Picking Your Poison

Well, it’s starting. A prominent physician at UCSF, Dr. Robert Lustig,  has declared refined sugar to be toxic (you can learn more about that here). I submit this is just the beginning, and predict that before I check out of Hotel Earth (I hope it’s not Express Check Out), the following substances will be designated as controlled or outright illegal:

• Meat, including poultry
• Dairy products
• White bread
• Potato chips, French fries
• Alcohol (illegal)
• Tobacco (illegal)
• Caffeine
• Table salt
• Most soft drinks
• Refined sugar

I can hear some of you cheering and wondering why these things haven’t already happened. Patience, patience. Just give it time.

Actually, time is a big issue, because if you take the long view, things that were once essential to our health are no longer considered so (leeches), while those experts who issued warnings years ago were not always listened to.

When I was growing up in New York, there was a guy on the radio named Dr. Carlton Fredericks, who lectured every Sunday on his show about the evils of cholesterol. He favored a low-carbohydrate diet and promoted the use of vitamins because he said most essential nutrients were lost in food processing. Were he alive today, he would have been elevated to sainthood, bur at the time, more than a few people thought he was a bit of a nut.

I used to drink a popular Coca-Cola product called Tab, the production of which was drastically decreased after its principal sweetener, saccharin, was found to be a carcinogen. Years later, saccharin was un-found to be cancerous, so at least in that regard, Tab is OK. It’s still produced in some areas and has millions of fans, even though not a single word of advertising has appeared for it in decades. I don’t drink it now because it’s hard to find and rather expensive.

As for the evils of meat, poultry and dairy, my solution would be to allow continued consumption of these things on the grounds that consumers produce their own – which means doing their own slaughtering. How many of us would wring the necks of chickens or butcher our own pigs or cows? Speaking of cows, would the average American enjoy getting up in the wee hours and milking one? If stays on farms were mandatory, it would do wonders for the vegan movement (which, as you have probably guessed, I haven’t yet joined).

There is one thing likely to happen relatively soon that will cheer many folks up: something coming OFF the no-no list. MARIJUANA! The only problem is, when you get the munchies, what will your choices be?