But “con men” is still a bit harsh.

Actually, it is terribly accurate. Blood sucking, snake bit, con men who knowingly make life worse and intentionally harm others for their own gratification and wealth.

Like someone selling poison as medicine.

Con men doesn’t catch it exactly, I’d call them grifters, perhaps.

Thanks!

I now work in cancer research (*lots* more rewarding), but I’ll share a horrible experience from my 15 minutes of fame in fat research. We had presented some data at the annual APA meeting regarding a change in attitudes for women who’d been on a low fat diet. The goal of the diet was HEALTH (ie, lowering cancer risk), and NOT altering body weight. Anyway, some local news person looked us up and arranged an interview. He insisted no less than a dozen times during my interview that this was information about dieting for weight loss. At every single instance, I corrected him, and told him altering body weight was **NOT** the goal. Later, we viewed the segment on the local news, which began something like, “Great news in fighting the battle of the bulge!” over images of a thin woman picking at a salad. *sigh*

Those polite, restrained English! If, while they’re being interrogated and accused, these “obese” people would just come out and say “kiss my ass,” then there wouldn’t be any of this silly misunderstanding about “denial.” Me for example, I’m not denying anything. No sir, it’s lunch-time; I’m asserting that I’m gonna go out right now and have me a juicy cheeseburger, with grilled onions. And fries. And beer! Man, it’s gonna be so good.

Fat people on average have to pay substantially more than thin people for health insurance (if they have it and live in a country that uses health insurance), out of salaries that are on average, significantly less than those for thin people.

That may be true for individual coverage, but most people get health “insurance” through their employers or the government, and, at my company at least, premiums don’t vary on an individual basis. And, of course, with Medicare and other tax-funded health care, payments are based purely on income.

I said, “on average”. That takes into account the many people who are covered by their employers and the substantial minority who are not. And that still leaves the average difference in salary. To repeat, thin people are not getting a raw deal at the hands of fat people when it comes to the costs of medical care.

By “legitimate,” I mean that you have no more right to insult me for not being attracted to fat women than I have to insult you for being fat.

That makes it clearer what you mean.

I don’t think anyone has the right to be insulted for their preferences. I will say though, that if a man says “I’m only attracted to blondes” then my (internal, kept quiet view) will be that I’m entirely unimpressed by that, but if a (heterosexual) man says “I’m only attracted to blondes, but that’s so restricting! I wish I were attracted to brunettes and redheads as well, there are some really beautiful women out there, but somehow the attraction button just doesn’t get hit *sigh*” then I’d be much more impressed.

Someone who has an irrational preference and knows that it is irrational I always find much more impressive than someone who has an irrational preference and attempts to justify it as being rational. I’m afraid, from the perspective of fat women, we tend to see a lot more of the latter than the former, with or without the justification.

I assure you that weight loss is a 100%-effective method of losing weight.

“Weight loss” isn’t a method of anything, nor is it a behaviour; it is simply a possible side-effect of some behaviours. However it is indeed the case that methods intended to cause weight-loss are generally reasonably effective in the short-term, and almost 100% ineffective in the long-term.

Brandon- Check out this article; Checking the Obesity Math
http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=120705M

Quote from the article:
“But this merely emphasizes the questions that Glick and Tsai raise about the health and other costs researchers say obesity is imposing on society: “Do we know the independent effects of weight, physical activity and fitness?” Their answer: No. “Could our aesthetic judgments about overweight/obesity be affecting our scientific judgments?” Possibly.

Their conclusion is clear, “evidence is lacking” to support statements such as “overweight/obesity is a major public health problem that costs society billions of dollars, and we should be doing everything we can to combat it.”

Fat people on average have to pay substantially more than thin people for health insurance (if they have it and live in a country that uses health insurance), out of salaries that are on average, significantly less than those for thin people.

That may be true for individual coverage, but most people get health “insurance” through their employers or the government, and, at my company at least, premiums don’t vary on an individual basis. And, of course, with Medicare and other tax-funded health care, payments are based purely on income.

I’m not sure exactly what you mean by “legitimate”, but “shallow” would be a much better description. Preference is largely dictated by culture.

By “legitimate,” I mean that you have no more right to insult me for not being attracted to fat women than I have to insult you for being fat. And I assure you that my preferences would be very different if they actually were dictated by culture.

given the immense effort required to lose weight AND keep it off (if you have the type of body that naturally tends towards fat in the first place), why on earth would it be surprising if someone made a rational appraisal of the costs and benefits and concluded that it wasn’t worthwhile?

Like I said, I can understand a cost-benefit analysis. And I don’t deny that the costs of staying thin are much greater for some than for others. But you seemed to be saying that it wouldn’t be worthwhile even if it were possible with little effort.

BStu:
I assure you that weight loss is a 100%-effective method of losing weight.

Assuming for the sake of argument that fat people really don’t cost me money by overusing medical services, I don’t care what they do or how much they weigh.

I can assure you that thin people are not somehow getting a raw deal compared to fat people when it comes to the costs of medical services. Fat people on average have to pay substantially more than thin people for health insurance (if they have it and live in a country that uses health insurance), out of salaries that are on average, significantly less than those for thin people. That should more than cover any increased costs used by fat people (not that fat people would have been much able to avoid those costs, anyway).

That said, while I don’t want to be a jerk by going on and on about how great it is to be lean, I do think that there are advantages (for example, being able to zip up a few flights of stairs without getting winded) that have nothing to do with the prejudices and bigotry of society at large.

There are both advantages and disadvantages to different body sizes. But there’s more overlap than you might think. If I zip up several flights of stairs with a friend, my half-my-weight friend is likely to be equally winded at the top. I can float and swim better than my thinner friends. They can run faster than I can. I’m cuddlier than they are. They can fit into smaller spaces. I can’t be pushed around. *shrug*

And I think it’s perfectly legitimate for most people to feel more attracted physically to members of the opposite sex who aren’t fat.

I’m not sure exactly what you mean by “legitimate”, but “shallow” would be a much better description. Preference is largely dictated by culture. But I daresay just as there are some fat admirers who buck the trend by being attracted to fat people, there are some thin admirers who would be naturally attracted to thin people even if the culture was pro-fat.

I can understand how you might think that the advantages of losing weight (or, more precisely, becoming lean) aren’t worth the effort, or that it’s unrealistic, but to say that you don’t consider it a worthwhile goal even if feasible seems rather questionable to me.

What’s strange about it? There are advantages and disadvantages of being in a “formerly fat” state of thinnes, but given the immense effort required to lose weight AND keep it off (if you have the type of body that naturally tends towards fat in the first place), why on earth would it be surprising if someone made a rational appraisal of the costs and benefits and concluded that it wasn’t worthwhile?

In addition, there are many people who have lost large quantities of weight and not found it a pleasant experience, so can attest directly to it not being a worthwhile goal.

Being healthy is always a worthwhile goal. But it has nothing to do with being thin.

Jakobpunkt:

Your wanting us to discuss the possible efficacy of this diet presupposes that losing weight is a worthwhile goal and that, while fat people might be forgiven for being fat if no diet works, once a diet that does work is found, then we can and should expect fat people to slim down.

Assuming for the sake of argument that fat people really don’t cost me money by overusing medical services, I don’t care what they do or how much they weigh. That said, while I don’t want to be a jerk by going on and on about how great it is to be lean, I do think that there are advantages (for example, being able to zip up a few flights of stairs without getting winded) that have nothing to do with the prejudices and bigotry of society at large. And I think it’s perfectly legitimate for most people to feel more attracted physically to members of the opposite sex who aren’t fat.

I can understand how you might think that the advantages of losing weight (or, more precisely, becoming lean) aren’t worth the effort, or that it’s unrealistic, but to say that you don’t consider it a worthwhile goal even if feasible seems rather questionable to me.

It was pure speculation, but I wasn’t imagining the defensiveness of BStu’s response to me. I hope BStu is not as offended as you are.

“People selling diets without evidence that the diets have a significant chance of producing weightloss for their customers are indeed very aptly described as “con men”.”

I’ve already responded to the “con men” slur. It’s not justified.

Jakobpunkt:
“Your diet isn’t really worth discussing because even if it works why should we care?”

I never said you should, and one of the reasons I posted my question is that I was wondering how many would care if it were believed to be effective, and how many would prefer their bodies as they are. I don’t think you’ll find anywhere where I suggested any of the presumptions you speak of. You just pulled them out of the social ether; you presumed that I share those attitudes because many other people have those attitudes, even against evidence that I don’t share the common attitudes, such as my words in comment 25: “It’s really appalling how people are shamed into starving themselves because it’s the “disciplined” thing to do, especially in light of its demonstrated worthlessness as a diet plan.”, or this: “I don’t have any problem with someone saying that the diet industry is conning the populace”“I think it’s pretty apt.”, or this from my comment 16: “people like Atkins and Agatston […] who were certainly blindly bigoted against fat people”, or this: “voluntary calorie self-restriction is virtually impossible long-term, and thus not practical as a dieting plan”.

BStu:
“PDF, I’m one of the few fat people in this world who have never dieted, so I’ll thank you not to dismiss my strong opinion as the product of “defensiveness” over my imagined dieting failures.”

Please accept my apologies. My speculation as to your motivations was unfounded. I do maintain that your reactions are overly defensive. You’re projecting a lot of attitudes on me that I haven’t espoused.

“I would also thank you not to apply such faulty reasoning to any of the fat people who have dieted unsuccessfully.”

I’m almost certain that the psychological mechanisms I attributed to you are very plausible. I wouldn’t believe that of someone without good evidence (more than I had of you when I wrote my previous comment), but I don’t think it’s very controversial that people are reluctant to change their minds about things that they’ve already spent a lot of energy deciding, and then built up a lot of their life around that decision. I still think the same thing probably applies to you, even if unconsciously, and I’m pretty sure it applies to me towards the opposite position, unconsciously. We’re just human, and humans suck at being rational. But I try my best.

If someone could point out an actual instance of this in my posts, especially an instance that indicates real anti-fat bigotry, I’d be grateful. But I don’t think there are any.

“You don’t even pretend your plan has scientific justification.”

It doesn’t have any empirical validation, but it has a strong theoretical justification. The diet isn’t scientificly validated, but it was developed using science by (arguably) a scientist. Like many others, to be sure, though I’d like to think to a greater degree, and with more ingenuity than others.

“You have no proof that your accepted scheme has an liklihood of success in ANYONE.”

Well, it’s absolutely, 100% proven to be successful in Seth Roberts, and in at least one of his colleagues who also lost weight using it. I find that pretty compelling evidence that it’s at least sometimes successful.

“A new scheme has no benefit of the doubt just because it pretends its new.”

I agree. It’s as I said in comment 37: “Without knowing anything about a new weight loss diet, it’s very likely to not be effective.” However, a new scheme can have the benefit of the doubt because of a very different approach, or because of the trustworthiness of its originator, or other factors that make the new diet less likely to fail for the same reasons as old ones. I do think that the approach of Roberts’ diet is very different from any other diets I’ve heard of, and I think that’s a reason to consider it with more of an open mind than one would other diets.

“The “Shangri-la Diet” is a terrible name”

hehehehe. Agreed.