Durianrider EXPOSED or TELLING the TRUTH?? | Dr. McDougall | Dr. Greger

[SamYo123]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUPnskr2RG4
​

 

[Richiebogie]

Which part surprised you?

Durianrider began as a raw food vegan but for the last 7 years has been promoting fresh fruit, cooked rice, table sugar, and very low fat - under 10g per day!

He does not believe in Calories In / Calories Out for weight loss. He says that you should eat as many carbs as you can but avoid fat, as the fat you eat is the fat you wear.

He points out that traditional Asian and African diets produce lean populations, but the introduction of processed foods with vegetable oils and animal fats have started to fatten up these people.

He occasionally quotes Walter Klempner’s rice diet studies as proof that a diet of sugar and starch without fat reverses obesity and lifestyle-onset diabetes.

He is also into prescribed testosterone and other bodybuilding steroids!

He is still vegan but supplements b12 and pea protein.

 

[yerrag]

Which part surprised you?

Durianrider began as a raw food vegan but for the last 7 years has been promoting fresh fruit, cooked rice, table sugar, and very low fat - under 10g per day!

He does not believe in Calories In / Calories Out for weight loss. He says that you should eat as many carbs as you can but avoid fat, as the fat you eat is the fat you wear.

He points out that traditional Asian and African diets produce lean populations, but the introduction of processed foods with vegetable oils and animal fats have started to fatten up these people.

He occasionally quotes Walter Klempner’s rice diet studies as proof that a diet of sugar and starch without fat reverses obesity and lifestyle-onset diabetes.

He is also into prescribed testosterone and other bodybuilding steroids!

He is still vegan but supplements b12 and pea protein.

I wonder if the b12 is to enablewthe conversion of beta carotene to retinol. If so, it's a hit or miss proposition.

Better to add liver as food. As only then are you assured you're getting retinol. It's not the beta-carotene that gives eyesight. It's retinol, contrary to everyone's association of good eyesight to carrots. Plus retinol is also key to better skin, as relating to pimples, dry or chapped skin, and flaky scalp.

Pretty much all vitamin A supplementation is merely beta-carotene. And many people taking such supplementation suffer the symptoms of vitamin A deficiency.

 

[Richiebogie]

Hi @yerrag, I’m not sure Durianrider is suffering vitamin A deficiency symptoms.

Do you find you experience these when you go low retinol?

Many old men have big, protruding bellies. What interests me is Durianrider’s claims that high carb, low protein and very low fat can get rid of this.

The action may be directly from reducing fat and reducing fat storage, or it may be from lowering insulin which means the carbs are not being turned to fat!

This may have many health benefits.

 

[SamYo123]

Hi @yerrag, I’m not sure Durianrider is suffering vitamin A deficiency symptoms.

Do you find you experience these when you go low retinol?

Many old men have big, protruding bellies. What interests me is Durianrider’s claims that high carb, low protein and very low fat can get rid of this.

The action may be directly from reducing fat and reducing fat storage, or it may be from lowering insulin which means the carbs are not being turned to fat!

This may have many health benefits.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee2OTKti_Ec

 

[RPDiciple]

A lot of things has come out about durianrider in terms of he actually restrict calories etc

 

[Jennifer]

I was part of Harley’s (Durianrider) and Leanne’s (Freelee the Banana Girl) forum 30 Bananas a Day when it was still in its infancy, and it was during that time my spine collapsed from advanced osteoporosis. I was in my 20s. I had been following Douglas Graham’s 80/10/10 diet, the diet Harley and Leanne promoted, for roughly three years. When I mentioned on the forum what had happened to me, members couldn’t believe the diet was to blame, they thought I must have done the diet wrong. Sound familiar? I spent two decades in the low-fat, low-protein, fruit-based community and know so many people who fell for their ill advice and suffered the consequences. There was even a forum dedicated to the harm the pair’s ex-followers had suffered, but it’s now gone and with it, the evidence. The harm those two in particular have caused and have never been held accountable for is terrible, but I take comfort in knowing how many ex-vegans they’ve created and how it has led to more awareness of pasture-based farming.

The main people the diet attracted were those with a history of eating disorders who were pulled in by Harley and Leanne’s promises of leaness with unlimited calories, as long as fat (and animal products and salt) was restricted because in their words “Fat makes you fat, carbs make you lean, so carb the f*ck up.” These previously anorexic individuals naturally gained weight, some to the point of being in pain, consuming the recommend bare minimum of 2500 calories a day. Any issues brought to the pair’s attention were diverted to a scantily clad Leanne patting her lean stomach, and refuted by her poor interpretation of the Minnesota Starvation Experiment to sell their dietary advice (and brand). The tired response given was “You damaged your metabolism so just keep carbing the f*ck up and the weight will naturally come off once healed.” They neglected to mention to their followers that the participants of the Minnesota Starvation Experiment didn’t refeed and heal on a diet of just carbs, let alone just fruit—at the time, Harley and Leanne were staunch followers of a raw, fruit-based diet. Members weren’t even allowed to discuss their intense cravings for a food as benign as sweet potatoes without receiving a warning. When the pair could no longer follow the diet themselves, Raw Till 4 was born, and they continued to capitalize on the disorders of others by promoting the same disordered diet now dressed up with some baked “chippies” and saltless condiments, in the evening.

We need to keep in mind that Harley is a cyclist. Cycling is his life so of course he’s going to be lean. I live in an area that resembles the area he’s from—Adelaide—and lean cyclists are everywhere here and if asked what their diet is, it’s not all carbs, and rarely 100% plant-based. And his dishonest representation of the eating habits of other cultures like his statement “Asians eat a low-fat diet of mostly rice and they’re lean.” can easily be refuted by watching some food vlog channels on YouTube like Mark Wiens, Mikey Chen of Strictly Dumpling and the Best Ever Food Review Show.

 

[Luann]

I loved your summary, Jennifer. Though I never tried it, I remember Freelee's video where she wakes up, drinks water, and goes for several miles of bike ride before she eats anything.

I always wonder how someone with a diet like that is even alive. Wouldn't a diet high in liquids with almost no sodium chloride kill you at some point?

 

[Jennifer]

Thank you, @Luann. And I love your name. It’s my mum’s name, too. :) I remember that video. Given things I heard Leanne say in at least one interview that was opposite of what she promotes to her followers, I take what is shown in her videos with a grain of salt. Same with Harley and Douglas Graham. Honestly, I think the diet’s track record speaks for itself.

 

[dukesbobby777]

Surely if he is on testosterone that makes any diet he advocates null and void (providing he is eating enough calories). He looks LEAN. Wow. Well, if he's taking testosterone, and he reacts very favourably to that, the diet he promotes is just irrelevant nonsense. Plus if he does take in sufficient pea protein each day (which he may do), then that actually isn't low protein at all. He just comes across as a fraud to me.

 

[Richiebogie]

Thanks @Jennifer for your warnings and experiences!
Durianrider’s censorship of people failing on his “protocols” is like Facebook censoring those who have suffered after the vaccine!

How can people judge the true effectiveness of a program when bad results are hidden?

Is the censorship coming from malevolence or delusional altruism? I have one old friend who unfriended me on Facebook for warning about the untested vaccine around January 2001, and another who concluded that one nurse’s severe neurological symptoms which appeared immediately after her first vaccine dose was solely due to a pre-existing psychological fear of the vaccine!

Both of these friends studied Science with me at Melbourne University and while they are both atheists I don’t believe they are consciously trying to cause harm in some satanic plan. They claim to have taken the vaxxes themselves!

I suspect some well-meaning people will make up facts to fit their beliefs. They reason that evidence supporting their views will emerge over time so it is ethically right to invent facts now so people can accept and benefit from “the truth” sooner.

Obviously this makes it difficult to argue with them, particularly as they suspect you of doing what they do!

Durianrider says he was recently bashed and injured in the neck so has not been able to ride or exercise. He claims he is staying lean due to his high carb, low fat diet.

His current calls for eating plenty of rice and white sugar are in line with the Walter Klempner rice diet experiments described beautifully by Denise Minger, but this diet was for obese patients and it does seem like large quantities of table sugar and rice could dangerously supplant important nutrients over time!

Unfortunately, not every scientific study is equally honest. It is important to be skeptical and proceed with caution analysing your own results.

Anyhow I am still an omnivore and am just trialling a reduction in my generous chocolate consumption to try to youth-en-ise my belly!

It could be that keeping some saturated fat in the form of mature cheese with its inherent vitamin k2 and reducing excess carbs will work better for optimum health and physique without anabolic steroids!

 

[yerrag]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee2OTKti_Ec

Whether he suffers from vitamin A deficiency isn't that important. He may be taking foods rich in beta-carotene and with b12 supplementation it is getting converted to retinol, and so he may not be vitamin A- deficient. But not everyone is like him, and his suggestion for everyone to do like him is flawed. He is durianophomorphic in advising everyone to do as he does, because if it works for him, it works for everyone. Throwing away individual context which Ray reminds us not to.

It's all too common for people to take "vitamin A" supplements that has zero retinol but only beta-carotene, which only has the potential to become retinol when the planets align, so to speak. Pop culture upsells carrots, making us think carrots are a surefire way to maintain our eyesight. But that's no surefire way because it's just a convenient and 'clean' and 'unyucky' and PC way to avoid having to eat liver for its retinol. And this is why Peat recommends eating liver once a week. Predators find over to be the prize in a kill, and humans should not forget that we are predators as well. But the carrot fairy tale believed and practiced makes us rabbits and mere prey. Prey to the medical-industrial-hospital-health insurance complex.

@Jennifer has answered the other question you ask. I want to add that his solution to large bellies is too simplistic. It's for people who are too lazy to think in contextual terms. From going from conventional doctors to fake natural health evangelists is only going from the fire into the frying pan, to quote Stephen Bishop.

p.s. I could not be 100% on this, but I no longer wear glasses since In began Peating. Uses to be nearsighted. Now I drive without glasses as well as use a small Samsung S5 to browse this forum. Used to have plenty of dandruff, and my heel used to be dry. Recently, I tested my vision and I passed with flying colors as far as my retina and cornea are concerned, relating to cataracts.

OTOH, my younger sister who sells a putatively good line of supplements for a company called Shaklee was told by her ophthalmologist that she may be due for cataract surgery. The vitamin A she sells is only beta-carotene.

A friend of mine who hates the texture of liver suffers from poor night vision, and has for a long time suffered from eczema. He's rather dense, as he now is taking Amway's vitamin A product, which I had already told him that it's only beta-carotene, as opposed to what I recommend retinol.

And yes, my sister eats liver sparingly. While I have been eating beef liver once a week since I began Peating.

 

[Luann]

Thank you, @Luann. And I love your name. It’s my mum’s name, too. :) I remember that video. Given things I heard Leanne say in at least one interview that was opposite of what she promotes to her followers, I take what is shown in her videos with a grain of salt. Same with Harley and Douglas Graham. Honestly, I think the diet’s track record speaks for itself.

Oh, wow :) It's a beautiful name, although it's not my real one.
That is interesting about Freelee and honestly makes more sense :P

 

[SamYo123]

I loved your summary, Jennifer. Though I never tried it, I remember Freelee's video where she wakes up, drinks water, and goes for several miles of bike ride before she eats anything.

I always wonder how someone with a diet like that is even alive. Wouldn't a diet high in liquids with almost no sodium chloride kill you at some point?

Even durianrider disagrees with that

 

[Jennifer]

You're welcome, @Richiebogie. :)

I’m sorry your friends reacted like they did. It wouldn’t surprise me if it was based on fear. Sadly, there seems to be so much fear from both sides.

My guess is Harley and Leanne didn’t want others to know the true effectiveness of the program because then they would have gotten less takers. 100% plant-based is challenging enough for many to follow, let alone cutting out fat, salt and restricting protein. They at least stressed the importance of eating enough calories, since cutting out such a calorie dense macro as fat, and all the other foods, can lead to unintentional caloric restriction, but then when followers consumed the recommended minimum, many gained a ton of fat. Funny, I was just thinking about Denise’s post on the rice diet the other day. I haven’t looked at one of Harley’s videos in years so I don’t recall if he mentioned this when talking about the diet:

“The rice diet consists of rice, grains, fruits, vegetables and beans, with an option of fish available on Saturday evenings. The diet provides 800-1000 calories a day, 5-10 percent of which derive from fat and 5-20 percent from protein. Sodium intake is extremely low on the rice diet, which contributes to the diet's success, but also mandates careful medical monitoring.

Daily exercise is critical to long-term success with lifestyle moderation, and we encourage brisk walking without becoming breathless. Resistance and strengthening exercise is not prohibited, and can be arranged at several local facilities. For most, walking on the path around the Rice House facility works very well.”

Rice Diet Healthcare Program

www.ricehouse.org

Given the extreme calorie restriction, it’s understandable to me why people lose weight on the program and why it has been used successfully to treat obesity and type II diabetes, however, nothing about it says to me its success is due to extreme fat restriction. If they had their patients consuming roughly the same amount of calories they were prior to following the diet, but just restricted their fat intake, and they lost weight, then I could see the theory having more credibility, however, from what I can see, the weight loss achieved isn’t via a higher rate of evaporation, it’s just weight loss via restriction.

Regarding Harley’s claim that he’s currently staying lean because of his diet, it’s not unheard of for people with a history of endurance sports. I was fairly active growing up—was a dancer and part of a competition team for cheerleading—and my weight was stable, but once I started climbing mountains in my early 20s, I couldn’t keep weight on no matter how much food I consumed during and post hikes, and even a year after my spine collapsed and I had stopped climbing, it took refeeding on a minimum of 6,000 calories daily to get my weight to budge passed 95 lb (43 kg). I was running on catabolic stress hormones. I image my experience mirrors Ray’s experience prior to supplementing thyroid hormone.

I wish you luck with your current dietary experiment. :)

 

[Jennifer]

Oh, wow :) It's a beautiful name, although it's not my real one.
That is interesting about Freelee and honestly makes more sense :P

Oh, okay. Well, it’s a nice coincidence. :)

 

[Richiebogie]

Hi @Jennifer,

I think Denise wrote that the original rice diet had unlimited rice and fruit juice, whereas the one you linked to with the 800 Calorie limit is one of several modern variants - a more extreme version!

Still, as @yerrag points out, the diet may only help a certain portion of the population. Maybe it only helps those who tend towards hypertension and obesity!

Skinny, athletic people may need more dense food like saturated fat and animal products!

It’s interesting that the vegan promoters don’t get banned on YouTube, whereas those critical of the diet do get banned.

It’s almost as if someone behind the scenes wants us to get sick!

 

[Jennifer]

Hi @Richiebogie,

Then I have to question why the modified rice diet would be low in calories when restricting fat intake (and salt) alone is claimed to have such a profound effect on weight. From Denise Minger’s post:

“When it came to blasting obesity, Kempner employed what he called a “rice-reduction diet”—the same protocol he’d designed for renal failure and hypertension, but with lower calories:

“In the unmodified initial diet, 90% to 95% of the caloric intake is carbohydrate, taken as rice and fruit. As in the original rice diet, salt intake is exceedingly low (less than 60 mg of sodium per day) and fluid intake is thus markedly reduced to prevent water intoxication. Thus, the initial diet is low-calorie, low-salt, low-protein, low-fat, and essentially free of cholesterol.”

After getting into that sugary, starchy groove for a month, the dieters could start eating veggies again (which were initially nixed due to their sodium content—kept low, in part, to help tame high blood pressure and “reduce the stimulatory effect of salt on food intake”). A bit later on, lean meats could also make a triumphant gustatory return.”

https://deniseminger.com/2015/10/06/in-defense-of-low-fat-a-call-for-some-evolution-of-thought-part-1/#kempner

I wasn’t able to find what Kempner’s patients averaged for calories prior to the diet. The average caloric intake of patients following his rice diet was 2400 calories, which may seem like a lot by today’s standard, however, we need to consider people’s average caloric intake during that time—prior to the study, participants of the Minnesota Starvation Experiment averaged 3200 calories a day to maintain their weight. Were Kempner’s patients consuming above 2400 calories daily prior to the rice diet? If so, was the weight loss due not so much from restricting fat, but a reduction in total calories and the fact that patients complied? Denise also wrote:

“Wisely, Kempner knew his diet was at no risk of being crowned Dietary Homecoming Queen. He apparently described it as a “monotonous and tasteless diet which would never become popular,” and whose only saving grace was the fact that it worked. And as I mentioned in my AHS presentation, he apparently whipped some of his patients in order to help them comply, as—in his words—”the risk to their life was so great that it warranted harshness.” Ouch!)”

I posted this years ago on the forum, but I found this old calorie recommendation chart from a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook from 1958. The 1950's was supposedly the decade the US consumed the least amount of calories in "recorded" history. When comparing men of the same age group in the BHG cookbook and their recommended values, they fall in line with what the Minnesota Starvation Experiment concluded almost 2 decades earlier that the men needed for daily maintenance calories (3200).

http://lh5.ggpht.com/_PlZN4MWvkq0/S_7-c ... 5B3%5D.jpg

So again, was Kempner’s success due more to a reduction in calories than fat? All I know is, there were followers who gained fat on Harley’s and Leanne’s fat restricted, high-carb, 2500 minimum calorie program, which included routine exercise like cycling, so their blanket claim that it’s fat that makes us fat and carbs that make us lean is not true, for all. Even my own mum gained weight consuming a low-fat, high-carb, 100% plant-based diet. When she told her doctor this while trying to defend her weight, hypertension and the need for thyroid supplementation, her doctor replied “Of course you gained weight. Carbs make you fat.” Her doctor went on to recommend 48 fasts, this to a woman who had a history of syncope from hypoglycemia. Sadly, Harley and Leanne aren’t the only ones with too simplistic a solution.

 

[Richiebogie]

Thanks @Jennifer. You are right there were calorie restrictions for some patients in the rice diet.

One of the benefits of the rice diet is reduced PUFA, which should lead to higher metabolism, however it sounds like one shouldn’t compensate with too many carbs!

Durianrider’s claims that any excess carbs get urinated out or heat the body does not seem to work for everybody, unless mass censorship occurs.

I am wary of the low nutrients available from rice and sugar! Is this some sort of demonic diet presented by a highly charismatic Australian who claims he has earned millions of dollars from his videos!

What nutritious foods have helped you the most?

Would you say that Calories In / Calories Out is the best formula for weight loss, so long as you consider the high energy burning needs of lean muscle at rest, and the energy conserving effects of PUFA?

I am slowly getting back my lean muscles since the swimming pool reopened post Covid! The sustained closures meant I changed my exercise habits to 10km walks which doesn’t burn much energy!

Well done @yerrag on improving your vision and heel skin.

I’m not sure whether you can attribute that to retinol given the arguments elsewhere on this forum. There could be other nutrients found in beef liver that are helping you. Have you tried cutting out the liver and seeing if the problems come back?

 

[yerrag]

Thanks @Jennifer. You are right there were calorie restrictions for some patients in the rice diet.

One of the benefits of the rice diet is reduced PUFA, which should lead to higher metabolism, however it sounds like one shouldn’t compensate with too many carbs!

Durianrider’s claims that any excess carbs get urinated out or heat the body does not seem to work for everybody, unless mass censorship occurs.

I am wary of the low nutrients available from rice and sugar! Is this some sort of demonic diet presented by a highly charismatic Australian who claims he has earned millions of dollars from his videos!

What nutritious foods have helped you the most?

Would you say that Calories In / Calories Out is the best formula for weight loss, so long as you consider the high energy burning needs of lean muscle at rest, and the energy conserving effects of PUFA?

I am slowly getting back my lean muscles since the swimming pool reopened post Covid! The sustained closures meant I changed my exercise habits to 10km walks which doesn’t burn much energy!

Well done @yerrag on improving your vision and heel skin.

I’m not sure whether you can attribute that to retinol given the arguments elsewhere on this forum. There could be other nutrients found in beef liver that are helping you. Have you tried cutting out the liver and seeing if the problems come back?

Naah. It took a long time of eating liver once a week to improve my vision and my skin. Like I said, it came about with no expectation nor awareness that liver had that effect. I connected the dots only when I read through past articles of Peat.

I wouldn't have come across those articles if not for having a search app on my phone that indexes my collection of his articles and books.

I highly advise people here to use a search app instead of asking questions in this forum where people of varying levels of proficiency with Ray Peat principles shoot off answers like they throw darts.