I'm actually really getting into this, and would like some edification. The Inuit did noy have office jobs or factory jobs, thier survival was primarily based on searching for game. I don't think dismissing the arguments pur forth by others ( immune system damage etc. ) can really go unnoticed until it's clarified that you have to be really active to be really healthy. Eating meat or whatever low carb food at your desk is not going to result in wonderful blood tests and if it does then I'm at a loss. Taking an hour of step class or aquacise a couple times a week is not enough. Plus, the Inuit, needed fat because they often went without meat for days. So eating it 4x a day every day with comparitively little physical exertion is probably not that healthy. I'm really not arguing against the diet with other lifestyle changes, but it's important to be active. I'm really not trying to come across as critical, I just see so much emphasis on what they ate and not on what they did. So, yeah, try to get as much physical effort in as possible. And every time you want to go to the fridge, consider moving it 30 miles away with a few snow covered hills and vegetables in between.

NoLogo,

What exactly is your question?

I agree that exercise is healthy and I doubt few would argue that it is not.

My Question is:

How can you devote all these threads to the diet and virtually nothing to the actual lifestyle? All criticisms seemed to be dismissed because <enter primitive society here> ate this way. I think, personally, that when a study arises ( tonight's US news was the red meat- colon cancer bit ) or someone on this forum develops some malady someone should address the fact that you cannot exclude vital aspects of a person's lifestyle and expect to achieve the same success. It's just important to not base everything, or not more than , say, 50% around the diet itself. So, I was hoping that more people would touch on this. That's all. Thanks.

NoLogo, excercise is encouraged by every low carb author I've read. In fact, Dr. Atkins went so far as to say, "It's not optional".



Then I guess you'll just have to be at a loss because that is precisely what has happened for many of those who post here. I'm not discounting the benefits of excercise, but it's quite possible to obtain good bloodwork results through diet alone.

BTW...have you had a look at the exercise forum? It's quite active...in more ways than one.

I completely agree with you, NoLogo. Trying to adapt Traditional Inuit diet (or any other very drustic diet) without actually considering the entire lifestyle, activity level, climatic conditions and genetic adaptation of these ethnic groups is what I see as a gruesome mistake. But if some ppl think it's healthy for them, then let them be. After all, there are also fruiterians, who don't eat anything but fruit, and somehow, they survive too. I think taking everything to the extreme is not healthy. Unfortunately, LC diet is easy to follow for those who think that exercise neither practical nor neccessary for a good health. But those who are active and watch their processed cabrs and sugars intake, can greatly benefit from this WOE. JMHO.
Dina

The reason that the diet is usually discussed here is that it is a low-carb forum and diet is what most people are concerned with.

I agree that looking at diet in isolation can give misleading conclusions, but it would be impossible to factor in all relevent elements of a culture to determine there inter-relationships with diet. That is one problem with the alleged Mediterranean diet. There are multilple cultures involved and even within each culture there is no fixed diet.

As has been mentioned before, there are multiple Inuit cultures that have different traditions and are just lumped together.

I believe in low carb diet since it has done great job for me. I lost my weight in about 4 months without hunger or any kind of pain and kept my weight for about a year and a half. My blood pressure went down, my HDL/LDL ratio has improved and my triglycerides have gone to less than half in addition to many other health improvements.

So, the main reason we all believe in this diet is in the results we have got. Whenever someone tells us "I can't believe you. Any body who eats this way should get heart problems,..etc", we may answer him " The Eskimos have been eating this way for generations and have been doing fine", but obviously, this is not all what we like about this diet!

So, the perfect diet for those much less active than walrus-hunters is a low-fat/high-carb diet?? Yawn...

Hey. I'm certainly not saying that. All I'm saying is that diet alone is not going to transalte into long term health if you don't do some sort of physical work. I don't eat anything cooked and 99% of my fruits/vegetables are high fibre. Obviously it's unreasonable to trap seal all day, but the physical exertion involved is somewhat similar to jogging/biking or my personal favorite, walking. It just bothers me that real health concerns are not investigated beyond food intake. There are bona fide links between low-carb, high-carb, vegetarian and various serious disorders because so many people are involved with their 'health' on a very superficial level.

NoLogo, not being terribly involved in other areas of the forum, I think you miss the myriad of posts that contain phrases such as "if you're not currently excercising, now would be a good time to start".
Excercise does have many benefits; it's good for the cardiovascular system, it's good for building muscle/toning and increasing metabolism and it has the potential to impact blood chemistry to a small degree.
However...what you eat has a much greater impact on blood chemistry than how much you move your body or for how long.
Something else to consider is that many people who are overweight, especially the severly overweight are focusing on getting the weight to a lower level so that they can safely excercise without risking bones/joints.
You see lots and lots of posts on this forum regarding what to eat because...well...it's Low Carb Support (not physical fitness support). Excercise is part of that, true enough, but it's not the main focus of this forum. We have a forum dedicated to excercising at various levels for those that wish to discuss the topic or need advice as well.

Lisa:

While I appreciate the fact that, yes, this forum is more so about menus that anything else, isn't it naive and irresponsible to deflect criticisms posted by quite a few people simply because they are having problems while low carbing? Yeah, if there weren't myriad comments refuting all studies/links/personal difficulties solely based on food intake alone, I wouldn't be as compelled to discuss this aspect. And the main focus of the war zone is to discuss issues such as these in as civil a way as possible. Why can't I talk about this? I'm not interested in talking about exercise.

Forgive me for being confused, but it's not clear what, exactly, you want to discuss here. Your first post in this thread seemed to indicate that you wanted to discuss the importance of excecise paired with diet. Are we on to a new topic now?

"And every time you want to go to the fridge, consider moving it 30 miles away with a few snow covered hills and vegetables in between"

Very clever!

BTW, my lipid profile improved dramatically after six months. I have an office desk job. I've since started exercising though.

What, specifically, is it that bothers you?

It's hard to address it when you keep talking about "insulting posts" but I can't really comment without knowing exactly which posts are bothering you.

Do you even low carb? Looking at your stats it seems like you just came onto this site to ask self righteous questions?




What food plan are you on? Why did you decide to join a low carb site?