The Air Diet: Why Eat When You Can Pretend!
Brace yourself for the silliest fad diet yet -- it's called the Air Diet!
A French-created weight loss plan where you consume, well you've probably guessed it, nothing at all!
The diet was apparently made popular by a Dolce & Gabbana campaign, which featured Madonna and other celebrities holding food up to their mouths, but not eating it.
It's been referred to as "L'Air Fooding." Here is Grazia's magazine spread on it:
The rules are simple: eat nothing, except for the water and salt soup -- yum!
You do however, get to go through all of the motions of eating -- placing food on your plate, cutting it, putting it on your fork or spoon, holding it up to your lips, just don't let it touch your mouth. In other words pretend to eat it.
I'm not sure if this is about fooling your body, or others, into thinking you're actually eating something.
My main issue with fad diets in general is their potential to promote binge-eating, and a weight loss-regain cycle. Also, they generally encourage unhealthy messages about food, particularly for young women. But, the Air Diet doesn't even come close to a diet!
I was honesty beginning to think this was a joke, but then I come across a similar practice known as breatharianism. A breatharian is:
A person who believes that it is possible, through meditation, to reach a level of consciousness where one can obtain all sustenance from the air or sunlight.
Now I'm simply amazed!
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33 Comments
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Created / Updated: November 13, 2011
Is this really can work? I do not think so. The better idea is to eat something really light and small - and wait until the brain will notice that it has just eaten and is not hungry anymore :)
ReplyWhoever comes up with these "diets" are a-holes. What a way to buoy poor self esteem in women. French women eat. And they eat gloriously. They just don't eat vast amounts of crap, like Americans. And that's not just the French, that's most Europeans. How about we eat better quality food, in normal quantities and go for a jog a couple times a week. Get your asses out of your cars and take a walk. Whoever advocates this stuff should get slapped.
ReplyYes, have you read the book, French Women Don't Get Fat, by Mireille Guiliano? It's excellent — the ultimate non-diet book!
ReplyIsn't it probably a bad idea to be constantly in the cephalic stage of digestion without progressing to any of the actual digesting phases?
ReplyI've seen some strange fad diets before, but this is pretty wild.
Of course, eating nothing will cause you to lose weight fast. Seriously, though, this practice would make the average person even MORE hungry, save the breatharians. I'm sure the success rate is pretty low.
It makes me wonder how long you're supposed to follow this diet. You wouldn't even survive past a week, I would think.
But yes, I agree with Z, above. Cut out the junk and reduce the portion sizes, and we'll all be just fine.
ReplyI don't think I'd last past 2 days! And, I'd miss the eating experience too much.
ReplyMy husband's friend does something similar to this...he chews food up and then spits it out. I suppose pretending to eat it is a little more glamourous. I wonder...if Madonna was seen doing it, was Tracy Anderson to blame for it? I wouldn't be surprised; that woman is such a total flake
ReplyThat's weird to hear a man doing that. Men love food.
Replyand do women hate food? it's not about loving food or hating food ...it's about the social perception of what's attractive. Since the men and women of our society think thinness makes a woman look good so women eat less. Since men and women of our society think muscular men are more attractive so men follow a different diet and work out regime. It's not that women can't be muscular by following the same regime as men ... but they choose not to and their choice is positively sanctioned by the society.
Women all over the world have a very complicated relationship with food. the people of Mauritania find thin women repulsive, and this sometimes results in women forcing themselves to consume more food than is healthy for them to.Some parents force feed their daughters to make them attractive to prospective grooms!
In my own culture, the Indo-Bengali culture...until globalization brought the western concept of beauty into my society people valued women of "Dohara Chehara" which meant women who were well proportionate, not too thin but not huge either ... say women with a rough vital stats of 34-32-36 (in inches).
as long as women cut out on the junk and follow a healthy lifestyle i think we should be broadminded enough to let her have the figure that is healthy for her. Social perceptions of beauty as can be seen from the above examples are frivolous, changeable and a real pain for women.
ReplyReally? I think I've heard of that before too, but I've never know anyone who admits to it. Is your husbands friend thin, or in need of a diet?
ReplyThat's what they call "an eating disorder." It can actually mess with your body, harmless as it might seem.
ReplyHow bizarre! Why not just eat normal, healthy, tasty food? This seems like just another silly fad ... and presumably quite an expensive one if you're preparing food which you don't eat.
ReplyYes, what a waste of good food, it's very sad indeed.
ReplyWhere does all this craziness end, And who in their right mind would give it a go?
As for "breatharianism" I've heard of it before with Yogi's in India. I don't expect it'll catch on much here in the western world.
ReplyDon't you know yogis are superior to us?
ReplyOK, to each their own BUT I just think this is weird! If it works for you, fine but for me, not so much! Are people paying to get this advice? I bet people would!
ReplyThese fad diets are such a terrible idea, they might work for the first week or so but after that people just loose their empowerment and motivation because the strict rules are so hard to stick with! A good diet with exercise is the best way to go
ReplySounds pretty goofy. At the same time, when one is on a diet, you are constantly reminded of what you are doing by the incessant hunger. That hunger could serve as a form of awareness that you have to remind yourself that you need to stop on top of your choices every minute.
I am not sure though that that is what was intended by the air diet.
ReplyHello diet blog,
ReplyI think it's a basic french joke using the term "soupe". Meaning a soup of all the bullshit you've been served as the last diet that did work with a random star. There're other expressions like "soupe au lait" (to be milk soup = quick tempered), "soupe à la grimace" (face soupe= hostile reaction), soupe (mediocre pop music, incoherent text, bamboozling(?),...). I'm not fan of this kind of magazine. Anyway from my french point of view, I would call water-soup and air-diet any diet someone would try to sell me if unhealthy and/or too restrictive. The meaning is really obvious.
I'm scared to know that the "breatharians" exist.
Hi Lena,
ReplyThat's really interesting, thanks for sharing.
Evidently, the diet is named after the creators head contents. Vraiment stupide.
ReplyThis "diet" has been around forever. It's called anorexia.
ReplyI keep thinking about my 11 year old cousins, eh... passing wind... and shouting "AIR COOKIES, GET 'EM WHILE THEY'RE HOT!"
Replyhahaha
lol, that's so funny!!!
ReplyOh my, that is funny!
ReplyOk, I just cannot believe there are people around who actually believe this kind of thing!!!
Reply