how bad science and fear mongering are trying to make you afraid of your food? Next time you see fear mongering headlines, I encourage you all to look at them with a critical eye.

Really? That's good to know. Where do I find them? (I've never seen any)

Not to mention that dimmer switches will be a thing of the past.

Well, there have been some religious books considered to be holy written in more recent times. The Mormon's have the book of Mormon. The Babis have The Book of Certitude, The Hidden Words, and a few others. Scientologists have Dianetics and some other stuff written by Hubbard. The thing is, even since before the Holy Bible was officially put together from the random selection of books that make up it's parts, people have emphasized the importance of age as being critical. Older, more ancient documents were considered to be naturally more reliable than more recently written work. A certain document called "Shepherd of Hermas" almost made it into the Bible, but was rejected in part because it didn't have the same authority of age as the rest of the books. I think that's just the way things go. As a society we respect religious books more if they were written a long time ago. But that doesn't mean that there aren't books any written today that won't become well respected religious literature in a couple hundred years.

Betsy, please forgive me for not addressing this post earlier, somehow I missed it in the midst of responding to your other posts. I wasn't able to view the page that you sent me to, but I did have a look at the realfoodnutrients.com website. It doesn't look very trustworthy to me. They make a lot of unsubstantiated claims and use a heck of a lot of junk science to back them up. Oh, and they're trying to sell me something. What a surprise! The idea that carbohydrates cause diabetes is just another version of the "sugar causes diabetes" myth (simple sugars being our most popular carbohydrate - and the form that all carbohydrates are broken down into). This myth is officially rejected by all diabetes organizations (The Diabetes Society, The American Diabetes Association, etc... ) The truth is that medical science hasn't been able to figure out what causes insulin resistance. What we do know is that obesity has been associated as a risk factor, and a lot of speculation has resulted from that. But no credible doctor or scientist will make the statement that diabetes is caused by carbohydrates. I was unable to find the original article comparing the Atkins diet plan. However, here is some information from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atkins_Nutritional_Approach Some of the documents in support of the Atkins diet note that when carbohydrates were reduced, "study subjects spontaneously reduced their caloric intake" Apparently the Atkins diet naturally causes people to eat less. There have been several reasons advanced for this, some of the most vocal critics of the Atkins diet suggest that the simple restriction of food choice is enough to account for a reduction in calories. In any case, there's a lot of debate out there over the safety and effectiveness of the Atkins diet. Medical professionals seem to be split on this. I think it's a good thing that the Atkins diet is challenging common medical beliefs, but in the end it hasn't been proven to be any more effective at long term weight loss than any other diet. Although I do really like the fact that Atkins has pissed of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

Well, perhaps I'm misinformed. I haven't been doing as much research on specific diet plans. I assume you're referring here to my statement about the Atkins diet being low in calories. I don't believe I said, though, that Atkins requires counting of calories. I read that information a while back in an article comparing different diet plans and noting that Atkins dieters lost slightly more. One thing that was noted in addition was that the Atkins dieters did consume a low amount of calories. I'm sure that was as a result of other factors though rather than by any conscious effort on the dieter's part. I'll see if I can't find that article once more for you.

Betsy, I know EXACTLY what you mean. It's confusing as hell, isn't it? But we know its a sad truth that you just can't trust the headlines to give you the full story. If you want to know what's really going on you have to do some digging. And even then you're not guaranteed to get your hands on absolute truth... but I figure that with research you can at least back up what you're trying to say. I've come to exactly the same realization. Here's how I look at it: We're all full of it, every single one of us. Even the experts can't be trusted to always be right. You're correct not to take what I have to say unquestioningly, I'm just some dumbass trying to promote the truth as I see it. I'm not always right, there's no reason to expect anybody to trust me just because I say so. The best thing I find is to just tell the truth as you see it and let people decide for themselves. If you're interested in a subject, do your research. But be sure to take everything you read with a grain of salt, including opinions that agree with yours. That's the standard I try to go by. It doesn't mean that I'm not a dumbass, but at least I'm a more knowledgeable dumbass. I think that's the best any of us can really expect to aspire to. In thinking about this I've been creating a set of rules for myself in order to try and weed out the truth from the fiction. My rule #1 is to be suspicious of fear-mongering. And this "obesity epidemic" positively reeks of fear mongering. But yeah, in the end it is completely your choice to make as to what you believe. I hope I've at least given you something to think about, though.

Betsy, you are a woman after my own heart. I also feel the need to research information on interesting new claims right away after I hear them. I read through this article you found. It seems to give a well rounded review of what people have been saying about the study. Like I already mentioned, some people have criticized them for not taking some things into account or question some of the confounding factors that they did take into account. It seems to me to be a lot of quibbling over small details. But I don't think anybody has insinuated that these figures aren't based on solid data. And this study definitely did take into account a lot of confounding factors that were negligently absent from the earlier study. I think it's fair to say that even if the study didn't take into account all causes of death, that if being even slightly overweight were as harmful to your health as some would have you believe that we would see a corresponding increase in mortality from this study. The fact that we don't is very telling. If you don't mind, I'd like to address a couple of sections from this article you quoted: This seems to me to be an attempt at a straw-man argument. That's the logical fallacy of trying to put words into your opponent's mouth that they've never said in order to rebuke them on a position that they've never held. I don't believe any of the pundits that are happy about this study believe that we shouldn't make an effort to eat healthy foods. As far as I know, nobody's taking this study as a green light to pig out on nothing but donuts and cheesecake. But I think it's safe to say that there is no such thing as an "Obesity Epidemic" and that efforts trying to fight this non-existent threat are thoroughly misguided. This is, of course, referring to the study that purported to show a 61% increase in diabetes between the years of 1991 to 2001. The problem with this study is that it was done entirely through telephone interviews. Many factors can account for huge skewing of that data. Even just the fact that people are becoming more aware of diabetes can account for higher reporting of it in telephone interviews like this. Luckily, we have actual data on this based on blood samples and laboratory results, not self-reported telephone interviews. This data comes from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). It is much more accurate, and according to the CDC: "indicate that the prevalence of diabetes, either diagnosed or undiagnosed, and impaired fasting glucose did not appear to increase substantially during the 1990s." For my money, I'm trusting the actual laboratory statistics over some half-baked telephone interview scheme.

Hey Betsy, good to see somebody challenging my claims. I always do research before saying these things, but I definitely appreciate that you want to see my sources and make up your own mind. If you want to really dig into this study I recommend this article by Sandy Swarc, whom I have a great deal of respect for and have mentioned before: http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=042505D If you want to look at the technical release, here's a small page on that from the Journal of the American Medical Association: http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstr...ourcetype=HWCIT It's a little dry and technical. But the authors interestingly also speculate that "The impact of obesity on mortality may have decreased over time, perhaps because of improvements in public health and medical care." I will note that some people have questioned some of the steps they've taken in order to account for a variety of confounding factors. But most agree that their stance on their methodology is defensible, and that these numbers are a huge improvement over the big 400,000 screw-up.

Some more facts for you all to consider: In the wake of the ridiculous 400,000 deaths per year fiasco (really just a lie masquerading as science), there has been some actual good science done on this subject. Katherine Flegal, a senior research scientist with the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics authored a study along with David Williamson, Barry Graubard and Mitchell Gail. This study is acknowledged for using scientifically solid data and methodology, including accounting for many confounding factors that were blatantly overlooked in the previous study. Guess what the study found? Being in the "overweight" category, having a BMI between 25 and 30, actually correlates with a higher life expectancy. That's right, people who are considered "overweight" are less likely to die in any given year than people of "normal" weight. In fact, being "overweight" saves approximately 86,094 lives per year! This is solid science, not the sensational and speculative weak correlations that you see splashed across the headlines. Our bodies store fat for a reason, being 10 or 20 pounds over the arbitrary BMI cutoff point for "overweight" is not a reason to panic - it's a reason to celebrate! In contrast, the risks of being underweight (BMI less than 18.5) accounts for the most pronounced risks of mortality. This is especially true for people over 60, where we see a 200% increase in mortality over "normal" weight, and a 266% increase in mortality over "overweight" people. Obesity only even catches up to these figures for younger individuals with a BMI greater than 35 (approximately 8% of the population). Obesity does have it's health concerns, especially extreme obesity. But the science is continually showing us that our focus is directed inappropriately on this matter. We need to sit up and take notice!

I believe you have your facts a little mixed up Betsy. Nobody has managed to link diabetes with carbohydrates. I would say that Atkins is a fad diet just like all the rest. The reason that it works like it does is mostly because it's low in calories. There are some body chemistry issues that may cause a small degree of extra weight loss, but overall this is just another band-aid fix for weight issues just like any other diet. And studies of "which diet is best" are notoriously unreliable. Another study done recently showed that the Weight Watchers diet came out on top. I don't mean to play "Dueling Studies" with you here. But I think it's pretty clear that in any discussion of which diet plan is the best, that the truth really isn't that straightforward. As for health, all fad diets are pretty much a wash when it comes to long term safety. I wouldn't really single Atkins out because it's just like all the rest in that regard. Cutting out vital nutrients is bound to be unhealthy for you, but the point is really moot since few people are able to stick to any of these diets long enough for long term studies to measure their health. I will give the Atkins diet a little bit of credit though. Atkins successfully challenged the main stream diet and medical industry's long held mantra of "LOW FAT, LOW FAT, LOW FAT!!!". It's really made a lot of difference in the way people think. It's a really good thing that people are starting to realize that fat isn't necessarily bad for you. And nobody would have taken the studies seriously showing the health benefits of Omega 3 Fatty Acids before Atkins came along.

I would like to take this opportunity to recommend to you all a website run by one Sandy Szwarc, BSN, RN, and CCP. She is a registered nurse with a biological science degree and over 28 years in neonatal intensive care and emergency triage; medical outreach education; health communications; and research. She is also a certified culinary professional, with an expertise in nutrition, cooking and food safety. She is an experience researcher in many health areas, including obesity and weight issues. She works as a contributor to science and policy institutes in Washington, DC, and is an award winning journalist. Her articles are quite eye opening, I would recommend having a look: http://junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/ Here is an excerpt from her introduction:

I want to address some of the things that have been said in a few of the recent threads. Overweight people have been categorized here as disgusting, delusional, unhealthy, lazy, and lacking in discipline, common sense, and education. These are all broad stereotypes that if you assigned them to any other group of people you would be labeled a racist. But somehow we consider it okay to say these things about fat people because "it's for their own good" and "they brought this on themselves." You don't have to find fat people attractive. But please, can't we recognize that these are actual people? Human dignity is not reserved solely for the thin. My mother taught me to treat people with respect. If you see an "overweight" person somewhere, you don't know anything about that person except for their body shape. To paint that person with these attributes based on so little is a grave injustice, and a firm example of our society's unhealthy obsession with body shape and size.

Well, I'm not going to start preaching to you about what kind of foods you should be eating. There's a lot of conflicting information out there, and you've made your own choices as to what you think is best. I know that there are so many studies trying to tell us that this, that, or the other food is really good for us. You're right, we can't take heed of every single one. But I think we should make an effort to at least stick generally to healthy eating guidelines and get foods from each of the food groups. LOL - they contain 53g of carbs per cup, you know.

My thoughts exactly, but I'd get stoned for saying I'd never date a fat girl... but I wouldn't. So bring on the stoning. I disagree with a lot of what has been said here, and I'll eventually get around to addressing everything. But perhaps it would surprise you to know that I don't disagree with this. Everybody has a preference in the type of person they're attracted to. If you're not attracted to fat people it's pretty much the same as not being attracted to thin people, tall people, short people, redheads, brunettes, blonds, or any number of attributes. So I'm not going to stone either of you for this. You're not attracted to overweight people, and nobody can force your libido to react when it doesn't want to. I do find RB's stereotyping of overweight people morally reprehensible, but as far as sexual attraction goes I have no complaints if either of you find certain body types more desirable than others.

It's interesting that this discussion is turning to body fat. I think it should be mentioned that "normal" weight people can often have a very high percentage of body fat. And dieting often causes you to lose muscle tissue at a much faster rate than fat. Often dieters reach their ideal weight and are suddenly declared healthy without even any consideration of this factor. If extra fat is a concern to overweight people, it should also be a concern to "normal" weight people. It's pretty clear that measures of health need to take a lot more into account than just weight.

I didn't say that any part was a concern. It just seemed like your plan consists of a bunch of different diet plans thrown together. 10 servings of vegetables is good, I just hope you're also getting your share of the other food groups as well. You seem to be on a very complicated plan, I just hope it's nutritionally sound. I have no way of judging that, though, so please don't consider this a criticism. I follow some guidelines in trying to keep healthy. I make sure to eat a lot of whole grains, particularly rice. And I make sure to get fish and other seafood in my diet often. I only have red meat on very rare occasions. I make sure to keep stocked up on veggies, and I take a multivitamin every day. In addition I go out for long walks or hikes whenever the weather is nice enough, I usually take the stairs instead of the elevator, I do exercises every morning to help invigorate me and get the blood flowing, and I regularly participate in sports. I've also added a single serving of alcohol and a small serving of very dark chocolate (85% cocoa, bitter stuff) to my diet due to their known health benefits.

BC_chick, you are sadly misinformed. The BMI doesn't take body types into account AT ALL! In fact, as of the changes from 1998, the BMI no longer even recognizes the bodily differences between men and women. I have no way of making any statements concerning your weight or how your health would be affected if you weighed 10 pounds more. Somehow I guess you came to the conclusion that you are overweight in spite of being under the BMI threshold. I suspect that's more of a statement of your insecurities rather than actual fact. Learning to love your body can be a challenge for fat and thin alike.

Dying in your 40's is a bad thing no matter what shape you're in. And it goes to show you that being tough and thin does not necessarily mean that you're in good health.

As a caveat, I would like to point out that people living in pioneer times were lucky to live into their 40's. Just because that lifestyle makes you strong and thin, doesn't mean that it's healthy for you. Don't get me wrong, I agree that more exercise is a good thing. I just want to point out that we should avoid the temptation to look at pioneer times as some sort of golden age in health. The reason our life expectancy is so high these days is partly due to the fact that we don't have to work ourselves to extremes anymore just for proper nutrition.

Cybercoma, I believe you have just made 2 mutually exclusive statements. First you say that vitamins and nutrition are important. Then you say that nothing else matters but caloric intake. Which is it? I think you're a little bit confused. Both the types of foods and avoiding over-eating matter. If you say that calories are the only thing that matter, then you're saying that if it's a choice between getting proper nutrition and lowering your calories, that you should always go for the lower calories. The truth is that for proper health, nutrition is the absolute most important element. If you make the focus simply on losing weight as quickly as possible, you damage your body. I believe the average daily requirements are thought to be around 2000 for women and 2500 for men. This is at the average level of daily activity that we all participate in. I think science is showing us pretty clearly that losing weight is a much more complicated matter than simply calories in minus calories burned. Dieting plays havoc with your metabolism and fat to muscle ratio and all sorts of other internal processes. And limiting your calorie intake so so that you're not getting enough doesn't just burn fat. It actually depletes your internal reserves of energy much more broadly, taking away from your fat, muscles, and even internal organs. Although I appreciate the fact that you pay lip service to balanced nutrition, I think it's a big mistake to make calories the all important factor in health. I think a focus on proper nutrition and on making an effort to lead a less sedentary lifestyle will lead to greater health and weight stabilization.

We're getting a little bit into semantics here. "Diet" can be defined in a few different ways. I think the most common ones, as outlined in the dictionary, would be: - "A selection or a limitation on the amount a person eats for reducing weight" and - "The foods eaten, as by a particular person or group" When I say that diets are bad for you, I'm talking about that first definition. I, of course, don't mean that eating food is bad for you. All diets supported by the diet industry are deficient in nutrition. Instead of going on "diets", if you make an effort to actually make positive nutrition changes you can see remarkable, long lasting changes rather than short-term band-aid fixes. As for the plan that you're engaging in... I'm not sure what to think of it. It sounds kind of like a hodge-podge of different diet plans and general ideas. Have you checked with a certified professional in nutrition about this? If not, you should perhaps think about doing so.

I don't believe it works out like that Betsy, and I think if you look at it you will see that the scientific research bears me out on this one. The reason people gained back the weight plus more is because diets are not meant as long term solutions. They are band-aid fixes. Diets do not promote nutrition, they promote weight-loss at any cost. In the world of health, diets are the anti-nutrition movement. You talk about making changes in eating habits. I think we're on the same page there in that we should be promoting healthy and nutritious eating. But that does not involve dieting. When you diet you're starving your body of the nutrients it needs. This is hard on your internal organs. Your body will fight you, it will do all it can to make sure that it conserves those fat stores. If you're fighting with your body and trying to force it into the way you think it should be... well, you're going to lose that fight. And the question is, why are we advocating fighting our bodies? Proper nutrition should be about working WITH our bodies to primarily achieve good health. If we promote healthy eating practices (Nutrition, not diets!) and regular enjoyable exercise, I think it's a good bet that we can see some reduction in obesity. But the focus should be on long term health, any changes in weight that come as a result will be gradual. The body just doesn't adjust well to sudden fluctuations, trying to force the issue only damages health. There doesn't need to be anything wrong with somebody in order for their body to resist their attempts to lose weight. The body does that naturally. And I think it's pretty clear that we don't completely understand all the complexities of the biological processes devoted to weight gain or weight loss. Trying to present it as a simple matter is gravely misguided. I think you've misunderstood what I have to say if this is what you got out of it. I do not believe that overweight people are sensitive, fragile, or in denial. I'm mystified as to where you got that impression from what I had to say... however, to set the record clear, I will state emphatically here that this is not what I believe. People who are overweight know that they are overweight. For some reason, a lot of people seem to get the impression that they are somehow ignorant of this fact. They aren't. And they want to improve their health and have more energy. They're trying every single fad diet under the sun hoping for lasting results. But those results just aren't forthcoming, and the constant yo-yo dieting is damaging their health. I'm not talking about deflecting or blurring the issue here. I'm talking about focusing on their health and trying to achieve some clear and lasting results. Betty, I find it useless to argue that people should have stuck to any diet. None of those diets provide good nutrition, people went back to their old ways because they were suffering under them. Their bodies rebelled. When that happens you just can't fight it for long. It wears you down, gradually weakening your resolve. Why should we blame the dieters for not being able to stick to a faulty diet? The anorexic celebrities are just one symptom of our society's obsession with thinness. This obsession perhaps didn't originate with the diet industry, but they've certainly done their best to fan the flames. They've distorted the facts and lobbied for changes that not only have warped the way we see weight, but also the way in which we handle overweight people. So I think I can blame the diet industry, and I blame it for quite a lot. Like I said, I'm all for advocating proper nutrition and exercise. But not diet. If parents puts their children on a diet, they're doing that child more harm than they would have if they'd left the issue alone. I'm not advocating that they leave the issue alone, though. It's up to the parents to sit down with their children and explore all the issues they may have with food and form a plan to help the child be healthy and active. It's a complicated issue, and it won't be solved with band-aid solutions like diets. I'm not sure if you understood what I wrote on this subject. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough - I apologize if I misrepresented my case. What I'm trying to say is that advertising fast food is not about getting people to eat fast food if they weren't going to in the first place. McDonald's and Tim Horton's advertise and run promotions in order to get more people to come in, but they only convince people who were going to have fast food anyway. If it weren't for whatever promotion McDonald's is running, many of the consumers may have chosen Pizza Pizza instead. It's not about fighting to bring in more customers that didn't already exist, it's about bringing those customers to YOU instead of your competitors. Do you see what I'm trying to say here? Is that not why we have food labels? So that we can take control and choose the best option? You have a choice over which frozen dinner you buy. Perhaps my grocery store carries different brands than yours. I eat frozen meals all the time, I can tell you for a fact that there are many, many healthy options.

As I understand it, the idea behind legislating hate crimes is that racism and other forms of hate are so destructive that they need extra punishment. Do I have that correct? I have a big problem with this way of handling things. For me, a crime is a crime, to the law motivation should not matter. If you kill a person, he's not any less dead if you killed him for his money instead of because he's black. Since when should the law make any sort of consideration for what you were thinking at the time? Isn't that dangerously close to charging somebody for a "Thought Crime"? As a society we should definitely not tolerate racism or other forms of hate. However, legally shouldn't we be primarily concerned with determining the facts of the crime? Shouldn't punishment be decided based on what the person did, rather than what he was thinking?

Betsy, I strongly disagree with you on this. Pointing blame in this manner seems to me to be very excessive and condescending to these people who are doing their best to fit in with the way society wants them to look. One thing's for sure, it's definitely not a matter of self-discipline. 95-98% of people who lose weight on diets gain it all back plus a little extra. The fact is that every single one of these diets was intended for weight loss, not life-long nutrition. If your body is not getting the proper nutrition, it's going to fight your efforts to deny it. In the end, you're fighting a losing battle. If what you're saying to me is that self discipline is to blame - aren't you pretty much just labeling overweight people as lazy gluttons? Perhaps that's not what you meant to convey, but that's the message that's being put out there. The majority of overweight people have worked hard to try to lose weight and fit in with the rest of society. To blame them for a lack of self-discipline is ridiculous. They've gone above and beyond the efforts that we should expect of them. Who wants to live on such a poor diet that you're constantly being gnawed at by hunger? Nobody! But these people do, and often for quite a long time. Self-discipline? Overweight people have it in scores! Diets don't work. They cause weight gain and poor health. Those are the facts. Considering that, isn't it scary that 90% of school girls have tried dieting? And they're starting younger and younger all the time. This means that millions of girls who are perfectly healthy and of normal weight are playing havoc with their bodies. So no, I don't think blaming the diet industry is very far-fetched at all. This kind of viewpoint seems very strange to me. If I see an ad for McDonalds, my mouth may perhaps water a little. But then the next commercial comes on or the show comes back and I forget about it. I don't feel the urge to go out right then and there and pick up some fast food. I only eat out about once or twice a month. What statements like this seem to be assuming is that we're all mindless zombies who are being victimized by television and can't resist the wicked temptation of the things we're shown. Forgive me if that's a little bit 'reductio ad absurdum', but it doesn't seem to me to be off by much. There's an interesting thing about marketing and commercials. For the most part, they don't convince people to buy stuff that they weren't going to buy anyway. Car commercials, for example, don't convince people who weren't interested in buying cars to become interested. Rather it's all about convincing people who were going to buy a car anyway to choose a certain brand. It's the same with most other products, including food. McDonald's commercials are not about convincing you to eat there if you weren't going to eat fast food in the first place. They're about saying 'If you're going to have some fast food, you should come here!' And according to market research, that's typically the way that they work. McDonald's commercials don't increase the number of people looking to eat fast food, they only help increase McDonald's percentage of that pie. So people eating at McDonald's haven't been tempted to eat fast food by the commercials. They were already going to eat fast food no matter what. McDonald's has only convinced them to choose their restaurants. I don't believe that homemade meals are any more nutritious in general than quick-fix meals. In fact, I know for a fact that if you look at the available frozen meals you will find many of them that have a good amount of healthy stuff like veggies and rice as well as having fairly low sodium and calories. Quick fix meals are made from most of the same ingredients you would use to make food from scratch. Meals aren't necessarily more healthy simply because they're homemade. I'll give you that people could be exercising more. But again here I don't blame computers and television so much. One thing I blame is schools for heaping our kids with an unnecessary amount of homework. That's only increased by leaps and bounds in recent years, by the time they're done who can blame them for being mentally exhausted and just wanting to veg? And it's the same in the work world. We're able to do more in less time than ever before these days, and yet we still feel the urge to push ourselves even beyond that limit. And, of course, there's the whole attitude that people have towards exercise. Somehow we feel that we must get our exercise in the stale, boring surroundings of a gym, and on a bunch of torture machines no less. The whole attitude can be summed up by the saying, started I believe in the 80's: "No Pain, No Gain!" Screw that! Who wants to put themselves through pain on a regular basis? Exercise doesn't have to be about pain. Exercise SHOULDN'T be about pain! A nice hike through the forest is a wonderful way to get exercise. Or a bike ride around the city exploring places you've never been. Spending time at the local swimming pool is a divine way to get your exercise during the summer. There are tons of ways to exercise pain-free! As a society we've made being "healthy" all about starving yourself and physical pain. And then we wonder why more people don't follow through with it. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm......