Why was everyone not fat in the 60's and 70's?

[Randomguy]

?

[Ralphie ★]

For one thing, they didn’t have the world at their fingertips. They had to rant the old fashioned way!  

 

[BuffJim]

1 minute ago, Ralphie said:

For one thing, they didn’t have the world at their fingertips. They had to rant the old fashioned way!  

And get up to change the tv station. 

[goldendesign]

11 minutes ago, Randomguy said:

?

Mother’s Little Helper = Valium
Black Beauties = Biphetamine 20
Barbs = Barbiturates

At least movies, songs, and my mother's recollections of her parents point to this. But what the fuck do I know, I wasn't born for another 20 years.

[az_cyclist]

For one thing, we were younger.  It is much easier to gain weight as I get older, even though I have a much healthier lifestyle.  And much harder to lose weight now.

[jsharr ★]

two words.  they both precede the word food

FAST
JUNK

[Razors Edge ★]

6 minutes ago, jsharr said:

two words.  they both precede the word food

FAST
JUNK

I ate a LOT of junk food growing up in the 70s and 80s.

Fast food was more an 80s thing for me.

[ChrisL]

4 minutes ago, jsharr said:

two words.  they both precede the word food

FAST
JUNK

Yeah and portion size. Also when did the microwave become prevalent, mid to late 70’s?  With the microwave came all sorts of processed high calorie crap you can easily nuke.  

Many reasons why but I think the two biggest factors are portion sizes grew and food became more processed. 

[MoseySusan]

2 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

Many reasons why but I think the two biggest factors are portion sizes grew and food became more processed. 

A lot of sedentary lifestyle.
In the 80’s there were kidnappers around every corner and parents started driving their kids to the neighborhood schools instead of letting them walk or ride their bikes.

In the 90’s, elementary schools were pressured by standardized testing into doubling the amount of time students receive math and reading instruction, so recess times were shortened or removed completely.

And if kids want to play, their parents would pay for them to participate in organized sports or enroll them in clubs and play groups. When kids are bored, they watch tv or play video games. 

It’s really hard to convince a 15 year old that they don’t need a car and can probably walk or bike most everywhere. Partly because we don’t have that neighborhood lgs culture anymore, and partly because we place a higher value on speed and comfort than on using our calories as fuel to go places. 

[Razors Edge ★]

18 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

Many reasons why but I think the two biggest factors are portion sizes grew and food became more processed. 

The WaPo had a story/editorial on it a few days back.

Blame "success" to some degree. Food has become better at catching and holding us.

[Randomguy]

I am thinking more and more that the abundance of food choices is out of control.  Your access to the sugar and chemical-filled snackage is seemingly infinite.  

I am also thinking that life is much more stressful now, all jobs are high stress, you have to do more with less, people leaving and not being replaced, low wages, forced overtime, way more nickel and diming, bills are out of control, you are one illness away from bankruptcy, housing costs are making home ownership less and less likely unless you have real estate already, and policies designed to quash the middle class are contributing to lots of stress-eating and power chugging of sugary beverages.

Stress is a killer, and stress eating is likely a large component of this with lots of folks.  Food composition is different.  Less activity, or opportunities for activities is decreased.  I think it is all a cycle.  One things leads to another and another and another, and then you are fatter than fuck and unlikely or unable to exercise in ways that have worked in the past.

In the end, people will eat food in bigger or outlandish portion sizes, that is full of sugar, salt, and chemicals, and they eat to temporarily reduce anxiety,  Because they are time-crunched with all the extra hours from work, they don't have time to take up activities or new hobbies or exercise much.  Because people are stressed, sleep is messed up, and being tired reinforces the cycle of eating to be temporarily happier, you don't exercise, and cortisol is through the roof.  This all causes diseases of stress and aging to go ape shit, and now you can't exercise at all.  Then all you have left is food.

[shootingstar]

1 hour ago, goldendesign said:

Mother’s Little Helper = Valium
Black Beauties = Biphetamine 20
Barbs = Barbiturates

At least movies, songs, and my mother's recollections of her parents point to this. But what the fuck do I know, I wasn't born for another 20 years.

I don't think my parents took any because they never underwent counselling (because multilingual counselling was/still often not available).  It was demanding to raise 5 children in 1 bedroom apt. in southern Ontario ..before they bought their house, then had kid #6. 

I don't know how my mother, a full-time housewife, withstood all that insanity of several young kids running/playing in tight home.  It did change part of her personality.. more volatile temper, etc. 

[Wilbur ★]

Because soda was an occasional drink and was 8 ounces.  Now a double gulp is 50 ounces and is consumed daily.  Sugar was replace by HFCS which is metabolized by the liver causing Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver disease. 

We can tolerate over eating much easier than we can an HFCS toxified liver.  If you want to lose weight and stabilize blood glucose, learn how foods and drinks, as well as medicines are metabolized. 

[az_cyclist]

Just now, Wilbur said:

Because soda was an occasional drink and was 8 ounces.  Now a double gulp is 50 ounces and is consumed daily.  Sugar was replace by HFCS which is metabolized by the liver causing Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver disease. 

We can tolerate over eating much easier than we can an HFCS toxified liver.  If you want to lose weight and stabilize blood glucose, learn how foods and drinks, as well as medicines are metabolized. 

This is part of it.  The fact soda was only in 8 oz bottles in the 50s and 60s, and we only had it once a week.  By the 70s it was available in 12 oz cans. 

[goldendesign]

1 minute ago, shootingstar said:

they never underwent counselling

Neither did my mother's parents. They were fairly typical parents of the California suburb they lived in most of their lives. Coming from conversations I've had with their neighbors back when I was still in contact with that side of the family.

But they were very active pill heads with all the baggage and side effects that come with it. Abuse both physical and mental, neglect, and promiscuity in their marriage. Maybe that's not what the 60/70s were for most people but in Cerritos CA, it seemed very much the norm.

[shootingstar]

26 minutes ago, Randomguy said:

I am thinking more and more that the abundance of food choices is out of control.  Your access to the sugar and chemical-filled snackage is seemingly infinite.  

I am also thinking that life is much more stressful now, all jobs are high stress, you have to do more with less, people leaving and not being replaced, low wages, forced overtime, way more nickel and diming, bills are out of control, you are one illness away from bankruptcy, housing costs are making home ownership less and less likely unless you have real estate already, and policies designed to quash the middle class are contributing to lots of stress-eating and power chugging of sugary beverages.

Stress is a killer, and stress eating is likely a large component of this with lots of folks.  Food composition is different.  Less activity, or opportunities for activities is decreased.  I think it is all a cycle.  One things leads to another and another and another, and then you are fatter than fuck and unlikely or unable to exercise in ways that have worked in the past.

In the end, people will eat food in bigger or outlandish portion sizes, is full of sugar, salt, and chemicals, and they eat to temporarily reduce anxiety,  Because they are time-crunched with all the extra hours from work, they don't have time to take up activities or new hobbies or exercise much.  Because people are stressed, sleep is messed up, and being tired reinforces the cycle of eating to be temporarily happier, you don't exercise, and cortisol is through the roof.  This all causes diseases of stress and aging to go ape shit, and now you can't exercise at all.

Depends how one defines stress...for sure full-time working parents really have to juggle their schedules/attention/energy...which then they worry if they are abandoning attention for kids.  

But there is stress of a full-time parent, not working outside the home and dealing with multiple young children AND if working partner comes home and doesn't help with some household chores, etc.  It's not to say my father didn't help out or there was that tacit understanding how they divided responsibilities...but my mother was all-day and even 24 hrs. with babies and growing children. She could not walk away. We could not afford day care, nanny, etc. Things MIGHT loosen up a tiny bit when older children in their teens, are asked to help out.    And it IS the parent's responsbility to request and ask their older children to help out ....often.

[MoseySusan]

1 minute ago, az_cyclist said:

The fact soda was only in 8 oz bottles in the 50s and 60s, and we only had it once a week

And a juice glass held 3 ounces. 

[shootingstar]

I also wonder if persistent (not occasional) major parental especially negative stress, especially between 2 parents, sometimes transfers onto the child. And the child unconsciously absorbs the stress ...some pyschologists ie. Gabor Mate have shown in their practice that can influence child anxiety. 

[shootingstar]

39 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

A lot of sedentary lifestyle.
In the 80’s there were kidnappers around every corner and parents started driving their kids to the neighborhood schools instead of letting them walk or ride their bikes.

In the 90’s, elementary schools were pressured by standardized testing into doubling the amount of time students receive math and reading instruction, so recess times were shortened or removed completely.

And if kids want to play, their parents would pay for them to participate in organized sports or enroll them in clubs and play groups. When kids are bored, they watch tv or play video games. 

It’s really hard to convince a 15 year old that they don’t need a car and can probably walk or bike most everywhere. Partly because we don’t have that neighborhood lgs culture anymore, and partly because we place a higher value on speed and comfort than on using our calories as fuel to go places. 

Past wk., I'm getting an online argument  on a totally different 'Net forum, with a bunch of retirees (obviously all around our age), trumping the importance of car culture.  And debunking cycling consistently. Pretty tiring.

[ChrisL]

44 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

The WaPo had a story/editorial on it a few days back.

Blame "success" to some degree. Food has become better at catching and holding us.

hit a paywall…

[Razors Edge ★]

1 minute ago, ChrisL said:

hit a paywall…

Some 73 percent of Americans are overweight or obese, and if you come here often, you’ve heard me say this before: When three-quarters of humans can’t navigate the system successfully, the problem is the system, not the humans. So let’s look at the system and give credit — er, blame — where it’s due.

The lion’s share — I’ll go with 61 percent (and, yes, of course I’m totally making this up to give some sense of how I think responsibility gets divvied up) — goes to the food industry, which developed product after product that was deliberately designed to be overeaten.

Food manufacturers didn’t start off trying to make people fat and sick. They just wanted to sell more food; that’s their job. But as they got better at it, it became clear that weight gain was a byproduct of that business model. Now, the people who run those companies are caught between their fiduciary responsibility to maximize shareholder value and their social responsibility to not contribute to a large and growing public health problem.

Fiduciary seems to win out, particularly since the food industry doesn’t just put the food out there, manufacturers also commission research and fund lobbying arms to make sure consumers are given every reason to eat more of their product. Marion Nestle’s books “Food Politics” and “Unsavory Truth” detail how the industry has influenced the government-issued Dietary Guidelines and the body of evidence on the health effects of foods.

Those manufacturers also get a meaningful assist from just about everyone in the retail environment, who make sure engineered deliciousness is in your face 24/7. No matter what’s in the rest of your store, there’s Snickers at the checkout.

Manufacturers aren’t the only ones trying to sell us deliciousness, of course. That’s an important goal of food, isn’t it? Restaurants fight for stomach share, too, and one of the weapons they have is portion size. You’ve probably seen the data, and the illustrations where modern-day portions dwarf portions of yore. Soda comes in sizes that top a half-gallon. Muffins are as big as softballs. Fast-food burgers are three times the size they were in the 1950s.

The fact that there’s more food on every plate wouldn’t matter if we didn’t eat it. But we do. The more there is, the more we eat. If you increase portion size by 50 percent, we’ll eat 10 to 40 percent more. Double it, and we’ll increase consumption 30 to 55 percent.

 

[ChrisL]

42 minutes ago, az_cyclist said:

This is part of it.  The fact soda was only in 8 oz bottles in the 50s and 60s, and we only had it once a week.  By the 70s it was available in 12 oz cans. 

This is interesting to me.  My parents only let us have one soda once a week and it was on Sunday.  It was more of a cost issue at first but it carried on through my childhood.

We didn’t keep soda in the house with my kids but didn’t really restrict it if they got it while eating out.  So they had it one, maybe 2 times a week growing up but definitely not every day. 
 

[ChrisL]

44 minutes ago, goldendesign said:

Neither did my mother's parents. They were fairly typical parents of the California suburb they lived in most of their lives. Coming from conversations I've had with their neighbors back when I was still in contact with that side of the family.

But they were very active pill heads with all the baggage and side effects that come with it. Abuse both physical and mental, neglect, and promiscuity in their marriage. Maybe that's not what the 60/70s were for most people but in Cerritos CA, it seemed very much the norm.

Cerritos!?!   Huh I would have thought the valley…   I currently work in Cerritos, it’s still a pretty chill bedroom community.  If I had to live in LA County I’d consider Cerritos but not for the swingers & pill popping! 😁

[Parsnip Totin Jack ★]

People were more active then too. I was born in 1959, the second of six kids. My mom was so busy sh didn’t have time to monitor us. My sister Nancy, a year younger than I, were out playing in the houses under construction in the neighborhood. Afterwords I went home. “Where’s Nancy?” My mom asked four year old me. “I dunno. She was there until she wasn’t.” We retraced my path and found her asleep on a plywood floor of a house under construction. In California, I went everywhere. A group of kids from school rode our bikes (7-8 miles) to Canoga Park and played among the boulders and threw rocks at trains that were entering the tunnel below us. We’d go to the beach, somebody’s pool. We were always doing something. Fast food was the exception not the rule. Soda was a treat but a rare occasion. 

[JerrySTL ★]

There was one unusually "fat" family in our neighborhood back in the early 1970s. One of the boys was a friend of my younger brother. They would go out to lunch and the kid would eat a large pizza by himself at 14 years old. The father and mother were both large and so were the girls. However, they wouldn't stand out all that much today.

[Kzoo]

Based on the hours of research that I've done, I've concluded that I was not fat during either the 60's or the 70's.

 

[Razors Edge ★]

1 minute ago, Kzoo said:

Based on the hours of research that I've done, I've concluded that I was not fat during either the 60's or the 70's.

[shootingstar]

1 hour ago, ChrisL said:

We didn’t keep soda in the house with my kids but didn’t really restrict it if they got it while eating out.  So they had it one, maybe 2 times a week growing up but definitely not every day. 
 

A can of pop was divided between 2 children...and we only had pop 5-6 times/yr. .... And we were not giving allowance at all because we were poor. So couldn't buy junk food.

As children, we knew our parents were rationing sweets and pop.  But remember, we would have it for special occasions which is when stuff like that could be eaten. Then as teens, we would bake cake, muffins, 1-3 times/month.  It was appreciated by everyone.

I volunteered along with other students in high school, in  helping sell junk food  at our school tuck shop..chips, pop. For 1 yr. but I never developed a hankering at that time, seeing others buy it.  I know. Incredible but true.  Even now I have never bought pop for home. Never. I've had an unopened can of Sprite sit in my fridge for 2 yrs.

Some of my siblings have bought pop, for their households.

I developed a sweet tooth...when knowing dearie..with his family background of home baked gourmet tortes and cakes.

[12string]

2 hours ago, az_cyclist said:

For one thing, we were younger.  It is much easier to gain weight as I get older, even though I have a much healthier lifestyle.  And much harder to lose weight now.

which is why his premise that people aren't fat in the 60's and 70's is flawed!  I bet you were thinner in your 50's!

[12string]

5 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

A can of pop was divided between 2 children...and we only had pop 5-6 times/yr. .... And we were not giving allowance at all because we were poor. So couldn't buy junk food.

As children, we knew our parents were rationing sweets and pop.  But remember, we would only have it for special occasions. Then as teens, we would bake cake, muffins, 1-3 times/month.  It was appreciated by everyone.

I volunteered along with other students in high school, in  helping sell junk food  at our school tuck shop..chips, pop. For 1 yr. but I never developed a hankering at that time, seeing others buy it.  I know. Incredible but true.  Even now I have never bought pop for home. Never. I"ve had an unopened can of Sprite sit in my fridge for 2 yrs.

Some of my siblings have for their households.

And fat may be the least of the damage that rampant consumerism from about the 80's on has wrought.

[Square Wheels]

'cause

[ChrisL]

1 hour ago, Parsnip Totin Jack said:

People were more active then too. I was born in 1959, the second of six kids. My mom was so busy sh didn’t have time to monitor us. My sister Nancy, a year younger than I, were out playing in the houses under construction in the neighborhood. Afterwords I went home. “Where’s Nancy?” My mom asked four year old me. “I dunno. She was there until she wasn’t.” We retraced my path and found her asleep on a plywood floor of a house under construction. In California, I went everywhere. A group of kids from school rode our bikes (7-8 miles) to Canoga Park and played among the boulders and threw rocks at trains that were entering the tunnel below us. We’d go to the beach, somebody’s pool. We were always doing something. Fast food was the exception not the rule. Soda was a treat but a rare occasion. 

Although I agree with you I still feel it’s what and how much we eat that is driving obesity today.  Here is my example:

Both my kids and my SIL grew up with a “crew” and were active all the time.  Pool time, bikes, games in the neighborhood and organized sports.

We made home cooked meals, limited snacks & junk and didn’t use food as a reward or for comfort.  My SIL’s mom got 100% of her meals out (still does), keeps crap in the house and used food as comfort.  Sad, here have candy.  Oh have a owie have a cookie…

My SIL was a freaking tank up to his teenage years when he finally understood his mom was making him fat.  My kids were not fat as kids.

We deal with this same crap with the Mom & CJ.  Just last night he was tired & grumpy and wouldn’t settle down.  She was trying to placate him with candy and my daughter barked at her to get that away from him.  Good on ya! 

[az_cyclist]

This tread gave me the push I needed to get out and ride this morning.  It was cloudy and cool, and I was thinking about taking it easy.  

Before you LOL, I do know that you cant work out enough to offset poor food choices.   I cant prove it, but it would not surprise me to find out that our bodies adapt to our lifestyle, and activities that used to work well to reduce weight dont work as well anymore. I dont change my workout routines as much as I should. 

[shootingstar]

2 hours ago, ChrisL said:

We made home cooked meals, limited snacks & junk and didn’t use food as a reward or for comfort.  My SIL’s mom got 100% of her meals out (still does), keeps crap in the house and used food as comfort.  Sad, here have candy.  Oh have a owie have a cookie…

My SIL was a freaking tank up to his teenage years when he finally understood his mom was making him fat.  My kids were not fat as kids.

We deal with this same crap with the Mom & CJ.  Just last night he was tired & grumpy and wouldn’t settle down.  She was trying to placate him with candy and my daughter barked at her to get that away from him.  Good on ya! 

Very challenging for parents not to use food as reward or to placate.  And it wasn't when I was growing up. Some of my sisters have worked very hard not to use food in this way for their kids. I can see the end result for the nieces and nephews who are adult:  they are not fat at all. But know they must be active as adults living on their own, and each have their own healthy habits:  Walking lots (my eldest niece since she doesn't drive), hockey, competitive frisbee, etc.

OR if kid does get food, something healthy and simple, like a fruit and...the tactic of distracting a child to something positive, which has nothing to do with food.

I seriously believe in certain regions, the environment can have overabundance of certain (bad) chemicals, plastic in water, air, that leach into our food and cause hormonal imbalance. There are people who try really hard to lose weight.  I find it interesting, that I eat the same reasonable amount of food ...which can manifest very differently for another woman is much bigger boned, heavier than I.  So it can be sometimes person's hormonal and metabolism too, which varies from person to person.

From my doctor-sister , a mother of 2 children this is the advice she gives to parents trying to feed their kids healthy food:  Prepare the same food in different ways.  And try not once, twice...try 10 times over a long period. 

[maddmaxx ★]

2 hours ago, ChrisL said:

Although I agree with you I still feel it’s what and how much we eat that is driving obesity today.  Here is my example:

Both my kids and my SIL grew up with a “crew” and were active all the time.  Pool time, bikes, games in the neighborhood and organized sports.

We made home cooked meals, limited snacks & junk and didn’t use food as a reward or for comfort.  My SIL’s mom got 100% of her meals out (still does), keeps crap in the house and used food as comfort.  Sad, here have candy.  Oh have a owie have a cookie…

My SIL was a freaking tank up to his teenage years when he finally understood his mom was making him fat.  My kids were not fat as kids.

We deal with this same crap with the Mom & CJ.  Just last night he was tired & grumpy and wouldn’t settle down.  She was trying to placate him with candy and my daughter barked at her to get that away from him.  Good on ya! 

When I was in the Navy inthe 60's and 70's I ate like a pig.  I've posted the working day breakfasts I had.  We worked hard, walked a lot.  Motion and exercise kept me thin (6' 165)

[Wilbur ★]

There are so many reasons but , there is an underlying truth that we cannot exercise our way out of bad food choices.  Bad food is not just quantity but also quality.  Growth hormones were not used to the extent they have been, there was very little genetic modification to food and the use of HFCS in so many food products has driven waistlines up.  Diabetes, Insulin Resistance, Kidney disease and heart disease are all associated with our diets of modified foods.  Exercise is important, but it doesn't trump diet.  Not even close. 

1 hour ago, az_cyclist said:

I do know that you cant work out enough to offset poor food choices. 

 

[groupw]

I was looking at a high school yearbook a while back and I noticed that compared to kids today, we were a bunch of hardbodies! This was the late 70s. The full length shots of people showed very few muffin tops. I remember the Haile twins being anomalies because they were so huge. They were 275-300 lbs. they were fat, but they wouldn’t be noticed anymore. 
We were farm kids. A lot of manual tasks back then are done by machine now. 

[Razors Edge ★]

17 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

There are so many reasons but , there is an underlying truth that we cannot exercise our way out of bad food choices.  Bad food is not just quantity but also quality.  Growth hormones were not used to the extent they have been, there was very little genetic modification to food and the use of HFCS in so many food products has driven waistlines up.  Diabetes, Insulin Resistance, Kidney disease and heart disease are all associated with our diets of modified foods.  Exercise is important, but it doesn't trump diet.  Not even close. 

I find the challenge is simply the wide variety of how each individual reacts to all the different factors.  Everyone has heard the smoked and drank until they were 110 stories.  Or died at 45 while out for a run.  Since genetics are such an invisible but strong part of it, folks often feel they are doing everything right (or wrong) and still locked into a certain path.  

But I really do find all foods in moderation and keeping a high activity level are simple and easy rules to live by and will keep most folks from getting into the "big changes required" territory that is so challenging.

[Bikeguy]

17 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

There are so many reasons but , there is an underlying truth that we cannot exercise our way out of bad food choices.  Bad food is not just quantity but also quality.  Growth hormones were not used to the extent they have been, there was very little genetic modification to food and the use of HFCS in so many food products has driven waistlines up.  Diabetes, Insulin Resistance, Kidney disease and heart disease are all associated with our diets of modified foods.  Exercise is important, but it doesn't trump diet.  Not even close. 

When I grew up, we had a 'stay at home mom' like most of the people we knew.   Just about all of our meals were cooked by mom.   Real food... no processed food like we have today. 

Fast food places were seldom visited by our family.   I'm sure it was cheaper to cook at home.    For example; I remember if we had chicken for dinner...  the next few days were chicken giblets, chicken sandwiches and chicken soup. 

We played outside a LOT.  We walked or rode our bikes where we need to go. 

It was a different life style compared to what most people do today. 

[Razors Edge ★]

16 minutes ago, Bikeguy said:

We played outside a LOT.  We walked or rode our bikes where we need to go. 

It was a different life style compared to what most people do today. 

I doubt any folks here are playing outside a lot or riding their bikes where they need to go.  We do it to some extent, as I try to ride or walk outside everyday, but based on how few folks I see riding, running, hiking, it is a small percentage of the population.

I can't imagine, though, that folks were doing any of that stuff back in the 70s or 50s either.

[ChrisL]

2 hours ago, maddmaxx said:

When I was in the Navy inthe 60's and 70's I ate like a pig.  I've posted the working day breakfasts I had.  We worked hard, walked a lot.  Motion and exercise kept me thin (6' 165)

But the difference is the quality of the food you consumed. You didn’t eat sugary cereal or pop tarts washed down with a sugary drink or soda. Many people today are just eating sugary crap. 

[Rattlecan ★]

I thought it was because everybody was smoking back then.

[ChrisL]

2 hours ago, shootingstar said:

Very challenging for parents not to use food as reward or to placate.  And it wasn't when I was growing up. Some of my sisters have worked very hard not to use food in this way for their kids. I can see the end result for the nieces and nephews who are adult:  they are not fat at all. But know they must be active as adults living on their own, and each have their own healthy habits:  Walking lots (my eldest niece since she doesn't drive), hockey, competitive frisbee, etc.

OR if kid does get food, something healthy and simple, like a fruit and...the tactic of distracting a child to something positive, which has nothing to do with food.

I seriously believe in certain regions, the environment can have overabundance of certain (bad) chemicals, plastic in water, air, that leach into our food and cause hormonal imbalance. There are people who try really hard to lose weight.  I find it interesting, that I eat the same reasonable amount of food ...which can manifest very differently for another woman is much bigger boned, heavier than I.  So it can be sometimes person's hormonal and metabolism too, which varies from person to person.

From my doctor-sister , a mother of 2 children this is the advice she gives to parents trying to feed their kids healthy food:  Prepare the same food in different ways.  And try not once, twice...try 10 times over a long period. 

Yeah Gramma is special… Sometimes when CJ gets grumpy she keeps trying to placate him with something.  I always tell her to just let him be mad.  Often times they will come over for a visit and my daughter will say no sweets please, he had 6 popsicles at grammas.  Really 6, yes and cookies and candy.  Jeebus why…. It’s tough on WOChrisL but she’s been watching him more as daughter is limiting grandma babysitting time…

Edit… Daughter also fired gramma from day care pick up as she’d always roll through McDonald’s for a happy meal…. 

[shootingstar]

2 hours ago, groupw said:

I was looking at a high school yearbook a while back and I noticed that compared to kids today, we were a bunch of hardbodies! This was the late 70s. The full length shots of people showed very few muffin tops. I remember the Haile twins being anomalies because they were so huge. They were 275-300 lbs. they were fat, but they wouldn’t be noticed anymore. 
We were farm kids. A lot of manual tasks back then are done by machine now. 

yup just looking at HS yearbooks  50-40 yrs. ago and photos of many class groups of teens, is visual general evidence that we were not dreaming nor had horrible memory as teens back then.  Most kids were average or slim overall.  Then stuff changed in midlife onward at times...very normal changes with adult stresses.

[ChrisL]

2 hours ago, groupw said:

I was looking at a high school yearbook a while back and I noticed that compared to kids today, we were a bunch of hardbodies! This was the late 70s. The full length shots of people showed very few muffin tops. I remember the Haile twins being anomalies because they were so huge. They were 275-300 lbs. they were fat, but they wouldn’t be noticed anymore. 
We were farm kids. A lot of manual tasks back then are done by machine now. 

I was on campus a lot with my kids and as both were athletes they ran with a different crowd but their crowd was the minority.  Most kids in HS were pretty heavy.

[Wilbur ★]

True story...  I was working for a large Canadian Pharma company.  We always have junk food on the aircraft and it would almost never be touched.  Normally it was thrown out.  Once we acquired a large US Pharma Company, we started flying US execs as well.  We couldn't keep enough crap food on the aircraft.  I blame Americans. 

[BR46]

58 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

 I blame Americans. 

Sorry

I blame Red's Giant Hamburg  

The incredible history of the drive-thru | lovefood.com

[MickinMD ★]

We ate less and got more exercise.

Getting restaurant or sub shop food was a much more occasional treat.

In the 60's, I had a high school fast-food job and was working the grill one night when the Area Manager came in and showed us a new product: a quarter pound hamburger.

Even we teenagers wondered who would be gluttonous enough to regularly order a whole quarter pound hamburger. The "Gino Giant," which McD's copied and called the "Big Mac," sold a small fraction of the time a regular 1/8 lb hamburger/cheeseburger was.  Back then, the large fries were smaller than today's small fries and the standard size of soft drink was 12 oz.

Gino's had the Colonel Sanders franchise for Maryland and the most common size was the 2-pieces of chicken meal with fries and a soft drink for 75 cents.  The 3-piece meal was $1.25 and that was really splurging.  Back then, $1.25 was also the minimum wage.

Little by little, the fast-food industry has conditioned us to ever-larger sizes and amounts, though I think they're hitting their limit when they try to get us to eat 1/3 lb burgers, "Baconaters," etc. and haven't been very successful.

We didn't have the Internet, 900 TV channels, air conditioning in most houses, etc.

So we went outside and found active things to do there.

If my nephews didn't play on organized sports teams, they'd have seldom got exercise.

[shootingstar]

While it's great there's wider marketing for greater range of  body shapes (ie. larger) for modelling fashion clothing and alot about not body shaming, the message only makes sense if those same individuals are exercising often too (walking, yoga, cycling, swimming, etc.).   It's great there are some fantastic yoga exercisers who also just happen to be more rotund but can execute many of the stances.

It would be far too easy to be hanging out with same friends/social circle of doing stuff together, that seeing the same people several times a wk. at length...that what we may consider not healthy, it is "normal".  And why not? We're all human. We normalize to suit our psychosocial needs...good or bad. We do eat together, do positive (hopefully) things together for social bonding, comfort.

I am certain there are enough women in my age bracket, who consider cycling "extreme', dangerous and abnormal.