Obesity is directly related to an individual's diet and exercise habits. Gaining/losing weight is easier/harder for different people for different reasons, but ultimately a person's BMI is within their control. To pretend that they are "victims" of some unavoidable outside force misses the point entirely. Obese people do not deserve to be mocked, shamed or blamed for their problems, but one cannot pretend that the power to fight obesity lies anywhere other than with the obese person. People don't "develop" or "catch" obesity, they become obese by allowing body fat to become too large a portion of their body mass. This problem may be harder to tackle for some people than others, which isn't fair, but that's life for you.

>I'd be perfectly content with a switch to flip, and have no guilt nor shame in flipping it.

As an overweight person, I completely agree! It would be great to have a truly reliable method for accelerating weight-loss. However, we can't pretend that this is going to lead to some "eat whatever you want and lose weight" magic diet pill. This research seems like it could lead to promising treatments that one would use alongside lifestyle/dietary changes and exercise.