High School Science Teacher Gets All Snobby With Me Over Low-Carb Support Columns

Because I have put my blog out there as an authoritative voice regarding the low-carb lifestyle, I often receive e-mails from students who are enrolled in a class of some sort and they decide to do a project about livin' la vida low-carb. I think that's pretty awesome considering all the negativity regarding this way of eating nowadays. Maybe we'll change a few minds along the way.

From research on fad diets (I bear with these people describing low-carb this way) to the rise and fall of marketing trends, I've talked with hundreds of students and teachers alike about my opinions regarding low-carb. It's something I enjoy doing and I'm always happy to help further the education of anyone with ears to hear.

A few days ago, I received another one of these e-mail requests from a high school science teacher working on a project about low-carb diets. Sweet! What he wanted from me was source articles that would be unbiased PRO-low-carb. He ideally wished for government sources, but that's a BIG FAT NO-GO!

Here's what he originally wrote to me in his e-mail:

Dear Jimmy,

I'm a high school science teacher and am trying to do a lesson plan on low carbohydrate diets, which involves the students reading 3 web pages for and 3 against, taking a side and arguing an exposition.

I was wondering if you could point me to what you think would be the 3 best web articles on low carb diets I could use. I'm looking for sites that are reliable, as non-biased as possible, well-cited and are written by an expert, ideally by a government health authority. Thanks!

Thinking he'd appreciate a wide range of sources to choose from, I responded with the following e-mail telling this high school science teacher about the best and brightest in the world of low-carb research.

This was my response:

THANKS so much for writing and best wishes on your assignment.

You're not gonna find a government health authority supporting low-carb...virtually all of them say that low-carb diets are only good for short-term weight loss, but not recommended for long-term.

But there are plenty of researchers who are finding otherwise:

Dr. Jeff Volek at the University of Connecticut
Dr. Eric Westman at Duke University
Dr. Richard Feinman at SUNY Downstate
Dr. Mary Vernon at the University of Kansas
Dr. Stephen Phinney at UC-Davis
Dr. Jay Wortman in Canada

There are many others, but these are the best of the best. As for web sites, you may want to check out the following:

Regina Wilshire's "Weight of the Evidence" blog
The official Atkins web site
Laura Dolson's About Low-Carb Diets web site

I realize my opinions about low-carb do not qualify for what you are looking to do with this assignment, but I wish you well in finding resources that are unbiased from either side. Let me know if I can assist you further.

Thinking that would be PLENTY of information to help him find what he was looking for the assignment, imagine my surprise when I received a response from him the next day stating my sources weren't good enough for him.

Hi Jimmy,

Thanks for your reply, but those websites are fairly broad--I am looking for specific articles. I can only expect my students to read 3 pages on each side, not look through entire websites.

These are the three I have found for the 'no' argument:

QuackWatch page on low-carb by Dr. Stephen Barrett

Australia's Better Health Channel column on "Weight Loss And Carbohydrates"

The Australian Heart Foundation's response to very low-carb diets (PDF file)

They are single articles that can be read in about 10 minutes--that's pretty much what I am after. Would you happen to know of anything similar I can use for the 'yes' argument?

Alrighty then, I didn't know I was gonna have to do this teacher's job for him. I gave him the names and web sites where he could find what he needed, but I guess he wanted me to do all the footwork to rebut the vegetarian supporter and two Australian government resources against livin' la vida low-carb (if he wanted to find that, he might as well have gone to the FDA, USDA, ADA, AHA, or any other American health organization for the opposition!

Okay, fine. I have three PERFECT pages for his students to read about the positive aspects of the low-carb diet which are "well-cited" and written by low-carb experts. See if you agree.

THANKS again! I was simply giving you points of reference in my previous e-mail. But, sure, I have specific articles for your students to check out:

Kent Rieski's fantastic "Top Ten Nutritional Myths, Distortions and Lies That Will Destroy Your Health"

Anthony Colpo's classic "Why the Low-Fat Diet is Stupid and Potentially Dangerous"

The Stanford A to Z Study published in JAMA earlier this year showing Atkins ranked best for weight loss and improved health among all diets

These three should be more than enough to counter the three you have chosen. THANKS!

Thinking I had done my due diligence going well above and beyond the call of duty to provide this teacher with ample ammunition for his young skulls full of mush to absorb, you're never gonna believe what happened next.

He wrote me back again! It seems he wasn't very impressed by my suggestions for supportive low-carb diet web pages.

Here's the snobby response he gave me about the pro-low-carb sites:

The first page is way too long to expect my students to read and is almost kind of obviously corny (nutritional program performing healing miracles is not something even high school kids would take seriously and will give the 'no' side an unfair advantage).

The second page seems to be more about low-fat diets than anything else.

And the third link is just about one study--not an article about low carbohydrate diets.

Thanks anyway, I'll keep trying.

Oooooooookay. So he didn't like MY suggestions and he obviously didn't read Colpo's brilliant column because it is NOT at all in favor of low-fat diets. It makes the low-carb argument succinctly and with all the proof to back it up.

Since I OBVIOUSLY don't have a clue what he's looking for, I thought I'd open up the floor to my highly-intelligent readers to come up with the ultimate pro-low-carb information pages on the Internet for this hard-to-please high school science teacher.

I'm assuming these are his very specific parameters:

1. Must be supportive of low-carb diets without biased opinions.
2. Must be pithy and readable within 10 minutes.
3. Must be supported by numerous respected sources.

Do you think you know any good web sites for him that meet these requirements? If so, then please share them in the comments section below. I'd love to give him MORE than three just in case he gets all ornery on me again thinking some of them aren't good enough. THANKS for your feedback!

Contacted By The Man Who Inspired My Weight Loss With His Low-Carb Success

For those of you who bought a copy of my autobiographical book about my low-carb weight loss experience called Livin' La Vida Low-Carb: My Journey from Flabby Fat to Sensationally Skinny In One Year, you may recall the name Keith Jackson from Chapter 5 on motivation.

Here's what I wrote about Keith on page 67 of my book:

"Keith and I were in the same high school class at Bolivar Central High School in Bolivar, TN in the late 1980s. Like me, Keith was overweight when he was in high school. But I could not believe my eyes at my 10-year high school class reunion in 1999 when somebody told me that skinny man with the goatee I inquired about was none other than Keith Jackson himself. I remember staring at him for what seemed like an eternity completely mesmerized by his incredibly radical change in appearance. This former chubby classmate of mine had dropped a considerable amount of his weight and restored his health by implementing a low-carb program. Although I was still skeptical of the low-carb lifestyle at the time, I never forgot the dramatic change in Keith's physical appearance."

I never got a chance to personally thank Keith for the impact he made on my life, but I was hoping to do so at my 20-year high school class reunion in 2009. But, as fate would have it, I didn't have to wait that long because Keith himself found my blog on Monday and stumbled upon this blog post where I had written about his influence on my life.

Quoting from that post, here's what I said about Keith Jackson:

"I have another one of my high school classmates to thank for being an inspiration to me to begin livin' la vida low-carb and he may not even realize it...My fellow classmate Keith Jackson showed up at a social we had at the high school on the Friday night before our reunion and everyone looked at him with their jaws on the floor. Keith Jackson, who had been a rather hefty young man, was...well, SKINNY! He was merely a shadow of his former self and certainly amazed most of us who knew him when he was 'bigger.' When he said he did it on the Atkins diet, I was skeptical about the method he chose. As you know, I chose to go on a low-fat diet that year and did well on it, but couldn't keep the weight off. The image of Keith Jackson was indelibly burned into my memory and he was one of my personal inspirations to start my Atkins diet on January 1, 2004. I hope to have the opportunity to shake Keith's hand at our upcoming reunion to THANK him for helping me change my life. And he probably has no idea he did anything!"

After reading what I had written, Keith was moved to e-mail me back:

Jimmy,

Congratulations on your weight loss!!!!! Words cannot express the emotions I had when I read your blog. You were right I had NO idea that I had been an "inspiration" to anyone about anything, and still would not have known had I not by some fluke Googled my own name.

I really think that saying I was "hefty" was very kind of you. As I recall I was just downright FAT! LOL! Having that in my history, I am always proud when someone loses weight whether it is great or small.

I applaud you for what you are doing to help so many people with a problem that without help is not easily solved. Up to this point in my life, I could have only hoped that I would have had an impact on someone's life for the better. Now after reading your blog I feel that if I do nothing else in my life I have accomplished this goal.

Needless to say, I will definitely go get your book. That is the least I can do for someone that is going to make me famous. LOL!

I wish you the best of luck. Keep in touch!

Keith Jackson

That's the power of a life that's been changed. If you have been positively impacted by my nearly 200-pound low-carb weight loss success story, then you have Keith Jackson in part to thank for that. Don't ever underestimate how even a brief encounter with someone in your life who needs to lose weight can result in the motivation and inspiration for them to really do it.

That 15 or so minutes when I saw Keith in 1999 changed my life forever. It wasn't instantaneous, but the seed was planted and came to fruition in 2004 when I DID IT! And I'll never be the same again. THANK YOU Keith!

He sent me a follow-up e-mail about another one of our "big" classmates who had also lost a lot of weight on low-carb and now runs 10 miles several times a week and competes in marathons. Think of the biggest kid in your high school class being able to run marathons and that's how amazing this story is. The neat thing is that guy is an honestly "good" person who always tried to make people laugh. I'm so thrilled to hear he has improved his weight and health so much by livin' la vida low-carb!

I called Keith on the telephone and spoke with him about 30 minutes on Monday night. I told him that I would love to feature his weight loss story on my blog if he would be willing. He seemed interested in doing that, so stay tuned. I asked if he had any contact information on the other classmate who lost weight on low-carb and Keith said he would try to get that for me so possibly I could post his success story as well.

The Internet and blogging has made this a small world, hasn't it? I'm grateful in this week of Thanksgiving that my high school friend Keith Jackson was able to know just how much he changed my life for the better. That's something I will never, ever be able to adequately repay him except by continuing to share with others what livin' la vida low-carb has done for me. You bet your sweet bippy I'll keep doing that! :)