Are You a 'Biggest Loser' Fan?

Posted by:
Kara Ghiringhelli, Department of Public Health 

 

Kara is a Nutrition Education Specialist at DPH.

With the coming of spring, everyone around me seems to be on a mission to lose the winter pounds they gained between Thanksgiving and Valentine’s Day. It’s everywhere: on the subway, I see ads for gym memberships, on TV I see commercials for Weight Watchers and Jenny Craig, and in magazines, I see articles about “losing the weight for good,” or “the bikini diet.” Nowhere is this sentiment more apparent than on NBC’s popular reality TV show, the ‘Biggest Loser’. While I am a ‘Biggest Loser’ viewer, I have conflicting feelings about the show.

On the one hand the show promotes healthy eating and physical activity as essential strategies for achieving weight loss. It is an inspiring show for many viewers, especially for those who have a large amount of weight to lose. Throughout each episode, the show motivates viewers to make better food choices and get off the couch to move more. In addition, the show sheds light on how obesity and its many associated health conditions (e.g. heart disease, diabetes, etc) are affecting our population.

On the other hand, I feel that the show gives viewers unrealistic expectations about weight loss. I have seen weigh-ins on the show where contestants are devastated to have lost ‘only’ 7 pounds in one week, when in reality, a recommend healthy rate of weight loss is between 1-2 pounds per week. On the show contestants live in an isolated environment absent of food temptations. Their full-time job is to lose weight, with no other obligations. They use a private gym and have daily personal training sessions. How realistic is this? If each of us had an opportunity to be in such an environment, I’m sure we would all be fit and trim.

Are you a ‘Biggest Loser’ fan? If so, what are your feelings about the show’s messages? Do they inspire you? We’d love to hear from you!

Comments

[Acai Optimum]

I'll rate your posting as one of the most informative and educative so far... i love to read brilliant posts like yours, all am just gonna say is keep the good work!

[Barbara]

It carries a good message. Eat less, move more! I love the Bigest Loser but you have to know it is a totally skewed version of weight loss reality when you are watching it. In that environment anyone can and will lose weight, the real test is when you are at home and have to live your life. The tips and tricks they give you are great and the competition is awesome. We are a consumeristic society. Everywhere you look there is food in mass quantities, signs telling you to supersize it. With the preservatives, different bad fats, high fructose corn syrup, and mega calories that are in our food today it makes you crave more of it. It is a recipe for disaster. It is a struggle to lose weight and make healthy choices. The key is balance, moderation and movement. It took me a year to lose 40 pounds but I have not gained it back. Slower is better. Some of them gain it back once they go home because they lost it to fast, it takes time for a change to become a habit. The contestants inspire me to keep on going until I reach my goals. I know they have it easy where they are.

[Howard]

I am not a "Biggest Loser" viewer, though I have watched snippets of this program here and there. It seems that the "reality show" format knows no bounds and has no scruples. My guilty pleasure is "Man Vs. Food", which I think is in effect, the oppossite theme of the "BL"... that is, the host goes across the country, visiting eateries that have running contests (of gluttony) to eat obsence portions of food within a certain time limit. Sometimes he wins, sometimes he doesn't, but he always stuffs ridiculous quanitities of food down his maw- and this is filmed soley for our entertainment. I find it interesting that both shows, with messages at both extremes, are successful and widely consumed by we the public. Here in America, our culture has some very burlesque ideas about food.