Why I hate the Biggest Loser

KaraCooks

KaraCooks

New member
This article just reinforces my every feeling about the show.



Some selected quotes:

On camera, Zwierstra seemed giddy and brash, interrupting host Caroline Rhea, hollering at her friends in the audience, tipsy on her 3-inch heels. Secretly, she was woozy, having dehydrated herself by avoiding liquids, baking in a sauna and fasting for days to skim off those last few pounds.
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Less attention was paid to diet, though there were plenty of product placements. Like the day they did a segment on drinking milk as part of a weight-loss plan

"That was sponsored by the dairy board," she said. "The minute the cameras shut off, my trainer was like, 'Spit it out.' "
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The philosophy of the show -- to radically change diets and exercise patterns of obese people -- seemed to have a hidden message about her character, Zwierstra said. It seemed to say that weakness made people fat. If they just had discipline, if they weren't lazy, they could be thin.
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Toward the end of the show, with her final weigh-in looming, the desire to be thinner swallowed her. She cut back her eating even more: lettuce, tuna and turkey burgers. Sometimes after she ate, she'd make herself throw up.

Shin splints crippled her, but she stuck to her gym routine.

Contestants are allowed "free days," when they can take a break and eat what they want. Zwierstra avoided them until one day when she decided to have a cookie, a Pepperidge Farm Snickerdoodle. Soon she'd eaten the whole bag, washed down with a quart of milk.

So she swallowed a box of Ex-Lax.

Her hair thinned. Jacob started hiding the scale.
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I hate that this show "inspires" people - because I truly believe that what it does it set up totally unrealistic goals and beliefs about weight loss.
 
Yea, i remember a contestant (that I have on myspace) saying that before the final weigh in, she did nothing before the finale, but sit in a sauna and eat jello.
 
Keep telling it like it is Kara. I remember a while back when you set a young woman straight on some ideas she had from watching that show that were just completely unrealistic. Anything worthwhile seems to take a lot of effort and time, two things no one wants to believe is their only option!
 
I don't really care for the show either, but it DOES inspire people, even if it's motives are a bit shady. Plus, that article isn't saying anything that common sense wouldn't tell you about "reality" television.

She wasn't allowed contact with family or friends for six weeks, and later calls were "chaperoned." Letters from family had portions blacked out because producers didn't want her to get emotional over news from home unless they could catch it on camera.
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The reason they're not allowed to talk to anybody is so they don't give away any results. But, they're making it sound like the show's producers were being jerks. I don't get it.
 
you know, after revisiting that article, I got to thinking how there are 2 sides to every story. I have heard enough from that contestant to believe that she can be a jaded person if she wants. I wonder how much of it was made up just to make the show look worse than it was???
 
The thing is, I've heard the same story from multiple contestants. You can Google and see tons of contestants saying the same thing.
 
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