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How To Lose Body Fat?

I am 15 years old, I weigh 180, and i think my height is 5′11. I want to lose body fat but what exercises do I do so that i can burn it off. I want to lose most of the fat thats on my belly and my pecks/chest. What foods should I stop eating that adds more fat to my pecks and my belly? HELP

Cardio, weight training or home training such as push ups and something like that :)

Do i have this right about about carbs and fat, im 13, please answer i just need these few things answered:!?

1)High fat diet, limiting simple carbs(sugar) and eating a moderate amount of complex carbs(starch and fiber)= better weight loss cuz it doesnt spike your insulin levels up, like simple carbs do, and thats promotes weight loss more efficiently and your body produces more pesterone(or however you spell it) from the fat which is very important for your body

2)what are pesterones?

3)And i know all about good and bad fats so i dont need any info. about that but does your body react to good fats, the same as bad fats? even though the good fats give you more health benefits, your body burns threw it the same right?

4)High carb(simple, not complex) and lower fat diet= high spike in insulin levels(from sugar carbs) which stores more fat and makes it harder for weight loss and your body doesnt produce as much pesterone which is bad

5)COMPLEX CARBS(fiber, starch): fresh veggies, fruits, peanuts, honey, anything naturally grown with the ingredients only saying "Honey" Or "Peanuts" if its in a package such as those 2 i just listed. Your body takes a while to break these things down, which makes you fuller faster and longer. Most likely will have more nutritional value.
SIMPLE CARBS(sugar): anything with refined sugars such as cereal, pastries, etc., anything not natural. Your body breaks them down easily, which makes you not very full and makes you crave more and more. Most likely to have no nutritional value.

6)GOOD FATS(monounsaturated/monosaturated)- chicken, pork chops, steak, peanuts, cheese, good oils that i think are vegetable and canola oils, milk, etc. but i look on the nutritonal labels anyways so i will find out whenever i use the food
BAD FATS(trans, saturated, unsaturated)- bad oils, pasteries, cake, sweets, etc. MOST of the time.

So basically what i got from this was that you need to eat high fat diets(mostly good fats) with a limited amount of simple carbs(sugar) and a moderate amount of complex carbs(fiber, starch).

1-2.) no clue what a pesterone could be (source?) I searched the web without luck. Could that be hormones? Your body doesn’t produce hormones from fat but hormones need fat to function correctly. Fat is required to make the vitamins & minerals in foods bioavailable so that they can be incorporated into the body structure.

3) I don’t think you understand about good & bad fats due to question 6 & it’s a complex subject, which few really understand. Bad fats are transfats. Transfats are man made chemically altered oil (hydrogenated oils) which may have started off as a good fat, til it was processed.

4) yes - high simple carb diet is bad with or without fats

5) honey is not a complex carb, it is a simple carb but raw honey is a more natural product

Simple carbs - It gets real confusing because there is the clinical definition of simple carbs as having 1-2 sugars & complex carbs having 3 or more but using that definition could make vegetables a simple carb.

Simple carbohydrates are broken down quickly by the body to be used as energy
In the context of a low carb diet, we avoid carbohydrates which raise blood glucose levels rapidly. In that context, a raw potato would be a complex carb but you bake it and you change the molecular structure to a starch which is broken down quickly by the body.

Using that context, I consider these items as simple carbs - sugar, white flour, white bread, cereal, pasta, potatoes, white rice.

6) Most foods have a combination of fats & your listing of foods with good fats are a combination
I don’t think there is such thing as monosaturated only monounsaturated found in nuts, olives, avocados
There is a controversy about canola oil - I wouldn’t highly recommend it, it’s fatty acids look good but won’t get into that here.
Saturated fats are not bad - there once was a myth (probably created by the transfat sellers) but that has been all but dismissed by current research - Half the fat in Breast milk is saturated - nature can’t be wrong. Coconut oil has the same health properties as breast milk and it’s mostly saturated fats.

Many foods are not "bad" but the processing changes the food. It is best to stick with whole foods that have minimal changes. Unrefined salt is essential for good health, refined salt is nearly toxic. Meats & eggs & dairy from animals that eat grass & can free range are far healthier than animals fed carbs. The carbs aren’t healthy for them either and it dramatically changes the fat composition. Many grains are perfectly healthy but food processors extract the starch which doesn’t include the vitamins & minerals in the end product. They "enrich" their products by adding synthetic vitamins because their product has little nutritional value.

I greatly admire your desire to understand how nutrition impacts your health. I wish I had BEFORE I lost my health.

Fat Burning Food For Your Effective Weight Loss

Nowadays more and more people are becoming concerned with their health and appearance, especially women. Some women want to lose weight at any cost. It can be.
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How to Lose Weight Fast - Weight Loss Tips - Losing Weight.

Your Wellness Guide provides variety of tips related to weight loss diets,weight loss products and advice on choosing right weight loss plan.
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100 Facts (pt. 1)?

There are more cars in Southern California than there are cows in India.

The two-foot long bird called a Kea that lives in New Zealand likes to eat the strips of rubber around car windows.

The province of Alberta, Canada is completely free of rats.

Illinois has the most personalized license plates of any state.

If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural causes.

There are two credit cards for every person in the United States.

The international telephone dialing code for Antarctica is 672.

The average chocolate bar has 8 insect legs in it.

There are 206 bones in the adult human body, but 300 in children (some of the bones fuse together as a child grows).

Fleas can jump 130 times higher than their own height. In human terms this is equal to a 6 foot person jumping 780 feet into the air.

Snakes are true carnivores as they eat nothing but other animals. They do not eat any type of plant material.

There are no poisonous snakes in Maine.

The blue whale can produce sounds up to 188 decibels. This is the loudest sound produced by a living animal and has been detected as far away as 530 miles.

The human eye blinks an average of 4,200,000 times a year.

It takes approximately 12 hours for food to entirely digest.

Erosion at the base of Niagara Falls (USA) undermines the shale cliffs and as a result, the falls have receded approximately 7 miles over the last 10,000 years.

The longest living cells in the body are brain cells which can live an entire lifetime.

The Main Library at Indiana University sinks over an inch every year because when it was built engineers failed to take into account the weight of all the books that would occupy the building.

North Dakota has never had an earthquake.

Alexander Graham Bell (who invented the telephone) also set a world water-speed record of over seventy miles an hour at the age of 72.

There is enough fuel in a full tank of a jumbo jet to drive an average car four times around the world.

Hawaii is moving toward Japan 4 inches every year.

Chimps are the only animals that can recognize themselves in a mirror.

The leg bones of a bat are so thin that no bat can walk.

There are more living organisms on the skin of a single human being than there are human beings on the surface of the earth.

Ants do not sleep.

Marilyn Monroe had six toes on one foot.

If you keep a goldfish in the dark room, it will eventually turn white.

Women blink nearly twice as much as men.

In England, the Speaker of the House is not allowed to speak.

Almonds are members of the peach family.

Maine is the only state whose name is just one syllable.

Americans on the average eat 18 acres of pizza every day.

One person in two billion will live to be 116 or older.

If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days, you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee.

February 1865 is the only month in recorded history not to have a full moon.

More people are killed by donkeys annually than are killed in plane crashes.

Lorne Greene had one of his nipples bitten off by an alligator while he was host of "Lorne Greene’s Animal Kingdom".

The dot that appears over the letter "i" is called a tittle.

All major league baseball umpires must wear black underwear while on the job (in case their pants split).

The Spanish word esposa means "wife." The plural, esposas, means "wives," but also "handcuffs."

If all Americans used one third less ice in their drinks the United States would become a net exporter instead of an importer of energy.

If the Nile River were stretched across the United States, it would run nearly from New York to Los Angeles.

San Francisco cable cars are the only National Monuments that move.

The Hoover Dam was built to last 2,000 years. Its concrete will not be fully cured for another 500 years.

Abraham Lincoln’s dog, Fido, was assassinated too.

All of David Letterman’s suits are custom made - there are no creases in his suit trousers.

Cranberry Jell-O is the only flavor that contains real fruit flavoring.

Fewer than half of the 16,200 major league baseball players have ever hit a home run.

In comic strips, the person on the left always speaks first.

Richard Versalle, a tenor performing at New York’s Metropolitan Opera House, suffered a heart attack and fell 10 feet from a ladder to the stage just after singing the line "You can only live so long."

If the entire population of earth was reduced to exactly 100 people, 51% would be female, 49% male; 50% of the world’s currency would be held by 6 people, one person would be nearly dead, one nearly born.

In 1920, Babe Ruth out-homered every American League team.

Topless saleswomen are legal in Liverpool, England, but only in tropical fish stores.

Toxic house plants poison more children than household chemicals.

The original name of Bank of America was Bank of Italy.

The ant, when intoxicated, will always fall over to its right side.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles has issued six driver’s licenses to six different people named Jesus Christ.

Michael Jordan makes more money from Nike each year than all the Nike factory workers in Malaysia combined.

People in China and Japan die disproportionately on the 4th of each month because the words death and four sound alike, and they are represented by the same symbol.

Chicago is closer to Moscow than it is to Rio de Janeiro.

Dogs have two sets of teeth, just like humans. They first have 30 "puppy" teeth, then 42 adult teeth.

In 1950, President Harry Truman threw out the first ball twice at the opening day Washington DC baseball game; once right handed and once left handed.

A Swiss ski resort announced it would combat global warming by wrapping its mountain glaciers in aluminum foil to keep them from melting.

The chameleon has a tongue that is one and a half times the length of his body.

Beethoven dipped his head in cold water before he composed.

There once was a town named "6" in West Virginia.

Ten years ago, only 500 people in China could ski. This year, an estimated 5,000,000 Chinese will visit ski resorts.

In 1920, Babe Ruth broke the single season home run record, with 29. The same year, he became the first major leaguer to hit 30 home runs. The same year, he became the first major leaguer to hit 40 home runs. The same year, he became the first major leaguer to hit 50 home runs.

A Nigerian woman was caught entering the UK with 104 kg of snails in her baggage.

Profanity is typically cut from in-flight movies to make them suitable for general audiences. Fox Searchlight Pictures has substituted "Ashcroft" for "A**hole" in the movie Sideways when dubbed for Aerolineas Argentinas flights.

Author Hunter S. Thompson, who committed suicide recently, wanted to be cremated and his ashes to be shot out of a cannon on his ranch.

Sports Illustrated magazine allows subscribers to opt out of receiving the famous swimsuit issue each year. Fewer than 1% choose this option.

There is a company that will (for $14,000) take your ashes, compress them into a synthetic diamond to be set in jewelry for a loved one.

The RIAA sued an 83 year old woman for downloading music illegally, even though a copy of her death certificate was sent to the RIAA a week before it filed the suit.

Two 1903 paintings recently sold at auction for $590,000 - the paintings were in the famous "Dogs Playing Poker" series.

Russian scientists have developed a new drug that prolongs drunkenness and enhances intoxication.

Romanian firefighters could not get their trucks close enough to a burning building, so they put out the fire by throwing snowballs at it.

A perfect SAT score is 1600 combined. Bill Gates scored 1590 on his SAT. Paul Allen, Bill’s partner in Microsoft, scored a perfect 1600. Bill Cosby scored less than 500 combined.

Motorists traveling outside Salem, Oregon saw one of the "litter cleanup" signs crediting the American Nazi party. Marion County officials had no choice but to let that group into the adopt-a-road program. The $500 per sign was picked up by Oregon taxpayers. The Ku Klux Klan is also involved in the adopt-a-road program in the state of Arkansas.

Spam filters that catch the word "cialis" will not allow many work-related e-mails through because that word is embedded inside the word "specialist".

McDonald’s restaurants will buy 54,000,000 pounds of fresh apples this year. Two years ago, McDonald’s purchased 0 pounds of apples. This is attributed to the shift to more healthy menu options (the Apple Pie, which has been at McDonald’s for years uses processed Apple Pie Filling).

The biggest dog on record was an Old English Mastiff that weighed 343 pounds. He was 8 feet, 3 inches from nose to tail.

Mailmen in Russia now carry revolvers after a recent decision by the government.

All of Queen Anne’s 17 children died before she did.

There are over 87,000 Americans on waiting lists for organ transplants.

American made parts account for only 1% of the Chrysler Crossfire. 96% of the Ford F-150 Heritage Truck is American.

A Dutch court ruled that a bank robber could deduct the 2,000 Euros he paid for his pistol from the 6,600 Euros he has to return to the bank he robbed.

Only 6% of the autographs in circulation from members of the Beatles are estimated to be real.

The time spent deleting SPAM costs United States businesses $21.6 billion annually.

60.7 percent of eligible voters participated in the 2004 presidential election, the highest percentage in 36 years. However, more than 78 million did not vote. This means President Bush won re-election by receiving votes from less than 31% of all eligible voters in the United States.

John Quincy Adams, sixth president of the United States, loved to skinny dip in the Potomac River.

La Paz, Bolivia has an average annual temperature below 50 degrees Fahrenheit. However, it has never recorded a zero-degree temperature. Same for Stanley, Falkland Islands and Punta Arenas, Chile.

41% of Chinese people eat at least once a week at a fast food restaurant. 35% of Americans do.

A Wisconsin forklift operator for a Miller beer distributor was fired when a picture was published in a newspaper showing him drinking a Bud Light.

G-rated family films earn more money than any other rating. Yet only 3% of Hollywood’s output is G-rated.

Richard Hatch, winner of the first "Survivor" reality series, has been charged with tax evasion for failing to report his $1,000,000 prize.

The entire fleet of Unicoi County Tennessee’s salt trucks was rendered out of commission in one accident. All three trucks were badly damaged when one of them began skidding down a road, causing a chain reaction accident. Officials blamed road conditions.

More people study English in China than speak it in the United States of America (300 million).

Fast food provider Hardee’s has recently introduced the Monster Thickburger. It has 1,420 calories and 107 grams of fat.
Sorry it’s so long lol. Something to do right?
And yes….PART ONE!!!!
More will come….eventually…

Thanks!! I love learning random facts to tell my friends! They always wonder how I find things like that out!!

Am I really anorexic or is my best friend just jealous and subconsciously trying to sabotage my success?

My best friend said that my body weight is too low (I just turned 15 and I’m 5′6 and 112 pounds), and then she sort of implied that I’m anorexic. Let me list what I ate today though (I keep a food journal):

Breakfast 9:05
Multigrain and all natural, flavorless oatmeal made completely with whole grains, barley, oats, etc (according to the ingredients list), one cup of soymilk, one tablespoon honey, two tablespoons flaxseed, six dried apricots, 12 almonds, and a medium sized apple.

Lunch-type meal that I made small because I had tennis right after: 12:15

Half cup of soymilk, half cup of Kashi cereal, two tangerines, three ounces shrimp, large salad with salsa

2:20 snack with comfort food and vitamin C for my perceived illness:
Enough almonds to feed a small country, four tangerines, a banana, warm milk with honey, green tea (decaf), two squares of dark chocolate (86% cacao).

And for dinner I’m having some wild Alaskan salmon, some sweet potato fries that I make with herbs and olive oil, and a huge salad, and then for dessert I might have some dates and cheese.

If I eat like this every day, and I just try to eat really healthfully and all natural, chemical-free foods, then I can’t be anorexic, correct? Anorexia is a mental illness, after all. I just am extremely mindful of how I eat, and my doctor, who I visited yesterday, and who’s my uncle, said that I’m probably the healthiest person he’s ever seen. And then my best friend is like, "lol, you think you eat alot?" and then she lists like, I had pizza and Panda Express and ice cream, and then all this disgusting unhealthy food.

Am I sounding insane when I suggest that she’s trying to get me to be less healthy, and a little fatter? It seems to me that I actually eat a lot, and I’m naturally thin and I tend to burn a lot of calories due to my exercise (I have two hours of tennis with my team five days a week, private hour lessons on Wed and Sun, and I dance an hour and a half two days a week at school, one 45 minute private on Wed, and I run and strength-train for fun when I have time.)

Your BMI is 18.1 which is somewhat underweight. Anorexia is defined as being 19% or more underweight, but is also a psychological compulsion. So you’re probably not anorexic even though you could stand to gain a few pounds. Just watch out for thinking of food as "the enemy," or striving for perfection in your physical form. That’s the path to obsessing over food and developing anorexia. Hope this helped.

Fat Burning Foods That Burn Fat Fast | slurrps

Victoria, I am so confused… I have no idea what to eat any more. With all the diet information out there right now, I don’t know what to do. I just want to.
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Going on a low carb diet? Need info. Does it work? List of appropriate foods? wat helps during this diet?

When energy is used, carbs are burned. if there aren’t many carbs, lipids (fats) are burned, and if there isn’t much fat muscle burns off (which is bad).
So, with this knowledge, i’ve decided to give it a go.

Over the summer, i lost 10 pounds with diet and excersize, and everyone saw the difference. But as school came around, i litterally had NO excersize, except almost every other tuesday for like an hour playing tennis, but eventually i quit. Because of school, stress, depression.. etc, i did NOT excersize, and my eating habits are TERRIBLE. That summer, i PUSHED myself to the ground, doing almost thirty laps of swimming every day, except friday, where i would play tennis. My diet was great too.

Yesterday, i checked my weight in a long time (guilty), and i did not gain any weight, which is surprisingly good, but i NEED to start watching, before it’s too late, or else all my hard work will go to waste.

I want to try a low carb diet, so that since i barely have time to excersize (i’ll work on that somehow), the activities i do will burn through to the fat.

So here’s what i want to know:
1 IS THERE MUCH SUCCESS WITH THIS DIET??
2 I WOULD APPRECIATE A LIST OF FOODS THAT ARE DECENT FOR THIS (IM A VEGETARIAN)
3 WHAT OTHER THINGS (FOR EXAMPLE, EXCERSIZING) HELP WEIGHT LOSS IN THIS DIET?? (THIGH FAT ESPECIALLY)
4 AND IF THERE ARE ANY OTHER MAIN POINTS THAT MAY HELP FOR GOING ON A LOW CARB DIET, PLZ FEEL FREE TO ADVISE.

Thank You!!

I’m not trying to convert anyone to being a meat eater only health conscious. Starches, sugar, fruit do not promote weight loss, they do promote weight gain. As a vegetarian you need to be vigilant to meeting your protein requirements. I have major concerns about soy products effecting thyroid health. If you could add eggs to your diet, that would solve a multitude of problems.

I would suggest you convert your diet to more of a fat based (mainly coconut oil & olive oil) diet with much more low glycemic vegetables. Stay vigilant about meeting your protein requirements but try to keep your carbs <9grams per hour. I would suggest not eating many starches that don’t significantly contribute to protein requirements. Significantly increase your consumption of nuts (peanuts are a legume not a nut - peanuts are fine, just realize the difference), flax seeds, chia seeds, spirulina.

Simple carbohydrates (sugar, flour, bread, cereal, pasta, potatoes, rice) trigger insulin which can store the calories eaten into fat. The more protein the more the fat burning hormone glucagon is released. The more carbohydrate the more the fat storage hormone insulin is released.

High insulin levels promote inflammation, weight gain, hunger & unbalance other hormones. Controlling insulin levels will balance out other hormones & allow human growth hormone (HGH) to be produced naturally so lean muscle will be gained even without exercise. Any exercise will greatly increase muscle mass with high HGH levels.

You have chosen a way of eating that needs you to know a great deal about nutrition and how the body processes foods. I wouldn’t try to dissuade you but encourage you to educate yourself fully. Weight gain is a symptom of a problem, not the problem.

I would highly suggest chia seeds - 3.5 oz is nearly 500 calories, half calories from fat (high in Omega3 fatty acids) & 16grams of COMPLETE protein for 6grams carbs & 63% DV Calcium - 95% Phosphorus - 23% Zinc - 9% Copper - 108% Manganese.

Spirulina is also a good complete vegetarian protein.

info on chia seeds
http://www.nutritiondata.com/facts/nut-a…
Source(s):
vegetarian low carbers forum
http://forum.lowcarber.org/forumdisplay.…

During the first 2 weeks, you can have several cups of salads. Jicama, cucumber, celery & radish marinated in sesame oil & hot pepper flakes with rice wine vinegar & artificial sweetener. Make a stir fry with Bok Choy, bean sprouts, bamboo shoots, celery, mushrooms, shirataki noodles.

Ground flax seed (2-3 Tbsp) 1/4 cup of water, cinnamon, artificial sweetener, mix in a raw egg - let sit 10 min to absorb liquid, put some cream cheese in the middle and nuke for 1.5 min. for hot cereal or 2 min. for more of a muffin type thing. Great low carb, high fiber treat.

After the 2 week induction, you add 5 grams of carbs per day every week and add a much greater variety of non starchy vegetables. Change your mindset - eat what you like to eat, just adapt it to low carb -
replace bread with lettuce
replace pasta with cabbage
replace rice with cauliflower
replace potatoes with brocolli
I eat all my favorite Chinese, Italian, even Mexican foods with low carb foods. Cabbage makes an excellent pasta substitute (for me) Make a lasagna with blanched cabbage leaves & thinly fried eggplant instead of noodles. Sugar free pasta sauce over fried cabbage. I add greens & flaxseed or chia seed for body. Alfredo sauce is also low carb.

I don’t cook often but I have gone into the forums for recipes (especially when I first started low carb) I was shocked that fried "rice" made with grated cauliflower tasted just like it’s name sake. Shirataki noodles are traditional in Japanese sukiyaki and low carb. I’ve heard faux mashed "taters" made with cauliflower & cream cheese can fool non low carbers. "potato" salad using cauliflower instead.

Chia seeds sound so expensive but 1# will make 10# food

Faux tapioca - 1 cup of water & add cup of chia seeds, after they have started to absorb the water, add in 4 cans of coconut milk & artificial sweetener if you like and mix it all in. Can be eaten after an hour but will be better tomorrow. Cream a pkg. of cream cheese into a can of pumpkin and add to the faux tapioca for an even more nutritious pumpkin pie pudding.

(berries are lowest glycemic) Cheesecake - strawberry ice cream (frozen berries, cream, a stick blender) avocado/mayo/cayenne dip - olives

Pumpkin soup
* 1/2 cup onion, minced
* 1 garlic clove, minced
* 1 tablespoon italian seasoning
* 1-2 cup fresh mushrooms, chopped
* 1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin
* 4 cups chicken broth
* 1/2 cup heavy cream
* 1/2 cup water

Directions
1.add onion, garlic, Italian seasoning and mushrooms and sauté until done.
2. Add pumpkin to this mixture and mix well.
3.Then stir in the broth and mix well.
4. Simmer 20-30 minutes.
5. Stir in the heavy cream and water and simmer on low another 10-15 minute Taste and add salt& pepper as needed.

What Makes AMERICA so GREAT????

This is not my own work….but this article is written so well that all I can do is pass it on to the rest of you…Although there are many great things about America, that were left out of this article…..its still a fantastic piece of literature
GOD BLESS AMERICA…….AND ALL THAT STAND WITH HER!

10 things to celebrate - Why I’m an anti-anti-American
By Dinesh D’Souza
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?
f=/c/a/2003/06/29/IN290713.DTL

America is under attack as never before — not only from terrorists but also from people who provide a justification for terrorism. Islamic fundamentalists declare America the Great Satan. Europeans rail against American capitalism and American culture. South American activists denounce the United States for "neocolonialism" and oppression.

Anti-Americanism from abroad would not be such a problem if Americans were united in standing up for their own country. But in this country itself, there are those who blame America for most of the evils in the world. On the political left, many fault the United States for a history of slavery, and for continuing inequality and racism. Even on the right, traditionally the home of patriotism, we hear influential figures say that America has become so decadent that we are "slouching towards Gomorrah."

If these critics are right, then America should be destroyed. And who can dispute some of their particulars? This country did have a history of slavery and racism continues to exist. There is much in our culture that is vulgar and decadent. But the critics are wrong about America, because they are missing the big picture. In their indignation over the sins of America, they ignore what is unique and good about American civilization.

As an immigrant who has chosen to become an American citizen, I feel especially qualified to say what is special about America. Having grown up in a different society — in my case, Bombay, India — I am not only able to identify aspects of America that are invisible to the natives, but I am acutely conscious of the daily blessings that I enjoy in America. Here, then, is my list of the 10 great things about America.

– America provides an amazingly good life for the ordinary guy. Rich people live well everywhere. But what distinguishes America is that it provides an impressively high standard of living for the "common man." We now live in a country where construction workers regularly pay $4 for a nonfat latte, where maids drive nice cars and where plumbers take their families on vacation to Europe.

Indeed, newcomers to the United States are struck by the amenities enjoyed by "poor" people. This fact was dramatized in the 1980s when CBS television broadcast a documentary, "People Like Us," intended to show the miseries of the poor during an ongoing recession. The Soviet Union also broadcast the documentary, with a view to embarrassing the Reagan administration. But by the testimony of former Soviet leaders, it had the opposite effect. Ordinary people across the Soviet Union saw that the poorest Americans have TV sets, microwave ovens and cars. They arrived at the same perception that I witnessed in an acquaintance of mine from Bombay who has been unsuccessfully trying to move to the United States. I asked him, "Why are you so eager to come to America?" He replied, "I really want to live in a country where the poor people are fat."

– America offers more opportunity and social mobility than any other country, including the countries of Europe. America is the only country that has created a population of "self-made tycoons." Only in America could Pierre Omidyar, whose parents are Iranian and who grew up in Paris, have started a company like eBay. Only in America could Vinod Khosla, the son of an Indian army officer, become a leading venture capitalist, the shaper of the technology industry, and a billionaire to boot. Admittedly tycoons are not typical, but no country has created a better ladder than America for people to ascend from modest circumstances to success.

– Work and trade are respectable in America. Historically most cultures have despised the merchant and the laborer, regarding the former as vile and corrupt and the latter as degraded and vulgar. Some cultures, such as that of ancient Greece and medieval Islam, even held that it is better to acquire things through plunder than through trade or contract labor. But the American founders altered this moral hierarchy. They established a society in which the life of the businessman, and of the people who worked for him, would be a noble calling. In the American view, there is nothing vile or degraded about serving your customers either as a CEO or as a waiter. The ordinary life of production and supporting a family is more highly valued in the United States than in any other country. America is the only country in the world where we call the waiter "sir," as if he were a knight.

– America has achieved greater social equality than any other society. True, there are large inequalities of income and wealth in America. In purely economic terms, Europe is more egalitarian. But Americans are socially more equal than any other people, and this is unaffected by economic disparities. Alexis de Tocqueville noticed this egalitarianism a century and a half ago and it is, if anything, more prevalent today. For all his riches, Bill Gates could not approach the typical American and say, "Here’s a $100 bill. I’ll give it to you if you kiss my feet." Most likely, the person would tell Gates to go to hell! The American view is that the rich guy may have more money, but he isn’t in any fundamental sense better than anyone else.

– People live longer, fuller lives in America. Although protesters rail against the American version of technological capitalism at trade meetings around the world, in reality the American system has given citizens many more years of life, and the means to live more intensely and actively. In 1900, the life expectancy in America was around 50 years; today, it is more than 75 years. Advances in medicine and agriculture are mainly responsible for the change. This extension of the life span means more years to enjoy life, more free time to devote to a good cause, and more occasions to do things with the grandchildren. In many countries, people who are old seem to have nothing to do: they just wait to die. In America the old are incredibly vigorous, and people in their seventies pursue the pleasures of life, including remarriage and sexual gratification, with a zeal that I find unnerving.

– In America the destiny of the young is not given to them, but created by them. Not long ago, I asked myself, "What would my life have been like if I had never come to the United States?" If I had remained in India, I would probably have lived my whole life within a five-mile radius of where I was born. I would undoubtedly have married a woman of my identical religious and socioeconomic background. I would almost certainly have become a medical doctor, or an engineer, or a computer programmer. I would have socialized entirely within my ethic community. I would have a whole set of opinions that could be predicted in advance; indeed, they would not be very different from what my father believed, or his father before him. In sum, my destiny would to a large degree have been given to me.

In America, I have seen my life take a radically different course. In college I became interested in literature and politics, and I resolved to make a career as a writer. I married a woman whose ancestry is English, French, Scotch-Irish, German and American Indian. In my twenties I found myself working as a policy analyst in the White House, even though I was not an American citizen. No other country, I am sure, would have permitted a foreigner to work in its inner citadel of government.

In most countries in the world, your fate and your identity are handed to you; in America, you determine them for yourself. America is a country where you get to write the script of your own life. Your life is like a blank sheet of paper, and you are the artist. This notion of being the architect of your own destiny is the incredibly powerful idea that is behind the worldwide appeal of America. Young people especially find irresistible the prospect of authoring the narrative of their own lives.

– America has gone further than any other society in establishing equality of rights. There is nothing distinctively American about slavery or bigotry. Slavery has existed in virtually every culture, and xenophobia, prejudice and discrimination are worldwide phenomena. Western civilization is the only civilization to mount a principled campaign against slavery; no country expended more treasure and blood to get rid of slavery than the United States. While racism remains a problem, this country has made strenuous efforts to eradicate discrimination, even to the extent of enacting policies that give legal preference in university admissions, jobs, and government contracts to members of minority groups. Such policies remain controversial, but the point is that it is extremely unlikely that a racist society would have permitted such policies in the first place. And surely African Americans like Jesse Jackson are vastly better off living in America than they would be if they were to live in, say, Ethiopia or Somalia.

– America has found a solution to the problem of religious and ethnic conflict that continues to divide and terrorize much of the world. Visitors to places like New York are amazed to see the way in which Serbs and Croatians, Sikhs and Hindus, Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants, Jews and Palestinians,

all seem to work and live together in harmony. How is this possible when these same groups are spearing each other and burning each other’s homes in so many places in the world?

The American answer is twofold. First, separate the spheres of religion and government so that no religion is given official preference but all are free to practice their faith as they wish. Second, do not extend rights to racial or ethnic groups but only to individuals; in this way, all are equal in the eyes of the law, opportunity is open to anyone who can take advantage of it, and everybody who embraces the American way of life can "become American."

Of course there are exceptions to these core principles, even in America. Racial preferences are one such exception, which explains why they are controversial. But in general, America is the only country in the world that extends full membership to outsiders. The typical American could come to India,

live for 40 years, and take Indian citizenship. But he could not "become Indian." He wouldn’t see himself that way, nor would most Indians see him that way. In America, by contrast, hundreds of millions have come from far-flung shores and over time they, or at least their children, have in a profound and full sense "become American."

– America has the kindest, gentlest foreign policy of any great power in world history. Critics of the United States are likely to react to this truth with sputtering outrage. They will point to long-standing American support for a Latin or Middle Eastern despot, or the unjust internment of the Japanese during World War II, or America’s reluctance to impose sanctions on South Africa’s apartheid regime. However one feels about these particular cases, let us concede to the critics the point that America is not always in the right.

What the critics leave out is the other side of the ledger. Twice in the 20th century, the United States saved the world — first from the Nazi threat, then from Soviet totalitarianism. What would have been the world’s fate if America had not existed? After destroying Germany and Japan in World War II, the United States proceeded to rebuild both countries, and today they are American allies. Now we are doing the same thing in Afghanistan and Iraq. Consider, too, how magnanimous the United States has been to the former Soviet Union after its victory in the Cold War. For the most part America is an abstaining superpower; it shows no real interest in conquering and subjugating the rest of the world. (Imagine how the Soviets would have acted if they had won the Cold War.) On occasion the United States intervenes to overthrow a tyrannical regime or to halt massive human rights abuses in another country, but it never stays to rule that country. In Grenada, Haiti and Bosnia, the United States got in and then it got out. Moreover, when America does get into a war, as in Iraq, its troops are supremely careful to avoid targeting civilians and to minimize collateral damage. Even as America bombed the Taliban infrastructure and hideouts, U.S. planes dropped food to avert hardship and starvation of Afghan civilians. What other country does these things?

– America, the freest nation on Earth, is also the most virtuous nation on Earth. This point seems counterintuitive, given the amount of conspicuous vulgarity, vice and immorality in America. Some Islamic fundamentalists argue that their regimes are morally superior to the United States because they seek to foster virtue among the citizens. Virtue, these fundamentalists argue, is a higher principle than liberty.

Indeed it is. And let us admit that in a free society, freedom will frequently be used badly. Freedom, by definition, includes the freedom to do good or evil, to act nobly or basely. But if freedom brings out the worst in people, it also brings out the best. The millions of Americans who live decent,

praiseworthy lives desire our highest admiration because they have opted for the good when the good is not the only available option. Even amid the temptations of a rich and free society, they have remained on the straight path. Their virtue has special luster because it is freely chosen.

By contrast, the societies that many Islamic fundamentalists seek would eliminate the possibility of virtue. If the supply of virtue is insufficient in a free society like America, it is almost nonexistent in an unfree society like Iran’s. The reason is that coerced virtues are not virtues at all. Consider the woman who is required to wear a veil. There is no modesty in this,

because she is being compelled. Compulsion cannot produce virtue, it can only produce the outward semblance of virtue. Thus a free society like America’s is not merely more prosperous, more varied, more peaceful, and more tolerant — it is also morally superior to the theocratic and authoritarian regimes that America’s enemies advocate.

"To make us love our country," Edmund Burke once said, "our country ought to be lovely." Burke’s point is that we should love our country not just because it is ours, but also because it is good. America is far from perfect, and there is lots of room for improvement. In spite of its flaws, however, American life as it is lived today is the best life that our world has to offer. Ultimately America is worthy of our love and sacrifice because, more than any other society, it makes possible the good life, and the life that is good.

Dinesh D’Souza’s "What’s So Great About America" has just been published in paperback by Penguin Books. He is the Rishwain Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. E-mail: thedsouzas@aol.com.

wow…give me a minute.

a quick browse trough it seems to show me that youre basically trying to make america look like some shining example of perfection. the reality of the matter is is that ots not.

the few things i did read seem to be the exact pola opposite of what america actually is. if america needs a brocure them im sure they can ask you (or whoever wrote this) to chime in.

the america you portray and the america that is are two different things. i think you simply refuse to beleive that america is bad so youve either come up with or subscribed to someone elses claims

at this point im willing to come to the conclusion that youre also a born again christian. if im correct about that then im correct about the post (the question you posted)

welcome to reality. america is not a shining example OR a shining beacon. it is a good country tough…but horridly corrupt and poorly run. america CAN become a nation like you posted…but it isnt anywhere near that.

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