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The story
In a Toyo Keizai Online article, a 35-year-old, 58kg reporter’s project to recreate “the diet of a middle-aged single man” for one week became a hot topic on 5channel’s News Express+ board. The article’s premise cites a Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare survey showing that 34.0% of men in their 20s to 60s are obese, while only 23.4% of men in their 30s and 40s have regular exercise habits. The thread split widely — from the practical argument that “cooking for yourself doesn’t even suit living alone,” to personal accounts that “past 40, you gain or lose weight no matter what you do,” to criticism that the article’s headline phrasing “the reason why…” is typical of a “made-up filler piece” that never actually reveals its reasoning.
Is your waistline doing okay?
According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s “Overview of the FY2024 National Health and Nutrition Survey Results,” 34.0% of men in their 20s to 60s are obese (BMI of 25 or higher). The proportion with regular exercise habits was 23.4% for men in their 30s, 23.4% for men in their 40s, and 30.4% for men in their 50s.
An unbalanced diet, lack of exercise… full-time salaried employees live in an environment where it’s easy to gain weight. At the same time, obesity sharply raises the risk of serious, life-threatening illnesses and severely lowers healthy life expectancy and quality of life.
Source: topics.smt.docomo.ne.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
I'm starting to think there are more benefits to NOT cooking when you live alone.
Cooking for one is inefficient, both in terms of ingredients and time. Unless you're dirt poor and doing extreme poverty-meal cooking, that is.
Even if you put in the effort to cook,
you finish eating it in no time anyway.
You should at least cook your own rice, and buy some side dishes to go with it.
And if you use a dishwasher it's not that much hassle — plus your food costs drop to less than half.
I lost 20kg after turning 50. Don't talk like you know it all, you young whippersnapper.
After I finished raising my kids in my 40s, I got into road cycling and started entering races — went from 84kg down to 60kg now.
Also, I work in consulting and several doctor clients kept telling me over and over to cut back on convenience store food, so I don't eat it.
I'm over 60 now but still have a full head of hair, and if I go to a hostess club I can pass for late 40s.
Exactly, right?
The reason isn't actually written anywhere in the article.
It was probably written using AI-generated suggestions.
That's it exactly!
Glad someone said it.
There are a lot of these.
Gross articles that jump to conclusions right in the headline!
Because they've already decided the conclusion at the headline stage,
there's no real 'reason' behind it.
It's a scam.
but if you do nothing you just stay fat.
There's no winning.
Go bald completely first, then start dieting.
When washing your hair:
– With lukewarm water (a temperature that feels slightly underwhelming when poured on your body), thoroughly wash your scalp with your fingertips for about 2 minutes
– Apply shampoo with the feeling of putting it on your scalp, not your hair
– Rinse it out thoroughly — rinse until it feels excessive
– Apply rinse/conditioner to your hair, not your scalp
– Rinse that out thoroughly too
Do this and it changes things
This is a hair-washing method I heard from a hairdresser
My thinning spot on top grew back to the point where you can't even tell by touch anymore
● Exercise for the week
★ Here's a complete record of every workout I did.
– Total steps: 85,973 steps ・Sit-ups, back extensions, and push-ups: 200-300 reps each
– Pull-ups: 100+ reps ・Running: 3 times (14km total)
– Cycling: 3 times (42km total)
If you're calling it an experiment, do it with an average person's step count and exercise volume!
Normal people can't spare that much time for exercise.
Unless you're unemployed, a NEET, homeless, or a dropout from life, that is.
Sounds like your knee cartilage would wear right down.
Now, age 72
Your hair texture changed.
At least cook your own rice and pair it with "nakashoku" (store-bought prepared food eaten at home).
Using up your ingredients efficiently is like playing Tetris or Puyo Puyo.
Figuring out the combo and having it click perfectly feels great.
Sounds like you'd end up unable to stand on your own two feet.
When you're low on energy, refuel with an energy drink.
Re: #141
Too much protein wrecks your organs, so don't.
That's just the reporter from Re: #1 — they had it prepared in advance, that's all.
Oh, it was just a thread about someone's personal belongings, huh.
…?
That's just pulling photos from the article in Re: #1.
You don't actually think those are the reporter's personal meal photos, do you?
I doubt anyone's that dumb, but still.
I hadn't bothered opening it each time.
When you exercise you get super hungry and end up eating even more.
Unless you restrict your diet, you will never lose weight.
"Building muscle through strength training raises your basal metabolic rate and makes you lose weight or gain weight less easily" is also a huge lie.
In reality, the calories burned by muscle's basal metabolism are negligible and don't have much effect on body weight.
I think controlling your blood sugar is the most important thing.
Eating smaller portions more frequently makes you feel less hungry.
It's less about "exercising to lose weight" —
I just work out hard as a hobby all the time,
so even though I eat more than the average person and drink like a fish,
without paying any attention to it at all,
I still have the same athletic build I had back in my student days.
Just laying out side dishes bought from the supermarket isn't "cooking for yourself" lol
Just from that passage,
aside from the half-price side dishes and canned mackerel,
you can't actually tell whether the rest
is homemade or store-bought.
There's a chance the stir-fried meat and vegetables is the only actual home cooking.
That's literally my life story lol
It's like you're constantly walking around carrying a giant commercial-sized oven range lol
Background and Key Points of Debate
The Toyo Keizai Online survey behind the article cites the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s “FY2024 National Health and Nutrition Survey,” which found that 34.0% of men in their 20s to 60s are obese (BMI 25 or higher), with 23.4% of men in their 30s and 40s and 30.4% of men in their 50s having regular exercise habits. The thread mainly split over whether cooking for yourself is actually worth it — arguments against it centered on time, food costs, and food waste, while a middle-ground view held that at least cooking your own rice is worthwhile. Another major point of interest was the backlash against the headline’s vague “the reason why…” phrasing, with many commenters criticizing it as a “made-up filler piece” that never actually states its reasoning in the body text. Note that the specific weight figures and numerical changes from the original experiment don’t appear in the thread’s quoted excerpts, so readers wanting details of the actual results should check the source article.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (News Express+) thread ““Banning Home Cooking for a Week” “Will My Weight Change?”… 35-Year-Old, 58kg Man Recreates “The Diet of a Middle-Aged Bachelor” → The Reason His Mind and Body Were Left Stunned.”
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