I found myself tuning into the Biggest Loser Australia Season 5 premiere the other week. I have to admit that this show is a guilty addiction of mine. When it first started I found it inspiring to see these overweight and obese people, make a decision to change their lives for the better. The aim of the show was to not only change the lives of the contestants but to make the public see the harsh reality of what being overweight is doing to their body and life expectancy and motivate them to change their lifestyle as well.
As an overweight person myself (although too small to be considered for the show! Go me!) I began to believe that I too could lose the weight after watching these contestants slug it out in the Biggest Loser house. If a contestant over 150 kg can get up off the couch and run a marathon then surely I can survive a few hours at the gym! I felt invincible, I felt inspired and I felt confident that I had the ability to do something about my weight.
Unfortunately over the past few years, the show no longer motivates me to change my unhealthy habits. It has now become a numbers game, where your best friend will stab you in the back to win the cash and the person who needs to be there the most gets sent home because of one bad week of results. Don’t get me wrong, I realise this is a reality show and a competition that thrives on drama and emotional conflicts, however when did reality stop being about the person and become about the number?
I was appalled after watching the weigh in to see some of the women being disappointed in their weight loss after pulling figures on average of 5 kg (11 pounds). Dieticians and even Wii fit will tell you that a healthy weekly weightloss is on average 2 kg (4.5 pounds). So keeping that in my mind, I compared it to the conditions these contestants were under in the house and figured that perhaps their weekly figure will be slightly higher due to the fact that they are solely focusing on their diet and exercise in isolation from their careers, commitments and most of their temptations So taking those factors into consideration I came up with a figure of about 4-5 kgs. Sounds pretty good to me right? Losing 2 kgs a week in the real world would make me happy, losing 5 kgs in a week would make me over the moon. I’d be so excited I’d probably celebrate with a glass of champagne (low cal of course)! But on the Biggest Loser 5 kgs is like the equivalent of a C on a Maths test. It says to you- yes you’ve passed but you could’ve done a lot better. 5 kgs is enough to get you sent to the elimination room because at Camp Biggest Loser the figure we’re aiming for it 10+ kgs (22 pounds) a week. I would love it if this was attainable while still maintaining a healthy lifestyle. If it were possible I could be in a bikini by next month! How great would that be? The cold hard truth of it is that losing that much weight in a week is dangerous, especially if it’s a repetitive cycle.
For the contestants in the house maybe it is an attainable figure. It’s easy to find time to exercise when you don’t have to make your kids lunches, or write a report or drive your kids to soccer practice. But for the viewers watching, it’s setting an unrealistic goal for us. It’s defeating us before we start because we’re not satisfied now with a 3 kg a week weight loss. We expect at least double and then criticise ourself when we don’t achieve it.
The Biggest Loser is now a reality competition with the sole purpose of putting its contestants through the ringer and creating emotional dramas that score ratings. So has the show lost it’s purpose? I believe that it has. The moment that a reality show stops sending a positive message to its audience, is the moment is loses all credibility with me!
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