Why You Are Fat

Samoans are fat people. Why? Were they always this way? Nope.

Fat people are survivors. They are blessed with highly efficient metabolisms. They burn calories at a much slower rate than other people. This allows them to live longer and function better without food. Put some fat people and some skinny people in a survival situation, and the fat people will live. The skinny people will quickly die off. Even if you introduced a new group of skinny people later, the former fat people will still outlive them. I learned this from watching the first season of Survivor which the fat guy won.

Samoans are fat because their ancestors were the only ones that survived those long ocean voyages in dugout canoes and could live in such a remote place. Samoans historically are not fat people. So, what happened? What made them balloon up like they did? The answer to that is simple--the American diet.

The key term is caloric density. The modern American diet is packed with calories from food larded up with fat and sugar. Everyone loves fat and sugar including skinny people because we have all evolved to prefer those foods. These are survival foods. Most of human history has been a tale of near starvation. Then, along came McDonald's.

Americans historically have not been overweight. Old Army posters of pre-WWII inductees show skinny guys coming to sign up. After joining the Army, they actually gained weight because they had access to three squares with lots of beef, pork, and dessert. Nowadays, inductees often must lose weight to make the cut.

The key to losing weight has always been to decrease caloric input and increase caloric output. From fad diets to The Biggest Loser, the answer is the same. It is simple math. Losing weight is no mystery. The problem is that no one keeps the weight off. It always creeps back on. What is the answer?

The answer goes back to caloric density. The problem with fad diets is that they leave you hungry. You can't live on them, so you go back to the shitty diet you had before to stop feeling hungry. Having a chronic growling stomach will erode anyone's willpower. People will say you just need portion control, but this is just so much horseshit. You need to go back to the culprit that makes those Samoans fat--the American diet.

I have always had a weight problem. The first time I lost significant weight was right after high school, and I had a job stacking hay for a feed merchant. That knocked a lot of weight off of me. Farm work burns the calories. It is so good that I used to eat a lot of crap like burgers and fried chicken and still lost weight. But you can't do that kind of work all your life. I was doing an aerobic type workout for 8 to 10 hours per day. I was up there with Tour de France cyclists in the caloric need department. When I left that job, my weight ballooned back up like before.

I lost significant weight again when I had another physically demanding job stacking boxes in trailers. I only did this four to eight hours a day with some running and cycling mixed in. The weight dropped off but not as significantly as when I was stacking hay. My meal of choice was the Whopper with Cheese combo from Burger King. I was on a first name basis with the ladies at that drive thru.

Now, I have tried fad diets. I went vegetarian for a year. I lost no weight on that at all. I was starving all the time and would eat a ton of carbs and sugar. Since I wasn't a vegan, I could do dairy, and I did. I made a lot of Hamburger Helper with the fake meat. I was also working moderately physically during this time. I didn't gain any weight, but I didn't lose any either. Perhaps I would have done better as a strict vegan, but the perpetual hunger just drove me insane. I have seen people on the Atkins plan which is the mirror opposite of veganism. They lose weight, too, but they report being hungry all the time as well except they crave plates of pasta. You might as well not eat because you are always hungry.

The answer came to me by accident. I had given up on fad diets as being unworkable, and I figured the only way I could lose weight was to do it like before--a couple of hours of exercise each day. But I was having problems with indigestion and all the rest from the crap that I ate. It was like having Crohn's Disease. I would eat a burger and then shit my brains out. After almost two decades of this, I decided to stop eating hamburgers. I was tired of having an upset gastrointestinal tract. Then, I started losing weight. No exercise. My job was really sedentary. No fad diet. No hunger. I just stopped eating the worst of the crap, and I noticed my pants weren't so tight. I didn't have to do the inhale-button routine anymore. I did some reading, and I figured out the caloric density thing. Remember, my goal was not to lose weight. I didn't care. I just wanted to stop having the shits. But I lost 50 pounds as a result of that one small thing.

You have to eat. Being hungry sucks. But you don't have to be hungry to lose weight. I was losing weight without being hungry because I was moving away from the diet that makes those fucking Samoans so goddamn fat. The twin culprits in our diet are fat and sugar. They pack more calories per gram than any other thing in our diet such as carbs. The Atkins diet is a farce, but it works because those Atkins people eliminate sugar. Similarly, vegans eliminate both fat and sugar. The problem is they eliminate stuff that is good for you as well. This is why you are hungry as well.

Fat and sugar in proper amounts are necessary. You must get these, or you will feel hungry. The problem is that people get the fat and sugar from sodas, candy, sweets, and fast food. In nature, you would get these things from fruit, nuts, and cuts of meat which are going to be pretty lean. The American diet supercharges this with ground beef, fried food, and Coke. A gram of fat contains 9 calories where carbs and protein only contain 4. Sugar has about 4 calories per gram as well, but when you dissolve it in a liquid you drink all day long, you get ginormous. I am convinced that these sugary beverages are the cause of so much Type 2 diabetes as the blood gets a gigantic hit of this sugar all day long. Insulin resistance builds.

When you eat foods that are less calorically dense such as those found in non-American diets, you lose weight while eating more food. Compare a 12" roasted chicken sub from Subway to a Big Mac. The sub is huge, but the Big Mac is small. Yet, the Big Mac has 704 calories. The 12" roasted chicken sub has 620 calories. The difference is 80 calories. Doesn't seem like much, but it is those small differences that add up to the big things much like a dripping faucet over a period of a few days can flood a house. Plus, you can't be hungry after eating a 12" sandwich. I switched over to this healthier eating, and the pounds came off slowly but surely.

In order to cut back on fat and sugar, this was the diet plan I followed:

-No sugared beverages. I used artifical sweeteners or drank water.

-No candy, desserts, or sweets. If I had a sweet tooth, I would eat some fruit or a low fat fig newton.

-No animal with four legs. This eliminated all beef and pork from my diet. Poultry and fish were all I would eat.

-Nothing fried. This meant eating the grilled chicken sandwich and a plain baked potato from Wendy's instead of the fried chicken sandwich and the French fries. It is the same amount of food minus the added fat from the frying.

-Skim milk and whole wheat bread.

When I switched over to this new eating, I was hungry for the first three days. I went ahead and ate more but stuck with the plan. Eventually, the portions came back down. I realize those three days are the "withdrawal." I wasn't chronically hungry. I just ate more for awhile until I adjusted. It was painless.

When you eat this way after eating crap, you immediately feel better. Your guts stop hurting. You have more energy. You feel lighter on your feet. In short, it works. You don't even have to be this austere. The French aren't this way, and they seem to do fine. They eat butter and beef and other crap. But it isn't American food. A French diet is in between what the Japanese eat and what we eat. The same is true for Italians and Mediterraneans. My own experience, the observations of Asians, Europeans, and Samoans, and everything you read in the medical literature coupled with whatever you doctor preaches at you all back me up on this. Caloric density is the culprit, and the American diet is the most calorically dense in human history.

There are people who seem able to eat this crap and not gain weight. It could be portion control or natural metabolism. Remember, I lost weight eating just such crap by burning a ton of calories on the job and from exercising, and I am a born fat ass. Then, you have the fad diets. The reason fad diets fail is because they always eliminate a food group. It could be carbs or meat. Think back to Thanksgiving when you were stuffed with Turkey and dressing and all the other goodies. You couldn't eat another bite. Yet, you still had room for dessert. Why is this?

The brain and your body has triggers. It wants protein, fat, and carbs. Vegans eliminate the fat and feel famished. Yet, a piece of grilled chicken with 3 grams of fat will eliminate that craving. Similarly, the Atkins guy wanting pasta just needs a couple pieces of whole grain bread. Because they are extreme diets, they punish you and can't last.

I have no problem sticking to this plan, but I do fall down from time to time. I might have the fried sandwich instead of the grilled. I might leave the Canadian bacon on the Egg McMuffin. When I start slipping bad, my weight creeps up. When I go back to the plan, the weight goes back down. And I eat at fast food places. My faves are Subway and Taco Bell because their menus are firmly within my plan. Other places like McDonald's suck because they will have a healthy sandwich but no sides worth a damn. The best advice I can give for eating healthy is to eat out as little as possible and bring your lunch to work.

I ignore certain food phobias. I think artificial sweeteners are great. I eat eggs all the time. That is good protein. I also like peanut butter. It is fatty, but I can't eat more than a spoonful of that stuff. I put it on whole wheat toast or a bagel, and I can go for four hours and not feel hungry.

Now, I know this post is going to bring all sorts of criticism from vegans, Paleo people, and all the rest. I have found out a dirty secret about these people. They cheat. I know vegans hit the soda and the Gatorade and the Clif bars and the McDonald's french fries. I knew a guy like this who wouldn't touch Jell-O but would eat the fries. Then, he went ape shit when it was discovered they used some beef for flavor. What an idiot. I know Atkins people will cheat as well with a piece of bread. No one misses that dinner roll. These are fucking fads on par with Christians teaching their kids abstinence instead of sex ed. The kids cheat by giving head and butt fucking which is why so many end up like Bristol Palin. Sorry, but that's the hard truth. Humans love to fuck. It is better to teach them how to properly fuck than to tell them not to fuck.

I cheat on my meal plan, but it isn't because of cravings but convenience. When I run out of milk for my cereal, the only thing I can get for breakfast is a Pop Tart from the convenience store. Crap food is ubiquitous and cheap. It takes extra effort to prepare a proper meal. It takes further driving and a longer wait to go to Subway than the McDonald's drive thru. You run into the social cost when you get invited to the picnic where they are grilling burgers and hot dogs. Everyone tells you to eat healthy, but they aren't going to help you do it.

The Samoans ate fish and rice and taro before the American diet hit. These are bad things according to the fad diet people. Yet, these people who have such an overwhelming genetic predisposition to be fat were skinny. When Spam and Coke came their way, it was over with. As for me, I know the truth. Here is my favorite food now:



The Japanese have the right idea. Even Chinese food is greasy and fatty compared to the Japanese. I imagine the Samoans ate similar fare for a long time. I love seafood as long as it isn't fried. The answer is to stop eating crappy American food. My weight goes up and down in direct proportion to the amount of crap I eat. But I am never hungry except when I forget to eat because of a project. I hate eating as much as I hate sleeping and having to take a shit. They interfere with the fun. But you have to do those things, or you will die.

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