I believe you have valid points, I respect your opinion, and agree with you on many of the statements you made. If you do not like what I have to say, I simply suggest you no longer read what I have to say. There are thousands of health and nutrition blogs out there. I am sure you will find one you like. Or, I believe you should start your own.

Best, Corinne

First, thanks for the timely response.

Regarding your comment on vegetarianism being ideal, the sentence you wrote, which I previously quoted, read as follows:

Regarding meats, should you try to eat grass-fed products without added hormones? Of course!

If an argument for vegetarianism was actually being made the following sentence would rebuke the idea that we should eat grass-fed beef at all; rather, it would declare given the current state of affairs meat-eating should be abandoned all together.

Regarding the irrelevance of my post to orthorexia and the intentions of the blog I refer you to Barthes’ “Death Of The Author” (PDF: http://bobbybelote.com/!!teaching/Readings/BarthesAuthor.pdf).

Cheers,
Aaron

We do have an immense problem. I agree. And, in fact, I do lobby for sustainable health and nutrition practices, which promote clean, pure, locally grown food. As “experts” I think we all do or at least should. However, this article, under which comments were made, is essentially discussing people with eating disorders. I assure you did not mean this, but you CANNOT set more limitations with foods for those with eating disorders. In fact, with the RD/psychologist/MD help you need to go in the opposite direction.

Regarding your comment, you brought up my point on “grass-fed animals with no added hormones.” You did not add what I also wrote: “Going vegetarian and eating mostly plant proteins would perhaps be ideal.” I agree that eating a mostly plant-based diet is best. That’s actually what I promote along with sustainable, locally grown, GMO-free products. I agree.

As I wrote before, to me, “healthy revolves around eating mostly plant based foods as close to their natural form as possible.” So, perhaps we actually do share similar views.

Lastly, each health professional does weigh-in with their own opinion regarding food and has different counseling/public health approaches. And, each eats differently. We share similar views in some aspects and perhaps differ in other. Yet, this is somewhat hard to tell over a blog. Regardless, I will say my views on food/nutrition/health are reflected in my blog. Perhaps our opinions simply differ.

You bring up very valid important questions that should be addressed regarding farming, food production, pesticides, etc. I think you should start your own blog about this, as this is not the intention/focus of this blog.

Also, that is a good article. Thanks for putting it out there for people.

Happy Holidays, Corinne

I must disagree with your largely fatalistic attitude toward our current food situation. We have an immense problem with our current agricultural system; however, accepting its flaws as necessary evils should not be the case. And, as food “experts” we must help guide the public’s opinions toward one that is more sustainable and, perhaps, healthy.

For example, you write, “Regarding meats, should you try to eat grass-fed products without added hormones? Of course!” Later in the same paragraph you continue, “but with the population expected to increase by about 50% in 2010, causing a consequential decrease in land and increase in food needs, the ability for this concerns me. It seems almost inevitable that more and more food will be “contaminated.” The goal is to stop this, but how?” The answer is quite simple (although much more difficult to implement), we must move toward a plant based diet. Regardless of the benefits of grass fed beef, or proper farming husbandry, they are inherently less efficient at generating calories than plants. It may be healthier to eat grass fed beef (due to the EFA profile), and the animals may be better treated, but it still does not address the fact that is a horribly inefficient way to produce calories.

As for GMOs, you’re absolutely right, there are problems with cross contamination of GMOs on organic product, and the soybean market is absolutely dominated by GM soybeans, but that does not mean choosing organics does not help attack the GMO problem. A higher consumer demand for organics is also a vote for non-GMOs and given the immense rate of growth in organics this is something important to the American people. Additionally, we as nutrition professionals need to lobby our congress people for better regulation and labeling for GMOs. Americans wouldn’t buy margarine when it first hit the shelves because it was required to be called “imitation butter.” I have a strong feeling that a big bright tag that says, “This product contains Genetically Modified Organisms” is going to make people have second thoughts when making food choices.

But creating an agriculture system that is pesticide, GMO free, and much more plant dependent cannot happen without our advocacy. We must not be afraid to provide recommendations that include comments that promote organics, local produce, deride GMOs and are favorable toward vegetarian/vegan diets. Telling people that they should eat plants is not enough today and if we are to be the world’s leading nutrition body we must include all of these factors in our recommendations. Additionally, we must form better public policy measures, lobby more effectively, and become more visible to the public. We cannot just be (in the public’s perception) the people who tell you whether eggs are bad or good for you this year, we must be the experts in all aspects of food and nutrition.

Perhaps a good start to this trend would be to cancel the keynote speakers at FNCE 2010 who are absolutely irrelevant to our profession – Suze Orman, Soledad O’Brien, and Pamela Jett – and replace them with talks of how to tackle the agricultural problems and how to better effectively advocate legislative change.

We cannot just accept these problems as necessary evils and we cannot accept that Americans are not willing, able, or intelligent enough to understand the complex problems that affect their lives daily.

Cheers,
Aaron

Ps. I recommend everyone read Don Lotter’s “The Genetic Engineering of Food and the Failure of Science.” http://www.ijsaf.org/contents/16-1/lotter1/index.html

Regarding meats, should you try to eat grass-fed products without added hormones? Of course! But, let’s be real, some people can’t afford it–so they’re best off buying just lean products. Going vegetarian and eating mostly plant proteins would perhaps be ideal. But, let’s be real–not all people are vegetarians. In fact, most are not. So, in a perfect world–there would be no GMOs and no factory farm raised animals, but with the population expected to increase by about 50% in 2010, causing a consequential decrease in land and increase in food needs, the ability for this concerns me. It seems almost inevitable that more and more food will be “contaminated.” The goal is to stop this, but how?

Regarding GMOs, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), GMOs are organisms in which the genetic makeup, DNA, has been altered in a way that does not occur naturally. “Modern biotechnology,” “gene technology,” “recombinant DNA technology,” and “genetic engineering” are terms typically used to describe GMO technology. In 2008 a remarkable 125 million hectares of biotech crops were grown a 9.4% increase from 2007 with the top crops being soybean, maize, cotton and canola at 53%, 30%, 12%, and 5% of global biotech crop area, respectively. From 1996, when the first GMOs were commercialized, to 2008, a 74-fold increase resulted in the global area of planted biotech crops. Hence, even if you think you’re GMO free–I doubt it, as the US is a top consumer of these seeds.

Also, obviously, the food stuffs that make up most of our daily diet aren’t healthy! Look at the state of our health! So, to me, it seems backwards to set unrealistic goals with people and have them eat all the time 100% GMO, pesticide, hormone, insecticide free. A good goal, yes. Also, even organic foods have chemicals in them, less yes, but they’re still there.

I agree that there are MANY MANY factors to consider regarding what is healthy. But, I also agree that each has their own food philosophy. Perhaps ours just differ.

Thanks for the comment.

In this context what exactly is meant by “healthy”? Does it include GMOs, or factory farm meat (often unnaturally high in Omega-6, and absolutely covered in fecal materials)? Does it include conventionally grown produce, or, highly processed foods that happened to be low in saturated/trans fat?

I’m not confident that some of these practices are necessarily bad for us, but I am most certainly not convinced that the food stuffs which make up so much of our daily diets are, in fact, healthy. So, does that 90% include those products, or, not? Obviously this classification is up to the individual consumer.

That being said, as nutrition health professionals (RDs and future RDs alike) can we justify recommending foods that are genetically modified, covered in pesticides, or produced from animals that are fed unnatural diets and spend their lives living in their own feces? I’m not sure, but I am sure that as nutritional professionals these facts must be taken into consideration when calling anything healthy, or recommending foods and diets.

It easy to see how such a disorder could arise and perhaps is the most unfortunate part of our current situation.

Glad to hear you EAT IT ALL UP !!!