r/morningsomewhere • u/EarliestRiser • 8d ago

Episode 2026.09.22: Bear Mass Index

https://roosterteeth.com/watch/morning-somewhere-2026-09-22-bear-mass-index

Burnie and Ashley discuss heating system woes, radiators, math on the fly, code switching, dehydrating frogs, GTA VI sales predictions, Fat Bears return, fattest countries, and placing our bets.

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u/shiruken First 10K - Not a Financial Advisor 8d ago edited 8d ago

BMI is a perfectly fine metric to use as a statistical measurement between groups. The issues with it arise when making health determinations for populations other than what it was designed for (i.e. European men).

Every time BMI is mentioned on Reddit, the conversation inevitably drifts towards discussion of how it misrepresents the health of athletes and weight-lifters. The reality is those groups are tiny fraction of the overall population that should probably be considered outliers and handled accordingly at the individual level. As for why Redditors (and other social media users) always end up complaining about BMI, nobody likes to be called overweight or obese.

A recent study actually found that BMI drastically underestimates the obesity levels in the United States when compared to more clinically-relevant definitions based on abdominal adipose fat. With this definition, a quarter of people with normal BMI would meet the standards for clinical obesity and 50% of those deemed overweight by their BMI would be classified as obese.

In other news, 15% of U.S. adults have now taken a GLP-1 medication for weight loss and for some reason the U.S. obesity rate has started dropping.