obesity, how to stop it?

Economy, money, living conditions etc ?

Originally posted by Maharbbal are you both for real? People are hardly starving any more, at least in the West. Well off people are ready to put a lot of money on the table for good healthy food, this leaves the poor with the fattening stuff such as Mars barre and chips and soda. Usually poverty takes away your drive to care for yourself and your children, a prefect field for obesity to spread.

This "West" of yours is not even half of this people's planet. If you bothered to open that list at its bottom are only non-Western countries, the very bottom contains countries like Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Nepal. I wonder how many Mars bars are eaten in these countries? How hard is to make a decent google search to see that starvation is still a problem and even a cause of death in 21st century:

A mars bar is cheaper than say a home-made sandwich! Of course money wise it is not necessarily, but in terms of time and attention, it is way lighter. A single mum may have no time or energy to allocate to her children's diet.

A home-made thin sandwich (bread with a cheap something) is definately cheaper than a Mars bar, and also easy to make (many people even tear the bread with their hands). I don't understand about what time and energy are you talking? (to put together a piece of bread a piece of something else). It would be few seconds but I don't know about joules.
Let me give you the case of some hard times food from my own experience. Cooking for many with little money (and that saves also time) is done with some large pots (5-10-15 liters) so one dish was enough for several days. One common dish for hard times is the soup which is made of water and whatever green (sometimes based on a main ingredient like beans, salad, pigweed, etc.) else (and if you want taste of meat, often bones or claws can replace succesfully meat or chicken - you don't eat them but they leave a nice flavor and color). Other common "poor" dishes are based on bread but also dough (flour, water and something else), potatoes, rice, cabbage, beans (green in summer, dried in the winter). Sometimes bread can be a dish in itself, can be with garlic, with mustard, with sugar, with tomatoes, with onions, sometimes with butter or cheese, but sometimes just bread. My experience here is perhaps too European (maybe even too East-European), but it's a point of view you don't seem to have it considered.

What is really bad for you is not only eating fattening stuff but also eating too much (anybody who has seen portions in US restaurants knows what I am talking about) and too often (imagine how you would look like if your parents hadn't told you not to ruin your appetite).

When poverty means not having enough food, eating too much is somehow not a daily issue. Poor people around here do not go in restaurants. Even fast foods are often too expansive for their almost inexistent budget.
Also this fattening stuff sometimes a scarecrow (for this obesity issue, I'm not saying is healthy, though sometimes is damn tasty). Fattening foods can cause obesity but you won't become obese just because you eat fat food. There are a lot of skinny people eating fats and not becoming balloons over night.

Next to my place there is a big Mexican community. Many are dirt poor but it is nearly impossible to find one adult who is not obese. Kids are devoting their lunch money to chocolates and chips, and their parents are eating enormous amounts of very rich traditional corn-based food (very good when on the point of starvation in the Chiapas, not so healthy when eaten in huge quantities).

Not quite next to my place, but near, there are some poor neighbourhoods. Not many fat people, and actually many of them look undernourished. Poor kids here do not have lunch money. Though my family was not that poor, I also did not have lunch money in my childhood and I actually don't remember much money on my hands until university when I started to work part-time.
The difference betewen your story and mine rather suggests that this entire poverty-obesity equation must be enriched with further consideration of culture and other aspects which contribute to a sedentary, gluttonous life. Becuase I don't think this is a characteristic for poor people in the world, not even for all poor people in the "Western world".

Besides, don't give me the "yes but you are only considering the rich countries" as far as I know Bangladesh and Ethiopia are not facing wide-spread obesity.

You said "Poor people are more likely to be fat." and similar generalizing remarks on poor people and poverty. On the other hand, true, you picked examples mostly from America's ghettos and reservations but then say "(North) American poor people are more likely to be fat.". Because the Ethiopian ones are not.

Is interesting that the savage peoples are having almost not at all excedentary fat. The fat comes from a disordered way of life inevitable to modern man.

Being vegan is another way to avoid fatness. I eat great quantities of food (1-2 kgs of fruits, 1 kg of vegetables, a big bread and sometimes even more daily) and I don't have any problems.

I also walk daily 5-6 kms and beside being pleasantful and useful for thinking, it gives you a good physical and mental state.

Metabolism is mainly an excuse.

Yes, but a very convenient one!

this is not history...moved