The story of how the most basic questions about what to eat ever got so complicated reveals a great deal about the institutional imperatives of the food industry, nutritional science and — ahem — journalism, three parties that stand to gain much from widespread confusion surrounding what is, after all, the most elemental question an omnivore confronts. Humans deciding what to eat without expert help — something they have been doing with notable success since coming down out of the trees — is seriously unprofitable if you're a food company, distinctly risky if you're a nutritionist and just plain boring if you're a newspaper editor or journalist. (Or, for that matter, an eater. Who wants to hear, yet again, "Eat more fruits and vegetables"?) And so, like a large gray fog, a great Conspiracy of Confusion has gathered around the simplest questions of nutrition — much to the advantage of everybody involved. Except perhaps the ostensible beneficiary of all this nutritional expertise and advice: us, and our health and happiness as eaters.
This is a very long, but very interesting essay on how neurotically confused we can become about life’s simplest and most straightforward matters when we throw out the wisdom and authority of tradition and replace it with fealty to the scientific rationalism of the expert.
7 comments:
If you've been around as long as I have, you know that experts have zigged and zagged back and forth so many times that anyone who pays any attention to them is wasting his or her time.
Although the people who insist on eating like our pre-historic ancestors ate, because that's the diet we "evolved for" are the nuttiest nutters of all.
Actually, David, our modern habit of consuming very processed foods, and huge quantities of grains and sugars, is very bad for the human body.
One need not eat like a cave-dweller to be healthy, but some change from the norm needs to be made, as the standard American diet is not very healthy.
If you're interested in learning something about the subject, go here and follow the links.
I dunno why that link isn't going to a specific comment, but follow the links in my comment of January 17, 2007 1:37 PM.
I'm not sure how "traditional wisdom" comes into play here. Our forefathers never had to deal with trans-fatty acids and other inventions of the food industry. But even with these, we are far better nourished than our wise ancestors were. We just need a little discipline and a lot less paranoia.
I'm sick of Americans being lectured about everything from using up too much of the earth's resources to childhood obesity. Go abroad and see if you pick out the American kids.
Hint: They're the ones, no matter their racial characteristics, with the straight posture, white even teeth, clear skin, shiny hair and gorgeous smiles.
Rest of the world -- eat your heart out.
In an article I saw recently about the 24 Hours of Daytona (an endurance race), there were two pictures taken in the pits, one from 1958, and another from last year.
The first thing to jump out, other than the former was in black and white, was how much, ummm, heftier, people are now than then.
Post a Comment