The Ethics of "Project Harpoon"

[umbr44]

As a healthy-ish sized person who was larger before, and also slimmer, since reaching my final height of 6 foot. (High of 13 stone, low of 9.5 stone, currently about 11 stone 4 pounds.)

I think it's easy to forget, or not even realise that even for one person, losing weight is not a straight forward thing. If I were to binge out and eat an entire cake, I would put on weight; if I immediately upped my exercise to counteract that, I would lose that weight easily, but it's harder to lose weight you've had for a longer period of time.

For simple numbers sake, say that I weight 11 stone, after eating that cake I now weigh 11 stone 1 pound. I lose that extra pound in a week and then return my life the way it was before....I then stay at 11 stone. Now lets say I've weighed 11 stone 1 pound for 5 years with exactly the same lifestyle as above, I up my exercise for a week and lose that extra pound. I return to my normal lifestyle but within a week or some I'm at 11 stone 1 pound again.

Our bodies are still designed to horde fat in case food runs out, if you are overweight for a long period of time, your body thinks that is normal and will do anything it can to get back there. Diets fail often because returning to a normal relatively healthy lifestyle after isn't always enough, your body will try to get back it where it was before.

So yes, it IS harder for people who have been overweight for a long time to lose weight, that it is for someone who just binged and ate an entire 15 inch pizza.


Having said that... I do think it is wrong if anybody tries to show an overweight lifestyle as being healthy, I just think it's unfair to equate losing short term weight gain to long term weight gain. They are different and it's not surprising that many people can't manage it even when they try.

 

[Fallow]

If you want to compare critical reading skills, bring it on.
You did notice the image was cropped by intention to hide the fact that that article was originally from the Daily Mail, British tabloid infamous for straight-up fabricating stories, right? Example: http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/mar/17/dailymail-pcc

Let's see.


I mentioned "reading", which is not the same as "comparing critical reading skills" (the hint is that these are spelled and pronounced differently). The fact you read something entirely different is downright funny.

Internet source criticism 101:
Be vary if:
1 - You are provided with a picture of an article instead of a link.
2 - The picture is provided with no source.
3 - Only parts of the article is available.

If all three are true, don't take anything provided as fact and, by all means, do not spread it further.

Your "internet source criticism 101" seems to lack sourcing (or the reasoning that would invalidate the need for a source).

Come on Fallow, all you had to do was read. If you want to signal how wrong others are, at least put the minimum amount of effort into it.

Captcha: make my day.
Indeed.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. -Charles Caleb Colton


Ooh, and here's another one: Shaming caused a woman to finally deal with obesity. [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3159006/Size-28-woman-shamed-losing-THIRTEEN-STONE-bullies-threw-kebabs-shouted-Oi-fatty.html]

(It might be worth noting that overall the studies appear to correlate support and acceptance with weight loss rather than shaming, but that says nothing for the individual case)