Quote:
Originally Posted by BucFan
Our culture focuses on eating. Holidays, celebrations, etc. Our media constantly promotes eating - pay attention to all the fast food and restaurant commercial ads that flood the TV everyday/night..
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That's a good point that may be hard to realize.
One of the things that I noticed many months ago (I was talking to a brother on the phone) that one of the reasons why my back ground stress was down, perhaps, is that I don't watch "broadcast" TV at all (or at least, nothing in English).
Just as perhaps TV contributes to our stress, so it may "make us" do things. An interesting off point on that is my relationship with salads. It was a commercial I saw years ago where the voice over, in a 70s tonal Kate Jackson, was saying, "Around here, we eat a lot of salads". That commercial hit all the right notes with me to make me a constant salad eater. Now, they were probably selling some salad dressing and I gave that stuff up in the late 80s.
I'm not "perfect" in what I use in my salads but it goes like this: Romaine, feta, Parmesan, fish, avocado, sunflower seeds, tomato, olives, spices, and croutons. I shake but not spin the water off for it gives something for the spices to attach to. I'm listing the contents for what's there that someone could advertise off of? The croutons and perhaps the cheeses but the other stuff, you either like it or you don't.
Someone might be able to advertise the avocado but after they process it and dish it up into a party atmosphere, such as some kind of dip. Interestingly, I don't think I've ever seen a commercial of having the avocado with salad dressing after the pit was removed (gave up that approach, too, decades ago).
They might be able to advertise the sunflower seeds but only after salt has been added. Hence, we come back to the salad dressing. Salad by itself is pretty plain on TV; it's only after it has been doused with the pretty people, sorry Paul, high caloric salad dressing that it becomes some thing to make commercials about.
So why doesn't all the pretty people on TV and in movies convince us to be slim like them? Well, a few things probably tie into that. First, we probably get the message of the food first and then get the message that even with the food, we can still be like them. The catch that is lost on us is that it is all movie magic and what we are seeing is not how it works. Of course, there is the other side of the story when one does get the message of the pretty people and starves themselves to try to achieve that.
I'd say that a big thing is that not many people cook any more so we get fast food, restaurant food (big portions, fillers, perhaps alcohol that doesn't tell us when we have had enough), and processed food. Of course, there are certain styles of cooking that add to the calories as well such as fried.
The "invention" of the fork and spoon may contribute. Every so often, I'll stop at the Chinese buffet. It's a lot of tasty food that is cooked in oil and I do see people shovel it in. I don't because I take that opportunity to use chop sticks. The Chinese buffet is an interesting 2 sided sword with me. On one side, it is a lot of calories but on the other side, it stops my thirst for alcohol that I might want when I get home (I don't drink outside the home).
Sodas are probably a big contributor. Besides being the replacement for alcohol, they are, probably, an example of a bigger problem in that we don't really know what is in our food and what it will do to us. This problem has been going on for decades. From corn syrup to margarine, it can make one shudder, whether the intent was malicious or not.
Finally, it may be how we get programmed in society. There's a PSA out there on youtube that shows the 33 (or so) obese man in the ER with a heart attack and the doctor asking how did he get to this point. His life is then rewound with all the related events and we get back to his mother feeding him french fries because "it's the only thing he will eat".
I remember back in my ROTC days at A&M where as freshmen, we really didn't eat at meals until "CHOW DOWN!" where we got to stuff it all in in about 5 or less minutes. This or that regiment system to teach and control others. When it comes to making time on the schedule, it may be the meal times that are slashed. They did that at my high school until they realized the effect it was having on students and faculty alike.
Little things, here and there, it all adds up.
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