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Comment by paulpauper | Hacker News Reader

I'd say this is largely why most people fail at dieting: after a month or two the results stop and they have to further decrease their intake which interferes with other pathways and tanks motivation.

Yes this is it. People with shit genes simply do not burn enough calories , so these people need to diet to absurdly low levels of calories to merely not be overweight, way lower than predicted by formulas/tables. Which is not sustainable , hence regain.

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This is all so obviously refutable if you look at the fact that this affects the USA so much more than other countries and even there if you go back three generations, peolr with essentially the same genes just at fewer calories and - surprise - were less fat.

It's not the calories, it's the carbs (aka sugar). The modern Westernized diet is carb-heavy, and carbs are the main macronutrient contributing to obesity (see the clear increase in obesity following the creation of the food pyramid).

Many Pacific Island nations also saw massive obesity rates. The reason was carbs, not calories. Soda contributes to obesity because of sugar, not the calories.

This person didn’t say “everyone in America”, they said “people with shit genes”. Are you assuming this is the same set of people?

Amazingly, some people are different. Who knew. We shouldn’t gaslight them into thinking they aren’t different because they aren’t like the aggregate, and we get to feel so morally superior if every individual is like the aggregate.

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