Sugar: Wondrous Natural Toxic Poison

The (Internet) Thinker

I did some Internet thinkin' and I got to the bottom of what the deal with sugar is. Did you know that sugar is naturally sweet? I was amazed to find that:

• More and more people choose natural foods - sugar has been a part of the human diet for over 2,000 years.
• Sugar is not a major source of increased calories - sugar's contribution to obesity is being overstated.
• Sugar is not empty calories - sugar makes healthful foods taste good which leads to increased intakes of key vitamins and minerals.

Sugar is a wondrous natural food! Then why did 60 minutes do this in depth piece about sugar being incredibly toxic and harmful to our health?

Sugar is toxic poison! Sugar is a wondrous natural toxic poison!

That sugar girl no, sugar, is poison.

OK, let's go back and continue to borrow slightly dated African-American lingo and culture for our amusement and bring in THE REMIX!!!! - breakitdowwwwn!!

• More and more people choose natural foods - sugar has been a part of the human diet for over 2,000 years.

Of all the claims of Big Sugar, this is the silliest. People have been choosing rape, racism and religious persecution for over 2,000 years, too (Cue the "traditional marriage" crowd). Their list of criticism of all the marketed artificial sweeteners are not really criticism, they just spit out  a bunch of chemistry jargon in hopes the reader is reminded of the high school chem class they struggled through. My dad was a chemist, and even waaaay back in the 80s and 90s, when he'd see a claim of "all natural" on a foodstuff that was clearly unhealthy, he'd scoff, and say things like, "Cyanide is also all natural."

That girl sugar is all-natural poison.

• Sugar is not a major source of increased calories - sugar's contribution to obesity is being overstated.

A bunch of figures are thrown out here. If you simply equate an 18.6% of your calories from sugar in 1970 going down to 17% in 2005 as a good thing, you have to ignore that our total calorie consumption went up by a whopping, gut-busting, moob-mobilizing*, ass-blasting 25% during that same period. Despite the 1.6% decline in consumption in relation to other food, we're still eating A HUGE AMOUNT MORE SUGAR. Without digging out a calculator, that's at least 20% more sugar in our diets in real amounts.

Amazingly, table sugar consumption has decreased by a whopping 39% since 1980 (now I know why the Domino plant closed across the river from my home.) Not sugar - TABLE sugar. High fructose corn syrup, anyone?

Guess which sweetener took off around 1980?

Then off to the McDonald's Defense: sugar is fine in a balanced diet, or simply, it's on you, buddy.

Dietary interventions that recommend reducing individual ingredients will only continue to obscure the real issue: if Americans continue to consume more calories – no matter the source – than they burn, weight gain is inevitable. Continually eating too much food and sedentary lifestyles are the major contributing factors to increasing rates of obesity – not sugars intake.

They're right, if this statement had no context. In the context of promotional material for refined sugar, it implies sugar bears no responsibility, it's FOOD'S fault, not sugar. Thing is, sugar IS food, and we eat too much of it. We eat too much fat and protein, too. But being that added sugar is just empty, non-nutritive calories, of course we should cut those more than more healthful sources of nutrition, right?

• Sugar is not empty calories - sugar makes healthful foods taste good which leads to increased intakes of key vitamins and minerals. 

Sugar is good because it makes us want to eat more food! Ummm, more good food? Sugar is so smart that it discriminates? Or is that people's responsibility? Unfortunately, sugar also makes unhealthful foods taste good.  Capitalism favors the cheaper foods that make the biggest profits, so in reality sugar leads to less consumption of more expensive whole foods, fruit, vegetables and key vitamins and minerals that have not been artificially reinstated. 

The main argument here is that kids like sweet foods, and when healthier foods stop being sweet, they don't eat them. I say GREAT, they need to eat less, fat little buggers. Unfortunately, take away the sugar and then they go for the cheap sugared junk food, regardless of nutritional content. Well, let's tax the sh#t out of sugar, and when their lunch money can't cover $5 chocolate bars over the school meal, the argument will be moot.

This doughnut is $25? Must give a stock-photography O-face right....NOW!

They deride anti-sugar folk like me with, "the assertion that a food is less healthy just because it contains sugar is misleading and not science based." How about this: it IS science based that the human body can live, thrive and be at maximum healthy from birth to death with out ever consuming one iota of refined sugar. FACT. No protein? You'll get awfully sick. No fat? You'll get hella sick. No salt from the moment you are born? You'll die. No refined sugar? No problem. (You do need sugar to live, but the body produces it from all the other food you take in. We are our own refineries.)

Tomorrow, we'll look into some of the talk about why sugar is poison, and my struggle with meth sugar addiction, which according to Big Sugar, does not exist and that's ridiculous, shut up and keep buying sugar....

*Doing an image search for "moob" was perhaps one of the most disturbing things I'll do this week.

THE COUNT:2210

I was going to skip my regular Tuesday fast food today, but Milli had a slightly pink eye and the only appointment I could get at the pediatrician left me in midtown at lunch time. He only had an irritation, not a communicable virus, and I took some rabbit food on the road with me to try to balance things a little.

A little sore from yesterday's weights, and I was hungry most of the day. This is how we transform ourselves, day in day out of mild discomfort, right?

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal

BREAKFAST: 9am, fruit smoothie, 365 cal

AM SNACK: 11:15am, baby carrots, 80 cal

LUNCH: 12:15pm, vegetable patty, jerk chicken patty, 740 cal

PM SNACK: 3:30pm, 7oz diet coke, 0 cal

DINNER: 7pm, 2.5 slices pizza, +/- 1000 cal

Picnic in the backyard with kids and friends. Wine was served, as was my homemade ice cream. Easily could have doubled the calorie count with those two things. Unfortunately after eating the pizza, still hungry, as I have been most of the day....which is a good thing.