It's Not Personal Jimmy

I've received a number of back channel communications -- most from well meaning friends -- regarding my recent calling out of the low carb community in posts like the "Is LC Morphing into HAES" series.   I've also eavesdropped on several discussions about me (from before my interview with Jimmy on through after that blog post series unveiled) where folks really "don't get me".

At this point I want all of my readers to realize that, yes, there is a personal component to my relationship with, and opinion of, Jimmy Moore.  We had exchanged an email/PM or few regarding discussions on his forum as well as my commenting several times on his menus blog regarding his weight struggles over time since I joined up on his forum a little over two years ago.  This was all before the LC Chief of Police  (Fred Hahn) found my blog entry on glyceroneogenesis that violated the LC Profanity Code.  Where were my three seashells when I needed them?


Jimmy instigated the email exchange with Taubes and was privy (not by my doing but by Gary's) to the whole thing whether or not I would have eventually shared it with my readers.  We'd also exchanged an email or few leading up to and following my interview (conducted Nov. 9, 2010) as well as having some off-air exchange -- again both before and after the phone call interview.   Since the airing of my interview and what transpired next, I've no doubt that there was a coordinated effort amongst Taubes, Moore and later Naughton to try to portray me as some sort of mentally unstable, internet stalker ... using, of course, my then preferred anonymity as a weapon against me.   I'll speculate publicly one day as to why Jimmy came to my blog and solicited my interview.  I'm sure many of you readers have your own ideas and it should make for a fun discussion on a slow day.

So yeah ... at this point, as regards these three, there is a degree of a personal aspect to my feelings.  Perhaps that comes through at times?  Probably impossible that it wouldn't.  I'm human.  I will address this at some point, as I do believe it is instructive for folks to know both where I'm coming from and the other sides of the public personas they are relating to, but it's not tops on my list of priorities.

One thing that is, however, a priority is doing my part to get this cart turned around with respect to the nature and quality of the discussion on matters of obesity, weight loss and the best and most healthful recommendations towards achieving lasting weight loss, preventing obesity in the first place and/or just living a long and happy life.   Whatever, IMO, was somewhat or even largely off track in the mainstream where demonizing dietary fat in general, and saturated fat in particular was concerned, it has been morphed by comparison by the militant "carbs = rat poison" faction of the low carb movement.  I see the recent stridency of ever lower carb consumption -- in the face of absolutely no evidence that this is working any better than low fat -- as a dangerous trend.  There are moderate voices out there, but they are being drowned out, and their own "movements" such as they are are being co-opted by the Big Guy and his LLVLC affiliates -- formal or otherwise.  If you're reading this and thinking "what about me?"  pipe up, will ya?! 

It's not personal to call you out Jimmy Moore.  Anyone who would argue that you are not THE biggest internet LC Weight Loss Success Story Celebrity is probably not paying attention.  Note, Kent Altena, I did not say the *only* one, I said the BIGGEST.  At the risk of sending my reader rkoffler over the edge (grin), I'm going to coin a new acronym here:  WLSSC = Weight Loss Success Story Celeb.   A WLSSC owes their fame to losing a lot of weight and that alone.  Nothing wrong with that.  With shows like The Biggest Loser, the numbers of people who owe their fame to this are ever increasing.  Does anyone remember who the first big WLSSC was?  Perhaps there was one prior, but I'm gonna go out on a limb here folks and give a shout out to the whacky and loveable Richard Simmons.  {Side note:  I find it funny that Simmons called his post-weight loss gym the Anatomy Asylum!}  He still wears those trademark shorts (that we all wore back then) and has maintained his over 100 lb weight loss for ... what ... three decades and then some and going strong?  Sure, like many others I'm sure he's had a little work here and there, but the man is now over 60 and going strong!  

At 5'6-1/2" tall, his 123 lb weight loss from a high weight of 268 lbs (final weight 145 lbs, 46% of body weight) certainly rivals the 180 lbs shed by the 6'3" formally 410 lb Jimmy Moore (final weight 230, 43% of body weight).   I'd have to say that Richard cannot be ignored -- and he certainly does his best not to be -- as a shining example of what ELMM can accomplish.  No doubt he's not the norm, but were Jimmy to have maintained his almost 200 lb low carb weight loss (he doesn't like to remind folks that he was once down to the low 210's), he would not be the norm either.  

But let's just imagine for a moment folks had Richard gained back 1/3rd of his initial losses to be a 186 lb 5'6.5" guy.  And let's suppose he was still out there sporting his shorts ... or in lieu of that tooling around town with a Sweating to the Oldies license plate coaxing passers by of his fitness studio to come one in and join him.  Would you go?  And yet here's this guy Jimmy Moore who is doing just that.  And another thing.  While we can argue over what an ideal physique is, or whether it is even attainable w/o surgical intervention post a certain degree of obesity, or the stupidity of BMI as a sole marker for obesity in an individual,  etc.etc., we know this.  At 230 lbs, Jimmy Moore was never "sensationally skinny" as the subtitle of his first book would have you believe.  Richard, OTOH, may not have a macho physique, but airbrushing and kitch and all that aside, he's no fatty!   Had Simmons gained the weight but gotten control over that to lose it again and then maintain it, well, there's room for extra admiration there.

But this is simply not the case for Jimmy Moore and folks stumbling onto his LLVLC "empire" for the first time in 2011 ought to be made aware of these facts.   Jimmy posts recent pictures, for those who look around, but his avatar?  It's nowhere near what he looks like today.  Don't get me started on the unflattering yet skinny-necked caricature.   Yes, Jimmy is very open and honest -- at times -- with his audience.  He's posted shirtless pictures and other pics of a rather obese man and owned up to the numbers on the scale.  But as in 2009 when I first stumbled upon his menus blog, a reader today will not find mention of his actual weight.  He's taken down that weekly scrolling weigh-ins once again and long gone are daily weigh ins.  He's alluded to "a few pounds" gained.  Muscle of course.  Sorry, but really, get a grip man.  He's full bore about it not being so much about his weight after all, it's about health.  But he's censoring comments for sure.  Mine I know about.  But nobody throws down a challenge to eat beef, eggs and coconut oil  until April 1, to get down to 230 lb, basically stops doing it one month short of the end date and falls far short of goal without at least one of even his ardent admirers pointing it out.  And yet nobody says a thing?  Yeah right.  And the weight reporting has stopped and nobody comments?  Uh huh.  Nuf said.

Now, I can understand Jimmy's desire to rebrand, but the fact remains that he became a WLSSC for losing the weight, and has built his business promoting low carb as the means by which he LOST weight - and ostensibly has kept it off.  Although there are a number of more moderate routes he could take and still preach the low carb Word, Jimmy seems to have decided to go more extreme and rely on excluding, shushing and downright intimidating more moderate or challenging voices out there.  This is cult behavior.  If the "truth" is so on your side, it should withstand the test of criticism.  Cults have various characteristics in common, and one is to hook members with a message that plays to their vulnerabilities -- most specifically a feeling of wanting to belong and be understood.  Check.  Next cults separate members from their outside relationships.  Your doctor is wrong, all those authorities are wrong, your family and friends are wrong because they all just can't see the truth.  But you're smarter than that!  Check check.  Once inside, cults ratchet up the isolation to completely sever ties with the outside world.  Stifle opposing opinion akin to shutting down incoming calls and visitors all the while continuing to reinforce cult dogma preaching to the choir.  LC Cruise lectures anyone?  Triple check.  

Only Jimmy is having a time of it shifting the dogmatic message from "low fat made me fat" and "low carb made me thin" to "it's not about weight, it's about health".  And for good reason.  Those already snagged in the cultish LLVLC web give him a pass, but new recruits are a bit harder to come by.  Jimmy is struggling to work off of his WLSSC but to do so he has to accelerate the cult indoctrination.  That's why no voices like yours truly can be tolerated anymore.  And why I was booted off his forum not for what I said there, but for daring to address a subject here that he, himself, has blogged on.  Really, part of the dust up came from folks who Jimmy blogged on ... I merely passed the names along and cited his work.

And while I'm on that subject, if you've got Before/After pictures out there that have made you a name as a WLSSC getting defensive when someone points out that you look nothing like your pictures is not a personal attack either.    If you feel you still have something to add to the conversation, and feel passionately that LC is your chosen dietary savior, that's great.  Be upfront about it though.  Given how so few are able to maintain weight losses, you are not alone.  There are many many worthwhile blogs out there chronicling continued struggles not to regain/maintain/etc.  Diet Girl never got down to "model thin" and she's also put some weight back.  She's sporting a current pic with the following blurb front and center:  "I'm Shauna Reid, an Aussie writer living in Scotland. I lost 175lb over 5 years, maintained for 3, then let 50lb creep back. Current status: finding my way forward in a mindful, diet-free manner!"    Jimmy, I had so much more respect for you when at least you were reporting on your weight struggles in a straight forward manner on a regular basis.  If only your blog "profiles" reflected this because this has been going on for more than half the years since you lost the weight.  Your readers deserve that truth up front and center, with a current avatar.  

It seems that 2005 was the only year where Jimmy maintained his weight loss.  The only reason I can see for his success at this point in not regaining all the weight, is that instead of going on a sustained Little Debbie binge like he did post his 1999 170 lbs low fat diet weight loss, this time he gains "mysteriously" for a time and then goes on a little (low carb of course) crash diet to undo the damage.  Only each time those diets are followed by regain and a bigger rebound than before.  The man has been fluctuating wildly and going on ever more extreme diets to keep things in check every time.  

Bottom line?  Just Livin la Vida Low Carb is NOT working for Jimmy Moore to control his weight in any sane fashion.   And yet day in and day out he sings the praises of the diet, disses those who don't blindly follow the Gospel according to Taubes, demeans swathes of well meaning, ethical and brilliant researchers and doctors simply because they don't buy into the superiority of LC ("idiots" seems to be his favorite word to call them, and I therefore considered myself placed in good company when he referred to my former pseudonym as an "idiotic moniker").  All the while Jimmy -- ostensibly touting his continued "success" with the diet -- encourages readers every day to start their own positive road to health by eating LLVLC style, still boasting over 180 or over 100 lb weight loss and sporting outdated avatars.

Does this mean Jimmy has not attained some measure of success?  Of course not.  Losing 180 lbs was nothing to sneeze at, and maintaining 2/3rds of it -- however erratically -- is not either.    I think Jimmy could make a transition to a HAES argument with a great WCSSC backdrop if he could only just stabilize his weight.  Even if that means weighing 275lbs.  I've suggested he do just that for his own health in the past, and I'm not the only one who has tried to help him get off the ridiculous rollercoaster.  On the back cover of his first book Jackie Eberstein had this to say:

Anyone following Jimmy's blog knows he's not kept it off without dramatic yo-yoing.  Shame on you Jackie for not truly trying to help Jimmy, and if he's not taking your advice as you're doling it out, wake up and call him on that.  Folks it is cruel, not helpful or supportive to stand back and watch a stranger, let alone a friend spiral downward.

But Jimmy is in deep denial  if he thinks he can continue to credibly promote LLVLC  even as a healthy diet/lifestyle in the face of his own experiences.   It would not be so much an issue were it not for the fact that so many are following his lead when there's little if any evidence that it will be fruitful over the long haul or that it is, indeed, healthy.   Going more extreme and using the science supporting FAR more moderate and/or shorter term studies and the results thereof is misleading.

My purpose is to help those seeking answers on the internet to see -- at this point even have access to -- the whole picture.  Evaluate what I say here, critically investigate around the internet and make your own choice of what's best for you.   In the weight loss business, hold the messengers who've made their name losing weight to a standard of credibility that includes whether or not they've maintained and/or are up front about their struggles.  At least hold them to the same standards as those who continue to advocate more so-called conventional means.  It may well be that whatever they are doing works for you or that perfection is not what you can ultimately attain.  I hear you!  Me here!!  But it may also just be that that a paradigm re-shift is in order and the path they're leading you down isn't so well cleared and smooth as they're making it out to be. 

It's not personal, it's not about personality.  It's about opening the discussion up and stopping these personalities from highjacking the discussion into their cultish domains and sealing them off.

And I would say that had I never exchanged a single communication with the guy.