Oh, pooh! I'm sick of all these goofy diets! Who knows what kind of harm they do in the very long run?
I could go on but you're capable of reading your own posts (I think).
I HAVE read descriptions of the diet.
This explains a lot. Accurate descriptions of the Atkins diet are hard to find, even in low carb circles. "Atkins friendly" articles often contain significant mistakes. The most common error is the author's claim that all carbohydrates are severely restricted and that some food groups such as fruit are even eliminated. Another common error is the author's claiming that the Dr. Atkins diet started out as no carb and that he added carbs in later versions. I will never understand why these myths still abound, but physicians, scientists and journalists continue to perpetuate them.
I have watched the long-winded commercials advertising the diet in detail
This explains even more. If you're talking about the infomercial I'm thinking of, these did not feature Dr. Atkins and were not endorsed by him. I watched one of these in a hotel room a few years ago, and the man doing the selling mischaracterized the diet more than once. I can understand why you have misconceptions. Twinkie, THIS is why the Atkins dieters start crying, "Read the book! Read the book!" when people comment on the diet negatively and we can tell they don't understand it. Most people arguing against the diet or questioning it don't even understand what a typical Atkins meal looks like.
And if eating the Atkins way makes one so irritable that they have to nitpick typo errors endlessly, DELIVER ME FROM IT!
The only thing that makes me irritable is when people who have read snippets about Atkins in Ladies Home Journal or have seen blurbs on the Today Show come on these threads and try to act like they know more about nutrition than people who have used the Atkins diet to successfully counter high blood sugar, obesity, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, reflux and other ailments.