Socially Engineer Weight Loss: Our Only Hope?
Socially Engineer Weight Loss: Our Only Hope?
Obesity and overweight rates in America continue to climb dramatically and yet there always seems to be a new and exciting weight loss diet and strategy on the market and in the news. So many people want to be thin yet find themselves overweight even when they maintain the best intentions and effort. After working for 30 years with clinical patients who are trying to lose weight I have concluded that there are two critical words that can help people lose weight and keep it off. They are social engineering!
We live in a culture where there is readily available high calorie, large portioned, delicious, and high variety foods. We also live in a culture where most people don’t need to move around very much to go about their daily routines. We have so many conveniences which are great but have unintended consequences when it comes to weight gain. Additionally, somehow we live in a culture where fast foods, high calorie sodas, and packaged snack foods are typically the norm rather than the exception in our food selections. No wonder the obesity rates have increased so dramatically in the United States. You couldn’t draw up a more perfect plan to increase the weight of average Americans.
So, how have average citizens tried to fight this trend? Mostly by willpower and individual dieting efforts that may or may not use commercial products and services. Additionally, fad diets that, when you think about it, are typically pretty weird if not just plain bizarre also seem to rule the day too. Look in any bookstore and you’ll see numerous selections on dieting and weight loss. It seems like all celebrities write a diet book at one time or another too. Do all (or even any) of these products and programs work? In a word, no! Is there any hope? Perhaps.