Ok, so every time this comes, every goes "calories in, calories out, nothing more!" Then pats themselves on the back for being "so much smarter than everyone else."
Ok, so on a hyper literal level, you could eat only tial crap, in very small doses, and lose weight. On a hyper literal mevel, you could only eat fruits and vegetables in large quantities, and gain weight.
However, to assume the numeric digit of weight is ALL THERE IS TO IT is moronic. If that's "all there was to it," everyone in the world would be in perfect health, because it "would be easy" and l, contrary to what some people on this site think, MOST people, including fat people, don't want to be fat or unhealthy. Reddit gets so bogged down on the razor thin minority of fat people who claim they are healthy that they claim utter nonsense and assume "anyone who doesn't see how easy and simple nutrition is just isn't as smart as me!"
So first of all, there are a LOT of unhealthy thin people. Correct calories each day =/= healthy. If you get the correct caloriez, but from junk food, you're going to be at crazy high risk for diabetes, various vitamin deficincies, liver/kidney/heart and a myriad of other diseases depending on what you eat. How much you can lift at the gym, while often corilated, is NOT a defining characteristic of your overall health.
Next, most junk food is SUBSTANTIALLY more addictive than most healthy foods. Now I'm sure Captain Pedantic can't wait to come out and say "but some people legitimately prefer broccoli to candy!" And I'm sure there are people like that, but not the majority, and if you claim that, you're delusional. A big problem with places like mcdonalds is that people get addicted to it, and they're VERY good at getting kids hooked at a young age, using almost identical tactics that cigarette companies used to get kids hooked before it became illegal.
Next, blaming fat people for being fat is like blaming homeless people for being homeless. Yeah, more often than not they had a hand in their own demise, but often they also had external forces pushing them in that direction too. It is a HUGE problem, especially in the US but in many countries that we have government publications coming out with manipulated data telling us that it's ok to have diets high in sugar/complex carbs. It is a HUGE problem that we have a culture that treats fat people the same as drug addicts, the homeless, and the poor (who we also treat incorrectly) and harass them with victim blaming instead of actually trying to do something to help.
Also, different calorie amounts will fill you up depending on the food. A filling portion of broccoli can be 40-80 calories. How many bites of a mcdonalds burger are 40-80 calories? It's not even close to an entire burger. You could eat a delicious, filling meal of veggies for 100-300 calories and feel satisfied. A quarter pounder is over 400 calories, not including fries or a soda. Is this guy seriously saying the answer is to go eat less than 1 burger, with no fries or drink, and that is a LOGICSL option instead of juSt eating better food from the start? What the hell message is he even trying to send to these kids? "Eat only candy if you want, as long as you count calories you won't get fat! And maybe you won't even get diabetes if the dice come up in your favor!"
The point of this documentary wasn't to disprove that "calories don't count." It never claimed that because it isn't true and that wasn't up for debate. Hiwever, when this movie came out, the cultural norm in A LOT of the US was to eat way to much, and way too much fast food. Eating small meals at McDonald's wasn't the point, because that's not what most people were doing. He only supersized his order when prompted to do so, to prove that employees were literally being trained to push customers into eating even more than too much food.
And it worked. A LOT of people changed their habits because of this film, and I'm one of them. I started the long journey to losing over 150 lbs. And it started with this film. So to the guy in this TIL and all the people with ZERO expertise in nutrition who are saying "hurry durr, it's only about calories and self control," fuck you. It is NOT that simple, and pretending it is is enabling to the horribly undereducated culture we live in.