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The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

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Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#181

Post by rrauenza »

dotancohen wrote: post #67
thereare5lights wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lmao, the history of racism behind the demonization of msg is well documented https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-msg-got-a-bad-rap-f... And funny enough there's another comment saying > If the only food they know to contain MSG is Chinese food then it’s a stretch to call that racism. and that's exactly where this hoax started after all, it doesn't take a genius to connect the dots when the vernacular for msg pr…

So stop calling MSG sensitivity "chinese restaurant syndrome". Do you suppose that hysteria does not exist because it is a sexist term?

Now it's "Mass psychogenic illness"

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_psychogenic_illness

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#182

Post by bigbubba »

derekp7 wrote: post #65
bigbubba wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MSG is healthy because it causes no harm and makes food taste better. All else being equal, food tasting better will make you enjoy life more. Enjoying life is correlated with good health outcomes.

But MSG can make unhealthy food taste better also. Which leads to eating more unhealthy food. Counter-tip -- if your children prefer to eat fast food, that may be due to the additives that make the fast food more enjoyable than home-cooked food. So learning how to incorporate some of their tricks into your own cooking can help your family enjoy the home-cooked foods more. In other words, learning how to enhance your…

> all else being equal

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#183

Post by unabst »

cube2222 wrote: post #2

This article is very long and having skimmed it I'm still not entirely sure: is monosodium glutamate unhealthy or not after all?

It's perfectly safe. Soy sauce and parmesan cheese has naturally occurning MSG. MSG is added in campbell and lipton soups, Doritos and Pringles chips, and dozens of menu items at McDonalds and KFC.

Ajinomoto is the powdered form that makes MSG easy. Traditionally umami is extracted through fermentation (as it is in soy sauce) or through konbu (seaweed) or fish (vietnamese fish sauce, katsuo dashi).

The only potential issue, as with any food, is with allergies. Growing up in Japan, there was a rumor that Ajinomoto may contribute to atopic dermatitis (atopy). Still doesn't appear to be any evidence of it [1].Of course, peanuts, milk, soy, wheat, fish, and eggs are the most common culprits, so it's not bad company to be in even if it were true.

[1] https://www.jacionline.org/article/S0091-6749(06)03525-1/ful...

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#184

Post by BoiledCabbage »

wpietri wrote: post #150
yongjik wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish people stopped invoking racism everywhere, when plain "being misinformed" explains things just fine. Millions of Koreans swear up and down that MSG is bad for health. Are we also being racist? (Against whom?)

I used to think the same way. But now that I see how pervasive a force racism has been in America's history, I have a different view. Now I think it's worth asking both questions: Is racism really at play? And given America's lasting, endemic racism, is there reason to think something makes it absent in a given case? A couple of the books that turned me around here: Kendi's "Stamped from the Beginning", a history of…

I think you've hit on the true issue.

The majority of people have only leared on a superficial level of of the intertwined racism of America's past - often times mostly the light touches they learned in elementary school. And what's taught in elementary school is intentionally simplified to something deemed appropriate for children. Some summary of slavery is bad, MLK, Rosa Parks, sit-ins...

Most people don't actually learn anything about American's history and ties with racism at an adult level. So instead people think they know the history of it, and as a result think (based on what they've learned) it's overblown.

Anyone I know who has actually taken time as an adult to read about American history and its relationship with racism, comes away with a very different view point.

It's so intertwined it's incredible.

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#185

Post by jacobolus »

yongjik wrote: post #76
fraudsyndrome wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are they for different reasons? What is the reason Koreans think it's bad for health? As I haven't read about that. Given that in the west it was also dubbed "Chinese Restaurant Syndrome" I would think some form of prejudice played a part.

> What is the reason Koreans think it's bad for health? Pretty much the same reason why Americans think it's bad for health. It has a scary-sounding name (it's also called "MSG" in Korea), it sounds like a "chemical", and you can find it in ingredient lists of all popular junk foods - most notably instant ramen, which is basically an MSG+salt solution masquerading as noodles. Give something in food an exotic name, an…

> instant ramen, which is basically an MSG+salt solution masquerading

Non-instant ramen is also essentially salt + oil + glutamate flavoring + noodles.

If you like you can take instant ramen and add a soft-boiled egg, some vegetables, and some fatty pork, or whatever other set of toppings you prefer.

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#186

Post by sellyme »

wwweston wrote: post #116
yongjik wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish people stopped invoking racism everywhere, when plain "being misinformed" explains things just fine. Millions of Koreans swear up and down that MSG is bad for health. Are we also being racist? (Against whom?)

Does anyone who swears that MSG is bad for health do so because they personally hold anti-chinese racist views? Probably not. Is it possible that: * the MSG mythology in some Western nation was proposed by those with some degree of bias against foreign things or chinese cuisine or people specifically * it caught on and was repeated by people who were enthusiastic about it because of some degree of that bias * MSG was…

> Maybe there's other equally credible explanations

While I have very little doubt that xenophobia was a large factor in the hysteria over MSG in the United States, there's definitely no need for a "Maybe" here. Just look at the "pink goop" claims about McNuggets that range from two decades out of date to completely falsified - people are willing to believe all kinds of nonsense that fits their preconceived notions.

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#187

Post by eli »

wwweston wrote: post #116
yongjik wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish people stopped invoking racism everywhere, when plain "being misinformed" explains things just fine. Millions of Koreans swear up and down that MSG is bad for health. Are we also being racist? (Against whom?)

Does anyone who swears that MSG is bad for health do so because they personally hold anti-chinese racist views? Probably not. Is it possible that: * the MSG mythology in some Western nation was proposed by those with some degree of bias against foreign things or chinese cuisine or people specifically * it caught on and was repeated by people who were enthusiastic about it because of some degree of that bias * MSG was…

You don’t have to knowingly possess a racist motive to be racist.

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#188

Post by markdown »

yongjik wrote: post #26
louisvgchi wrote: post #10

Dave Chang has a small scene in one of his Ugly Delicious (great show, by the way) episodes where he gets a group of non-Asian Americans, who claim to be MSG-allergic, to come and share their stories of MSG-related symptoms after eating at Chinese restaurants. He then hands out Doritos and American products that the participants claim they love and can eat all day. Hard to see where this is going... he says, all thes…

I wish people stopped invoking racism everywhere, when plain "being misinformed" explains things just fine. Millions of Koreans swear up and down that MSG is bad for health. Are we also being racist? (Against whom?)

I wonder what proportion of Koreans who believe that MSG is bad also believe that fan death is real.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_death

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#189

Post by smsm42 »

louisvgchi wrote: post #10

Dave Chang has a small scene in one of his Ugly Delicious (great show, by the way) episodes where he gets a group of non-Asian Americans, who claim to be MSG-allergic, to come and share their stories of MSG-related symptoms after eating at Chinese restaurants. He then hands out Doritos and American products that the participants claim they love and can eat all day. Hard to see where this is going... he says, all thes…

I hate how everything is now "racism". Any mistake people make must be "racism". When you have only a hammer everything looks like a nail.

A lot of people believe in myriads of myths about food. MSG is one of the strongest ones, which I've heard about from people living in Americas, Europe, Asia, Australia... and probably is popular in Africa too, my sample there is not great. But in the US people are now obsessed with finding "racism" so that must be it.

There's also a lot of people who claim gluten allergy without actually having one. Are those racist too? Or maybe we could stop reducing the infinite variety of human behavior - and infinite capacity of humans to delude themselves and others - to one specific reason that is in fashion in the US this season?

Re: The Strange Case of Dr. Ho Man Kwok (2019)

#190

Post by Frost1x »

wwweston wrote: post #116
yongjik wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish people stopped invoking racism everywhere, when plain "being misinformed" explains things just fine. Millions of Koreans swear up and down that MSG is bad for health. Are we also being racist? (Against whom?)

Does anyone who swears that MSG is bad for health do so because they personally hold anti-chinese racist views? Probably not. Is it possible that: * the MSG mythology in some Western nation was proposed by those with some degree of bias against foreign things or chinese cuisine or people specifically * it caught on and was repeated by people who were enthusiastic about it because of some degree of that bias * MSG was…

I think we need to create new language for dealing with these sorts of cases to differentiate what's being said.

When you make a claim that a statement someone makes displays racism, that usually implies indirectly that the speaker is actively/knowingly/intentionally being racist. Being a racist voluntarily implies a lot of negative baggage. It often implies not only ignorance but more consequently, unjustified: bigotry, hatred, willingness to commit violent acts against another on this bias, and so forth.

When you promote an idea that happens to prop up or create institutional racism, the vast majority share only one feature: ignorance. We're all ignorant of somethings to different degrees so I wouldn't put a scarlet letter like "racist" on someone due to ignorance. Unfortunately, this also sets the stage for sociopaths to push academic dishonesty, to essentially truly be racist in the traditional sense and promote/support features of institutional racism while feigning ignorance, so you'll get some false negatives, but I think it seems reasonable.

I'm not exactly sure what the term, phrase, or linguistics should be but I think something new and distinct from "racist" and "racism" needs to be developed, otherwise the terms become wild cards for any and every type of bias that may arise, even if the bias has no real intent of being racist, directly or indirectly. The more you throw "racism" and "racist" around outside the well established context, the less power it carries in language. Right now it carries a lot of weight still and I don't want to see that language lose its power.

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