Explaining fat shaming to my mother.

Let me see if I follow your logic.

You support making overweight people feel ashamed because you think that they eat too much, and eating too much signifies a lack of self-control, and leads to problems like being unwelcome in your close company.

Alright. Regardless of what you think causes weight gain or loss, why is making people feel BAD about themselves the solution? When people are ashamed of themselves, they are not inspired to change. Feeling worthless is not conducive to change. Feeling worthless just makes somebody want to hide his head in a bucket of fried chicken. It's when a person feels GOOD about him/herself that a person feels worthy of self-work. Think about it: If your car's totaled, and you LIKE your car, you're more likely to fix it.

And while we're at it, why aren't we solving ALL of humanity's problems with the shame solution? If people should be ashamed because they do something too much that is unhealthy, underweight people should be ashamed, too: they exercise too much, they take too many diet pills, they spend too much time not eating. Why doesn't our culture shame them? And anyone whose skintone is more than three shades darker than how they were born: they go out in the sun too much, it's bad for them, they have no self-control. Why aren't they ashamed? People who drink too much, people who work too much, people who engage in any behavior that is unhealthy outside the bounds of moderation.

(As an aside: I don't think I would like being next to YOU in an airplane, either.)

It isn't what I think, it's facts. It's interesting that people are perfect;y willing to "Kill the messenger" buy not one of you has attempted to prove even one word I have posted is not true.

No matter what your excuse, thyroid problems, metabolism "too slow" whatever makes you feel good to think, it's very simple math. If the caloric intake exceed the caloric burn, your body likes to store the excess as fat against a possible famine. Unfortunately, heart attacks, strokes, and renal failure get most of us before the famine ever happens.

So you don't like the news. That doesn't make it false. Changing your eating habits isn't even difficult. Just take a little less of everything. Yes, one should try to eat a healthy diet. But no one wants to live on grapefruit and toothpicks forever. Gradually reduce the portions you take until you reach an equilibrium in the calorie equation. That's it, no higher math required, no special diet foods, no gym dues, nothing. If you take a 20-minute brisk walk every day, that will help your physical conditioning and burn some calories. But no amount of exercise will make you lose weight as long as you are on the wrong end of the intake/burn ration. Like it or not, those are the cold, hard facts.

Anything else is a scam and only designed to make you lose weight by lightening your wallet.

Aha, I see. You're not actually READING any of these comments, or doing anything so simple as to reply to what I actually SAID, you're just trying to sell your weight-loss math.

Well, I guess I can't blame you much. But I wish you'd back up your claim that "shame is good" with something besides "calories are bad."

I am not selling anything. In fact, I GIVE the book away.

Again, you attack me personally, but decline to attempt to disprove even one word. That tells me lost about you. None of it says anything good about your attitude, mentality or ethics.

Shame is good if it gets people to stop stuffing their faces and do something useful for themselves.

FYI, my ignorant little friend, I have been in the health and fitness business for over 30 years and have owned martial arts schools, a Nautilus center, and have helped thousands of people with fitness and weight control. What have you done to make you an expert on anything?

Instead of attacking people who say things you don't like, how about doing something positive for yourself?

"If freedom means anything, it is the liberty to tell others what they do not want to hear."

But, my supposedly wise little friend, what I'm SAYING is that shame DOESN'T get people to stop stuffing their faces.

And how do you know that. As usual, you attack me without one shred of proof that you are anything but an argumentative, ignorant little jerk. When are you going to answer even one question about proof, or your qualifications to be anything but an annoying POS? I'm pretty sure that will be never,

So I'm not wasting any more time on a fool like you. Either put up or stop embarrassing yourself by making idiotic statements that you cannot hope to back u with anything like evidence.

Just think about it. In your 30 years of health and fitness experience, did shame help people achieve the goals they set?

When you were trying to help someone towards a goal, a new belt at your martial arts schools, or a heavier weight on a Nautilus machine at your center, did you encourage them by making them ashamed of themselves? Did it work?

AS a matter of fact, dumb-ass. yes it did work in many cases.

Again, you are exposing your total ignorance of everything and have not even attempted to prove one word I have posted it wrong. So why don't you obey the biblical imperative to "Go forth and multiply thyself" (Brother Dave Gardener)

You are not only stupid, you're boring. If you can't be semi-intelligent, at least be entertaining. You haven't even been able to come up with a decent insult, except to yourself.

You want proof that shame is a poor motivator for weight loss?

Oh-kay. Here's three quotes from scholarly articles in peer-reviewed journals from the last three years, and accompanying links:

http://www.nature.com/oby/journal/v15/n3/full/oby2007590a.html, "Changes in Obesity-Related Attitudes in Women Seeking Weight Reduction," and here's a quote: "Improvement in self-esteem was associated with a reduction in negativity about obesity and with improvements in body image." They felt better about themselves, they felt less negative about obesity, they lost weight.

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/121388211/abstract, "Who copes well? Obesity-related coping and its associations with shame, guilt, and weight loss" In this article, they tried to prove your point, and failed: "Body Mass Index showed no substantial association with the coping measures."

And here's the REAL kicker, from the Journal of Health Psychology, "Effects of Weight Stigma on Exercise Motivation and Behavior", http://hpq.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/13/1/131, and I'm just going to quote the entire abstract:

This study examined the relation between weight stigma, exercise motivation and exercise behavior. One hundred female undergraduates (BMIs [kg/m2] 17—38) completed measures of experiences with weight stigma, body dissatisfaction, self-esteem and exercise motivation, and reported on their exercise behavior. Stigma experiences were positively correlated with BMI and body dissatisfaction. Importantly, stigma experiences were related to increased desire to avoid exercise, even when controlling for BMI and body dissatisfaction. Exercise avoidance was in turn related to less frequent strenuous and moderate exercise. These findings suggest that weight stigma (through its impact on avoidance motivation) could potentially decrease physical activity levels.

Oh, look, the troll who can only speak in ad hominem attacks stopped responding because the links from actual scientists and real studies made his head hurt.