#my writing to research ratio is horrendous

[thesefallenembers]

what people think the most time-consuming part of writing is: writing

what it actually is: stopping every few sentences to fact-check, make sure a word means what you thought it meant, find synonyms, revert to the outline…

#my writing to research ratio is horrendous #writer memes #writer #writing #writing memes #writers of tumblr #writers of instagram #writers #reader #readers of tumblr #reading

[scripttorture]

Star Wars AU anon! Thanks for letting me know! Basically, my questions were: How can I characterize Rey’s deskilling/mental health issues in a mafia setting if she goes on a trip with Finn? How could I characterize Boss Kylo and why he would keep a torture group that is poisoning his organization? I want Finn to inform him when he sees Rey’s condition and incompetence as more than just being new, but I want Kylo to see competent/powerful and not too dense about his organization. [1/2]

(Star Wars anon) Lastly, just to make sure I didn’t miss anything, would the torturers interact with Kylo and would they be disrespectful? Or only toward those who don’t like torture? Would Rey be nice to Finn even though he doesn’t like torture itself? [2/2]

Thisis quite a long set of questions, I’ll try to tackle it as best Ican. Some of these have more definitive answers than others. In somecases I might make suggestions based on the characters, as I’mfamiliar with them.

And this got very long so the rest of it is under the cut.

Ihad quite a few conversations with the author discussing the story,so I got quite a bit of extra information on the characters andcontext.

Oneof the things that came up in conversation with the asker was a fearthat this plot might have sexist connotations. That Rey is going frombeing led by Kylo to being led by Finn.

Nothingin the plot outline struck me as particularly sexist, though I agreethat context and connotations are important. Female torturers arerare but there’s nothing in the current research to suggest thatthis is because women are less likely to torture. Instead thedisparity is likely explained by women being denied opportunities.In most countries the sorts of occupations torturers are usuallyemployed as, are heavily skewed towards men. In some countries womenare actively barred from filling these roles.

Theresult is that (while I admit research is lacking) it seems likelythat there are less female torturers because there are less women ina position where they can become torturers. When there arewomen in these kinds of positions and environments then we dostart seeing them participating in torture.

Oneof the things the author mentioned in conversation was thedifferences between torture in a military or policing context (ie thefocus of most research) and in an organised crime context. When itcomes to the gender ratio the observations in policing and themilitary hold just as true for organised crime: most of thesecriminal organisations favour men and many actively exclude women.

Thatdoes effect Rey’s position here. The story puts her in a sexistenvironment, but that doesn’t necessarily make the story sexist. Ithink if you’re worried about that the thing to emphasise here isRey’s choice.

Theodds are that in this deeply sexist environment she’s listening toKylo because he gave her a chance. It may seem cliché butpeople do remember and respond well too individuals who help us wheneveryone else was dismissive. Stressing her reasons for followingmakes this less about Kylo and more about Rey actively choosingbetween the options available to her.

Youcan then extend that to Finn as well. Because if this Rey limitsherself to a life in organised crime (or a life as a torturer),  thenshe may well see Kylo as her best option. Listening to Finn thenbecomes less about Finn himself and more about Rey discovering thatactually she does have other options. Again, it’s aboutshifting the focus to emphasise that she’s making a choice.

Asfor how sexism would effect the way readers respond to afemale torturer-

Ithink whatever you do there will always be a couple of people whowill excuse a character’s actions because they like the characteror because she’s a young, pretty white girl and thereforecan do no wrong. However well you write this scenario you’re notgoing to get rid of that section of fandom.

Iknow quite a few fic authors who have written wonderful, lengthynuanced (tagged) pieces and still gotten a bunch of responsesthat say far more about the commenters prejudice then they do aboutthe character or fic. They are a minority ofcomments/responses. I would suggest preparing yourself for thoseresponses even while doing the best job you can.

AndI think the answer here is actually the same as the prior one:emphasise Rey’s choice. Kylo may want or ask her to dohorrible things but it is still her choice to do them. Emphasise herreasons and motivations. They won’t all be about pleasing her boss.

Somethingyou could include that would help here (and be in keeping with thebehaviour of torturers) is having her jump the gun sometimes. Havingher leaping straight into abusive behaviour before she has theorder or OK from Kylo. She might then have to justify her actions tohim afterwards. But one or two incidents of this kind of realisticinsubordination would serve to underline her decisions, her thoughtprocesses and her choice.

Ithink this is probably the point where I should start talking aboutorganised crime.

It’sa minor point but I’m not sure it’s appropriate to call thesesorts of Organised Crime settings/AUs ‘Mafia’ AUs. I’ve seenquite a few Italians object to this usage and- well it seems to implythat mafia groups are a thing of the past or from old Americanmovies. Rather than hugely powerful groups that are very much stillaround murdering people today. Hence why I’m referring to this as‘organised crime’ throughout.

Ialso think that the story you’re going for would benefitfrom a little distance from Mafias in particular. Because while youdo get torture around some of their ‘traditional’ activities (ieracketeering and ‘protection’ money) it comes up a lot morefrequently in human trafficking gangs. I’mnot sure if that’s something you want to use butif Kylo’s gang had a history of being involved in that trade itcould explain why they have a full-time torturer.

Fromwhat I can tell (and once again I’m not an expert on organisedcrime) most of these sorts of gangs don’t.There doesn’t seem to be the same relentless intensity of violencethat you see in the context of police and military torturers.

Iam not suggesting thatorganised criminals don’t torture or that they don’t dohorrendous things. What I’m saying is that individual gang membersdon’t typically seem to occupy positions where they’ll betorturing people 9-5, five days a week every week for years at atime. And that difference in intensity of exposure maylead to a difference in things like symptom severity. I don’tcurrently have enough data to confidently judge that.

ButI think if you characterise this criminal group as having beenheavily involved in human trafficking in the past (whether it stillis now or not) then you have more a plausible explanation for thespace you want Rey to occupy.

Internationalhuman trafficking gangs definitelyhave members who are engaged in torture in ways that are comparableto military and police torturers. Thishappens while victims are being transported and throughout the timethey’re held. The result is that gangs members who have directcontact with victims are oftentorturing or witnessing torture for the majority of their day.

Ifyou feel comfortable writing the characters engaged in these sorts ofactivities then you have a perfectly plausible explanation for Rey’scondition and function within the organisation already: she startedout at that level and she’s carrying the same behaviours andproblems forwards.

Ifyou don’t feelcomfortable writing that I think you could get Rey to a similarposition by having that as part of the gang’s recent past.

I’mthinking of a scenario something like this- The gang has stoppedengaging in human trafficking for whatever reason. However there arestill a fair few older members who were heavily involved with humantrafficking, including torturers. These older torturers are likely tofeel like they’ve been sidelined. They’re likely to feel bitterand generally opposed to the organisation’s current leadership. Asa result most of them are not likely to last long in the gang.

Butyou only really need one or two to last until Rey joins. Becausetorture is generally passed on in the same way ‘craft’professions are: an older more experienced person takes it uponthemselves to show a younger person how to do things.

Reyis already in this intensely sexist and competitive environment. Alot of fellow criminals are unlikely to want to give her the time ofday when she starts out and Kylo may not have noticed her instantly.She’d likely be isolated within this group, which makes her a primetarget for a torturer to pick up as an apprentice. The oldercharacter’s motivation here would be showing the others that theystill have a purpose and that what they do has a use. From Rey’sperspective she’d probably just be glad to have someone in the gangappearing to care for her and give her attention.

Ifyou haven’t found a use for Phasma in the story this could be avery good background role for her. It could also help address some ofthe worries you have about sexism by giving Rey a female ‘mentor’.

Thiskind of ‘training’ from early on when Rey joins could give anexplanation for her being pigeon-holed into this sort of violentrole. In fact it could be something her mentor figure here activelyencouraged. ‘Look how well I trained her to be violent. Use her forthis. Send her in when the protection money isn’t paid and you needto make an example out of someone.’

Itgives Rey her ‘role’ in the organisation and it would give adisgruntled, bitter formerly-activetorturer thekind of ego boost they thrive on.

Nownormally I would say that yestorturers would show a lack of respect to the people who outrankthem. Which in this scenario includes Kylo. But- well with some ofthe things I’ve outlined above, the likely sexist nature of theorganisation and this mentor-ship idea to explain Rey’s role- Ithink you could plausibly side step that.

Ina typical situation torturers disobey orders and don’t respond wellto authority. However this isn’t a typical situation. If Rey feelslike Kylo is one of the few men/people in this organisation that’sgiven her a fair chance (or one of the few to respect her‘abilities’) then that couldresult in a different relationship.

Theask and our conversations gives me the impression that theirrelationship isn’t distant. They know each other personally, thereseems to be a certain amount of mutual respect there. I think thatfits with the way you’ve established these two characters withinthis AU. It seems like this Rey may well feel personally indebted tothis Kylo.

Thatdoesn’t extend to other torturers though.

Thereare two realistic ways to handle that. The first is keeping thenumber of torturers very low; perhaps only two others aside from Rey.That could lead to a situation where Rey is the only one reallyinteracting with Kylo. The second is giving the torturers a highturnover rate: a lot of them are killed quickly for insubordinationor general incompetence.

Bothof those are plausible, realistic scenarios and they can functiontogether. The second in particular could be used to strengthen theboss-employee relationship between Kylo and Rey. He may well havenoticed that the torturers generallyaren’t trustworthy while also noticing that Reyhasn’t been insubordinate. That could also help with making himseem less incompetent; he believes Rey is trustworthy so he’sattaching the problems with other torturers to the individuals ratherthan torture itself.

HonestlyI’m a little unsure what else to advise with regards to Kylo andincompetence because one of the things I love about the character ishow incompetent he comes across as. I absolutely adore the way StarWars gave us this villain with huge personal power and no idea how towield it. With so many villains positioned as incredibly smart andtactical it seemed incredibly refreshing to me.

Divorcingthat question from the character though-

Ina military context a lot of superior officers don’t notice the facttorture doesn’t work because they’re not effectively comparingwhat their people are actually doing. Torture destroys their abilityto fact check.

Ithink this is probably easiest to explain in a policing context. Saythere’s been a robbery. The torturers go out and arrest some randompeople while the officers who are actually policing do the hard workof trying to look for evidence. To the superior (who is going by whatthe subordinate officers say)it looks as if the torturers have been more efficient. They havesuspects in jail already.

Bythe time the officers come back with some evidence the torturers mayhave forced a confession out of someone. The superior looks at thatand at the evidence and realises they don’t match. At this pointthe superiors has one group of subordinates telling them one thing iscertain, and another group saying something different. They’relikely to tell both groups to go away and investigate further.

Inthat time the torturers will probably get their victim to changetheir confession, taking the new details into account.

Thesuperior ends up praising them and feeling like they’ve got the‘right’ person. The officers go on working in the background anduncover more evidence that contradicts this, but by that point thevictim may already have been charged. The case might go to court andget thrown out because the evidence contradicts the confession.

Butby that point the truth, as it’s being communicated to the superiorofficer, is so muddied that it’s not particularly surprising thesuperior is having trouble. Especially when they’re dealing with alot of cases.

Unlessthey keep detailed records of these sorts of confused, contradictoryevents and the officers involved over time, they may well notidentify the problem with particular officers. It’s a question oftrust: superiors often need a clear reason to stop trusting theirsubordinates and torturers are usually very good at presenting theirstory as if it’s established fact.

Thisfeeds into the broader question of why an organisation might keepthese groups around. What follows is my opinion, rather thansomething I can point to research on.

Inthe context of the sort of organised criminal group you’representing- they may just not care. They may see it as something thatscares the competition and victims. They may (wrongly) believe thismakes people more likely to obey them.

Iget the impression that in military and police organisations there’soften a lack of will: the authorities in particular areas can’t bebothered to root out torture. There’s also often a high acceptanceof apologist ideals, especially ones surrounding victim’s‘deserving’ to be tortured.

Ifyou choose to use the idea that the gang engaged in human traffickingin the past they may have torturers through... inertia. They’ve‘always’ had them so why change?

Organisations,criminal or otherwise, don’tnaturally follow the path to greatest efficiency. People do thingsthey think work,rather than rigorously test everything. And if this organisation hasnever been without torturers then they probably have no idea how muchthey’re being dragged down.

Buthonestly? I don’t think you need much more explanation then anacceptance of apologist ideas and a lack of will/time/energy to roottorture out.

Ithink that covers the questions about the organisation and leaves thequestions about Rey in particular and her interactions with Finn.

I’mgoing to try and start with mental health problems.

Oneof the questions underlying this is what it takes for us to recognisesomething as a mental health issue, as opposed to an individual issueor not liking someone. And that varies greatly depending on theculture. The question of recognising and addressing incompetence intorturers is much easier.  

You’veprobably taken a look at the list of symptoms but here they are againjust in case.

Ithink characterising and recognisingthose symptoms depends on both the symptoms themselves and thecharacters.

Somesymptoms are probably easier to recognise in the context of thistrip. Memory lapses stand out as both obviouswhen you’re spending a lot of time with someone and something thatcan be tied to incompetence. Addiction could be used similarly butcan easily warp any narrative it’s put into: make sure you’ve gotthe narrative space to address it before deciding to use it.

Anxiety,panic attacks and PTSD can all make people freeze or seem to spaceout. They can cause visibleshakes. Anxiety and panicattacks can also make people repeat words or speak noticeably morequickly.

Depressionand anxiety can cause nausea and difficulty eating.

Hypervigilance,anxiety and panic attacks can look like paranoia. And any of thosesymptoms coupled with insomnia, memory loss or difficulty relating topeople can lead to situations where characters massivelymisjudge someone’s emotional state or a situation more generally.

Someof these things are easier to recognise as mental health problemswithout prior information on mental health. I think the best thing todo here is decide on symptoms, not just in relation to Rey but inrelation to what you think Finn would recognise. You need thesymptoms you pick to fit the broader plot as well as the character,so I’d suggest leaving out symptoms that you don’tthink Finn would be able torecognise as symptoms.

Deskillingis going to be- well prettydependant on what Rey and Finn are actually doing during this trip.

NarrativelyI think the best way to approach that would be to try and create anincident that highlights it, a situation where Rey leaps into doingsomething Finn knows is wrong. Not in the moral sense, in thepractical sense.

Thebasic template that comes to mind for me is this: Rey and Finn arelooking for someone, some thing or a particular important piece ofinformation. They’re in a new place. They’ve been together forthe time it took to get there but they don’t necessarily know eachother well yet.

Theydecide they’ll cover more ground if they split up. Youcould then show Finn following effective investigation methods andgetting some decent leads as a result. He contacts Rey and askshow she’s doing. Rey says she’s doing great and she’s got somefantastic leads. But when they meet up the things she’s saying makeno sense to Finn. They contradict the information he has, informationthat’s backed up by separate sources.

Finnmight be a little suspicious of this but interpreting it as a lack ofskilled information gathering means having the pattern repeat. Itmight mean Finn going out and trying to investigate Rey’s ‘leads’and finding either nothing or outright refuting evidence. Or it mightjust mean a generalised pattern of the same thing repeating; theykeep coming up with different ‘evidence’ and Rey’s is startingto seem increasingly outlandish.

Eventuallythat could lead to Finn questioning howRey is getting information. Finn might also start encounteringunexpected resistance. You could have previously reliable informantsflatly tell him they don’t want to talk to him any more because hebrought a torturer into town (perhaps people they know were targettedor perhaps they fear for their own safety).

Fromthe longer conversations I had with the author it’s clear that Reyisn’t completely comfortable with her role by this point and she’sprobably linked her mental health problems to what she’s doing insome way.

Nownormally I would saythat a character trying to intervene and stop a torturer (or justtrying to present an anti-torture point of view) was likely to getattacked. But I think a combination of the way you’ve characterisedthis version of Rey and the isolated situation they’re both inmeans that you could pull this off.

I’vespoken before about how torturers have a tendency to interpretanti-torture stances as attacks and respond accordingly. But thatresearch is all from amilitary context. What happens in that scenario is that thetorturer-sub-culture tends to close ranks. They try to make life asuncomfortable as possible for the person they see as a ‘threat’.Social isolation, bullying, attempts to sabotage their job and thelike are common. The situation can escalate to violence and attemptedmurder.

Howeverthis is within a context where torture is (at least theoretically)always against the rules. Your characters are alreadybreaking the law, none of them need to really worry about whetherbreaking another law is going to get them jailed or fired.

You’vealso taken Rey outsideof that toxic sub-culture when this happens. So she isn’t going tohave other people putting social pressure on her to reject what Finnsays.

Sometorturers do say theywant to stop. Especially when they acknowledge that their healthproblems are caused by what they do.

Whetherthis counts as ‘guilt’ or ‘regret’ depends on how you definethose terms. I think a lot of torturers regret the consequencestorture has had for them.But that’s not the same as a deeper understanding of what they puttheir victims through.

Fromeverything you’ve said about the way you’re characterising Reyand the story generally I think you could easily present her as‘regretting’ the fact her actions have led to her mental healthproblems. A greater insight into what she’s done would probablytake more time. But I’m not sure that greater insight would benecessary at this point, when you have Finn confronting Rey about thepointlessness of her actions.

Ifshe’s aware that she’s hurting herself and Finn can presentevidence that what she’s doing is ineffectivethen I think you have enough for the character development and arcyou have planned. It seems plausible to have an intervention workwith these specific characters under these specific conditions.

Ithink that leaves the question of Finn bringing this information toKylo and the question of how Rey might interact with Finn morebroadly.

It’sseems pretty clear to me that you’ve got their relationship growingand changing as the story progresses. It would make sense to havetheir interactions and Rey’s attitude change over that time periodas well.

Onceagain the differences between military torture and torture in anorganised crime context come into play here. Everything I’ve justsaid about how Rey might respond to Finn pointing out how ineffectiveher efforts have been is notbased on research. Because there is not so far as I know sufficientresearch on this in organised crime particularly. It’s an educatedguess on my part.

Imentioned that Rey is…. ina position where she’s at less ‘risk’ then a military torturermight be. That could result in a less confrontational attitudetowards Finn at first but I’m not sure. What it boils down to iswhether she sees him as a threat. Not in a physical sense but as athreat to the role she’s carved out for herself, her position inthe organisation, her prestige, her livelihood.

Ihonestly think you could play it well in a number of ways. You couldhave Rey start this trip not feeling threatened by Finn butdismissive of him. A general attitude of ‘well he doesn’t knowwhat he’s talking about’ that lets her ignore everything he says,right up to the point where he can underline just how pointless herefforts have been.

Ithink you could also start this off with Rey feeling quite threatenedby Finn’s stance and determined to ‘prove’ she’s right. Thatcould make it harder for Finn to reach her later.

Youcould also lean in to the fact that torturers are often quitesocially stunted. If Rey is already questioning what she’s doingbecause of the effect it’s having on her health she might feel tooconflicted about the issue to really know how she feels about Finnhimself. If she thinks what she’s doing is effective and haspurpose then she might see herself as sacrificing her health for theorganisation. She may find it difficult to interact with Finn oraddress any of his points against torture.

Shemay feel like she ‘needs’ to verbally defend what she doesbecause she sees it as ‘for the greater good’.

Ithink however you start their relationship off you could use theconfrontation, Finn pointing out how ineffective her methods are, asan opportunity to bring them closer together. You could use it as anopportunity for Rey to open up about her mental health, possibly forthe first time. You could use it as a chance to have her addressthese conflicting feelings about what she does, about what her placeand purpose is if everything she’s been taught about violence is alie.

Youcan bring the characters much closer together at this point by havingFinn willing to listen andto assure her she has worth.

Asfor taking this to Kylo-

Ithink that depends on whether Finn primarily wants to get Rey out ofa bad situation or end the torturer subgroup.

Thefirst option probably means emphasising the skills she does have andhow Finn finds them useful. How they makea good team and how thatwill make Kylo more money then what he currently has Rey doing.

Thesecond option would take longer and be more involved. It would meanspelling out to Kylo both that this isn’t working and that it’sdamaging his organisation. Particularly his ability to make money.

Ifyou go down that route I think you should include Rey in theconversation in some way. You’re concerned about her agencythroughout the story so Ithink involving her in dismantling the torturer-sub-group would helpaddress that. It gives her aplatform to state her feelings and views as well as something activeto do: rebuild part of the organisation afterwards.

Shecould also play a much more active role in convincing Kylo then Finndoes. Because it’s one thing to have someone uninvolved come alongand tell him that this doesn’t work. It’s another thing to havesomeone directly involved come along and say the same thing.

Ithink stressing the fact torture isn't working is probably the mainarguement to stress here. In this universe they're all violentcriminals so a moral stance is going to be less important. But Finnand Rey can still argue that they got further when they weren't usingtorture, that torturing made their job harder and that represents alarge waste of time. Time that gang members could be using to say,make money.

Dependingon how exactly you want to play their relationships with Kylo youmight also be able to have them making more personal appeals. Rey inparticular can attest to the way doing this has injured her andtherefore argue that Kylo is going to lose good loyal people if hekeeps doing this. If you go with some of my suggestions about theorganisation generally, with a high turnover rate among torturersthen that point could stand out; highlighting that Kylo doesn'treally lose anything by instituting this new policy.

Activelygetting rid of torturers is another matter.

Somethingas simple as a change in the 'law' (in this case 'the bossdisapproves') has a big effect. But to totally eradicate torturetakes more then that. It takes time, effort and perseverance. In thecontext of a criminal organisation, I think you need to think abouthow the organisation is set up and whether they'd ever make it apriority.

Theycould still get rid of the 'ring leaders', the 'mentors' thecharacters who are most actively perpetuating this toxic sub culture.In the context of a regime that would usually mean killing them.That's not the only option in this scenario. Kicking people out ofthe gang is a possibility, but it might be seen as a risky one. Theycould join rival gangs and give away the organisation's secrets.Another possibility is setting them up and letting the authoritiestake them away. That makes them someone else's problem. I think whereexactly you go with this aspect should depend on- well how you seethis criminal organisation functioning and where you want to take thestory later on.

And,at almost five thousand words I think I’m going to have to leavethat there. I hope this helps. :)

Disclaimer

#tw torture #effects of torture #behaviour of torturers #writing torturers #ways torture fails #organised crime #fantasy ask #star wars #fanfiction #deskilling #Anonymous

[stellatateblog]

Low Carb vs Low Fat, What’s Best For Weight Loss?

Will Brink writes for BrinkZone.com – the final frontier in bodybuilding, fatloss, health & fitness

I read an awful lot of studies on nutrition, supplements, and so forth per my job, most not really worth noting here on BZ. Not that they are bad studies per se, but they don’t really tend to tell us anything we don’t already know or add much to the body of knowledge. Once in a while a study comes out that really deserves some discussion, and this is one of those. The most common criticisms of such nutritional studies are they don’t run long enough to really see the differences between diets, and or, they’re not large enough to see differences between groups. Other criticisms are a lack of focus on the quality of the foods ingested. These and other criticisms often result in people ignoring the findings of various studies that examine say one dietary approach vs another on end points such as weight loss.

One of the big debates in nutrition is a low carb vs low fat diet on weight loss. This recent study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA. 2018;319(7):667-679) had over 600 adults, attempted to focus on the quality of the food, and ran 12 months! The study also examined genotype pattern and insulin secretion. Frankly, I’m surprised this one has not gotten more attention than it did, but I suspect that’s due to the results, but I digress…

The mean macronutrient distributions in the healthy low fat was diet (HLF) vs the healthy low carb diet (HLC), respectively, were 48% vs 30% for carbohydrates, 29% vs 45% for fat, and 21% vs 23% for protein. So obviously not a keto diet per se, but still a substantial macro nutrient difference in F/C to parse out the differences. It’s also important to note the protein intakes were essentially the same. Another common criticism of nutritional studies is they often fail to match protein intakes between groups, then claim the effects were due to the differences in fat or carbs!

So what were the results? Pretty much what I had expected.  When the source calories are healthy, isocaloric, and protein the same between groups, the effects are essentially the same.  The HLF diet group lost 5.3 kg vs the HLC diet group that lost 6.0 kg, “…and there was no significant diet-genotype interaction or diet-insulin interaction with 12-month weight loss.”

Yet again, a well-designed study that lasted a year, well controlled, focused on quality nutrition, matched for protein, finds magical macro manipulations resulted in nadda for differences in weight loss and other end points examined between groups. A result I would have fully expected. The study tested two primary hypothesis, “… that there is a significant diet × genotype pattern interaction for weight loss. The second primary hypothesis was that there is a significant diet × insulin secretion interaction for weight loss.” Neither of those two hypothesis were supported via the findings of this study. That is, neither genetics nor insulin were apparently responsible for the effects as both groups lost a similar amount of weight. Understandably, there’s considerable  interest in identifying “…genetic variants that help explain interindividual differences in weight loss success in response to diet interventions, particularly diets with varying macronutrient compositions.” This study suggests those genetic differences do not play an essential role in weight loss regardless of macro nutrient split, nor does the dreaded “fat promoting” hormone insulin, at least not during reduced calorie intakes and a focus on healthy foods consumed. The authors concluding “neither of the 2 hypothesized predisposing factors was helpful in identifying which diet was better for whom.”

Does that mean macro nutrient ratios have no impact on weight loss or body composition? No, but it does suggest what I and others have been saying for decades, total calories is still the primary driver of weight loss and no amount of “magical macro manipulations” will ever change that. Would the results have been different had the differences in macro ratios been more extreme as no doubt some will claim? Probably not, and data tends to support that. Two, while there may be some minor differences in body composition experienced between extremes in macros, one has to also consider long term health and sustainability of such diets. That’s a topic for a different day, but many a popular nutritional approaches  that stress extremes in macros to achieve changes in body comp, are rarely sustainable long term and are questionable as to their long term health benefits, or lack there of, and the actual long term differences vs a more balanced approach, minimal at best.

Is this a perfect study? No. There’s no perfect studies when humans are involved, and actually controlling all the possible confounding variables in 600+ people, while not impossible per se, so horrendously expensive and difficult to achieve, it may as well be viewed as impossible. This study however did a commendable job of controlling the variables to get some answers examining the questions they asked below.

As far as secondary outcomes, “…both diets improved lipid profiles and lowered blood pressure, insulin, and glucose levels, with the exception of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations, which increased for participants in the healthy low-carbohydrate group. The 12-month changes in low-density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations significantly favored a healthy low-fat diet. High-density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations increased significantly more and concentrations of triglycerides decreased significantly more for the healthy low-carbohydrate diet group than for the healthy low-fat diet group. The decrease in the prevalence of the metabolic syndrome was not significantly different between the diet groups.”

It would appear both diets had benefits to lipid profiles, but differed in those effects and benefits to lipids however. The reader can take that for what it’s worth as it relates to their health.

Effect of Low-Fat vs Low-Carbohydrate Diet on 12-Month Weight Loss in Overweight Adults and the Association With Genotype Pattern or Insulin Secretion. The DIETFITS Randomized Clinical Trial

Key Points

Question  What is the effect of a healthy low-fat (HLF) diet vs a healthy low-carbohydrate (HLC) diet on weight change at 12 months and are these effects related to genotype pattern or insulin secretion?

Findings  In this randomized clinical trial among 609 overweight adults, weight change over 12 months was not significantly different for participants in the HLF diet group (−5.3 kg) vs the HLC diet group (−6.0 kg), and there was no significant diet-genotype interaction or diet-insulin interaction with 12-month weight loss.

Meaning  There was no significant difference in 12-month weight loss between the HLF and HLC diets, and neither genotype pattern nor baseline insulin secretion was associated with the dietary effects on weight loss.

Abstract

Importance  Dietary modification remains key to successful weight loss. Yet, no one dietary strategy is consistently superior to others for the general population. Previous research suggests genotype or insulin-glucose dynamics may modify the effects of diets.

Objective  To determine the effect of a healthy low-fat (HLF) diet vs a healthy low-carbohydrate (HLC) diet on weight change and if genotype pattern or insulin secretion are related to the dietary effects on weight loss.

Design, Setting, and Participants  The Diet Intervention Examining The Factors Interacting with Treatment Success (DIETFITS) randomized clinical trial included 609 adults aged 18 to 50 years without diabetes with a body mass index between 28 and 40. The trial enrollment was from January 29, 2013, through April 14, 2015; the date of final follow-up was May 16, 2016. Participants were randomized to the 12-month HLF or HLC diet. The study also tested whether 3 single-nucleotide polymorphism multilocus genotype responsiveness patterns or insulin secretion (INS-30; blood concentration of insulin 30 minutes after a glucose challenge) were associated with weight loss.

Interventions  Health educators delivered the behavior modification intervention to HLF (n = 305) and HLC (n = 304) participants via 22 diet-specific small group sessions administered over 12 months. The sessions focused on ways to achieve the lowest fat or carbohydrate intake that could be maintained long-term and emphasized diet quality.

Main Outcomes and Measures  Primary outcome was 12-month weight change and determination of whether there were significant interactions among diet type and genotype pattern, diet and insulin secretion, and diet and weight loss.

Results  Among 609 participants randomized (mean age, 40 [SD, 7] years; 57% women; mean body mass index, 33 [SD, 3]; 244 [40%] had a low-fat genotype; 180 [30%] had a low-carbohydrate genotype; mean baseline INS-30, 93 μIU/mL), 481 (79%) completed the trial. In the HLF vs HLC diets, respectively, the mean 12-month macronutrient distributions were 48% vs 30% for carbohydrates, 29% vs 45% for fat, and 21% vs 23% for protein. Weight change at 12 months was −5.3 kg for the HLF diet vs −6.0 kg for the HLC diet (mean between-group difference, 0.7 kg [95% CI, −0.2 to 1.6 kg]). There was no significant diet-genotype pattern interaction (P = .20) or diet-insulin secretion (INS-30) interaction (P = .47) with 12-month weight loss. There were 18 adverse events or serious adverse events that were evenly distributed across the 2 diet groups.

Conclusions and Relevance  In this 12-month weight loss diet study, there was no significant difference in weight change between a healthy low-fat diet vs a healthy low-carbohydrate diet, and neither genotype pattern nor baseline insulin secretion was associated with the dietary effects on weight loss. In the context of these 2 common weight loss diet approaches, neither of the 2 hypothesized predisposing factors was helpful in identifying which diet was better for whom.

Full Paper HERE

The post Low Carb vs Low Fat, What’s Best For Weight Loss? appeared first on BrinkZone.com.

Low Carb vs Low Fat, What’s Best For Weight Loss? syndicated from https://ugbodybuildingblog.wordpress.com/

[greenplanetplumbing]

How-to Prepare a Theoretical Framework to get a Research Paper

Check out new post published on https://www.greenplanetplumbing.com.au/how-to-prepare-a-theoretical-framework-to-get-a-5/

How-to Prepare a Theoretical Framework to get a Research Paper

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[fbitennis]

Command of Match (COM) and Lost Opportunity Score (LOS)

I’ve been watching the Davis Cup tie between Borna Coric and Frances Tiafoe.  

The first set, won by Tiafoe in a tiebreak, is largely marked by Borna Coric showing an incredible lack of touch around the net (he cannot volley at all*) and the near impossibility of keeping his forehand in the court.  

*Separate research project: Check The Match Charting Project to see if Coric is the worst volleyer in the Top 50.  Starting hypothesis is that he is.

Then when the second set kicks off, Frances Tiafoe can’t win a game, and barely any points.  His energy level plummets and his serve is about as bad as you will see from a male professional tennis player.  He loses the second set 1-6, and proceeds to carry that over into the third set.  In an 11 game stretch, he wins only 1 game, and only 14 of 53 points, resulting in a 0-4 deficit in the third set.  Although his aggressiveness waned, I think the most important factor is that Coric stopped making those horrendous unforced errors, at which point Tiafoe’s weaknesses were all brought to the fore (or is it “foe”?).

But at 4-0, Coric started making horrendous errors again.  I mean horrendous.  At one point, he makes 7 in a row, and voila, Tiafoe’s energy returns.  Tiafoe does not play great in the rest of the third set, but Coric is so bad that Tiafoe comes back and wins the second set tiebreak.  (In fairness, the tiebreak itself is fairly well-played by both players).

As I’m writing this, I have not started the fourth set.  I know Coric wins the next two sets because I know Croatia is in the finals, but I actually haven’t looked at the set scores for the final two sets.  Based on what I’ve seen, it seems almost certain that if Coric can keep his forehand in the court, he will win, and win easily.  For all the Twitter talk of how Tiafoe was a warrior in the match (apparently forgetting that 11 game stretch), he shows no sign he can control the points. His backhand is merely steady, and his wack-a-doo forehand stroke just rolls the ball around the court.  In other words, this match is not on his racquet.

I paused in my viewing of the match, partially because I needed a break and partially because I wondered if there’s anything in the statistics that would tell someone who didn’t watch the match that the match is entirely on Coric’s racquet.   And looked at another way, if Coric had lost, could you look at his stats and know just how bad the loss is, because the match truly was on his racquet, and only he could blow it?

There are probably several ways to do this, and what I’m presenting here is perhaps the most back-of-the-envelope way to do it, primarily because I’m starting it on a whim at 11 pm while trying to stay interested in this match.  So I think this is just a toy stat, although as I have posted before, I think toy stats have their own kind of value.

But “stat” is the wrong word for the two things I’m proposing here.  “Status” is probably a better word...toy status(?).  Both COM and LOS seek to identify particular matches, rather than producing a statistic for every match.  

I’m doing LOS first, because I was initially motivated by wondering how horrendous it would have been if Coric had lost this match when he was in total control of the match.  

Lost Opportunity Score (LOS) 

I’m using the acronym LOS for this concept, but it is a bit of a misnomer because it isn’t really a score. Nevertheless, the acronym is so apropos that I can’t drop it.  LOS should indicate when the match a player lost was almost entirely on his/her racquet and he/she blew it with too many errors.

Command of Match (COM) 

We already have Carl Bialik’s Dominance Ratio (available for every match on Tennis Abstract), which indicates how much a player dominated the match statistically, but we don’t know when that dominance is attributable to the winning player playing great, and when it is attributable to the losing player playing horribly.  

COM is trying to identify when the winning player was in control, even when the other player did not play poorly.  In other words, COM isn’t designed to measure how in command one player is (though I suppose you could use it for that), but rather, to identify those relatively rare matches where the match a player won was almost entirely on his/her racquet even thought his/her opponent may have played reasonably well.

Calculating LOS and COM

The fundamental basis for both LOS and COM is the same.  For each player, calculate this number:

(1-(OppUEs/Points Won)) - (UEs/Points Played)

The first part of the formula determines what percentage of points won by the player were not gifts from the opponent.  Some of those points may be unusual situations, but most of them will be winners or FEs caused by the player, and therefore within the player’s control.  The second part of the formula indicates what percentage of overall points were gifts given away by the subject player.

Conceptually, if your first number is high, you were controlling the match to a significant degree, but if your second number also is high, you gave away a lot of points in a match.

To calculate LOS and COM, you need just one more step.  

Lost Opportunity Score (LOS)

Divide the losing player’s number by the winning player’s number.  If the losing player’s quotient is greater than 1.10 (in other words, 10% higher), it’s a lost opportunity (LOS).  In other words, the losing player had the match on his/her racquet, but made so many unforced errors that he/she gave the match away.  The 10% buffer is to capture only the most egregious of these situations.  It is approximately 1 standard deviation away from the average loser quotient. 

Here’s an example from the first round US Open match between Sam Stosur and Caroline Wozniacki, won by Wozniacki.  From the match score (6-3 6-2) it appears to be an easy win, and Woz’s dominance ratio was 1.56. Stosur won 45 out of 110 points.  She made 34 UEs and Wozniacki made just 12.  

Stosur’s number via the formula above is (1-(12/45)) - (34/110) = .424

Woz’s number via the formula above is (1-(34/65) - (12/110) = .368

Then, .424/.368 = 1.15 (greater than 1.10), so Stosur gets a Lost Opportunity (LOS) “award.”

Looking at the first part of the formula, Stosur’s points won were largely because of good things she was doing (73.3%), and Woz’s points won were mostly about Stosur doing bad things (47.7%). The second part shows Stosur made unforced errors on nearly 31% of points played, and Woz, typically, only 10.9%.  That’s in keeping with what we know about their respective styles.

Bottom line:  Stosur controlled the action in the match, but due in large part to the high number of UEs, lost the match.  I suspect this is not uncommon for Wozniacki opponents.  (See Caveats at the end).

Command of Match (COM)

Subtract the losing player’s number from the winning player’s number.  If the winning player’s difference is greater than 0.13 for men, or 0.17 for women, the winning player had command of the match (COM).  In other words, the gap between how much control the winning player had, and how much control the losing player had, is so significant that we say the winning player was in command via his/her own efforts.  Significantly, you can get a COM even if your opponent played reasonably well.

You might wonder where the 0.13 and 0.17 come from.  Using US Open matches as the measuring stick, these numbers are 1.5 standard deviations from the mean differences between the players, so we are only capturing relatively rare matches with COM.  I tried it with 2 SDs, but the list was far too thin.

Here’s an example from the first round US Open match between Simona Halep and Kaia Kanepi, since most of us saw at least some part of that match and know there wasn’t much Halep could do in that match.  The score alone (6-2 6-4) gives us some indication of Kanepi’s level, and the dominance ratio was 1.36.  Halep won 47 out of 107 points, not that much different than in the Stosur example.  Unlike Stosur, she made only 9 UEs and Kanepi made 28.  

Halep’s number via the formula above is (1-(28/47)) - (9/107) = .320

Kanepi’s number via the formula above is (1-(9/60) - (28/107) = .588

Then, .588 - .320 = .268 (greater than .17), so Kanepi gets a Command of Match (COM) award.

Going back to our concept with the first part of the formula, Halep’s points won were largely because of bad things Kanepi was doing, with Halep controlling only 40% of those points.  She didn’t hurt herself with errors obviously.  And because of that, only 15% of Kanepi’s successful points were due to her opponent’s mistakes.  

Bottom line:  Kanepi controlled the action in the match, to such a degree that even her significant number of errors, and Halep’s lack of errors, could not stop her.  

Caveats

This is not scientific, so let’s get that out of the way.  I haven’t tested it on gobs and gobs of data.

Also, only 13 hours have passed since I first thought of the idea (and 7 of them were spent sleeping), so I reserve the right to make adjustments (or even scrap LOS and COM altogether).

I initially see three issues with LOS and COM:

1.  UEs are not official statistics of the ATP and the WTA.  They are typically recorded for the grand slams, although I noticed the IBM Slamtracker didn’t bother with many lower profile matches at the US Open.  Only 178 of the 254 US Open main draw matches had meaningful UE statistics.  In the other 76 matches, IBM Slamtracker reported UEs, but they are clearly understated by vast amounts, so I’m not sure why they even list them (or winners). For example, Andrey Rublev had only 5 winners and 13 unforced errors in a four set match, while his opponent Jeremy Chardy also had only 13 UEs?  High-risk player Nikoloz Basilashvili had only 7 UEs in a five set match against Aljaz Bedene?  I don’t think so.  

So, LOS and COM are good for only Grand Slams, matches that have been charted, or matches you are watching on TV that flash the summary numbers at the end of sets or matches.  I don’t feel too badly about this.

2.  UEs are extremely subjective.  Anyone who has charted a match and then seen the on-screen statistics from the TV broadcast knows the number of differences in judgment that can arise as to whether a player should have made the shot or not.  Hopefully some of that is taken care of by the 10% buffer in the LOS calculation and the 1.5 standard deviation buffer in the COM calculation.

3.  Aggressive players are far more likely to get a LOS or COM than steady players.  It’s not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, so long as no one says “Wozniacki has 0 COMs in 2018″ (if in fact she does have zero) and uses that as a stick to bash her with. 

As a corollary, recognize that aggressiveness is just one way to measure who had control of the match.  Steady play with few errors is arguably just as valid a way to keep the match on your own racquet, though it is a lot more subtle.  Perhaps a player should get automatically get a COM if his or her opponent gets a LOS, but I’m not yet convinced that’s the right approach as it presumes the LOS players errors were mostly attributable to the steadiness of the opponent. 

Since this one is so long, I’ll do another post with the list of LOS and COM awards from this year’s US Open.

#LOS #COM #Lost Opportunity Score #Command of Match #US Open #Toy Stats

[jakehglover]

GMOs Revealed

By Dr. Mercola

“GMOs Revealed” is a nine-part documentary series featuring more than 20 top experts in the field, including yours truly. In Episode 1, above, you’ll hear from Dr. Zach Bush, whose triple-board certification includes expertise in internal medicine, endocrinology and metabolism, Vani Hari, blogger and founder of FoodBabe.com, and Gunnar Lovelace, CEO of Thrive Market, an online non-GMO food store.

While genetically modified organisms (GMOS), and the pesticides that go along with them, are touted as the solution to feed the world, the reality is a far cry from this industry-spread ideal. In reality, 86 percent of the value of U.S. agricultural exports in 2015 went to 20 destinations with low numbers of hungry people and high rates of human development scores.1 The top recipient? Canada.

In 2013 as well, U.S. farms contributed only 2.3 percent of the food supply to the countries with the most starving people.2 Such countries, unbeknownst to many Americans, actually produce most of their own food already. What they need is not for the U.S. to step up its production of genetically engineered (GE) corn and soy, but to be given resources to distribute and increase access to food while helping local farmers to earn a good living.

Further, as Bush stated, “If we took GMOs off the market today, we would still be feeding the world with the same inefficacy that we are today. We have starvation. We have the biggest famine in human history happening over in sub-Saharan Africa right now.” However, the problem with GMOs is one much larger than failed promises or misguided expectations.

Instead, it’s a form of technology that threatens human health, the environment and the very food supply we depend on. At the foundation, “GMOs Revealed” seeks to answer a question that’s relevant to all of us:

“What if the desire to use technology to enhance our world and save lives has evolved into a lust that, when paired with corporate greed and politics, becomes a catastrophic mass experiment that harms you and your family? Genetically modified foods, also known as GMOs, represent one of the most controversial issues in the world today. What is more vital to humanity, to each of us, than our food supply?”

The Not-so-Green Revolution

As Bush explains, many of the problems with industrialized agriculture began with the Green Revolution, which is not at all “green” as its name suggests. It's easy to forget that at one point, not so long ago, all food was organically grown in a way that supported the ecosystem and environment as a whole. This all changed in the 1940s when the Green Revolution took hold and industrial, chemical-dependent farming techniques quickly spread to become the norm.

When WWII ended, there was a glut of petroleum, and in petroleum are nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium — three nutrients needed for crops to grow. The Rockefeller Foundation funded the Green Revolution that led to the introduction of petroleum-based agricultural chemicals, which quickly transformed agriculture, both in the U.S. and abroad.

President Lyndon Johnson's Food for Peace program actually mandated the use of petroleum-dependent technologies and chemicals by aid recipients, and countries that could not afford it were granted loans from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

However, as happens in humans, when you isolate only a few nutrients and remove many others, you end up with a weakened immune system. “And so our plants started to fail,” Bush said, “and started to be prone to insects and fungi and viruses.” Again, instead of looking to the root of the problem of why the plants were failing, chemical companies introduced pesticides and herbicides to kill weeds and bugs.

Meanwhile, companies like Monsanto got into the business of killing plants via Agent Orange, which was used to defoliate jungles during the Vietnam War. After the war ended, it was time to repurpose their efforts to developing chemicals like organophosphates and glyphosate, which is now the active ingredient in Roundup.

Glyphosate Impacts on Human Health and the Environment

Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup, is an herbicide like no other, as more tons of it have been sprayed worldwide than any other herbicide before it. Writing in Environmental Sciences Europe, scientists noted that in the U.S. and likely globally, “no pesticide has come remotely close to such intensive and widespread use.”3

“Glyphosate will likely remain the most widely applied pesticide worldwide for years to come,” they continued, which is alarming as its environmental and public health risks become increasingly apparent. Glyphosate is used in large quantities on GE glyphosate-tolerant crops (i.e., Roundup Ready varieties).

Its use actually increased nearly fifteenfold since such GE crops were introduced in 1996.4 Glyphosate is also a popular tool for desiccating (or accelerating the drying out) of crops like wheat and oats, a use that began before the introduction of GE crops.

Monsanto has steadfastly claimed that Roundup is harmless to animals and humans because the mechanism of action it uses (which allows it to kill weeds), called the shikimate pathway, is absent in all animals. However, the shikimate pathway is present in human gut bacteria as well as soil bacteria and plants. In an interview I conducted with Bush in 2017, he explained:

"Glyphosate blocks an enzyme pathway … called the shikimate pathway. These enzymes are responsible for making some of the most important compounds in food [including] ringed carbon structures, such as tryptophan, that are the backbone of hormones. If you take away tryptophan from the plant chain or the plant kingdom by killing this pathway in bacteria and plants, the plant cannot make these essential signaling molecules …

It wipes out about four to six of the essential amino acids, which are the building blocks for all proteins in your body … There are only 26 amino acids. You take away four to six of those [and] you just lost a huge percentage of biology. There's a family of compounds called alkaloids … [When you] remove the alkaloids from food, what you see is the disease burst we have going on across so many organ systems in our bodies.

There's a family of [alkaloids] that are anti-parasitic … [others] are antidiabetic … anticancer … antihypertensive … anti-mood disorder … antiasthma, anti-eczema type of compounds.

You go through the list of alkaloids and [realize that if you add a] chemical to our food chain that wipes out the production of [alkaloids] … we [lose] the medicinal quality of food that has existed for thousands of years … [By using glyphosate] we robbed the soil and the plant from the ability to make these essential medicinal [compounds]."

Further, research by Bush and colleagues has found that glyphosate actually hits the cell membranes of the intestine, which upregulates the receptor for gliadin, the gluten breakdown product that causes gluten sensitivity. He believes that the surge in celiac disease and gluten sensitivity can be tied to the use of glyphosate as a desiccant, which, together with drying out the wheat early (leading to an abnormally high gluten-to-fiber ratio), created a perfect storm for biologic damage.

How to Live in This Overprocessed World

Food activist blogger Vani Hari, better known as "Food Babe," takes a more personal approach to spreading awareness on the dangers of GMOs. While working to climb the corporate ladder in her early 20s, Hari was overworked and eating a highly processed Western diet. When she was struck with appendicitis that required emergency surgery, it was a wake-up call that triggered her mission to reveal what’s really in the food we’re eating.

“My whole life I had been suffering from eczema, asthma … I was on three or four medications for asthma … one of the things I found out almost immediately was the way I’d been eating had been affecting these other things that I’d been living with my entire life, not even knowing,” she said, adding:

“ … The scariest thing about GMOs that really got me was knowing that there is corn being planted here in the United States that is injected with Bt toxin, which is an insecticide that’s inside the corn kernel, inside the seed, so when an insect tries to eat it, their stomach explodes. I was terrified … what happens to our own bodies when we … eat it. That is something that hasn’t been tested long-term on humans … [but] in laboratory studies of animals it produces horrendous results.”

One of her messages is the importance of teaching children how and why to choose foods that are grown organically and raised humanely, as there are poisons on food that they can’t see.

“Imagine a world where a child goes to lunch and talks about their lunch in a really positive way, and how their choices, them eating a non-GMO meal or an organic meal is changing the world,” she says, “and then telling other friends about it and talking about what’s really happening in our food supply and what brands are doing the right things and what brands are doing the wrong things … that’s how this information catches wildfire.”

Hari has been instrumental in prompting real changes in the food industry, inspiring Chipotle to take a closer look at its ingredients, for instance, and launching a petition that eventually led to Subway removing the chemical azodicarbonamide from their sandwich bread.

She wants to let people know that they don’t have to buy into the cycle of eating industrialized food, getting sick and spending money on pharmaceuticals as a result. Instead, she stresses, spend a fraction of that money on organic, non-GMO food so you can live your best life. “You don’t have to be part of the system,” she says. “You can opt out.”

Gaining Access to Healthy, Non-GMO Food

Affordability and availability are two common hurdles to choosing organic, non-GE food. The third expert in GMOs Revealed’s first episode is Gunnar Lovelace, CEO of Thrive Market, which cut out the middleman to provide online access to organic and non-GMO foods at affordable prices. Yet, another issue is the lack of labeling on GE foods in the U.S., which is why Thrive only carries products that are non-GMO. Lovelace said:

“The idea that we’re going to engineer food crops like corn, wheat, soy and cotton to withstand systemic poisoning and the destruction of topsoil, the infiltration into water systems and 90 plus percent of Americans now testing positive for glyphosate through these Roundup Ready crops that are now in all … the packaged goods … that to me is the definition of insanity …

There are all sorts of studies that we’re destroying topsoil at an alarming rate and there are only 60 harvests left on the planet. And so the way that we are producing, distributing and marketing and consuming food is going to leave this planet completely unsustainable for us and for our children.”

Thrive was also instrumental in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) decision to allow participants in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) — formerly known as the food stamp program — to shop online for food. This will allow people living in “food deserts” without access to healthy foods an option to secure healthier choices.

The company launched a petition for the cause in June 2016 and had gained more than 310,000 signatures just a few months later. “People are voting with their dollars and they’re voting with their values,” Lovelace said.

If you’re new to healthy eating and are wondering what step to take first to get yourself and your family on the right track, Lovelace echoed one of my key tenets of healthy living: eat whole foods. “We need to eat food with way fewer ingredients, so the fewer ingredients listed the better … buy truly nutrient-dense food from a local farmer at a farmers market … eat as many veggies as possible.”

Keep in mind, too, that it’s important to choose organic, non-GMO animal products as well. The use of genetic engineering is prohibited in organic products — a significant benefit. Importantly, not only are GE seeds prohibited but animals raised on organic farms may not be fed GE alfalfa or GE corn. Over the past two decades, the majority of the anti-GMO movement was focused on GMOs found in processed foods and a small number of whole GE foods. Yet that's only 20 percent of the GMOs in the human food chain.

Twice as much (40 percent) goes into the making of animal feed for CAFOs. The only way to change that trend is by not buying CAFO animal products, be it poultry (including eggs), pork or beef. While fruits and vegetables are the top selling category of organically grown food,5 it’s important to choose organic and grass fed meat and dairy products as well.

from HealthyLife via Jake Glover on Inoreader https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/03/17/gmos-revealed.aspx

[martinfzimmerman]

A man on a financial mission against predatory investment schemes

Trying to be a sensible expat, Matthew Miller set up two long-term savings accounts in lieu of a pension soon after arriving in the UAE. By the time he pulled out of the plans three years ago, he had lost US$45,000 in locked-in fees and commissions.

Mr Miller, a 33-year-old Canadian teacher in Abu Dhabi, has been living here nine years. He bought a 25-year plan in 2009, paying in $2,000 a month, then set up an additional $2,000 a month 10-year plan three years later.

In 2014, having paid in a total of around $140,000, he felt "sick to his stomach" when he realised his savings were not growing. Crunching the numbers, he realised fees were wiping out profits and decided to shut down the plans early.

Mr Miller was spurred on to change his savings ethos by the book Millionaire Teacher: The Nine Rules of Wealth You Should Have Learned in School, written by Andrew Hallam.

A fellow Canadian, author Hallam - who has also written The Global Expatriate's Guide to Investing - is a teacher himself, and worked in Singapore for 11 years. He turned his frugal ways and prudent savings into $1 million before he turned 40 and is now on a crusade to help other expats.

Hallam, 46, left Singapore and his job in 2014 and is now in his third year of travelling with his American wife Pele. While he may return to teaching one day, he says, he no longer needs to work: he can live off his investment portfolio. Yet he has spent this year on an unpaid tour of the Middle East, South East Asia and parts of Africa, giving seminars on investment and how not to get caught out by fixed-term investment plans with inbuilt commissions and high fees like Mr Miller. Since January he has delivered 82 talks in 11 countries in his bid to "stop the spread of financial malaria".

Coming from a modest family upbringing, his father a mech­anic and one of four children, Hallam was buying his own clothes by the age of 15 and, at 16, bought himself a car with the proceeds of a part-time supermarket job. He started saving $100 a month from the age of 19, which had turned into a million-dollar pension in his late thirties.

Hallam says he believes the long-term savings and investment plans sold in the UAE are "the most expensive financial products available anywhere in the world" and he hopes that his tour of the region could cumulatively save people in the UAE, Egypt, Kuwait, Jordan and further afield tens of millions of dollars.

"We don't learn financial literacy in school, so people are afraid," he says. "I present fin­ancial education. I don't want you to believe what I'm saying: I want you to question it. It's important for everyone to do their own maths.

"Going with compensation-based schemes is not good. There is a far greater conflict of interest because people get you into schemes that just pay them more money. Payment-based financial advice follows more of a fiduciary principle and is a partnership over time - there is no windfall. Commission-based, particularly in the Middle East, can become exploitation."

The UAE Insurance Authority (IA) has received numerous complaints from residents locked into these fixed-term savings products, typically provided by some of the world's largest insurance companies, that see gains eaten away by hefty upfront commissions paid out to local financial advisers by the insurers themselves and recouped from the saver - and which also charge savers the full fees of the plan, even if they exit early, to cover those initial commissions.

As a result the IA is now pushing ahead with tough new regulations to transform the way savings, investment and life insurance policies are sold. Its second draft proposal for the overhaul was issued in April, which included plans to impose limits on the indemnity commission - the upfront commission - advisers can earn and a ban on advisers recouping fees from the products they sell. Life insurance companies were given until May 11 to respond with the new regulations expected to be issued imminently.

Such regulations would prevent people like Mr Miller from losing out. When he exited his two savings plans, the process cost him dearly in surrender charges - some $21,000 of the $100,000-plus value of the first plan and a whopping $24,000 of the second plan that was worth $32,000. It was a "costly lesson", he says.

"Doing the maths, if I was earning 8 per cent but paying four per cent in fees, I was only getting four per cent. Over 25 years, that was hundreds of thousands of dollars. It still seemed better to surrender than lose $400,000 or $500,000 down the road."

Hallam agrees that "education is the enemy of exploitation".

With a wide smile, Hallam is a natural orator thanks to his background as a teacher. In one of two open talks he delivered in Abu Dhabi earlier this year, at Cranleigh School on Saadiyat Island, he leapt around the stage, firing off questions to the audi­ence constantly and keeping them totally engrossed, drawing tuts and gasps at some of the numbers he demonstrated.

Often, he says, the targets are the schools, with a large "victim base" of 200-400 teachers which financial advisers "infiltrate". As "one of them" himself, he says teachers tend to trust him.

Another teacher caught in the net was Kate, a 34-year-old who did not want to reveal her full name. She left the UK for Abu Dhabi in 2012 and is moving away this summer. Five years ago, she and her husband signed up for a 25-year plan, paying in $2,000 a month.

They surrendered it 18 months ago after reading Hallam's book. Of their $47,000 pot, they got back just $10,000. "I'm very aware we've been burnt pretty badly," Kate admits.

"I was cynical - I didn't think we'd be expats for the 25 years of the plan - but the adviser managed to convince us we needed to save. He was very persuasive. While it was horrendous to walk away, the compound interest over time [on the amount we took out] is far better than the loss we suffered."

Lasse Lamminheimo, a 39-year-old Abu Dhabi-based Finnish helicopter engineer, has been in the UAE almost six years. For the last two years he has had one 15-year plan and a second 13-year plan, paying in $2,460 and $550 a month, respectively, but, after listening to Hallam talk, he says he will not be keeping them for much longer.

"It's not called a pension plan but it was my plan to retire after 15 years with the money it was making," Mr Lamminheimo says. But his $66,000 of savings has turned into an under-performing $64,000, with a surrender value of just $4,000 after taking into account the fees for the full term of the plan that must be paid regardless, while his other pot has made just $60, he says. "It makes you feel fairly deflated," he admits.

Hallam advises Middle East investors to steer clear of long-term pension schemes offered by at least seven firms, which he says all have fees of at least 4 per cent a year on average (when all platform costs and mutual fund expense ratio fees are considered).

These "devastating" fees are the "reality you face, investing in offshore pensions," says Mr Hallam. So how do you keep a check on such fees?

Firstly, look out for establishment charges, which could be in the realm of 1.6 per cent a year. These might be taken in the first two to five years - and that's either starting a policy or even just increasing the premiums.

Then there are annual administration charges, he says, of around 1.2 per cent per year of the gross value of each investment-linked fund. There are also underlying annual charges of pot­entially up to 3.5 per cent of the underlying fund value each year.

So in total you might easily be paying as much as 6.15 per cent in the early years, and 1.3 to 4.55 per cent thereafter.
 In a 2015 report entitled Mind the Gap, US investment research firm Morningstar calculated that, after fees, an investor would have received 3 per cent less on international equity funds than the 8.77 per cent the funds had made in that time.

"Unfortunately, average investors often suffer from poor timing and end up buying and selling at the wrong times," writes author Kittikun Tanaratpattanakit. "Timing the market is too difficult. It is a losing strategy." Chasing "hot, trendy funds" has "never been a good investment idea", he adds.

So what's the alternative? Hallam suggests that investors create a diversified portfolio of low-cost index funds. An index fund is a type of mutual fund with a portfolio aiming to track a market index such as the Standard & Poor's 500, which is often used in pension plans.

"DIY investors", as he calls them, should buy exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which are funds traded on stock exchanges, much like stocks. The costs are just 0.1 to 0.15 per cent per year - and often even lower for American investors.

Kate has followed his advice, cutting out the middlemen and opening an account directly with a Luxembourg brokerage, TD Direct Investing International, to buy ETFs. As there is a fee per trade of €14.95 (Dh61), she builds up her monthly cash and buys only quarterly. The £20,000 (Dh93,106) she has invested so far in a year has already turned into £21,900.

However, Sam Instone, chief executive of AES International, which charges around 1.25 per cent per annum for investment management and financial planning, sounds a note of caution for the DIY investor, saying that "the size or cost of a mistake is not likely to become apparent for a number of years" (a comment that is equally true for fixed-term savings plans).

Professional advice is critical - but by a fee-based chartered planning firm, someone "who isn't incentivised or paid by the industry," he says. "Not an individual you play golf with who comes to your home, who works on commissions or referrals or who you consider to be a 'friend'," he stresses.

Mark Zoril is the founder of US-based PlanVision, a five-year-old financial advisory that Hallam recommends. Mr Zoril charges just $96 a year on retainer to set up a financial plan and help an investor set up their own low-cost funds.

He says other advisers "laughed" at his price point but he does not believe commissions are "appropriate" and that his service is "time-based", not related to whether the funds "go up or down".

But, says former fixed-term savings investor Mr Miller ruefully: "It's hard to know who to trust once you've been taken to the cleaners."

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