big fat surprise

A study, heavily laden with footnotes and cross-references, from the British Medical Journal suggests that all the lies the public have been fed regarding diet and nutrition over the last five decades or so was more or less experimental in nature—with the subject of study being more marketing, agricultural surplus and farming lobbies rather than health and well-being—and could neigh equate with mass-murder. This rather short analysis has been bantered about in the news for the past few days and subject to quite a bit of elaborate and imaginative conclusions, which was the stuff of the fringe-community previously, for going against the rubric of the Food Pyramid.

The article is not a summary dismantling of the pseudo-science, sponsored studies and poor sampling techniques that launched a thousand fad-diets and ensured that despite what appear to be good-faith remediation, we are as a whole, much unhealthier than ever before, but it does open the way for rigourous and humbling studies to follow. What do you think? Were we just naïve in believing that we not are surrounded by touts and hucksters—untouchable even in more wholesome rackets? Is this bit of righteous arson just clearing the stage for the next round of opportunists, as usually what’s quality isn’t worth the investment?