I am so glad this program is off the air. I watched an episode once showing a trainer shouting at a 600 lb man to run faster. The man was obviously struggling. I felt much of the program was trying to prove that exercise was an aid to weight loss but how much exercise was the issue and at what cost?

The winner for the 3rd season of the program describes her experience and aftermath of being on the program. It is a horror story. TV reality shows will go to any lengths to get a good visual no matter how the contestants are harmed in the process.

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainmen...intcmp=features

This is the newspaper article: http://nypost.com/2015/01/18/contes...-biggest-loser/

This sort of thing is what really encourages people to get in shape. NOT!!

I've never watched this show, but I'm not especially sympathetic to the whistle-blower. What did she expect?? Stockholm Syndrome or not, quitting when you believe your life is in danger might still cross one's mind. Reality shows never did succeed on the basis of kindness, gentleness, and friendly feelings toward others. Everybody knows it's all about $$$$.

I am very sorry the show lasted for so long while doing actual harm. Apparently viewers, like Romans in the Colosseum, liked watching that.

I'm pretty sure they select people for those shows based on self destructive tendencies.

People definitely like watching people fail

and cats, cats fail spectacularly

I'm pretty sure you could reframe all that as "How individually terrorizing people can get them to do anything. Including lose scale-weight," but that seemed rather obvious at the start.

I have never been able to watch reality TV. I can't even watch pseudo-reality TV. Actually, I can't much watch TV, although I can watch occasional movies and shows-with-no-commercials ON a TV. I just don't seem to have the personality profile for it, whatever that is.

I suspect Jillian Michaels is chromosomally male, and if someone treated me like they treat their contestants my answer would start with a pistol. It's all very well for people to say now, "Oh, it was so abusive!" but HELLO, that was obvious to what, like everyone in the world but them?

PJ

I'm sorry, but what exactly are you basing that on? If that was a joke because she yells and acts tough it's not funny and very sexist, and if you're serious it feels like a disrespectful thing speculate about because it's none of your business, and there's no reason to think it's true because Jillian Michaels has talked about having PCOS (meaning she has ovaries!).
Hyperandrogenism is a symptom, which, obviously, can cause masculinized features and hirsutism.
I have PCOS with hirsutism too, and I'd be really upset if I thought people were speculating that must be genetically male because of how I look!

Wait, they've cancelled the show for good?

Why can't they do the show, but without all the extraneous drama and extreme exercise? I'd watch it. Dieting is tough enough and there is a lot they could do other than the above. Can't see why viewers wouldn't like friendly competition and challenges.

I think it's because you're a minority in that. A lot of people, whether they really admit it or not, do like it for the train-wreak aspect. They like seeing fat people screaming and puking while working out because the un-spoken idea is they deserve it for being fat.

I don't think that the show is off the air. I just Googled that and it did not come up.
I watch sometimes. I root for all of them to achieve their goals. I find it painful to watch at times though.

If they really do fat shaming, shame on them!!

I apologize for hurting your feelings. No offense intended.

PJ

Isn't this a sad and sinister thought? But there's truth in it. It's the same spirit that causes me to "critique" the groceries placed on the cashier belt at the grocery store by the person in front of me.

I'm trying to create a more compassionate inner space. I'm persuaded by much LC reading that "it's not your fault" is a good starting place for any successful weight management journey. Guilt (or shame) is not motivating at any point.

Unless you're getting paid big bucks for it as a tv victim.

Dear heavens!



It seems obvious to an outsider that anyone sensible would bail when they are suffering so much. But I'm sure the audition process weeds out those who are not sufficiently "motivated." I'm sure they look for people who feel desperate.

the contestant in that article did not win season 3.

Love this season though.

How to show that 6 hour workouts and calorie restriction "work" for weight loss.

1)choose the 28 percent of candidates it's most likely to work for.
2)each week, send home somebody it didn't work for.

As time goes by, you end up with the people most consistently and highly responsive to this type of program.

3)based on this, tell people at home "if these guys can do it, so can you!"



With the thyroid, I wonder how much of her weight loss she's maintained--and what she's done to maintain it. A person who loses a hundred pounds isn't going to be the same as a person who never had 100 pounds to lose in the first place.

To be fair, some of those symptoms can even hit people on other kinds of diets at home, even without the barbaric reality-show-torture vacation package. Often those symptoms are not all that apparent until the end-stage and after a 1-3 month hard diet, so it's not like that was obvious to her after a week and she chose to ignore it.


Exactly. It seems to me what this protocol evidences is that even with insane amounts of total environmental control and trainers and more, still, only 1 in 4 people were even able to seemingly do ok with that.

That reminds me of the joke about Oprah, of course -- that if she with all her money and ambition for thin is still heavy, everybody else oughtta relax on the "should have" front, because if it really could be done that easily she'd for sure have already done it. I mean when a person can afford personal chefs, personal trainers, the finest foods in the world, and so on, and they still aren't perfect, it's a clue that the perfect is probably a myth to begin with.

PJ