Althouse: "Being hungry is wonderful. The opposite of hungry, which is not hungry, is the opposite of wonderful, which is terrible."

June 27, 2012

"Being hungry is wonderful. The opposite of hungry, which is not hungry, is the opposite of wonderful, which is terrible."

Dr. Andrew Chung's hunger cult.

40 comments:

Kev said...: (the other kev)

They're choosing to be hungry, as opposed to those who have hunger forced upon them. Dicks.; 6/27/12, 11:31 AM
Anonymous said...: Huh?!

Yes food does taste better when you're hungry, but damn...

C.U.L.T.S; 6/27/12, 11:33 AM
Michael K said...: The guy is a nut. It seems that his ideas come from diet advice to stop eating before you are full as a way to lose weight. That sort of thing just doesn't apply to kids. Fat people are hungry when they shouldn't be but people of normal weight need better advice than this guy provides. The admissions dean at Emory is probably cringing at the publicity.; 6/27/12, 11:45 AM
rhhardin said...: Hunger is my favorite emotion. - Some character on Hogan's Heroes; 6/27/12, 11:50 AM
Joe said...: Looking at his picture, methinks Dr. Chung isn't practicing what he preaches.; 6/27/12, 11:50 AM
Tibore said...: "'When we're 10 times hungrier, doesn't food tastes 10 times better? And when food tastes 10 tastes 10 times better, that's wonderful, isn't it?... It's a mathematical principle,' he exclaims."

Uh, no, it's not. You're using math wrong there, doc.; 6/27/12, 11:53 AM
BigFire said...: As an American born in Taiwan, I want to apology to the rest of the world for this freaking moron and his ideas.; 6/27/12, 12:11 PM
Chip S. said...: Malnutrition, where is thy sting?; 6/27/12, 12:26 PM
Mary Beth said...: Wasn't the 16-year-old in school? I'm sure she didn't go from a normal weight to 40 lb. in the last month, didn't anyone at school notice that she was so underweight?

I don't think her drawing is disturbing just because the plates are empty. Norman Rockwell's Thanksgiving painting shows all of the plates empty. If she hadn't been starved to death it would just look like people getting ready to eat.

Spaghetti along with the turkey is kind of odd.

Being satiated feels 100 times better than starving. There, I've mathematically proven that eating is better than being hungry.; 6/27/12, 12:26 PM
Saint Croix said...: Of course self-denial is a strong component of most of the major world religions. Celibacy, for instance, or fasting. Hunger, like lust, is an appetite. And a lot of people feel that control of our appetites makes us better people. There is truth to that. And of course it's also true that control is a problem as well.

That's a horrible way for a child to die.; 6/27/12, 12:27 PM
Richard Dolan said...: Only a culture of overflowing abundance could give rise to such a strange view of the 'wonderful life.' But the 'less is more' idea keeps popping up in odd places, like this.

What's missing is any sense of moderation (as well as wonder). Perhaps Aristotle is no longer on the curriculum at Emory, which might explain why one of its MDs can't seem to grasp that simple concept.; 6/27/12, 12:32 PM
Shanna said...: encourages his followers to eat just two pounds a day

I don't have a good feel for how many calories that is (although I suppose it depends on what you eat!) but it's at least possible that that is plenty of food. I have seen people advocate that you finish eating when you're still a little bit hungry. (and people who advocate different types of fasting).

But I don't think any of that applies here. This woman was crazy and abusive, if her daughter was able to get to 40 pounds because she was starved. She should go to jail. I don't understand why the girl wasn't able to get food at school/other places, though.; 6/27/12, 12:34 PM
Crunchy Frog said...: Mr. Crack Emcee, please pick up thw white courtesy phone...; 6/27/12, 12:36 PM
Saint Croix said...: I don't think her drawing is disturbing just because the plates are empty.

You have to be careful in prosecutions, because when people are weird it's quite easy to demonize them. You want a prosecution to be based on evidence, not on a witch-hunt.

There are lots of cases where kids have starved to death under their parents care.

But in this case, the media is going with "hunger cult" because that's scary and weird. (And sells newspapers).

Describing a normal child's drawing as "haunting" and "chilling" is the sort of rhetoric that would put me on guard if I was a judge.

Googling the case, I found out the girl who died is 16. From the article I would have thought she was 9 or something.

It might actually be a really tough case prosecuting a parent for the actions of a 16-year-old.; 6/27/12, 12:42 PM
Saint Croix said...: Really horrible journalism to omit the child's age. Dishonest.; 6/27/12, 12:44 PM
Saint Croix said...: Similar to the age games in the Trayvon Martin case. What the fuck, media?; 6/27/12, 12:46 PM
Geoff Matthews said...: I'm sure that Crack will explain how this is applicable to Mitt Romney.; 6/27/12, 1:11 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: Saint Croix, I don't know what you're talking about. The girl's age is in the first sentence of the damn article.

A 16-year-old who weighed 40 pounds at the time of her death is way, way beyond garden-variety anorexia. That's Buchenwald territory. Actually, I'm surprised that anyone that age could survive long enough to reach that weight.; 6/27/12, 1:11 PM
bagoh20 said...: I do love feeling "hungry". It's great to have gone all day without eating knowing you will sit down to a wonderful meal and a glass or two of wine and some nice company.

Unfortunately, the only time I go all day without eating is when I'm just too busy, and I forget. I just love the anticipation of a guilt free meal.; 6/27/12, 1:22 PM
edutcher said...: Bet the people at Auschwitz and Santo Tomas didn't know how much fun they were having.; 6/27/12, 1:36 PM
Saint Croix said...: Oops! What the fuck, Saint Croix?

Not only is it in the first sentence, it's in the frickin' headline.

My bad.

Still, the child's drawing and the child picture seems awfully similar to the media games done in the Martin case, yes? You run photographs of the child as a little girl so that we are more outraged.; 6/27/12, 1:44 PM
wyo sis said...: Why isn't the mother dead of starvation if the idea is so wonderful?; 6/27/12, 1:45 PM
Saint Croix said...: I'm going to leave that up as a humility reminder. Which is like twice this week.; 6/27/12, 2:01 PM
DADvocate said...: Sometimes I'm just fed up with the idiots in the world. Where were the rest of the people in this family constellation? Why didn't anyone report this when the girl reached 75 pounds or so? Why does this doctor still have a job at a university? The amount of stupidity and ignorance surrounding this boggles the mind.; 6/27/12, 2:19 PM
Balfegor said...: Re: Bigfire:

As an American born in Taiwan

Oh, he's Taiwanese? Ah, good. I was thinking he was Korean-American. What with, you know, the scripture and the psychotic weight-loss obsession and all that.; 6/27/12, 2:47 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: encourages his followers to eat just two pounds a day

Two pounds of what? Potato chips. Beef steak. Oranges? Kapok?

Two pounds of well balanced nutritious meals should be enough to sustain life. There is something else going on here.

What I ate yesterday
Breakfast:1 hard boiled egg, half grapefruit, coffee (I guess liquids don't count).
Lunch: 6 Wheat thins crackers, several slices of different cheeses, 3 kinds of olives, half an apple sliced, a few bing cherries. Iced tea.
Dinner: A bowl of chinese corn and shrimp soup. Homemade it was GREAT! (recipe on request :-) Small amount of stir fried chicken (probably about half of a half breast) with broccoli, mushrooms and onion. No rice.

I'm quite sure it all weighed less than 2 pounds and I am not hungry in the least.

And YES. We are on a diet and plan to lose some weight but are not starving ourselves.

However. The people who adhere to this as a cult are nutbags and the so called Doctor should be culpable for encouraging their nuttiness.; 6/27/12, 2:47 PM
traditionalguy said...: Starvation is a cruel death. A deadly enemy uses that method.

That is why we need the EPA dismantled and started over as a rational agency with out the power to starve us all to death.; 6/27/12, 3:02 PM
Anonymous said...: "Bet the people at Auschwitz and Santo Tomas didn't know how much fun they were having."

Nor did Terri Schiavo. Though, come to think of it, didn't her husband's lawyer tell us how euphoric it all was?; 6/27/12, 3:12 PM
Lyssa said...: DBQ: bowl of chinese corn and shrimp soup. Homemade it was GREAT! (recipe on request :-)

REQUEST! REQUEST! Seriously,that sounds delicious.

I think that I remember reading somewhere that the average person (American?) eats 4 lbs a day. Of course, the average is overweight, so who knows if that's a good amount or not. But a typical 16 year old would defintely eat more than a typical adult, I would think.; 6/27/12, 4:17 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: Lyssa,

REQUEST! REQUEST! Seriously,that sounds delicious.

Seconded!; 6/27/12, 5:23 PM
Henry said...: Vintage Althouse:

tags: hunger, lightweight religion, murder, psychology ... cannibalism, crime, intelligence, lips, surgery

Brilliant juxtaposition.; 6/27/12, 6:18 PM
dbp said...: That whole "Two pounds of food" bit really struck me as arbitrary too.

One pound of butter, according to the information printed on the side of the package, has 3,200 calories. So I think I could easily sustain myself on two pounds. Not if it was all celery sticks and apples though.

The doctor is a nut, though his ideas in moderation have merit. When I was (successfully) trying to loose a bit of weight, I welcomed hunger. Hunger told me that my blood sugar was low and that my body was at least in a position to draw on fat or glycogen stores.

One problem with being hungry though is that when you finally do eat, it is very easy to stuff yourself.; 6/27/12, 7:03 PM
Blue@9 said...: Only a culture of overflowing abundance could give rise to such a strange view of the 'wonderful life.'

This. I'm constantly amazed at how the rich turn their backs on progress as a statement of "enlightenment."

I will admit that the tastiest thing in the world is an In-n-Out burger after backpacking in the mountains for two weeks.; 6/27/12, 7:24 PM
Methadras said...: This story doesn't add up in a ton of ways. First of all, who is this doctor and where does he come from? Secondly, why would a mother starve her child and not herself to death? How is it that this child never thought to actually go out and get something to eat at school or from a friend? Was she a prisoner in her own home and denied food? Did no one notice she was missing? Her friends, something? Something does not make sense here.; 6/27/12, 10:04 PM
Methadras said...: For the record, I can tell you with assurity that one of the best tasting things in life is a burger and a beer after a whole day of surfing. Hits ever note in the world.; 6/27/12, 10:05 PM
Michael K said...: "Ironically, today the word comes out that the Atkins approach to diets <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/story/2012-06-27/calories-low-carb-weight-loss/55843134/1" is correct. Eating protein and fat suppresses appetite much more than carbs do. The medical literature has ignored Atkins since 1972.; 6/27/12, 10:15 PM
ed said...: "Spaghetti along with the turkey is kind of odd."

Spaghetti with chili and cheddar cheese is even stranger and yet people eat that.

Which frankly amazes me and yet I'm Korean and I'm used to eating some pretty odd things.; 6/27/12, 10:39 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 6/27/12, 11:20 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: bowl of chinese corn and shrimp soup. Homemade it was GREAT! (recipe on request :-)

REQUEST! REQUEST! Seriously,that sounds delicious.

Here you go
on my blog so I won't clutter up Althouse's space

Makes 4 really large bowl servings. Not those itty bitty cups in the Chinese restaurants.; 6/27/12, 11:26 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: Geoff Matthews,

I'm sure that Crack will explain how this is applicable to Mitt Romney.

Glad to oblige:

It all comes down to the phrase "Garbage in/Garbage out." If you put bizarre shit into your head - and, especially, if you hang out with people who also put bizarre shit into theirs - you increase the odds of ending up with less-than-optimal results.

Look at (poor) John Edwards. He got into Rielle Hunter's NewAge nonsense, about revealing his true nature, and - with no threat of a Rielle Hunter government take-over - still opened up a can of whoop-ass.

This widely-held idea, that electing Mitt will unleash an easily-imagined problem, is reflective of the ignorance surrounding cultism:

We have no idea what these people will do.

As I've said many times, I expect the economy to improve once Barack is gone - not because Romney is in but because Barack is out. But what we'll face, specifically because Romney is in, is anybody's guess. I can think up lots of obvious scenarios (we become the laughing stock of the world - with no explanation for our gullibility - once his "beliefs" are known) and less-than-obvious ones (a constitutional crisis stemming from a revelation Mitt's been acting under the persuasion of the "church's many "prophets") but what, exactly, the result will be are too many to pin-point. I can tell you this, for sure, though:

Any people who elects the follower of a convicted con man - with a firm understanding of their interplanetary "beliefs" - and after knowing that candidate and his cult have plotted to sell them bogus concoctions in the past, are too stupid to avoid whatever mayhem they'll bring with them in the future.

I look forward to the show - including your many I-didn't-know excuses - when appropriate,...; 6/28/12, 6:51 AM