Killer Tomatoes and Other Fables: A Skeptic’s Guide to Navigating Dietary Headlines
Remember when butter was bad and margarine was better… until trans fats were identified as even worse (and that’s what helps to make margarine, well, margarine). Then butter was back in style? Next it was eggs, beef, bread… even tomatoes! Now, it’s one of the most popular low-calorie sweeteners and your Diet Coke is at risk.
What will “The ScienceTM” reveal to be the next killer food, chemical, or convenience of the modern world? Here’s a hint, if it’s in your usual news or social media sources all with similar language, you’d be lucky if you’re even getting even half the story.
But surely not tomatoes! Turns out they’re a member of the nightshade family of plants along with potatoes, eggplant, and peppers. So are tobacco and belladonna, the former being public enemy #2 (Covid having taken over the top spot). The latter is a poisonous plant well known and well used as such throughout history. Because of the taxonomic and chemical similarities, someone decided that those common veggies (I know, technically fruits) are bad for you too. They aren’t.
Then there was the massive scare (and lawsuits) about glyphosate, AKA Roundup, the world’s most commonly used and highly beneficial herbicide responsible for massive increases in farm productivity, lower food costs (so fewer starving people) and lower use of fertilizer, fuel, and even more dangerous herbicides. Turns out the actual toxicity of glyphosate is lower than that of vinegar and salt. Chalk up another loss for science magazines and another win for actual science. Too bad the juries didn’t get the memo.
And don’t even think about your water, with its commonly found minute levels of naturally occurring arsenic or purposefully added fluoride or chlorine. But since I’m thinking about water, what about the impending doom from microplastics… until we dumped millions of pounds of the stuff in our oceans and forced it into your lungs (not mine) from the useless masks “the experts” forced on billions of people.
The latest in the never-ending stream of things that will kill us (and enrichen personal injury and class-action lawyers) is aspartame, AKA Equal, the artificial sweetener found in many low calorie sodas and other common low calorie foods. I guess dumping on low calorie choices makes sense since obesity is now in style (more than eight out of ten Americans weigh-in overweight or obese) rather than one of the most common and serious preventable health risks. Then again, that’s par for the course since obesity is the second biggest risk factor for Covid complications, behind only age, yet the “experts” closed playgrounds, gyms, and parks “for your safety.”
Missing from the breathless reporting on Aspartame is that the same organization that labeled it as a potential human carcinogen also labeled methyl eugenol, a chemical found in large amounts in basil, as an even worse potential risk; it’s in the same class as Roundup. They’ll have to pry my pesto from my cold, dead hands — though I wouldn’t have died from eating it.
If you’ve read this far — and hopefully you have since it’s only been a two minute read — you’re probably wondering if there’s a point to this snarky list. Of course there is, and it’s a common theme throughout my posts.
“The ScienceTM” isn’t science, and if you haven’t already, please, please, please start consuming massive doses of skepticism when reading reporting on any topic that’s presented with even the slightest hint of sciency authority — including mine. Follow the links.
Then search for contrary views and spend most of your time on those rather than the ones that reinforce your views. You’d be amazed at just how uncertain the actual evidence is versus the hype.
Virtually none of the hyped risks are well-supported nor are most of the claimed cures. You don’t need a fancy diet to lose weight either; for the vast majority of people, just eating less and drinking less alcohol will do.
If you want to have the greatest chance of a long and healthy life (other than just being grateful for great genes), the evidence supports the advice of your grandparents — everything in moderation, except for bears, because bears will kill you. Oh, and your elderly grandparents almost certainly found at least a few occasions to eat and drink too much and had too much sex as well (whatever that means). How else do you think you’re here to read this drivel?
If you want a more modern version of grandma’s dietary advise, I’d suggest Michael Pollan’s version of “eat food, not too much, mostly plants”.
Life is 100% terminal. Live it while you can. Move more, eat a little better and a little less. Ignore most of the reporting on things that are going to kill you because they almost certainly won’t and are likely to be contradicted later anyway.
As for me, I’m going to thoroughly enjoy eating pounds of fresh tomatoes from my garden this summer topped with creamy fresh burrata, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, a handful of fresh basil (also from my garden) and a generous pinch of salt. (And, no, it doesn’t matter if it’s fancy sea salt — pink or grey — or Mortons; other than the size of the grains or added iodine, salt is salt.)
Bon appétit.