Month: May 2014

‘Fed Up’ Asks, Are All Calories Equal?

The movie “Fed Up” is coming out in theatres — just saw Katie Couric doing publicity for it. Despite the popularity of spinning it as a case of corporate greed, I don’t see much corporate villainy here. I do see cheap foods that taste good pushed by government subsidies for Big Agriculture, plus a move to eat on the go. There are two problems with the “calories in, calories out” theory now amply disproved: first, calories of energy absorbed from food are not the same as calories of the same food burned in a bomb calorimeter. And second, the components of what you eat (notably high-glycemic-index carbs) can drastically affect your metabolism and cause you to crave even more, and to use less energy. “Eat less and exercise more” may be very difficult unless you change what you eat.

The New York Times story (also tie-in PR for the movie) goes on to say:

Dr. David Ludwig, the director of the obesity program at Boston Children’s Hospital, argues in the film that [all calories are not the same]. In recent studies, Dr. Ludwig has shown that high-carbohydrate diets appear to slow metabolic rates compared to diets higher in fat and protein, so that people expend less energy even when consuming the same number of calories. Dr. Ludwig has found that unlike calories from so-called low glycemic foods (like beans, nuts and non-starchy vegetables), those from high glycemic foods (such as sugar, bread and potatoes) spike blood sugar and stimulate hunger and cravings, which can drive people to overeat.

While people can certainly lose weight in the short term by focusing on calories, Dr. Ludwig said, studies show that the majority of people on calorie-restricted diets eventually fail. “The common explanation is that people have difficulty resisting temptation,” he said. “But another possibility is that highly processed foods undermine our metabolism and overwhelm our behavior.”

At Harvard Medical School, Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, an associate professor of medicine and epidemiology whose research was cited by experts in the film, said that the long-held idea that we get fat solely because we consume more calories than we expend is based on outdated science.

He has studied the effects that different foods have on weight gain and said that it is true that 100 calories of fat, protein and carbohydrates are the same in a thermodynamic sense, in that they release the same amount of energy when exposed to a Bunsen burner in a lab. But in a complex organism like a human being, he said, these foods influence satiety, metabolic rate, brain activity, blood sugar and the hormones that store fat in very different ways.

Studies also show that calories from different foods are not absorbed the same. When people eat high-fiber foods like nuts and some vegetables, for example, only about three-quarters of the calories they contain are absorbed. The rest are excreted from the body unused. So the calories listed on their labels are not what the body is actually getting.

“The implicit suggestion is that there are no bad calories, just bad people eating too much,” Dr. Mozaffarian said. “But the evidence is very clear that not all calories are created equal as far as weight gain and obesity. If you’re focusing on calories, you can easily be misguided.”

For more on diet and weight loss:

Getting to Less Than 10% Body Fat Like the Models – Ask Me How!
Starbucks, Jamba Juice Make You Fat
Fat Doesn’t Make You Fat. Government Guidelines Did!
Fructose: The True Villain?
More on “Fed Up”, Sugar Subsidies, and Obesity
Another Study on Diet Drinks
LeBron James Cut Carbs for Lean Look
Why We’re Fat: In-Depth Studies Under Way
Almonds: Superfood, Eat Them Daily for Heart Health
Fish Oil Supplements Ward Off Dementia
More on Diet Drinks: Best Studies Show They Aid Weight Loss
Vani Hari: “Food Babe” and Quack
Cleanses and Detox Diets: Quackery
Sugared Soft Drinks: Health Risk? (and What About Diet Soda?)
Gluten-Free Diets: The Nocebo Effect
Acidic Soft Drinks and Sodas: Demineralization Damages Teeth
Fish and Fish Oil for Better Brain Health
Salt: New Research Says Too Little May Be Unhealthy
Bulletproof Coffee: Coffee, Oil, and Butter for Breakfast?

Life Is Unfair! The Great Chain of Dysfunction Ends With You.

You’ve read my book and others and discover that you treat people badly and rationalize that it’s not really your fault — your genes and your parents sabotaged you. Certainly it’s true most abusers are acting out defense mechanisms they developed as children to protect themselves from abuse; one example is a young man who was undermined by his mother and attacked by a knife-wielding stepfather. In his family, violent outrage at the first sign of trouble was the only defense, and for the rest of his life, any imagined slight turned on his attack mechanism. Foul-mouthed tantrums and violence undermined any relationship he was able to start.

And the dismissive or abusive parent got that way most likely because they were mistreated or badly cared for by their parents. And so forth — sometimes leading back to a source like an ancestor orphaned by war or a parent with organic mental illness. As all of your ancestors had to act to succeed in protecting their children so that you could be alive, they were in the most important sense successful — and we have to forgive them for not getting everything right, for not overcoming their flawed legacy to give you the best possible emotional upbringing. And so the responsibility now rests with you to fix what they didn’t understand or couldn’t fix.

Your parents may have left you in sad shape by leaving you afraid of relying on anyone; or too afraid they wouldn’t love you to give anyone near you any freedom, or prone to violence or manipulative behavior. But you are the one who’s here now and can do something about it, because you know what the problem is. Your parents didn’t understand it and didn’t break the chain of dysfunction, but you can. You can stop the craziness — treat yourself and your loved ones better; bring up your children so that they know you’re always there to help, but also letting them go to achieve on their own. It’s hard but you have the power and the knowledge. Use it.


More on Divorce, Marriage, and Mateseeking

Marriages Happening Late, Are Good for You
Monogamy and Relationship Failure; “Love Illuminated”
“Millionaire Matchmaker”
More reasons to find a good partner: lower heart disease!
“Princeton Mom” Susan Patton: “Marry Smart” not so smart
“Blue Valentine”
“All the Taken Men are Best” – why women poach married men….
“Marriage Rate Lowest in a Century”
Making Divorce Hard to Strengthen Marriages?
Student Loan Debt: Problems in Divorce
“The Upside of ‘Marrying Down’”
The High Cost of Divorce
Separate Beds Save Marriages?
Marital Discord Linked to Depression
Marriage Contracts: Give People More Legal Options
Older Couples Avoiding Marriage For Financial Reasons
Divorced Men 8 Times as Likely to Commit Suicide as Divorced Women
Vox Charts Millennial Marriage Depression
What’s the Matter with Marriage?
Life Is Unfair! The Great Chain of Dysfunction Ends With You.
Leftover Women: The Chinese Scene
Constant Arguing Can Be Deadly…
“If a fraught relationship significantly shortens your life, are you better off alone?
“Divorce in America: Who Really Wants Out and Why”
View Marriage as a Private Contract?
“It’s up there with ‘Men Are From Mars’ and ‘The Road Less Travelled’”
Free Love, eHarmony, Matchmaking Pseudoscience
Love Songs of the Secure Attachment Type
“The New ‘I Do’”
Unrealistic Expectations: Liberal Arts Woman and Amazon Men
Mark Manson’s “Six Healthy Relationship Habits”
“The Science of Happily Ever After” – Couples Communications
Free Dating Sites: Which Have Attachment Type Screening?
Dating Pool Danger: Harder to Find Good Partners After 30
Mate-Seeking: The Science of Finding Your Best Partner
Perfect Soulmates or Fellow Travelers: Being Happy Depends on Perspective
No Marriage, Please: Cohabiting Taking Over
“Marriage Markets” – Marriage Beyond Our Means?
Rules for Relationships: Realism and Empathy
Limerence vs. Love
The “Fairy Tale” Myth: Both False and Destructive
When to Break Up or Divorce? The Economic View
“Why Are Great Husbands Being Abandoned?”
Divorce and Alimony: State-By-State Reform, Massachusetts Edition
“Sliding” Into Marriage, Small Weddings Associated with Poor Outcomes
Subconscious Positivity Predicts Marriage Success…
Why We Are Attracted to Bad Partners (Who Resemble a Parent)

Romance Soothes Neurotic People

Couple holding hands

Science Daily reports on another study telling us what we already know: Love makes you strong: Romantic relationships help neurotic people stabilize their personality.

It is springtime and they are everywhere: Newly enamored couples walking through the city hand in hand, floating on cloud nine. Yet a few weeks later the initial rush of romance will have dissolved and the world will not appear as rosy anymore. Nevertheless, love and romance have long lasting effects….

Psychologists of the German Universities of Jena and Kassel discovered that a romantic relationship can have a positive effect on personality development in young adults. Researchers report on this finding in the online edition of the science magazine Journal of Personality. The scientists focused on neuroticism — one of the five characteristics considered to be the basic dimensions of human personality which can be used to characterize every human being. “Neurotic people are rather anxious, insecure, and easily annoyed. They have a tendency towards depression, often show low self-esteem and tend to be generally dissatisfied with their lives,” Dr. Christine Finn explains, who wrote her doctoral dissertation within the framework of the current study[0]. “However, we were able to show that they become more stable in a love relationship, and that their personality stabilizes,” the Jena psychologist says.

The scientists have accompanied 245 couples in the age group 18 to 30 years for nine months and interviewed them individually every three months. Using a questionnaire the scientists analyzed the degrees of neuroticism as well as relationship satisfaction. Moreover, the study participants had to evaluate fictitious everyday life situations and their possible significance for their own partnership. “This part was crucial, because neurotic people process influences from the outside world differently,” Finn explains. For instance, they react more strongly to negative stimuli and have a tendency to interpret ambiguous situations negatively instead of positively or neutrally.

The scientists found that this tendency gradually decreases over time when being in a romantic relationship. On the one hand, the partners support each other, according to Christine Finn. On the other hand, the cognitive level, i.e. the world of inner thought of an individual, plays a crucial role: “The positive experiences and emotions gained by having a partner change the personality — not directly but indirectly — as at the same time the thought structures and the perception of presumably negative situations change,” Finn emphasizes. To put it more simply: Love helps us to tackle life with more confidence instead of seeing things pessimistically straight away.

More on Attachment and Personality Types:

What Attachment Type Are You?
Type: Secure
Type: Anxious-Preoccupied
Type: Dismissive-Avoidant
Type: Fearful-Avoidant (aka Anxious-Avoidant)
Avoidant: Emotions Repressed Beneath Conscious Level
Serial Monogamy: the Fearful-Avoidant Do It Faster
Anxious-Preoccupied: Stuck on the Dismissive?
Anxious-Preoccupied / Dismissive-Avoidant Couples: the Silent Treatment
nxious-Preoccupied: Clingy and Insecure Relationship Example
Domestic Violence: Ray and Janay Rice
Malignant Narcissists
Teaching Narcissists to Activate Empathy
Histrionic Personality: Seductive, Dramatic, Theatrical
Life Is Unfair! The Great Chain of Dysfunction Ends With You.
Love Songs of the Secure Attachment Type
On Addiction and the Urge to Rescue
Sale! Sale! Sale! – “Bad Boyfriends” for Kindle, $2.99
Controlling Your Inner Critic: Subpersonalities
“Big Bang Theory” — Aspergers and Emotional/Social Intelligence
Porn Addiction and NoFAP
Introverts in Management

Life Is Unfair! The Militant Red Pill Movement

red-pill-blue-pill

My readers usually get to the chapter about the aging dating pool and (if they are single) come back with questions: “Is that really true? Most of the good ones are taken??” And I have to answer, “Yes, that is the reality. There are always some people out there who would be good partners for you, but the older you get, the harder they will be to find.”

One woman (the BitterBabe) wrote of her investigation into the statistics she faces at 40, even in a big city. In the comments to that post I found an excellent summary of one of the men’s movements I’ve been encountering:

As you may have noticed, the Militant Red Pill is a postmodern networking movement that uses economic models as its primary narrative structure. It masquerades as conservative insofar as it lays claim to objective truth.

The Militant Red Pill attracts a lot of high I.Q. STEM/business types, because in the main, modern-day STEM/business types tend to be vocationally educated but not classically educated (i.e. you won’t find a Wittgenstein or a Newton there). Western culture at the moment rewards this type of education materially, ergo, these men, possessing a big piece of the pie, have internalized that such material rewards signify that they are superior and “know everything.”

The married ones simply cannot abide the notion that a masculine man could be married to a high-value woman that he does not have to manipulate (i.e. “game”). Unhappy in their own marriages (often for legitimate reasons), they seethe with resentment at the notion that other men have what they most deeply desire. Ergo they avoid most mainstream social interaction, preferring instead the company of other likeminded men (and a few women), whom they spend much of their free time soclalising with on Militant Red Pill blogs. It is a subculture that has many of the benchmarks of a cult, and it needs to be viewed this way in order to be understood.

I recommend all women become fluent in Militant Red Pill. Militant Red Pill has arisen in response to legitimate social problems. It is Feminism for Men and eventually it will go more mainstream, just as Feminism did. As I have posted elsewhere, there is a lot to learn from the Militant Red Pill about male attraction triggers. Furthermore, understanding their philosophy, techniques, and tactics will enable you to protect yourself from these men should you encounter one IRL.

This explains the “red pill” reference one of my reviewers made, which I thought referred only to The Matrix. There’s another story on the movement here, at Business Insider. Now I don’t think any of these comments are completely fair to the red pillers, but that is what their movement looks like from the outside.

The bitter divorced fathers we have all encountered have similarly organized, and they overlap. The entire online men’s grievance movement is called the Manosphere, a shorthand term for the interconnected web sites where these guys hang out. The trouble with dismissing them as reactionary anti-feminists is that they do make some valid points and ask some good questions. As a not-directly-affected observer I can see that, so I’m trying to engage and understand what they are saying — because I suspect angry tribes of men and women talking past each other are just harming us all and not resolving any of the serious problems of fatherless children, crumbling middle-class families, and aimless young people kept out of stable career-path jobs by economic stagnation and corporatist government regulation. In a time when women are the majority of college students and increasingly dominate important institutions, we still have an unwillingness to confront a reality that young men are now stunted and damaged by control-based public schools who try to force everyone into a college-bound straitjacket. We need to strive for a diverse society where all skills and roles are valued — women who want to stay home with their kids are doing a great service, and so are men who do the same thing. Parents who want the best education for their children and are prevented from escaping bad public schools are being damaged. The politicians who want to force equality of outcome on the sexes are just increasing the sense of grievance to get votes and retain power; meanwhile, the economy slows as people are blocked from pursuing their best opportunities and have their subsidies taken away if their income increases.

None of this political wrangling should stop young people from finding the right human being for them. I have to guess that much of the bitterness and anger comes from people on all sides who haven’t found a good, reliable, empathetic partner. It won’t solve all the problems of the world, but it will make it easier to be kind and generous when you encounter these angry souls.

And in Jimmy Carter’s immortal words, “Life is unfair.” We all start out with a bag of advantages and disadvantages. Women even in supposedly patriarchal societies have always had power, even when their roles were constrained; and almost all men have always had to serve someone to survive. Nearly everyone has a talent or characteristic they can be proud of, and some to be ashamed of. But it’s wise to remember the point from both most religions and recovery movements: you will be happier if you take account of the good and are grateful. Dwelling on the injustices and slights that everyone, without exception, suffers at one time or another won’t make your world a better place.


Death by HR: How Affirmative Action Cripples OrganizationsDeath by HR: How Affirmative Action Cripples Organizations

[From Death by HR: How Affirmative Action Cripples Organizations,  available now in Kindle and trade paperback.]

The first review is in: by Elmer T. Jones, author of The Employment Game. Here’s the condensed version; view the entire review here.

Corporate HR Scrambles to Halt Publication of “Death by HR”

Nobody gets a job through HR. The purpose of HR is to protect their parent organization against lawsuits for running afoul of the government’s diversity extortion bureaus. HR kills companies by blanketing industry with onerous gender and race labor compliance rules and forcing companies to hire useless HR staff to process the associated paperwork… a tour de force… carefully explains to CEOs how HR poisons their companies and what steps they may take to marginalize this threat… It is time to turn the tide against this madness, and Death by HR is an important research tool… All CEOs should read this book. If you are a mere worker drone but care about your company, you should forward an anonymous copy to him.

 


The Latest from Jeb Kinnison:


Death by HR: How Affirmative Action Cripples Organizations

Death by HR: How Affirmative Action Cripples Organizations

[Death by HR: How Affirmative Action Cripples Organizations, In Kindle and trade paperback.] The first review is in: by Elmer T. Jones, author of The Employment Game. 

Corporate HR Scrambles to Halt Publication of Death by HR

Nobody gets a job through HR. The purpose of HR is to protect their parent organization against lawsuits for running afoul of the government’s diversity extortion bureaus. HR kills companies by blanketing industry with onerous gender and race labor compliance rules and forcing companies to hire useless HR staff to process the associated paperwork… a tour de force… carefully explains to CEOs how HR poisons their companies and what steps they may take to marginalize this threat. For it is now fairly impossible for any company not to erect an HR wall as a legal requirement of business with the sole purpose of keeping government diversity compliance enforcers as well as unethical lawyers from pillaging their operating capital through baseless lawsuits… It is time to turn the tide against this madness and Death by HR is an important research tool…  to craft counter-revolutionary tactics for dealing with the HR parasites our government has empowered to destroy us. All CEOs should read this book. If you are a mere worker drone but care about your company, you should forward an anonymous copy to him.


More reading:

Divorced Men 8 Times as Likely to Commit Suicide as Divorced Women
Life Is Unfair! The Militant Red Pill Movement
Leftover Women: The Chinese Scene
“Divorce in America: Who Really Wants Out and Why”
View Marriage as a Private Contract?
Madmen, Red Pill, and Social Justice Wars
Unrealistic Expectations: Liberal Arts Woman and Amazon Men
Stable is Boring? “Psychology Today” Article on Bad Boyfriends
Ross Douthat on Unstable Families and Culture
Ev Psych: Parental Preferences in Partners
Purge: the Feminist Grievance Bubble
The Social Decay of Black Neighborhoods (And Yours!)
Modern Feminism: Victim-Based Special Pleading
Stereotype Inaccuracy: False Dichotomies
Real-Life “Hunger Games”: Soft Oppression Destroys the Poor
Red Pill Women — Female MRAs
Why Did Black Crime Syndicates Fail to Go Legit?
The “Fairy Tale” Myth: Both False and Destructive
Feminism’s Heritage: Freedom vs. Special Protections
Evolve or Die: Survival Value of the Feminine Imperative
“Why Are Great Husbands Being Abandoned?”
Divorce and Alimony: State-By-State Reform, Massachusetts Edition
Reading “50 Shades of Grey” Gives You Anorexia and an Abusive Partner!
Why We Are Attracted to Bad Partners (Who Resemble a Parent)
Gaming and Science Fiction: Social Justice Warriors Strike Again
Culture Wars: Peace Through Limited Government
Perfect Soulmates or Fellow Travelers: Being Happy Depends on Perspective
Mate-Seeking: The Science of Finding Your Best Partner
“The Science of Happily Ever After” – Couples Communications