This is my first post in a series I’m doing to help disprove the widely held belief that obesity is “caused” by genetics. This misconception seems to be the number one argument people have when discussing obesity, and rationalizing why it has become so ubiquitous.
I’d actually like to start out this series without any references to any research or articles or books or websites, and just talk about some things that seem common sense to me. I will state a FACT, and then show how it doesn’t make any sense that genetics plays the role that so many people think it does.
FACT #1 - In the 1960’s, in the U.S., about 10% of people were obese. Today, 32%.
If genetics is to blame for our obesity epidemic, this would imply that before the epidemic, our genes were different. If our genes have changed so much in the past 40 years, why have I heard or read NOTHING about scientists and geneticists FREAKING OUT that our gene pool is going through some drastic changes? Perhaps the majority of humans have managed to develop some type of genetic disorder in the past few decades. Although currently, almost all known disorders are quite rare. Since that is most likely not the case, what are the most obvious changes that we have undergone (that can be undergone) in such a short span of time?
The answers are: Diet and Lifestyle.
FACT #2 – Our DNA plays a role in Cancer, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer’s.
Although we know that genes do play a role in giving us these diseases, we do not, however, have much of an idea of how to prevent them. We do know how to prevent, AND REVERSE obesity. The only one of those three diseases that can be stopped is cancer, but not through treatment. Only by killing or removing cancerous cells can you stop its spread. I suppose you can remove fat cells to stop a person from being obese, but they can get fat again. Cancer can spread again, but that is completely fucking different. The easiest thing a person can do to prevent or reverse obesity is to alter their diet and lifestyle. If you’ve been led to believe that a surgery is the easy way out, you’re mistaken. It’s the last resort. How many times does it have to be said? Calories consumed verses calories burned. It’s that simple. A fat cell cannot make itself fatter if the raw materials that it uses to synthesize fat are not present. Fat does not appear out of fat thin air!
FACT #3 – Obesity rates vary widely by geographic region.
This fact might be the simplest one to explain, and will prove my point the most effectively. Currently in the U.S., states like Massachusetts and Colorado have nearly HALF AS MANY obese people as there are in West Virginia and Mississippi. Is a person’s genetics different that happens to live in a place where they most likely walk more than they drive their car? NO! This isn’t the Galapagos Islands. Humans are not isolated or landlocked, causing them to stay in one place for thousands of years while random mutations in their genetics are allowed to influence their evolution. We can travel a thousand miles in 3 hours. It is a small world, after all!
FACT #4 – Obesity vs. Mal-Nourishment rates vary depending on a society’s developmental stage.
As a nation makes the transition from ”developing” to “developed”, the population goes from having more mal-nourished people than overweight, to having MORE overweight people and less mal-nourished people as the overall wealth of the nation increases. Not only do the proportions of under-nourishment to obesity shift as socioeconomic changes happen, so do the rates of obesity change among people within different income levels. When a country is less economically developed, the obesity rates are highest among the wealthiest. When that same nation (or culture, region) becomes more “developed”, the group containing the most obese individuals changes from being the wealthiest, to the poorest.
Whilst once a symbol of wealth and prosperity in nations such as the U.S., Canada, and most Western European countries, obesity has now become a symbol for poor health, mediocrity, and poverty. The socioeconomic level with the most overweight people is that of those which are below the poverty line in these nations.
Take a trip to any art museum, and you’ll see painting after painting, spanning several centuries, of overweight men and women being deified. The reason for this is because only the rich could afford to eat enough food to become a heavy size, and then commission a painting to be done. Also, most of these people were kings, queens, or otherwise somehow affiliated with nobility. Until the industrial revolution, if you weren’t one of these few people, odds are you were a farmer or some sort of tradesman, and extremely poor, and had very little food to eat.
Now, fast forward to today, when an image like this one doesn’t make me think that this guy is of noble birth. It looks more like he just got done eating about 20 pounds of ribs, sausage, and crawfish. This photo doesn’t make me think of wealth or affluence. If I had to guess, I would say he is an American, who lives in the south, and is in the lower-middle class. It makes me think of abundance, gluttony, sloth, and mal-nourishment. Likely, this man hasn’t eaten a piece of fruit in a week.
If you think my points are crap, awesome, retarded, unfounded, genious, or you have some others that you’d like to add… PLEASE leave a comment. I encourage discussion about this.
This should be fun. I am looking forward to seeing the responses you get to this post.
Based upon my research into the subject (theory & practice), I both agree and disagree with your central argument.
I disagree because on the most basic level dis-ease occurs at the cellular/genetic level.
A physical condition like insulin insensitivity is most likely a result of our ancestors genes being the best suited to our former hunter-gatherer lifestyle.
Note – (science by its very nature never ‘proves’ anything, it just disproves other theories)
Change in the human genome is verrryyyy slow and our switch from a H-G lifestyle to an agrarian lifestyle to today’s Bagel-ful lifestyle has happened quickly as our technology has progressed.
Back in the day, it made more sense that when food was plenty, we were efficient at storing excess fuel as fat instead of burning it as energy.
On the other hand, I completely AGREE with your argument because, genetics is not destiny.
As our technology towards producing easily available, calorie dense food stuffs increased, so did our knowledge that putting that ‘modern’ food into our ‘ancient’ bodies made us FAT.
We know that cancer has a genetic component. Two people could both smoke cigarettes for 20 years, and one will get lung cancer, while the other doesn’t. The one with cancer was probably genetically predisposed to cancer.
Now, if the one disposed to cancer had realized that smoking causes cancer, he would have had the opportunity to NOT smoke and avoid the lung cancer altogether.
The same holds true for obesity.
We all know our own bodies. If you can eat whatever you want and never get fat; congratulations. You are built to thrive in this era of plentiful food.
If, however, you gain five pounds, just looking at a bowl of ice cream; DON’T EAT THE ICE CREAM DUMMY!!!!
It’s not rocket science.
Fruits, vegetables, lean protein, water are #1
Nuts, seeds, tea are #2
Basically, the farther away from ‘natural’ that you get, the more likely it will make you fat.
Especially if you are already fat.
For those unlucky people, you need to lose most of the fat (stick to # 1). Once the fat is gone, your insulin sensitivity should be better and you can splurge a little bit.
Genetics isn’t destiny
Great post McBloggenstein
Hey DR! Thanks for the comment. Good points, although I don’t understand how you disagree…
You said “I disagree because on the most basic level dis-ease occurs at the cellular/genetic level.”
To what are you disagreeing with?
I don’t believe a disease that starts at the cellular level is always genetic in cause (if that’s what you’re saying). If by the fact that our genes are not strong enough in design to keep our bodies perfect and impervious to any and all disease, then yes, everyones genes are flawed.
But the very simple definition of disease is “an impairment of health or a condition of abnormal functioning”.
You make other good points though that reminded me of some stuff that I forgot to include. I’ll have to add a bit more to the end.
I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. Obviously I missed my morning java
Your quote –
This is my first post in a series I’m doing to help disprove the widely held belief that obesity is “caused” by genetics
Caused being the operative word
So, obviously, we’re sympatico on this.
Damn, I was looking forward to a good debate.
just found you…have a trainer friend who takes this SAME approach with clients and it works FANTASTICALLY.
for him.
because he can pull it off.
MizFit surely could not
One problem I think obese people have with weight loss is not their unwillingness to lose weight (obesity acceptance folks not-with-standing) but rather the overwhelming difficulty of complete lifestyle change.
I recently saw a talk by a nutritionist who continually used the phrase “Think big, start small.” His basic premise was that if one goes from eating fast food, ice-cream, candy, chips, and soda every day to trying to eat an all-natural vegan diet, you will fail. Period. But if you start small, like drinking enough water every day and having an extra serving of vegetables and a ten minute walk, that’s the kind of start you can stick with.
Another thing he pointed out is that you can still have ice-cream. If that’s your favorite food, denying it to yourself entirely will only make you binge on it. But if you have it in reasonable amounts at reasonable times and choose an ice-cream that’s better for you, i.e. all natural ingredients and the fewer ingredients the better, then you’re satisfying your cravings and improving your diet where you can.
Again, I think many obese people want a change, but the idea of instantaneous change is daunting.
Jarrod,
During my 19+ years of helping people transform their bodies, one of the most important things I learned was to ignore most dietitians / nutritionists.
Up here in Canada, dietitians/nutritionists are paid by their respective provincial health care system. The client does not pay. As a result, the client’s results are not tied to the financial success of the practitioner.
As a result, each patient gets essentially the same advice: Follow Canada’s food guide
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/food-guide-aliment/index_e.html
That’s it. period. no room for discussion
Atkins.bad, juice fast. bad, protein supplements.bad, protein cycling, caloric cycling, no grains, organic….not necessary, destroys your kidneys, etc….
I would love to see the research your nutritionist relied on to arrive at his premise – “that if one goes from eating fast food, ice-cream, candy, chips, and soda every day to trying to eat an all-natural vegan diet, you will fail. Period”
Not every dieter is the same. Some may thrive under this philosophy, while others will fail and just never go back to the doctor.
I always smell B.S. when someone makes an absolute statement like your nutritionist.
http://www.t-nation.com/article/diet_and_nutrition/superfood_super_recipes&cr=
I agree with Jarrod’s first point. Making a lifestyle change is difficult, and it seems like a lot of people today are predisposed to superlazyitis. Maybe it’s their genes or something. Doesn’t hard work bring the greatest rewards? At least that’s what I’ve experienced.
I hear all sorts of excuses for not making the change; but that’s exactly what they are, excuses. However, I do agree with DR on his point regarding making instant changes. Some people need to go cold turkey, others need to make incremental changes. The trick is finding out who belongs to which group.
Good post.
Jay
[...] Does that sound familiar? (see fact [...]
I love this I totally agree, fat people hate me too.
Response to Dr, RE: Jarrod’s nutritionist “absolute” statement.
I think the mistake was made on the absolute nature of the nutritionists statement:
“His basic premise was that if one goes from eating fast food, ice-cream, candy, chips, and soda every day to trying to eat an all-natural vegan diet, you will fail. Period.”
In general I think that that the above while not absolutely true would be true in a significant number of cases if not (and I have no scientific basis to say this) in a likely majority of cases.
It’s not that going to a natural vegan diet overnight will not produce results. It will, if the person is able to go cold-turkey. But, I believe much like smoking (although without the chemical side effects of quitting) that going cold-turkey takes a resolve and will power that many people are unable sustain across a time period that weight loss requires.
While I don’t like absolute statements either, I think the point that was being made was to encourage people who are trying to make healthier choices to make them no matter how small at first, and that even small changes can begin to make a difference. Considering there is an obesity epidemic I would be hesitant to discredit any reasonably reliable natural method, especially one of slow manageable change as contrasted with big sweeping all or nothing change.
As the sane voice of fat acceptance I have gone toe to toe with my fellow fatties on the genetic thing. The simplest and most undeniable proof that the obesity argument is bunk is this simple fact. In 1975 only 3% of Americans were obese. Today 35% are obese. Our genes cannot change in that rapidly.
Many of the fat accepters are women and therefore cannot grasp the concepts of thermodynamics and conservation of mass. They get too “fat girl breakdown” to listen long enough to comprehend. I stick with the 1975 VS now explanation as proof the role of genetics in obesity is very minimal.
Visit my blog and hear the sane voice of fat acceptance.
EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT EAT
While some people may have genes that predispose them to gain fat more easily than others, these genes do not cause the fat gain. The fat gain is caused by a person’s behavior – mostly their eating habits but also their activity level. As a species, we have not changed much over the past quarter million years, much less the past hundred, so genetics is not an excuse. What has changed? The availability of inexpensive, high-calorie food and drinks and and increase in labor-saving devices has made it incredibly easy to consume far more calories while expending far fewer.
Good points, Drew.
Genetics generally only make you more susceptible.
Behavior and diet is what brings them out.
Fat Bastard:
“Many of the fat accepters are women and therefore cannot grasp the concepts of thermodynamics and conservation of mass.”
WTF!!
Seriously, while I agree with the point that our genetics cannot change in such a short period of time you totally discredit your argument by then making a statement that implies women can’t understand science.
How about trying “many of the fat accepters are not educated in science therefore cannot….”
Or
“many of the fat accepters actively dispute scientific arguments therefore cannot….”
If this were the 1950’s or 1970’s I might even give you:
“many of the fat accepters are women, and only a small percentage of women are choosing to study science therefore most women do not….”
FYI, if you look at university enrollment today women make up more than half of overall university enrollment are are now equally competitive in enrollment into environmental and medical sciences as men.
Being a woman does not make it impossible to understand thermodynamics, or genetics, or basic calories in calories out. Being an uneducated person in deep denial about the existence of and reasons for an obesity epidemic does.
Hi I like your blog. I believe that our problems are to do with an error in obese peoples ability to metabolise fat from their adipose tissue. This is largely linked to insulin levels. So even though this is a very genetic problem you can have some action by limiting carbs. So here are my rebuttals:)
Fact 1: The increase in consumption of carbohydrates has dramatically increased during this time. Because our genes are not evolved to deal with large amounts of carbs you get surges in insulin that leads to obesity. Of course if you just stop eating carbs then problem solved but the problem does come from the genes not been able to deal with the insulin in the first place. Has got nothing to do with genes changing in 30 years but definitely has a genetic component to it.
Fact 2: I would disagree that we know how to treat obesity. This is why 99% of diets fail. These diets reduce calories. They fail. Many mammalian studies have shown that you can reduce calories but still get or maintain obesity. The answer is NOT reducing calories. Clearly, the last 100 years of diets has taught us this lesson.
Fact 3: again I am sure those regions in the United States where obesity is the biggest problem are also the areas where the most refined carbs are consumed.
Fact 4: Carbohydrates are cheap as chips (haha literally) and so it makes sense that the more impoverished you are the more you are going to rely on them. Thus the more you mess with your insulin levels, the more you get incidences of diabetes and obesity. Wealthier people are more likely to eat whole food and have less reliance on heavily refined carbs.
Hi Dan, thanks for coming by to comment.
It sounds like to me that your points are less of a rebuttal, and more supportive of my argument!
Note the specific language I use in my first paragraph. I wrote this post in response to people that claim that they are fat because of their genes, completely independant from their behavior.
You seem to be in fact arguing in favor of the idea that our genes ARE to blame, simply because of the way our bodies process excess carbs. By your logic, you’re right in that our genes tell our bodies how to react when certain levels of carbs are consumed.
However, as you said
This is purely a behavioral issue, not a genetic one.
#’s 1,3, and 4 all basically make the same point.
#2 – I will both agree and disagree with. Depending on what you mean by “work”, most diets do work in that the person will lose at least some weight. However, of course that does not mean that they will keep it off. That does not mean that some diets don’t have the potential to work. One big reason why some diets do not work is simply because the dieter intended the change in eating habits to be a temporary one. The change needs to be lifelong, not temporary. The behavior that caused the excessive weight gain needs to be changed for life, not for a few days or months.
Also, not all diets restrict calories in the manner that you implied. I would not consider myself to be “going on a diet” if I were to simply start eating better. Eating better would perhaps result in a lower calorie intake, but it wouldn’t be considered a restriction.
Finally, the other BIG determinant of the worlds weight gain is less movement. Less physical activity. You can’t deny that this has happened, and is a behavior. By saying that you disagree that we know how to treat obesity, I feel you are implying that we don’t know that eating better and exercising will result in losing excess fat. It absolutely will. Therefore, a change in behavior will change the state of an obese person much more so than a change in behavior will change the status of someone that has cancer or alzheimer’s disease. This is what I meant.
Hi McBloggenstein
So I think then we are in almost in full agreement. I agree that behaviourally we have things we can do to change our position. I just wanted to state that their is a genetic component that causes our excess weight. I thought it would be too easy for someone to read this and think genetics has nothing to do with it when I think in fact it has everything to do with it but that does not absolve the person from responsibility. There is something that can be done. However, unfortunately todays advice ( I think) is simply wrong.
That advice is that: energy consumed – energy expended = change in body fat storage. But this premise can easily be turned around. It is equally feasible that less exercise and overeating results FROM your body storing a lot of fat. I believe that this results from a genetic stuff up that causes our body to store more fat and this then results in us overeating and exercising less. Thus these are associated, but not the cause, of weight gain.
Many studies show that increased exercise, and eating healthy or low fat or low calories does not result in permanent weight loss. Furthemore, when it does (through heavy restriction) obese people lose fat from around their organs and muscle tissue but seem to hold on to the fat in the adipose tissue. They simply become emaciated fat people. This is why I believe it is a genetic stuff up that causes obese people to store more fat in adipose tissue DESPITE the amount of calories involved or expended.
I believe that this genetic stuff up is exacerbated by eating a diet high in carbs, which effects our insulin levels. So this does not mean we are not capable of losing weight. BUT it does show that the old mentality that more exercise and less food means you get overweight is wrong. This is what I meant from my argument, because if it was this simple, people would lose weight by following this advice. We are not machines we are biological organisms which have many biological controls through hormonal pathways to adjust our metabolism to compensate for any reduction in food. Anyway, I am in the process of writing blogs to prove my hypothesis.
Having said ALL that I do agree with what you said earlier and I do pretty much think that we are in agreement. You are basically saying that being overweight is not out of your hands. What I am arguing is the method to reduce this may be different.
You say that we are mostly in agreement (that behaviors ultimately dictate what our genetic framework sets in motion), but then you say that exercising more and eating better does not result in permanent weight loss.
Then… what on Earth does? Unless your attempt is to say that nothing results in permanent weight loss, then I would have to adamantly disagree with you.
The only reason they wouldn’t work, is if the participant cheated, or stopped doing them.
You said:
But, overweight people DO lose weight by following this advice! I don’t quite understand why you think that they don’t. When people lose weight, how do you think they are doing it? Perhaps you mean that they don’t keep it off? But, that does not mean that the new lifestyle is flawed. It only means that the participant, again, went back to their old habits. If you say you have seen studies that show that this type of lifestyle change does not result in weight loss (in overweight/obese people) then I would love to see them.
Your logic seems conflicting.
Sure, genetics has everything to do with weight gain, but only because genes are the framework for which every cell in our body does what it does. That includes storing fat, and doing that is what it does in response to consuming too many calories, and being too sedentary. You’re right, we’re not machines. People do handle food in excess differently. This only proves that some people need to have different diets to maintain a healthy weight. Of course the same habits will not work for everyone. But it IS possible for almost everyone.
This is why I pointed out in Fact #1 in the post above, that while our genes haven’t changed, only our lifestyles have. And what kind of lifestyle have people adapted? As we both said, eating more carbohydrates, and as I said, being more sedentary. Therefore, eating less energy dense food, and getting more exercise, will bring us back to the lower rates of obesity that we had only a few decades ago. This seems like the simplest idea to me.
I don’t understand how you can say that consumption of carbs has increased, causing weight gain, and then say that you don’t think that a healthier diet and increased exercise would result in sustained weight loss…
In response to the idea that being fat makes us overeat and not exercise, this seems like insane logic to me. Isn’t it the chicken or the egg? Well, I would have to argue that in this case, that what came first was the big fat chicken. That being = poor eating habits, and the lack of exercise, because those are the most common reasons by far for having excess fat.
We are not machines. Genetic programming does not tell the metaphorical motors in our arms to shovel bad foods into our mouths. Our willpower can control what we choose to (or not to) eat. A lack of being able to maintain a healthy lifestyle change is due to a lack of willpower.
I appreciate the discussion.
Ok so this is where I think we differ. Here is the equation.
Fat storage = energy consumed – energy expended.
You are saying that the second two are the CAUSE for fat storage. I am saying that something that messes with our fat storage metabolism (insulin) is a CAUSE for the other two factors.
The reason I dont think that exercise and a healthy diet result in weight loss is because our body likes to be in homeostatic equilibrium and if you start to try to go either way it can compensate for it by either making you become lethargic and lowering your metabolism OR burning off the energy as heat and making you more active. I believe that overeating and lethargy are more a consequence of your body trying to maintain this equilibrium within its adipose tissue but this gets stuffed up by insulin. I am saying that it is not calories that matter it is the carbohydrates and its effect on insulin and then its subsequent effect on our fat reserves.
Obese strains of mice, which if fed restricted calories remain obese but simply become lethargic and their metabolisms slow. On an extremely restricted food intake these mice do lose weight equal to their lean counterparts BUT their body fat in the adipose tissue is 50% higher and they lose most of the weight from their organs and muscle tissue. So even though they are losing weight they are still fat! I believe this happens with humans too when they restrict calories. They become emaciated fat people. Other studies that increase insulin levels in mice have shown that they become obese and once this is stopped they return back to their normal weight. Clearly it is not about calories as much as it is about insulin.
Our lifestyles have changed your correct but our carbohydrate intake has significantly changed during this time too and so this could easily explain why obesity has occurred just as you ascertain that it is due to an increase in calories. Both are correlated with recent lifestyle changes and equally plausible.
I am going to write a blog about it and so once I do I can let you know and see what your take on it is. At the moment though I do provide evidence that calories do not make us obese: http://darwinstable.wordpress.com/metabolic-hypothesis/does-overeating-make-us-obese/
I would be interested in your feedback. You being a critic of this is excellent as it will make me have to defend it and think about it so this is great.
ps – the behaviour I was referring to was eating less carbs rather than less calories to lose weight. However, I do think our argument is not weight loss but rather weight gain (obesity) which I feel has nothing to do with calories but again carbs.
The discussion between Dr Dan and I is continued on another post:
A Discussion About Obesity
Interesting facts from another blog
The average American household spends roughly $1,200 per year on electronics alone, According to a recent study by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), which is suprisingly more than the combined expenditures for both alcohol and tobacco.
Among the $1,200 in purchases, televisions are of the greatest popularity, being in over 90% of American households; of which, 25% own HDTVs. Mobile phones are also amidst some of the most popular devices, occupying 76% of American homes.
Over the past year, the fastest growing gadgets in the electronics industry were Digital cameras, MP3 players, network routers, and DVRs.
“Many of the top owned products have enjoyed mass-market saturation for years and will likely see growth based on upgrade and replacement sales,” said CEA senior research analyst Elena Caudle. “Some of the more intriguing categories are those that still occupy niche markets, such as mobile CE devices like GPS systems and satellite radio, which have seen healthy growth in the past few years.”
Households with teens, which were determined to spend half of their total arbitrary income on electronics, were shown to exceed the average household expenses by $500.
Caudle added that, “It’s interesting to note here that two of the fastest movers and shakers in the CE industry are devices that enable home networking. The other three products enable consumers to create, shift or transport digital content. As consumers continue to embrace digital technology this new convergence will continue to change the way Americans live, work and play.”
These figures, while they may be accurate on the average household, simply do not reflect what the majority of us actually spend on electronics. If you’re sitting at your computer reading this, chances are, you spend significantly more than $1,200 per year on your ‘must have’ gadgets.
Interestingly enough, these figures surpass the combined annual household spending of alcohol and tobacco, according to the U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics; of which, households spend ~$450 and ~$320 on alcohol and tobacco, respectively.
Ha! Galapagos Islands! Island biogeography and genetic drift! Brilliant!
never judge a blog by one post…
i was ready to bit you because of that post regarding starving people. i see your point there , but the problem is way bigger.
but i guess my opinion regarding that matter isn’t this important on this blog, because what really matters here is the fat problem.
i’m am overweighten, but i didn’t give up, what i can’t understand is why so many people simplilly give up on being healthy and build so much excuses to keep going on the bad habits and stile of life
Leptin continued here: You stated in your previous comment against mine that you said that nowhere on this site it states that you don’t believe in leptin. Well my friend you are in another catchy situation because if leptin does exist it has been SHOWN that it tries to keep people on a “Set point weight” based on genetics and age and that when they lose weight it fights back with “medical responses” to caloric reduction. Which means that if I shocked you in your private with a couple prongs you would have a medical response and jump back probably in pain; sort of the same way people feel when leptin levels aren’t kept to scratch by reducing calories and getting off their set point–it causes sever psychological resolve and I have to council these people all the time with their binge eating disorders and anorexia i.e. they are afraid to eat much because they say they won’t be able to stop. Then people like you keep reinforcing that bad behavior by telling them how stupid they are if they are overweight or obese which makes them want to start crash dieting and getting eating disorders again. By the way you are right nutritionists do know a lot about this stuff, some of them even know about leptin and ghrelin like I do. Nutritionist=you’re not
Ah… So now we get more specific, but still… not really.
You are attempting to demonstrate that because a person’s leptin levels influence appetite, that this proves that there is a link between genetics and obesity. Am I correct?
First let me clarify something.
Me saying “Obesity is not genetic”, more specifically means: “The recent explosion in obesity rates is not due to a change in genetics”.
I did not mean to imply that there can not be a single genetic link to obesity. Surely there are disorders that are genetic in origin that cause weight gain, or a change in appetite. But I have seen no evidence that says anything different than these cases are in the minority.
Case in point: Lets look at the entry for Leptin in Wikipedia…
Ok, now let’s look at this:
Is it not possible that a person that becomes obese due to overeating, and accumulates excess adipose tissue (fat), is storing this leptin in higher concentrations than they normally would, resulting in the desensitization?
And very similar to diabetics, insulin resistance can occur because of a genetic effect, or because of habitual diet (the rates due to the latter are skyrocketing).
Quite often, risk factors that upset one system, upset another, in a similar manner. Central obesity, glucose intolerance, cardiovascular disease, insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, high concentrations of leptin, and leptin resistance. They’re all linked in some way or another.
And what’s the #1 best way to reduce the likelihood that you will get any of those disorders? Proper diet and active lifestyle.
Take a look at this post:
http://healthhabits.wordpress.com/2008/10/10/binge-eating-is-your-brain-making-you-fat/
It seems that behavior can have a huge impact on leptin sensitivity in some of the same ways that it does regarding insulin.
So, while genetic predisposition should always be taken into account, you can’t ignore that behaviors have a lot more impact than some might, or would like, to think.
Wow, I’m surprised the discussion went on as long as it did there. Genetics accounts for a very small number of obesity cases (in the neighborhood of <0.1% of all people) and even then with hard work and diet those people could probably not be obese.
A good example would be that in countries where people are starving, you don’t see any obese people in the impoverished areas and therefore obesity is NOT a genetic disease in almost ALL cases. Obviously there is the very very uncommon exception to this.
People need to stop eating so much food and stop blaming everyone else including fast food. Cook your own dinner, eat a variety of different foods and exercise. If you’re still obese you’re either not doing that or are eating too much.
The whole genetics thing on obesity is all bunk based on a number of very rare medical conditions linked to obesity (particular genes that affect fat storage)! I should know.
I think these blogs are very interesting. I am currently writing a paper on how media has affected both women and men psychologically and physically. I am trying to come from a time when heavy was attractive to now when ‘thin is in.’ I came across this article and although I did not read every blog, I did read a lot. I have worried about weight since I was very young and started gaining weight in 8th grade. I went from weighing 92 pounds in 7th grade to 146 pounds after one year of college. I made up my mind that I would reduce the amount of carbs I was eating and only eat whole wheat or whole grain and only before 3:00 in the afternoon, eat a smaller portion to the point where I was satisfied and not full, not eat after 6 P.M. and eat the heaviest meals of the day in the morning. From September to December I went from 146 to 124. I was only exercising the first month or month and a half and although I do feel that it is very important I have not gotten back into it lately. Carbs are a huge factor in weight loss or weight gain. I honestly believe that they make me feel bloated and I can notice a huge difference in my stomach when I do or do not eat them. I have since started eating some carbs again such as chips or pop corn but I really try never to eat white bread or white noodles…
In response to the DR guys comment which is for the most part dumb. He says the less natural it is the better the chance that it will make you fat. Okay I fucking hate that word “natural” it’s such a mumbo jumbo oogie boogie 4 flushing pile of shit word just like the owner of this blog. First of all there is absolute nothing around us food or otherwise that isn’t natural because energy isn’t lost or gained meaning that everything has come from the earth in one form or another. Also just because something is natural gives me absolutely no reason to eat it. Horse shit is natural..very natural in fact; would you eat horse shit? Hemlock is also very natural, so for all those people who want to go natural especially the owner of this blog I recommend it, it builds strong bodies 8 ways. Basically this natural argument is crap, and the owner of this blog only puts the facts that he/she *probably a she* wants to put out instead of completely substantial and respect arguments against this like Leptin and set point theory. If most of this obesity problem is environment and behavior then can you explain to me how most people gain little or no weight over a 5 year span *IF THEY ARE NOT PAYING ATTENTION AT ALL TO WHAT THEY EAT*. I know that I eat all I want and while I look at my weight on the BMI charts it says I am slightly overweight but my weight never changes no matter how many calories I eat. Would you like to explain how most people who are not dieting weights don’t change hardly at all over a 5 year period if they are eating all they want? Oh wait it’s all about calories in and out right? So they must be balancing their calories; that argument wouldn’t make sense though because if they aren’t watching what they eat you would think they would get depressed or something and start to eat more calories than normal to gain weight wouldn’t you? Oh no everyone counts calories that’s why most people’s weights in America overweight obese or skinny stay about the same now they are all thinking about it. By the way I eat what I want all that I want and I don’t think about it, I don’t count calories and my weight NEVER CHANGES. Heck! I wouldn’t want to. Thinking about it would be letting people like the owner of this Blog control me, and as far as I am concerned I would like to take a shit right on them if I had the chance. My shit is natural too.