McDonald's and BMI

[eXcommunicate]

t's "food porn." That's what the Center for Science in the Public Interest dubbed the 1,030-calorie, deep-fried Lasagna Fritta appetizer at the Olive Garden.
The restaurant, known for its "bottomless" salad and breadsticks, made the consumer group's 2010 "Xtreme Eating Awards".

Other restaurants you frequent also made the list: P.F. Chang's, Five Guys, The Cheesecake Factory, California Pizza Kitchen, Outback, Chevy's and Bob Evans.

Two Cheesecake Factory dishes were also singled out. The pasta carbonara -- described as spaghettini with smoked bacon, green peas and a garlic-parmesan cream sauce -- is loaded with 2,500 calories and 60 grams of saturated fat. The chocolate truffle cake has 1,670 calories and 48 grams of saturated fat.

The group, which some call the food police, knocks Five Guys for its 700-calorie hamburger and its fries (620 calories for the small and 1,460 for the large). Five Guys is "no friend to your hips," CSPI says, pointing to the bacon cheeseburger and large fries adding up to 2,380 calories.

In issuing its awards, CSPI says two out of three adults and one third of children are now overweight or obese in America. Nearly 30 percent of young people are too heavy to join the military.

http://www.wtop.com/?nid=25&sid=2124737

Sounds like some of these other restaurants may be bigger contributors to obesity.

Yet, I'd wager fast food joints serve a greater number of meals per capita, making them a larger impact on society than Cheddar's or Olive Garden, which are usually once-in-a-blue-moon treats for most families.

We've started eating out more.

Seriously, that's really it. Two people are now working. Used to be mom cooked and cleaned, dad worked. Sexist? Yes. But we lost sexism, and with that loss, we lost good teachers and home cooking.

I'm not saying woman's lib was a bad thing, but if we want to identify "OMFG what fucked up America," America never had a restaurant culture. America ate out to celebrate! This contrasts large parts of Europe. A 2,300 calorie meal? More excusable when it happens once a month.

We're trying to turn that into a restaurant culture, and it really is not fucking working in the least.

I think women moving into the workforce was a foregone conclusion as industrial competition against the U.S. increased over the decades following WWII. The 1950s Leave It To Beaver family was unsustainable economically.

[JimC]

I don't know what my BMI is, but I'm sure it would reflect the figure of a Greek god...

(was Bacchus Greek or Roman, I can never remember...)

[eXcommunicate]

Bacchus was the Roman equivalent of Dionysos, iirc.

[JimC]

Bacchus was the Roman equivalent of Dionysos, iirc.

That rings a bell, thanks...

Fine figures of men, either of them...

[eXcommunicate]

Bacchus was the Roman equivalent of Dionysos, iirc.

That rings a bell, thanks...

Fine figures of men, either of them...

I thought they were traditionally depicted as gluttonous.

[JimC]

Bacchus was the Roman equivalent of Dionysos, iirc.

That rings a bell, thanks...

Fine figures of men, either of them...

I thought they were traditionally depicted as gluttonous.

Exactly! Rubens style females are sexy, so are us slightly portly gentlemen...

IMO...

[Trolldor]

I think you need a larger sample size if you want to test those theories and extrapolate the results to the broader population.

And not use the BMI given how poor an indicator it is of someone's physical health.

[Tigger]

I think you need a larger sample size if you want to test those theories and extrapolate the results to the broader population.

And not use the BMI given how poor an indicator it is of someone's physical health.

It is pretty crap, yes, but it's an indicator of some sort: if one's not athletic and has a BMI >30 then it says a lot.

[Trolldor]

So does "I weigh 186 kilograms".

[Tigger]

So does "I weigh 186 kilograms".

Ok, you win.

[Coito ergo sum]

I think you need a larger sample size if you want to test those theories and extrapolate the results to the broader population.

And not use the BMI given how poor an indicator it is of someone's physical health.

BMI is not now and never was intended to be an indicator of a person's "physical health." It is an indicator of body mass relative to height and weight.

[Trolldor]

*snore*

The BMI was taken as an indicator of your physical health, hence the 'obese' and 'underweight' categories on the scale.

[Coito ergo sum]

*snore*

The BMI was taken as an indicator of your physical health, hence the 'obese' and 'underweight' categories on the scale.

BMI is a measurement - sometimes called a "metric." It puts a number to the ratio between height and weight, that's all.

There are health issues associated with higher body fat contents (generally in the "obese" ranges), the BMI is not a measure of health. The BMI is a very blunt implement, and known to be so. A person who is very strong and has a large muscle content - say someone who weight trains and weighs 220lbs at 5' 11" tall, may be in perfect health, have a low body fat percentage, but a very high BMI.

If, however, a person has a high BMI and a body fat percentage of, say, more than 25%, well, that person would be at a higher risk of certain health related issues than someone with a normal BMI and an 18% body fat percentage. That doesn't mean the obese guy is, in fact, less healthy. It means his fat content puts him in a group that is correllated to certain health issues.

[Meekychuppet]

I think you need a larger sample size if you want to test those theories and extrapolate the results to the broader population.

And not use the BMI given how poor an indicator it is of someone's physical health.

BMI was never intended for that. It's a tool to measure national health levels. If youbreach a certainnaverage ratio then you have a national problem.

[GreyICE]

I think you need a larger sample size if you want to test those theories and extrapolate the results to the broader population.

And not use the BMI given how poor an indicator it is of someone's physical health.

BMI was never intended for that. It's a tool to measure national health levels. If youbreach a certainnaverage ratio then you have a national problem.

Not being Japanese, for instance. Of course they tend to treat it as more of a 'high score' than a range of good values, but that is that.

It's a reasonably clumsy tool that has been horribly overused, the point where I wonder if it causes more harm than good.