By Joan Breibart MD DDS RD DPT DNP DVM PHD (only kidding)
Let's start with health clubs before exposing the great Eat Healthy TRAP.
Health club owners are worried. Early reports suggest that people taking GLP-1 drugs are visiting gyms less frequently. But don't start sending flowers to the fitness industry just yet. It's far too early to predict what this means for business because only 20 million Americans take the drugs. There's another 174 MILLION who need to start! Talk about an untapped market!
Have GLP-1 users finally figured out that “going for the burn” exercise makes you HUNGRY? Then you eat too much, stretch your stomach, unbalance your hormones, raise cortisol, and become EVEN HUNGRIER! Congratulations! You've burned 300 calories and earned yourself an appetite for 1,000.
But we're getting ahead of ourselves. First, let's expose the EAT HEALTHY TRAP because this is where the real mischief begins.
Everyone knows that ALL DIETS FAILED. Even the clever non-diets—Intermittent Fasting and Intuitive Eating—don't work. So what are the Feds, journalists, nutritionists, wellness gurus, and food manufacturers supposed to do? Tell Americans to EAT LESS?
Are you CRAZY? Think of the ECONOMY!
The question is: what schemes can keep Americans SHOPPING, BUYING, CHEWING, and SWALLOWING? Preferably all day long.
Today it's PROTEIN, PROTEIN, PROTEIN! But remember LOW FAT? Every food manufacturer raced to remove fat so consumers could supposedly EAT MORE without getting fat. After all, fat has NINE calories per gram (what the hell is a gram?), while protein and carbs have only FOUR.
What a bargain! TWICE THE food for half the guilt!
Now we've moved on to PROTEIN, even though we all know that no American is protein deficient. But who cares? Slap PROTEIN on the package, charge more, and watch the cash registers sing!
And, of course, we're instructed to eat LOTS of fruits and veggies. Unfortunately, few people do because they're tasteless. It’s hardly surprising that today's fruits and vegetables have 20–40% LESS nutrition than the same products in the 1950s!
But never mind. Just eat MORE of them!
And here we arrive at the genius of the entire scam:
EATING HEALTHY IS AN EXCUSE TO EAT MORE.
Eating large amounts of ANY food stretches the stomach and destroys satiety and sensitivity, leading to BINGE EATING.
SHOP. BUY. EAT. REPEAT! The American Dream, with a fork.
Then there's SNACKING, another triumph of American marketing. We've been encouraged to eat every few hours, sometimes every 60 or 90 minutes. Apparently, three meals a day don’t provide enough opportunities to make real money.
Why let your mouth sit idle when it could be contributing to GDP?
This is excellent training for continuous hand-to-mouth activity. And it keeps your digestive system working overtime. No coffee breaks for YOUR stomach! What does all this accomplish? FOOD NOISE! Wonderful for business! We're constantly thinking about what to eat, when to eat, how much to eat, and whether it's healthy or unhealthy.
MORE STRESS! MORE GUILT! MORE SALES!
And then there's BINGING—also known as Olympic-level OVEREATING. If this were an Olympic sport, America would sweep the medals.
Nobody wanted to discuss binging until GLP-1 support groups and those endlessly chirpy “Health & Life Coaches” dragged it into daylight. Naturally, most of the coaches are clueless.
People don't become obese simply because they ate fries instead of kale. They eat an ENTIRE Entenmann's Chocolate Cake. Or EIGHT enormous Costco cupcakes with strawberry frosting. Or an ENTIRE PIZZA! Maybe 2,000 calories and HUNDREDS OF BITES that stretch the stomach and screw up the hormones.
Terrible for the body. FABULOUS for business!
America produces ENORMOUS quantities of food, and somebody has to eat it. Preferably Americans, spending $TRILLIONS.
There's just one little problem. Everyone knows—particularly Christians—that GLUTTONY IS A SIN.
Oops! A marketing emergency! So what did the Branding Experts advise? Simple. TURN GLUTTONY INTO A VIRTUE!
Don't call it overeating. Call it HEALTHY EATING!
Don't talk about QUANTITY. Talk about NUTRITION!
Don't ask why people are eating all day. Ask if they're getting enough PROTEIN!
BRILLIANT!
Is it any wonder our public conversation is obsessed with nutrition? Now we can feel downright HOLY while eating the RIGHT foods.
Of course, those big/little binges are unfortunate. But why dwell on last night's chocolate cake when you can wake up tomorrow and drink HEALTHY COFFEE?
Yesterday's glutton. Today's wellness warrior!
Meanwhile, 70% of Americans feel miserable lugging around that extra VISCERAL waistline fat, metabolic problems, diabetes, fatty liver, and assorted other souvenirs of the American lifestyle. And we know our future has very little to do with Republicans or Democrats. Who has the energy to worry about politics? Or AI taking our jobs?
We're too busy hauling around our own bodies!
The THREE Ds—DISEASE, DISABILITY, and PREMATURE DEATH—are waiting in the wings. Not exactly the retirement package we ordered.
But here's a frightening possibility for the people running the show:
WHAT IF FAT AMERICA STARTS BLAMING THE FEDS AND THE MEDIA?
Both have blood on their hands. Perhaps that haunts them a little. But apparently not enough to make them publish the new statistics!
Never fear! BRANDING TO THE RESCUE—AGAIN!
And what perfect timing! Now we have WELLNESS and LONGEVITY!
Forget about getting through lunch without overeating. Let's concentrate on living to 110!
Think of the possibilities! Programs! Supplements! Powders! Coaches! Retreats! Podcasts! Expensive machines that promise to reverse aging while you lie on your back!
And now, the MAGIC WORD: SCIENCE!
Yes, SCIENCE! Sprinkle it on everything. It gives the whole enterprise a lovely air of legitimacy. Never mind that science and religion are opposed, and we're dealing with religion's traditional territory: GUILT and SIN.
But please, don't overthink it. At this point, Americans can't keep two opposing thoughts in their heads at the same time. It's exhausting enough just deciding which protein bar to buy.
And now there are LAWSUITS against food manufacturers for making Americans fat! Really? Back in the 1950s and earlier, practically everything we ate was cooked in CRISCO. Hello, PROCESSED FOOD!
I'm 85. I grew up with FOOD RATIONING. Nobody ate very much because THERE WASN'T VERY MUCH TO EAT! And when food became plentiful, we had our oral pacifiers aka cigarettes. Why start eating when your mouth could be entertained all day?
And nobody sized up!
Today, social media is full of people—besides ME—making fun of the WELLNESS BITCHES. Frankly, they're providing endless material. Every time one wellness miracle collapses, another pops up wearing a lab coat and carrying a smoothie. But just imagine a world without wellness branding: No wellness guru. No longevity retreats. No protein obsession. No snacking schedule. No lectures about kale. No heroic suffering at the gym.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all obese Americans lost substantial weight and then discovered the benefits of functional exercise with bio-tensegrity?
And don’t worry about the economy. Food manufacturers will simply shrink portions, raise prices, and stop producing 10 versions of every product. And who cares if the Wellness Bitches can no longer find their personal identity in Almond Milk? Remember, dead people have very little purchasing power!
This article was written by Joan Breibart, inventor, author, Pilates expert, co-creator of 80Bites, and anti-wellness warrior.
