America Eats Bad!

Here’s a section from an article by Michael Mason

“After crunching dietary data gathered from more than 4,700 adults, researchers at the UNiversity of California at Berkeley found that soft drinks provide more than 7 percent of the average daily adult intake of calories - the largest single source. Soft drinks, alcohol and sweets, including pastries, account for more than 25 percent of adults’ calories. Add fruit drinks and salty snacks and the figure rises to 30 percent. Nearly one-third our calories come from junk food and alcohol.”

That’s a lot of crap to eat!

That’s how I ate one year ago…I can see how it happens in a world of conveinence.

It’s funny how we (my family) wasn’t allowed to eat any of that crap as a kid, and now it’s standard food for most americans (I watch my sisters feeding her kids and it makes me scared…I hope I am wrong about what I think it’ll do to them over the next 10-20 years.)

And the guys at work think I’m a freak eating the way I do!

My brother’s girlfriend was kinda puzzled and surprised when she found out that their kid is overweight after a medical exam. I wasn’t surprised at all. The kid eats hotpockets and pepsi every friggin’ meal–including BREAKFAST. What’s worse… she actually allows it too! Even puts the hotpockets stuff in the microwave for him for chrissakes. Shows you how some people can be very ignorant when it comes to nutrition.

I’ve been meaning to post something to this affect for a while and this seems like a good title for it. First, what I am about to rant about really pisses me off, but it pushes me harder and gives motivation to stay the course. My family, friends and co-workers think I am psychotic for eating “healthy”. I am tired of fat, skinny, out of shape fucks (they are my family and friends so I can say that) telling me that I am crazy for “depriving” myself the way I do. Every phone call, every conversation includes “How are you eating now”? The only change in the answer in the last 5 years is whether I am bulking, maintaining or cutting. In their sense they don’t deprive themselves because they do not have an ounce of self-control. They absolutely cannot understand that I enjoy eating this way. Every time I am eating my chicken and broccoli and they are eating fried whatever, I feel a sense of satisfaction. These are the same people who ask me how to get in the same shape I am currently in. When I start to tell them, they are out of the conversation before I finish the second sentence - the first is eat right and exercise. By the way, ALL of these people are either on or were on some kind of fad diet.
Secondly, my wife (30 years old, mother of a 13 month girl) has cancer; it’s cancer of unknown primary. It is terminal and she is about to start her second round of Chemo, more on that in a couple months. Sticking with the topic, asking the doctors if there is anything she can change with her diet to make her tolerate the chemo and cancer better, they look at me like I asked them to build a fucking rocket. I have done the research on my own, and know there is plenty she could do, but my wife and her dumbass family will not do anything without the Dr.'s say so. Talk about frustration…
Third and last, I obviously have been spending a lot of time in the hospital. The health care industry has to have the largest % of fat fucks working for them than any other industry. It’s amazing to see the people that care for the people, that are in their situation at least partially because of their dietary habits, walk around eating doughnuts and drinking Pepsi?s all day. The food that is sent to the patients is also a dietary disaster. Also, I bring my own meals to the hospital - these people, of course, criticize me. The health industry needs to get their asses up to speed on nutrition fast. I think we are in bad shape now (no pun intended) and if this doesn’t happen, we are going to be in real trouble. If the health care industry doesn’t understand the affects of diet, how in the hell can we expect our general population to understand?
Whew - I’m done.

That was very well-said, STILLERS, and you most likely spoke for most of us too. I’d like to expand that even further. I’m in the Army and am in the last stretch of a combat tour in Iraq. While I’ve been here, I’ve eaten a lot of MRE’s, Iraqi shit-food, some stuff I’ll be able to identify, and some relatively decent food (by which I mean it’s identifiable and semi-fresh). The idea of eating like a T-Magger here is a bit far-fetched, however, Halliburton is serving the same food, the EXACT same food as the services serve in the big fancy, state-of-the-art dining halls in the States on post. No kidding! And the food absolutely sucks ass! More specifically, it’s on the same level as a fast food joint. It’s all fried, or instant, or whatever cuts costs and makes the crap ready to serve in 5 minutes or less. We’re talking about stuff that is the nutritional equivalent of feces. The Army allows for a male soldier 17-21 years old to have 20% bodyfat. Not too many people meet that nowdays. Most soldiers have a beer-belly effect from eating in the chow halls, or eating at Burger King. This is exaggerated by the crappy fitness program that we have to use. They wonder why there are a lot of fat soldiers! They wonder why people are injured so much. I’ve posted the Eight Keys 1-4, various articles by Lonnie and John. These were tossed by the unit “fitness expert” whose expertise consists of two weeks of extra push-ups, situps, and various perversions of both. This Army is badass, and no other society will ever take us down, but goddammit, we need to bring our military out of the nutritional Stone-Age. Let’s make a good thing better, and maybe even toss in some kettlebells and power-racks and send some beefy, lean, Conan-looking guys to our wars. Or maybe we can at least enjoy the benefits of being lean, strong, and damn good looking.

I wondered about that. I sespected that the forces ate a terrible diet. I just always thought in the back of my mind that it just couldn’t be true. That “we” would have to know better - guess not.

I know I’m just repeating what people already said, but why is it that we are the freaks when we eat healthy? When I eat my cottage cheese, people look at me like I’m eating worms! But when someone eats a bag of chips, it’s fine?! It’s sad what this world has come to…

Ive been told I have an eating disorder for pulling a bag of almonds out of my glove box. Meanwhile the person telling me this is having 40g of sugar in liquid form (Mountain Dew) and a sandwich dubbed “the artery clogger”, (pizza sub double meat and double bacon) for lunch.

I eat oatmeal with berries and protein powder. “You eat protein POWDER?” I take it to college classes because…well I have to. Eating in a class isn’t too easy because you have to be quiet. Slurping up the last bits of oats and watery protein is yummy, but I get stares. I brought chicken, whole wheat pasta and a shake to one class. People oggle. I just finished a two week bout of Massive Eating. “You eat 6000kcal? Are you sick? Don’t you puke? Aren’t you getting fat?” Sure, maybe a teeny weensy bit of fat, but not as much as that Taco Bell shit you eat. I’ve never dieted, until I came to this apartment, and living with someone else who diets makes it so much easier. I am now training my girlfriend with T-Dawg 2.0 etc. She likes it. I’ve gained 21 lbs in five months. BF% has gone up 1%. People always sya ‘wow you’ve gotten bigger, you’re really looking good’ but these are the same people who make fun of me for eating healthy.

I love hypocrites.

~Lotus