response 34 of 41:

Jul 4 15:45 UTC 2007

I've been thinking some of why my anecdotal evidence of friends being 
able to lose weight and maintain their loss is somewhat at odds with 
your statistics.  I mean, I sure have more friends who have effectively 
maintained weight loss than friends who have hit the lottery jackpot.

Some of it may be that they had serial-dieted without success.  But 
along they way they'd learned some of what didn't work.  So they stopped 
dieting and instead shifted to adapting long term weight loss behaviors 
- habits for a lifetime.  If a researcher collected a group of dieters - 
they wouldn't be counted.  They're not attending Weight Watchers or 
counting carbs or stocking their freezer with Jennie Craig. They've 
learned from "diets" and moved on, finding a degree of success.  I'm not 
sure research is capturing their weight loss success.

But I agree with you that obese people face discrimination and that for 
some, many even, significant change is not under their control for lots 
of reasons.