All Meat Paleo Carnivore Diets Are Going Mainstream Big Time !

[Blossom]

I’ll just state that whole civilizations thrived off of wheat, and that people try to find a single scapegoat for a much more complex problem.

Before glyphosate. I suspect that’s a big part of our current problem with wheat and other grains.

 

[TeaRex14]

Soaked & sprouted ancient grains, and naturally fermented sourdough breads, are examples of relatively "safe starches". Refined white flour, from a Peat perspective, is perhaps even slightly better because whole grains do have a small amount of PUFA in them. I personally believe the PUFA content is negligible, nevertheless it is present. Refined flour is devoid of nutrition unless fortified, but if it's not the center of your diet it probably doesn't matter. I can't eat oysters anymore without breading them and frying them, so tasty. White flour really helps in a scenario like this too, because white flour lacks the phytates in whole grains so all those nutrients in the oysters are absorbed.

 

[Kartoffel]

beneficial aspects of wheat consumption

There are no beneficial aspects of wheat consumption. None. Very healthy and robust people can tolerate it more or less, but it is not beneficial in any way. As Ray said: Wheat isn't made for human consumption.

 

[ecstatichamster]

Dr. Peat says gluten is harmful over time. Good thyroid function can let us tolerate it.

 

[Runenight201]

There are no beneficial aspects of wheat consumption. None. Very healthy and robust people can tolerate it more or less, but it is not beneficial in any way. As Ray said: Wheat isn't made for human consumption.

I really dislike when people make claims saying that there is nothing beneficial about things, which is an inaccurate thing to say. Everything has a pro and con, even dangerous substances like heroin or methamphetamine, and one could make an argument that the heroin is beneficial for pain relief and methamphetamine is beneficial for extended periods of intense concentration.

Wheat consumption provides energy, as well as miniscule amounts of vitamins/minerals. These are beneficial. It's better to eat wheat than starve, and in my opinion, so long as wheat isn't the sole food consumed, it can be used in a net beneficial manner, in that it provides energy and a change of pace from eating the same foods all the time.

In my anecdotal experience, a wheat free diet would degenerate me, as there are distinct times when I can feel the craving for toast and pasta, and if I were to substitute rice or potatoes for that call for energy, I would not be operating at an as optimal level as had I consumed wheat.

 

[JustAGuy]

I have recently come to the conclusion that I should eat what my body tells me to eat.

Being intimately in tune with your body is the key.

Sometime I go two days straight eating only watery fruit, because I feel thirsty as hell.

Sometimes my meals are comprised of 400g of red meat and green veggies, no carbs, because I don't feel like it.

Sometimes my meal will be only 2 sweet potatoes, because I am not that hungry and I am craving the potatoes.

I think it's a fallacy to try and stick to a diet, and to religiously include carbs, proteins and fats at each meal.

Hell if you want your dinner to be 100 grams of butter and nothing else, go for it.

This is true due to the fact that you are currently in a homeostasis with such an eating pattern.

In my experience when I ate only fruit for a while eventually I only wanted fruit when hungry and nothing else, because my body was in such a homeostasis and adjusted.

Currently I am eating a lot of meat and start craving meat regularly when previously I really disliked meat.

When I am back home next month I will experiment with a carnivore/dairy~ish diet. I have met people who are extremely robust eating only such foods (mongolians) for their whole life.

 

[InChristAlone]

Wheat is a good source of selenium depending on where it came from and also betaine. That's not even whole wheat. I only eat refined.

 

[RisingSun]

This is true due to the fact that you are currently in a homeostasis with such an eating pattern.

In my experience when I ate only fruit for a while eventually I only wanted fruit when hungry and nothing else, because my body was in such a homeostasis and adjusted.

Currently I am eating a lot of meat and start craving meat regularly when previously I really disliked meat.

When I am back home next month I will experiment with a carnivore/dairy~ish diet. I have met people who are extremely robust eating only such foods (mongolians) for their whole life.

That’s weird.

I tend to crave red meat when it’s a long time I haven’t had it, not when I eat it regularly.

Same for everything

 

[ecstatichamster]

I do eat some wheat. I enjoy butter cookies. I enjoy a piece of baguette now and then. I don't find a problem with it if I keep the quantity low and infrequent.

When I used to make bread, I got very involved. Yeast bread, then sourdough, then grinding my own flour.

The bread that was made from whole grain flour, was VERY fattening. Crazy how you could eat a few pieces and gain weight just like that.

 

[Dennis]

I've been carnivore ( red meat + eggs) for about 6 years now. I've been aware of Ray Peat's views for even longer I think.
I'll be happy to answer questions. I have tried common foods on multiple occasions to account for variations in ways that the foods are produced and for things like palebo. Other than read meat and eggs, so far only 2 brands of honey that I have tried does not elicit a negative reaction in me. I can also have butter without a problem.

 

[JustAGuy]

I've been carnivore ( red meat + eggs) for about 6 years now. I've been aware of Ray Peat's views for even longer I think.
I'll be happy to answer questions. I have tried common foods on multiple occasions to account for variations in ways that the foods are produced and for things like palebo. Other than read meat and eggs, so far only 2 brands of honey that I have tried does not elicit a negative reaction in me. I can also have butter without a problem.

So how do you feel and what is your body composition like?

 

[stevrd]

What's with all the people using anecdotal experience as if it were science? I don't care if somebody was a vegan or carnivore for 20 years. They could be "healthy" in spite of their diet, not because of it. Whether their diet is the sole reason for their health improvements remains unknown because of the huge amount of confounders that could also be interfering with it. To provide an example, the vegan community always cites Dr. Ornish research claiming it to be proof that only a vegan diet can reveres atherosclerosis. Basically if you read his research it is based off a program that includes a vegan diet (however permits egg whites), and also includes exercise, meditation/stress-reduction, and calorie restriction. Arteries do appear to have less atherosclerosis after doing these lifestyle changes. But are we really to believe that the sole reason for a reversal of atherosclerosis was because of the vegan diet? Or was it because of calorie-restriction, weight loss, exercise, or meditation? I'm more keen to believe that a combination of exercise and weight loss can produce a number of benefits, including plaque reversal, irrespective of diet. And Dr. Volek has basically has confirmed the same thing, reversing atherosclerosis on nearly zero carb diets. This doesn't mean a keto diet is good for heart disease, but that weight loss and exercise are!

So the problem is most nutritional "science" is completely void of actual science and is rife with a multitude of confounders that would make it nearly impossible to determine the cause and effect of a particular diet. In order to actually do science you need to have randomized-controlled, metabolic ward studies with control groups and control for calories. Both groups have to be doing the same activities of daily living and health should be monitored through blood panels, metabolic function, spirometry, physical fitness tests (VO2 max, etc). Furthermore weight reduction should be factored into a multi-variate analysis. The composition of weight loss should be considered, especially showing whether the weight loss came from glycogen, fat, or muscle. You could do this with dexa scan, but also by monitoring nitrogen losses, etc....

But unfortunately we don't have the ability to test a lot of hypotheses in humans because it is unethical. This is why Peat relies on a lot of animal studies. You can induce cancer in rats and then feed them diets of various oils (corn, canola, soybean, tallow, butter, coconut oil) and then observe what happens. Can't do the same in humans.

But I digress. To get back to my point, how one feels should not be an indicator of what diet is optimal. Somebody who follows a vegan diet could be feeling great until he/she comes to a nutritional deficiency. A person on a Keto diet may feel great because he/she is running on cortisol/catacholamines, the same way somebody who uses cocaine is running on catacholamines. Doesn't make it healthy. Bottom line is that none of these diets actually have any good science or conclusive evidence to back up their claims. Counter arguments are ignored. Confounders are not considered. The best research we have is on body composition and at the end of the day the dozens of metabolic ward studies we have show there's no difference in fat loss in either of them.

So most people probably fare best on a balanced diet with mixed macros for a variety of important reasons. Macro profiles will depend on activity level and it does take some trial and error to find what works for an individual, but the worst thing somebody can do is take advice from somebody who says "follow xyz diet because it cured me of xyz." I literally read a youtube comment the other day of somebody claiming the carnivore diet cured him of AIDS. This ***t is just getting out of hand.

 

[RisingSun]

So most people probably fare best on a balanced diet with mixed macros for a variety of important reasons.

How do you know?
What’s « balanced » in detail?
Any study backing up that claim?

And even if there were studies for your « balanced diet » proving that it works, what would be the criterias for it « working »? Less inflammation? Better longevity? More energy?

So many criterias at play, so many diets that haven’t been studied at all by science because they dismiss them as being lunatic (the raw diet from Vonderplanitz)

 

[stevrd]

How do you know?
What’s « balanced » in detail?
Any study backing up that claim?

And even if there were studies for your « balanced diet » proving that it works, what would be the criterias for it « working »? Less inflammation? Better longevity? More energy?

So many criterias at play, so many diets that haven’t been studied at all by science because they dismiss them as being lunatic (the raw diet from Vonderplanitz)

Sorry to see that you drank the cool-aid.

Not to appeal to authority or anything, but since you're trivializing balanced diets by saying "your balanced diet," let me just clarify something: It's not "my balanced diet," since a balanced diet with mixed macros is basically the prevailing view of what a diet should be straight from allopathic medicine, dietetics, sports nutrition, etc.... This is text book, not my hypothesis. The onus is not on me to prove that a balanced diet works, the onus is on the low carb, carnivore zealots to prove that their diet is better. This is how science works. You formulate a hypothesis, then you test it against the prevailing view, or other hypotheses. I'm perfectly fine with changing my stance provided that they are able to prove their hypothesis. Since literally zero studies have been done on the carnivore diet, I'm not the one that needs to prove anything.

I don't know for sure what diet is most optimal, hence the word "probably" I used when describing the diet I think MOST people would feel best on. I am basing this off of the fact that each macro nutrient plays an important role in a variety of biochemical pathways. And the amounts of macronutrient needed will depend on the context. Pro-carnivore zealots will tell you that they don't think that one "needs" anything other than animal foods to survive, namely red meat. The word "need" is of course dependent on the context. A carnivore diet as a bare-bones diet really is all one needs to survive. I can concede to this. It can supply all the vitamins and minerals required at the bare minimum. Even vitamin C is less important when deriving energy from mostly animal foods. But does this mean it's optimal? Not by a long shot. Surviving and thriving are two completely different things.

So the context that I'm speaking of when I say "balanced diet" being healthy, is because a balanced diet can not only support the minimum nutritional needs for survival, but can also support the needs to overcome stress, especially physical stress, as anything defined by >70% VO2 max. Think sprinting or doing a 8-15 rep set of squats.

I say carbs from sources such as tubers and fruits are important to supply the energy needed to support optimal glycogen replenishment. Of course some glycogen replenishment happens on a keto diet (and studies do show this), but it's not optimal and it's at the expense of protein (as evidenced by increased urinary nitrogen losses because of gluconeogenesis). This is why keto athletes can be decent at running marathons but perform poorly in glycolytic sports. Show me a study that compares keto athletes vs high carb athletes performing at >70% VO2 max. By the way, pretty much every mainstream sport fits this classification (basketball, football, MMA, tennis, etc...). So besides running and golf, what other sports could you even remotely perform well on a keto/carnivore diet? And because keto diets suck for sports, this is reason enough to completely dismiss them entirely for anybody who is not sedentary. And since being sedentary is not good for health, we can then suppose that neither is a ketogenic diet. Because unless you want to perform at a sub-par level in whatever sports endeavor you are doing, you'd best stay far away from anybody telling you a keto diet is best for sports (hint: use your sense of smell to pick them out of the pack, you can smell their acetone). Again, the onus is not on me to prove this point (since this is already mainstream), it's on carnivore/keto zealots to prove that their hypothesis/diet is superior for athletic performance. Good luck with that....

A "balanced" diet with mixed macros could mean for example, 30% fat, 20% protein, 50% carbs. This will supply enough fat for a steady supply of nutrients to enter the bloodstream and avoid too much blood sugar variability, and also blunt the feelings of hunger between meals. It will supply adequate carbohydrates to keep stress hormones like cortisol, catacholamines epinepherine/norepinepherine quiet, and supply enough substrate for adequate liver glycogen to catalyze T4 to T3. Carbs are needed for OPTIMAL T4 to T3 conversion, which also lends itself well to optimal utilization of cholesterol and steroid production. In biochemistry, the activation energy required for optimal T4 to T3 conversion is liver glycogen. Why would you want to impair this?

Of course there are many, many more reasons why a carnivore diet sucks, but I'm busy and don't have all day.

If you want to read more about all of the things I'm writing (and more), refer to Dr. Mamounis' paper here: https://www.researchgate.net/public...nd_PUFA_Why_You_Don't_Want_to_be_a_Fat_Burner

If you need further convincing/clarification, simply read more of Dr. Peat's work. His articles have plenty of research showing why low carb/keto diets are a poor choice for long-term health.

 

[Cirion]

Agree with most of that, my only pet peeve personally is that's its not weight loss that causes improved health or exercise even and I find myself wanting to correct whenever I read that. Weight loss and exercise are often habits of healthy people, but its not what made them healthy, they are positive "Consequences" of being healthy. Both forced calorie restriction and forced exercises are NOT the path to good health, if they were, I wouldn't be here on the RP forums with a trashed metabolism because I used to do both all the time.

Calorie restriction is probably better if and only if one is eating the SAD (high pufa, lots of processed junk foods) but even then, only maybe temporarily and in the long run will also trash health compared to proper calorie intake from quality foods.

Its stress reduction ultimately that causes improved health, which in turn tends to eventually induce healthy weight loss as well as the energy and motivation to do exercise in a healthy manner. Good health allows you to exercise. Not the other way around.

This is pretty easy to prove given that most people feel so much better when they can take an extended beach vacation, rest as much as they want, soak up sun all day, bringing down those stress hormones which are often way elevated in most people these days with all the responsibilities that modern life entails.

Being sedentary (except for light walking) is pretty much required if you're in bad shape. I'm at a stage where anything more than that does NOT help.

 

[stevrd]

Agree with most of that, my only pet peeve personally is that's its not weight loss that causes improved health or exercise even and I find myself wanting to correct whenever I read that. Weight loss and exercise are often habits of healthy people, but its not what made them healthy, they are positive "Consequences" of being healthy. Both forced calorie restriction and forced exercises are NOT the path to good health, if they were, I wouldn't be here on the RP forums with a trashed metabolism because I used to do both all the time.

Calorie restriction is probably better if and only if one is eating the SAD (high pufa, lots of processed junk foods) but even then, only maybe temporarily and in the long run will also trash health compared to proper calorie intake from quality foods.

Its stress reduction ultimately that causes improved health, which in turn tends to eventually induce healthy weight loss as well as the energy and motivation to do exercise in a healthy manner. Good health allows you to exercise. Not the other way around.

This is pretty easy to prove given that most people feel so much better when they can take an extended beach vacation, rest as much as they want, soak up sun all day, bringing down those stress hormones which are often way elevated in most people these days with all the responsibilities that modern life entails.

Being sedentary (except for light walking) is pretty much required if you're in bad shape. I'm at a stage where anything more than that does NOT help.

Hi Cirion,

Thanks for chiming in. I always like your point of view. I stand by my stance that both weight loss and exercise improve health markers. Whether or not they improve sense of well-being or happiness is a topic for another discussion. Suffice it to say, I was at my worst when I had a full six pack abs under 10% body fat. I feel best when I'm about 10-15% body fat. The key is finding the right amount of exercise one can handle and only increasing when ready. There is something called the maximum recoverable volume (MRV) that is important to understand because it is person-specific. When it comes to diet, if weight loss is the goal, most people should go slow with reducing calories and coax the body into weight loss, not force it. Also, taking periodic "diet breaks" helps to prevent the inevitable adaptive thermogenesis that happens. I do see your point, but I think you may be missing my central argument and taking me out of context.

I think there are many circumstances where forced diet and exercise are required (albeit temporary), and in many cases it's life or death. Part of my job is to help people lose weight in a medical setting. We're talking about people who are five or six hundred pounds. Irrespective of their desire to diet and exercise, doing so is not a choice, but a necessity. It's medicine. Yes it will be stressful for them, but it is required for them to improve health markers. If somebody is overweight or obese and then loses weight, their blood pressure, blood glucose, A1c, lipids, and other panels will generally improve. So there are specific and measurable results proving that weight loss does indeed improve health as determined by these and several other markers. My point in writing about that weight loss is a confounder is not to make people confused or think they have to follow some special diet, but actually my point was to liberate people in showing that it is not any one particular diet that causes the improved health markers, but it is the weight reduction itself. Being overweight or obese in and of itself is a stress to the body and is the cause of type II diabetes. A lot of people erroneously subscribe to the carbohydrate theory of insulin resistance, made famous by Gary Taubes.

This theory has been disproven many times. The cause of type II diabetes in most cases is actually just excess energy beyond which the cell can handle. More specifically, it is when there is an excess amount of reactive oxygen species beyond which the cytosol of the cells can handle, so they become resistant to taking in more glucose or fat. Chris Masterjohn does a good job at explaining this in his free youtube video on energy metabolism.

So there are clear and measurable problems with being overweight or obese, and many co-morbidities that can result, but in general an overall metabolic syndrome so to speak. A cluster of issues encompassing poor blood glucose regulation and circulatory issues. Losing weight in and of itself helps to alleviate this, so is therefore very necessary in many individuals.

To your point about the importance of rest, I say why do rest, stress-reduction, exercise, and calorie restriction have to be mutually exclusive? One can lose weight while being in a slight calorie deficit AND not being in a stressed out, cortisol/catacholamine driven, wired-but-tired state. Carbohydrates go a long way in achieving this, because they prevent thyroid shutdown during calorie restriction, which further supports my point that keto diets are stupid for weight loss and long-term health.

 

[Cirion]

Yeah perhaps my example of being 600 lb is a bit extreme. Regardless, you can actually be "starving" even when that overweight and in fact many are due to believing they need to diet down to lose weight, but they still don't lose it, and then end up making their health even worse. I am a big believer in temperature therapy now. I just don't personally see how bringing your temperature set point below 98.6F is ever healthy whether dieting at 200 lb or 600 lb though. Once the diet is over your appetite will double and you'll just get fatter. That was my experience.

Not saying 600 lb is healthy, quite the contrary. But the mannerism in which the weight is lost makes a big difference IMO. Getting fat is the bodys' response to a perceived stressor. Adding a calorie deficit by definition increases the perceived stressors, making life more difficult for you. Stress MUST MUST MUST (cannot emphasize enough) be removed before even thinking about losing weight. Maybe we even agree, I think at least to a degree you do? This includes lowering cortisol, serotonin, estrogen, prolactin etc etc...

Started RP ... gained from 190 lb to 220 lb decided that was too much fat, dieted back down to 190 lb, realized this trashed my health, now I'm sitting at 270 lb thanks to the extreme stress that dieting did to me. Funny thing is if I had just accepted the 30 lb fat gain I wouldn't be in my situation. Dieting in fact ruined my health. I was actually starting to feel good, but stupidly thought I needed to diet. If I diet again back down to 190, I bet that I'll gained back to 300+ the next time. I have very large hunger if I drop below 4000-5000 calories & Temperature and hormones drop like a rock. Thus, calorie deficits simply do not work. Gwyneth Olwyn speaks about this when it comes to cellular regeneration / fixing a screwed up body from chronic dieting etc. She explains it better than I could. I only disagree with her on food choices. SO I have to respectfully disagree. A 600 lb person would have to diet for a VERY long time and this simply isn't healthy. That'd be on a calorie deficit for literally years. The moment this person goes back to maintenance all their weight and possibly more would return. I saw this simply from going from 220 to 190, I hate to think the rebound effect from going from 600 to 200.

(Sorry if this is getting off topic BTW) feel free to PM me to keep from derailing the thread.

 

[sunraiser]

The cause of type II diabetes in most cases is actually just excess energy beyond which the cell can handle. More specifically, it is when there is an excess amount of reactive oxygen species beyond which the cytosol of the cells can handle, so they become resistant to taking in more glucose or fat.

In my experience the energy issues are metabolic and not intake based. Energy processing and compromised mineral metabolism create a sitution in which the cells cannot handle energy in any kind of effective manner. Intake, of course, matters in that refined sugars and especially liquid calories are going to deplete the body of minerals used in energy production and efficient calorie processing.

I'm not sure you're arguing differently but the forced exercise angle is only going to be an acute measure, but also there exist "overweight" people in which forced weight loss will only have negative health parameters.

Effectively I just wanted to assert that the "excess energy" phrase is rather a loaded term that can be used in a dangerous and unhelpful manner (via media, for example) that'll cause animosity and directly force people into lower wellbeing. At face value it sounds like it's simply an input issue, but it's far more complex!

 

[stevrd]

Yeah perhaps my example of being 600 lb is a bit extreme. Regardless, you can actually be "starving" even when that overweight and in fact many are due to believing they need to diet down to lose weight, but they still don't lose it, and then end up making their health even worse. I am a big believer in temperature therapy now. I just don't personally see how bringing your temperature set point below 98.6F is ever healthy whether dieting at 200 lb or 600 lb though. Once the diet is over your appetite will double and you'll just get fatter. That was my experience.

Not saying 600 lb is healthy, quite the contrary. But the mannerism in which the weight is lost makes a big difference IMO. Getting fat is the bodys' response to a perceived stressor. Adding a calorie deficit by definition increases the perceived stressors, making life more difficult for you.

Started RP ... gained from 190 lb to 220 lb decided that was too much fat, dieted back down to 190 lb, realized this trashed my health, now I'm sitting at 270 lb thanks to the extreme stress that dieting did to me. If I diet again back down to 190, I bet that I'll gained back to 300+ the next time.

(Sorry if this is getting off topic BTW)

That wasn't your example, it was mine, lol. And yes, it probably was a bit extreme for this discussion. But my point remains the same whether somebody is just 30 pounds overweight or 400 pounds overweight. I disagree with the idea that one can be starving at a weight of 600 lbs. This is just factually incorrect. It doesn't fit the criteria for starvation (i.e. frail appearance, low BMI, elevated liver enzymes, fatigue, abnormal hemeglobin/hematocrit levels, brittle nails, etc).

Getting fat is not the body's response to a perceived stressor. Getting fat has more to do with math (CICO) then it does with physiology. Physiology does play a role in body composition, gene transcription variability, fat distribution, etc, but it has nothing to do with putting fork to mouth. It changes nothing about the laws of thermodynamics. At the end of the day, success or failure is going to be based on calorie intake. And this may be politically incorrect to say, but I'll say it anyways from the perspective of liberating people, being overweight or obese is a choice, not a consequence. If somebody has the desire to lose weight and improve her health, it is up to her. Yes, her metabolism might be broken, but it's not going to get any better by continuing to support a corrupt metabolic system.

Temperature does not have a monopoly on health. It is not the be-all-end-all determinant on whether one is healthy, or not. It is just one aspect of health and focusing solely on that and avoiding everything else is narrow-thinking. I have helped people/seen people lose hundreds of pounds so they are able to get on therapy and walk again. It may not have been easy, and it may have been stressful at times, but it was absolutely necessary. Being significantly overweight or obese trashes health just as prolonged and inappropriate calorie restriction does. Both are damaging to health. The question shouldn't be whether one is better than the other. The question should be "how do I bring myself to a state of health where I not only feel the way I want to feel, but look the way I want to look?" I do not believe they are mutually exclusive. I don't think weight loss in and of itself inherently imprisons people to a state of hypothyroidism. Quite the contrary. Weight loss can help somebody go from a bedridden or sedentary state to a state of improved metabolic health, because he/she can move normally again. Being sedentary is one of the worst things somebody can do for metabolism.

"Once the diet is over your appetite will double and you'll just get fatter. That was my experience."
This shouldn't happen. If you're dieting properly, consuming a healthy diet with filling foods (i.e. protein, fiber, some fat) and avoiding excess liquid calories, there will not be as much of a response from grhelin as if you were eating a diet filled with junk food. There will be an inevitable decrease in leptin, since losing fat does this, but if you are able to get to a stable weight where you want to be, and keep that for one or two years, then your body will be at a new weight set-point and leptin will normalize. Unfortunately it does take this long. This is what the research shows. If I have time I will look for it, but the study I read says it can take a very long time to actually get to a weight set point. If this is too stressful for somebody, well, I'm not going to try to convince them to lose weight. I just present the facts to them and then they can make that decision for themselves. But I will say that on a spectrum of least to most stressful, I think being severely obese is much more stressful for the body long-term than enduring the shorter-term stress of calorie restriction and mild exercise. One leads to type II diabetes and metabolic syndrome, the other may just lead to a temporary reduction in leptin, insulin, and thyroid hormone, which are all reversible as long as a healthy diet and active lifestyle is adopted long-term.

 

[stevrd]

In my experience the energy issues are metabolic and not intake based. Energy processing and compromised mineral metabolism create a sitution in which the cells cannot handle energy in any kind of effective manner. Intake, of course, matters in that refined sugars and especially liquid calories are going to deplete the body of minerals used in energy production and efficient calorie processing.

I'm not sure you're arguing differently but the forced exercise angle is only going to be an acute measure, but also there exist "overweight" people in which forced weight loss will only have negative health parameters.

Effectively I just wanted to assert that the "excess energy" phrase is rather a loaded term that can be used in a dangerous and unhelpful manner (via media, for example) that'll cause animosity and directly force people into lower wellbeing. At face value it sounds like it's simply an input issue, but it's far more complex!

Metabolic and intake are both mutually inclusive. If you overeat to the point where you are severely obese, then your metabolic pathways will not function properly and there will be an excess amount of ROS that the cytosol can handle. If this happens to enough cells, then you have insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is not just a "you have it" or "you don't" thing. There are various levels of insulin resistance, from mild insulin resistance to severe, which is why when somebody adopts a lifestyle that allows him to lose weight and get weight-stable, he can slowly come off of insulin therapy, irrespective of diet. The weight loss itself does this. So "excess energy" as reductionist as it sounds, is exactly what's happening at the cell level. This is not my opinion, it's biochemistry. Refined sugars and liquid calories have nothing to do with it. These things make it easier for somebody to gain weight and become insulin resistant, but if one follows a calorie-reduced diet including lots of refined sugar and liquid calories (in the context of a calorie deficit), and loses weight, the result will remain the same, improved insulin sensitivity.

I don't really know what else I can say about this topic other than read biochemistry.
Here is a good video that describes this process in more detail: