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Something in Your Food is Moving
Dekortage writes "The New York Times has a report on probiotic food: food that has live bacteria in it. From the article: "[for Dannon's] Activia, a line of yogurt with special live bacteria that are marketed as aiding regularity, sales in United States stores have soared well past the $100 million mark.... Probiotics in food are part of a larger trend toward 'functional foods,' which stress their ability to deliver benefits that have traditionally been the realm of medicine or dietary supplements.""
This is a general trend where you can get the consumer to cough up cash to make themselves feel better about how generally unhealthy they are.
- Eaten one too many big-macs this week? Why not take our an annual subscription to the gym! We don't actually care if you don't come, as long as you pay.
- Had another night on the bevies? Why not drink some of this foul muck? It will pacify your conscience!
- Hopelessly overweight? It's not your fault! You must be one of the minute percentage of people who have a genuine obesity disorder, rather than because you're a lazy slob. Why not have your stomach stapled/pay for some other expensive surgery?
Being healthy is not complicated and hardly ever involves eating gimmicky probiotics. Just eat a balanced diet with plenty of fruit and vegetables and exercise regularly. Unfortunately, you can't sell any book/diet/fad food item with this advice, because for some people it involves genuine effort, rather than just effort-free financial outlay.
Peter
Most evolutionary biologists believe that eating meat was what provided the necessary ingredients for humans to be able to develop our brains, language centers, and the other things that make us who we are. This explains why most vegetarians are so fucking stupid.