The Myth of muffins. The "I'll just have a muffin" line cracks me up.

Have you seen muffins lately? They've got more crap and fat in them than a hot fudge sundae and they are bigger than ever. A (on edit)chunky pal of mine pulled the I'll just have a muffin" line -- acting like he's watching his weight. He proceeded to sink his teeth into an oversized chocolate, black and white swirlly thing, moist and full of chips. It was ridiculous.

if your "pal" would still be your "pal" if he/she knew you called them "fatso".

has a chocolate chip chocolate muffin with a diet coke. Go figure.

Why is it such a big deal?

It used to be mixed-race marriages that offended people. Then it was gay people that offended "normal" (hetero) people.

Now it's food.

And spare us the concerns for his health. His health is more damaged by the stress of public shaming than by what he eats.

--bkl

Thanks, BKL. But then, why should we expect anyone who refers to a friend as "a fatso pal" to understand what you're saying?

why is what other people eat such an issue with some people???

why he CANT FIT INTO A CAR OR WALK MORE THAN A BLOCK WITHOUT SITTING DOWN, (on edit) not shame. And what bug up your ass brought race into this? Actually, he is gay, in a mixed marriage and a lard ass, to boot.

--H

You seem more interested in mocking your friend and other "lardasses" (to use your charming term) than in offering help or support. If your friendship is conditional on your friend's ability to walk or fit into a car, then maybe you should leave him to friends who really care about him. If it's not, then shut the fuck up about it!

I can promise you, it will not have escaped his notice that he is fat, and there is not a damn thing you or anyone else can do about it. If you love him regardless of his size, then let him know that. I doubt anyone would think calling him fatso and lardass, to his face or behind his back, is a way to show that you love him.

If your friend ever decides to lose weight, you can support him by listening to him and encouraging him. Until then, you can support him by listening to him and encouraging him. Unsolicited advice is never, ever, helpful.

Oh, and I can think of lots of reasons to just have a muffin:

1. That's the only thing on the menu/buffet that appeals to me


2. I'm full from a meal I've already had


3. I don't feel that well


4. I have an asshole for a friend who is watching everything I eat in front of him, so I'll wait until he's out of sight to eat what I really want

I am sure you have weaknesses too. If you would like to tell us what they are I am sure we can have a good laugh passing judgement on you.

There's no such thing as someone who can't fit into a car (I assume he weighs more than 400 pounds now) who doesn't have a significant medical problem -- and diet alone won't make a person that fat. Such medical problems are getting much more common. My guess is that is has to do with people reacting to certain food additives and pollutants, especially trans-fats and phytoestrogens.

This isn't something I thought up to "get fatties off the hook". The problem is pretty well-known, but physicians are beholden to right-wing interests as often as not. And it's tough to treat because there are a lot of phytoestrogens even showing up in drinking water, especially residues of alkylpolymer plastics (like Teflon).

Second, re-read what you wrote. It's just name-calling. Something about obesity -- and your friend -- sets you off, like mixed-race marriage and homosexuality sets other people off.

Use Google to search under "bariatry" -- that's the formal term for weight-and-eating-disorder medicine -- then avoid the diet-pill ads. You'll find a wealth of information buried under the marketing and bigotry.

--bkl

I started a thread on MSG in ice cream here in the lounge. You can read it to get the name of the book.

One interesting thing that was noted in mice, when fed normal doses of excitoxins (like MSG and nutrasweet), those mice always had one trait in common -- they were heavier, and had reproduction problems.

I'm only 1/2 way through the book, but it seems very credible to me, written by a neurosurgeon with a degree in biochemistry.

Both MSG and aspartame (NutraSweet) were designed from amino acids. Actually, MSG is a naturally-occurring substance in some plants; we had no native word for it in English, but the Japanese call it Ajinomoto. Aspartame also occurs in nature, but in much smaller amounts than are needed for sweetening. Glutamine has a long history of being known to increase animals' body weight, and it's occasionally used to promote post-surgical healing for people who have had some part of their digestive system worked on.

Most of the stuff on excitotoxins in the popular press is way exaggerated, but there is a significant literaure about their effects on growth, development, and health.

My own theories -- and I don't claim they're anything more than theories -- include:

1. Trans-fats act as pseudo-hormones and as pseudo-enzymes, and may interfere with intracellular nucleic acid processes, especially RNA "transcription".

2. Teflon derivatives (alkylated polymer plastics) break down into pseudo-estrogens and psychoactive compounds. Alkylated styrenes are especially suspicious, since they are polymeric forms of hallucinogenic speed derivatives like MDMA, DOM, and 2CB.

3. Mercury compounds from decades of leaded gasoline are still ubiquitous in the environment. Mercury is the most powerful excitotoxin pollutant known. I suspect it is about 50% responsible for the incidence of crime. Follow the trends of when mercury pollution rose and fell, add 15-25 years, and you'll see it match the crime rate.

4. Since most, or all, of these problems are interactive, different people will show radically different reactions to increases or decreases in exposure.

I don't think it's just humans' doing, though. The ecosystem is in a die-off, and nature emits its own kind of hormones. And what they are communicating now is death.

I don't have a cure or a solution, but acidophilus, mushrooms, (live-culture) cheese, any kind of fermented food will help. Composting would help in agriculture. But I really don't know how deep the problem runs.

--bkl