How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
washingtonpost.com
How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
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Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#2Listening excessively to one lobby group is as hazardous as eating excessively exactly one staple - be it sugar or wheat. Moderation is important, both in politics and nutrition.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#3Listening excessively to one lobby group is as hazardous as eating excessively exactly one staple - be it sugar or wheat. Moderation is important, both in politics and nutrition.
In general, not so simple.
The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market.
Very typical example is the corn lobby group, whose result on the market is to cause junk food to be much cheaper than nutritious food, thanks to perverse subsidization. In turn this makes much more difficult for a relatively large part of the population to eat correctly - practically difficult.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#4Listening excessively to one lobby group is as hazardous as eating excessively exactly one staple - be it sugar or wheat. Moderation is important, both in politics and nutrition.
In general, not so simple. The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. Very typical example is the corn lobby group, whose result on the market is to cause junk food to be much cheaper than nutritious food, thanks to perverse subsidization. In turn this makes much more difficult for a relatively large part of the population to eat correctly - practically difficult.
Very good elaboration. Most of the times, objective science has way fewer resources to spread the word than industry groups. One can only imagine how our society would look like if power and money was distributed more evenly and information was freely available to anyone.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#5Has anyone here closely investigated the research that led to recommendations to brush teeth after every meal or at least two times a day, as e.g. suggested on toothpaste containers, and to floss frequently, etc.? Any idea how well designed / how complete the relevant studies were? Have there been more recent improved studies? In the last few years I’ve heard second-hand some alternative recommendations to brush before meals rather than after, but I haven’t ever done my own research review.
I’ve long suspected that a good diet + brushing the teeth very carefully a few times per week would be more effective than drinking soda and sweet and starchy foods + brushing after every meal, just based anecdotally on how my own teeth feel to my tongue depending on my diet and toothbrushing frequency.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#6Sort of reminds me of Huxley's "Brave New World" when they traumatized the young children to recoil at nature so that when they grow up they never want to take trips out to the country, and so that they would spend all of their money on expensive sports equipment for recreation instead.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#7Listening excessively to one lobby group is as hazardous as eating excessively exactly one staple - be it sugar or wheat. Moderation is important, both in politics and nutrition.
In general, not so simple. The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. Very typical example is the corn lobby group, whose result on the market is to cause junk food to be much cheaper than nutritious food, thanks to perverse subsidization. In turn this makes much more difficult for a relatively large part of the population to eat correctly - practically difficult.
The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market.
As you say, it's not so simple.
Industry is just a part of a cycle of perversion of the goal of effective government.
Industry isn't forcing politicians to create or execute bad legislation. Industry isn't forcing voters to ignore the voting records of politicians who demonstrate poor integrity.
Ultimately, the driver of everything in a democratic republic is the voter.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
In general, not so simple. The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. Very typical example is the corn lobby group, whose result on the market is to cause junk food to be much cheaper than nutritious food, thanks to perverse subsidization. In turn this makes much more difficult for a relatively large part of the population to eat correctly - practically difficult.
The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. As you say, it's not so simple. Industry is just a part of a cycle of perversion of the goal of effective government. Industry isn't forcing politicians to create or execute bad legislation. Industry isn't forcing voters to ignore the voting records of politicians who demonstrate poor integrity. Ultimately, the driver of everything in a democratic re…
Even more fundamental than the voter is information itself. Voters would be the ultimate drivers if they had perfect information. Since they do not, their choices are limited by their access to information (as well as their ability to process it).
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#9Listening excessively to one lobby group is as hazardous as eating excessively exactly one staple - be it sugar or wheat. Moderation is important, both in politics and nutrition.
In general, not so simple. The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. Very typical example is the corn lobby group, whose result on the market is to cause junk food to be much cheaper than nutritious food, thanks to perverse subsidization. In turn this makes much more difficult for a relatively large part of the population to eat correctly - practically difficult.
This is one of the more bizarre artifacts of our system. And it took the concentrated efforts of almost everyone involved to make it this way.
But in a way , cheaper is always better. Nutritious food is also cheap, relatively, unless the "nutritiousness" of it is also a price differentiator. Frozen veggies are pretty easy to get, IMO - but it seems there usually has to be a largish supermarket to buy them in. And that implies a finance model, which implies a governance structure, which in the end means more dependence in suppliers being "standard". Junk food makers probably can spend more bandwidth on being "standard" and less on "quality".
If I had to describe Whole Foods model I would say that it intentionally "violates" this tendency.
I have never been to a Trader Joes, and I usually use a mix of WalMart and the dominant local chain - Publix when I lived in Florida. Whole Foods is kinda creepy to me to shop in. I can't say exactly why.
Re: How the sugar industry shaped key government research about your teeth
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
In general, not so simple. The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. Very typical example is the corn lobby group, whose result on the market is to cause junk food to be much cheaper than nutritious food, thanks to perverse subsidization. In turn this makes much more difficult for a relatively large part of the population to eat correctly - practically difficult.
The industry shapes the culture, but worse, the law and the market. As you say, it's not so simple. Industry is just a part of a cycle of perversion of the goal of effective government. Industry isn't forcing politicians to create or execute bad legislation. Industry isn't forcing voters to ignore the voting records of politicians who demonstrate poor integrity. Ultimately, the driver of everything in a democratic re…
You seem to be reinventing "median voter theory", which got rebadged "public choice theory", which nearly nobody attests to in public.
In the US at least, government was designed to be ineffective and deadlock-prone. When there was a monoculture, individual legislators (say, Tip O'Neil) bucked the central tendency to ... do whatever it is we do now out of a sense of duty and pragmatism. And as the monoculture faded, so did that.
As the culture got noisier, you had to yell louder. Once you ( you public servant ) get used to living without dignity and a sense of gravitas, it just gets easier... eventually the system selects for the lack of those.
There's much more money in it now, and money makes people take less risk. So you get cookie cutter.