William Shakespeare - Marquis de Sade - Sadaf Farooqi - John Vanbrugh - Charles Dickens - Lord Byron - Seneca - Vivienne Westwood - Jose Rizal - Horizon TV - Jacques Paretti & The Men Who Made Us Fat TV - John Milton -
Who riseth from a feast
With that keen appetite that he sits down. William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice II vi 8-9, Graziano to Salerio
Sex is as important as eating or drinking and we ought to allow the one appetite to be satisfied with as little restraint or false modesty as the other. Marquis de Sade
We now know about a number of other chemicals in the brain that act to regulate appetite. Dr Sadaf Farooqi
In matters of love men’s eyes are always bigger than their bellies. They have violent appetites, ’tis true; but they have soon din’d. John Vanbrugh, The Relapse 1696
Subdue your appetites, my dears, and you’ve conquered human nature. Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, Mr Squeers
I only go out to get me a fresh appetite for being alone. Lord Byron
A well-governed appetite is the greater part of liberty. Lucius Annaeus Seneca
All that self-expression has just created a generation of morons, hooked on an endless appetite for rubbish. Vivienne Westwood
The appetite is sharpened by the first bites. Jose Rizal
28-year-old Sven’s life is dominated by the drive to eat. He could literally eat himself to death. It’s not a question of willpower or choice no matter how much food he consumes he always feels hungry. For doctors Sven demonstrates that there is some sort of hardwire switch that turns hunger on or off. Horizon: Born to be Fat, BBC 1999
Appetite is now at the centre of modern obesity research. Horizon: The Atkins Diet, BBC 2004
When we start eating, we can’t stop. ibid.
Humanity’s most fundamental relationship is with what we eat. But nowadays in wealthy countries we’re eating far too much of the wrong things. And we pay the consequences of our expanding waistlines with an epidemic of diseases that kill. Dr Susan Jebb: Horizon: A Diet Guide, BBC 2010
The developing tide of obesity was to have serious consequences affecting the way we live and how we die. ibid.
It would be another twenty years before the connection between heart disease and increased levels of saturated fat in our diet could be graphically demonstrated. ibid.
We now know that the best way to lose weight other than a healthy diet is to exercise. ibid.
Scientists suddenly clocked that maybe what they should be looking at was what was driving us to eat so much – our appetites. Proving its importance was a different matter. ibid.
Researchers then looked at humans and discovered that the hormone leptin was a messenger molecule for us too. ibid.
We still don’t have a medical solution to obesity. ibid.
As a nation we are slowly but surely getting fatter. We’re all eating well, maybe too well. Gabriel Weston, Horizon: The Truth About Fat, BBC 2012
What is it about this epidemic that operates so randomly? ibid.
It’s the fatty calorie-rich foods we love the most. ibid.
Nearly a quarter of the adult population is clinically obese. ibid.
They discovered two new hormones – Ghrelin and PYY – that together seem to control appetite and weight. ibid.
I’m pretty shocked to discover that my assumption of a lifetime which is that I’m the size I am because of my character is nonsense. ibid.
What was making these twins so different in weight? ibid.
Professor Spector: Stress can create parallel but different strategies. ibid.
The biggest single factor causing a child to be fat was the nine months it spent in its mother’s womb. ibid.
A new set of answers is emerging which could help us to defeat what to me is one of the defining epidemics of our age. ibid.
More people in the world are overweight than undernourished. Obesity levels are rising. Jacques Peretti, The Men Who Made Us Fat I, BBC 2012
How business changed the shape of a nation. How the food industry itself choreographs temptation. ibid.
Two thirds of British adults are overweight. ibid.
The food industry has the changed the very nature of what we eat in the last forty years. ibid.
A Japanese scientist had invented a process that turns corn into a cheap sweetener. By the 1980s high fructose corn syrup would become the number one substitute for sugar. ibid.
Earl Butz transformed the American diet and ultimately its waistline. ibid.
Corn syrup: its greatest impact was when it was put into soft drinks. ibid.
In 1994 the figures showed a frightening increase in people’s weight at the very time that Corn syrup in America’s food and drinks had spiralled out of control. ibid.
Scientists are now beginning to think that there is something very specific about fructose which accelerates obesity. ibid.
Keys’ view of fat as the enemy [cf. Yudkin] became the orthodoxy. ibid.
The food industry denies that it exploits neuroscience. ibid.
The idea that certain foods can be addictive is highly controversial. ibid.
The food industry and the sugar lobby in particular brought its muscle to bear to bury the [McGovern] report. ibid.
Overnight a whole new type of food was invented: low fat. ibid.
SnackWell’s was a marketing triumph but a disaster for America’s waistline. ibid.
What they did in the ’70s was give us sweeter food and more of it. ibid.
Britain is in the grip of an obesity epidemic. Twenty-four million of us are now overweight, our appetites super-sized by big business. Jacques Peretti, The Men Who Made Us Fat II
The story of the men who trapped us into eating more. ibid.
Kid’s breakfast: weighs the same as a small child. ibid.
This over-consumption is killing us. More than 60% of men and women in Britain are overweight or obese. ibid.
So when did we all start over-eating? And who was it that decided we should eat bigger and bigger portions? The answer lies not in Britain but four thousand miles away across the Atlantic in America. Here in downtown Chicago is where the story of super-sizing began. ibid.
People loved the bigger popcorn buckets and taller drinks. Sales and profits soared. The super-size portion was born. ibid.
It was the arrival of McDonald’s in Britain that was to really transform the way Britons ate. ibid.
Across Britain the new counter-service restaurants offered faster food for a faster lifestyle. ibid.
McDonald’s didn’t want to bring in the value meal. ibid.
The value meal was rolled out globally. Within three years it accounted for almost half all meals sold. ibid.