Weird Science
According to a recent article from CNN, Mark Haub, a professor of human nutrition at Kansas State University lost 27 pounds over 10 weeks by living on what CNN is calling a Twinkie diet. Haub would eat a sugary snack cake like a Twinkie, or a Little Debby cake every three hours, instead of meals. He threw in Doritos, sugary cereal and Oreos into the mix, too. The point of the experiment was to explore Haubs thesis that what matters most in weight loss is not the nutritional value of food, but the calories of what you eat.
I have a bunch of problems with this. First, allow me to attack the experiment itself, the results of which Haub has dutifully been reporting on a Facebook page dedicated to it. Over the course of the experiment, Haub limited himself to 1,800 calories a day, two thirds of which came from junk food. The remainder tended to come from things like a little whole milk and some baby carrots. He would also take a multi-vitamin. Haub reportedly engaged in moderate exercise during this time, but the article did not specify. All of this stacks up against the 2,600 calories a day a man of Haubs pre-dieting size is said to take in.
Now, this is a no-brainer. Anybody familiar with weight loss, let alone a nutrition professor, knows that 1,800 calories a day paired with moderate activity (which Ill assume for the purposes of this project is anything more than sitting on the couch, just to give Haub the benefit of the doubt)will result in weight loss. Hell, if Haub had eaten junk food exclusively at that calorie level he still would have lost weight. My point is…so what?
Considering that our national obesity level has not just gotten sky-high but reached cruising altitude, Haubs experiment does more harm than good. Weight loss should be a nationwide concern, but the problem with our national obesity isnt just a matter of excess weight. It is that as we eat the high-starch, high-sugar, high-fat foods that make us as big as we are, we take in a pitiful amount of the colorful, nutritious foods (i.e., fruits and vegetables) that fill us with the vitamins we need to stay healthy. Weight loss should only ever be a means to an end, that end being optimum health.
This is not to say that there is any merit to the ridiculous health at any size movement that is trying to legitimize obesity. If youre overweight, you are not as healthy as you could be, case closed. But if you are losing weight, it is just as important to maintain ones level of nutrition also. For anyone to address excess weight through Haubs "convenience store diet does little good, as it does not address the unhealthy eating and exercise habits that led to ones excessive weight in the first place.
Normally, I would chalk off this story as the kind of pablum CNN has resorted to in recent years to gain viewers. (Oh, CNN. I remember when you were a respectable news outlet. Before you tried to go toe to toe with circus acts like FOX and MSNBC. Tragic.) However, the story was linked by a Facebook friend of mine, and on Haubs own page, I found comments like this:
I hit on this a few mos ago bc I was spending so much on food. who knew a candy bar or donut for breakfast has less sugar and calories than the average fiber rich cereal recommended by the average rd? THANK YOU Professor for injecting common sense back into your profession. No one is listening to RDs anymore they give us strange food phobias and make ppl afraid to eat.
I started eating junk food daily b/c I realized that my maintenence plan was low in calories. I had to have the trade off of liking what little food I could have. If you have done the pyramid over and over w/o success, I recommend the junk food route. I look forward to eating now–no more egg white omlettes! R U with me?
Wow. This person is seeing legitimacy in Haubs diet, which Haub himself says he would not necessarily recommend to anyone because while it made him healthier, it did not make him healthy. No kidding, Sherlock. Haub is not a bad person for this project, but he strikes me as a little irresponsible. As a nutrition professor, his job is to advance the science of nutrition (which the convenience store diet doesnt really do), not to set eating policy for America. But come on. When you publicize your diet on Facebook and get CNN to cover it, you know the book deal is maybe six months out. And as obesity levels show no signs of going down any time soon, its clear that our countrymen are more interested in finding reasons to maintaining their unhealthy lifestyles than they are in doing the hard work of getting healthy and staying healthy. The first step is admitting there is a problem. The second is learning how to be healthy again. This junk food diet nonsense does neither.
