Posted on 09/03/2009 6:13:03 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
When I first started writing my upcoming book Organic Manifesto a year ago, I fully expected to have lots of information about how organic foods are healthier for you because they are more nutritious. The more research I did, the more I realized that nutrition is the least of our worries. Aside from the fact that the nutritional content of just about ALL of our food has declined over the past 50 years, we are, as a rule, overfed. And good nutrition is available from many sources in our diet.
So I wasn’t surprised in the least when a report was released last week by a British research team saying that a review of studies showed that organic foods aren’t more nutritious than chemical foods. As it turns out, there are some significant flaws in the way that analysis was done, as reported by Rodale.com and others. But beyond that is a larger point: The quest for more nutrition should be the last reason to eat organic foods.
What’s the first reason? The REAL reason we should eat organic foods? The real reason to eat organic food is that the thousands of chemicals used to grow chemical foods are causing horrific health and environmental problems. In my book (due out in March 2010) I discuss multiple well-documented studies from reliable sources showing that chemical pesticides, fungicides, herbicides, and the GMO’s used in chemically based food production, are implicated in, if not causing, the following health problems: diabetes, obesity, cancer, autism, Parkinson’s disease, male sterility, genital deformities, female infertility, miscarriage, infant deformities, ADHD, hormonally caused gender confusion, asthma, allergies, accelerated aging, and smaller penises in boys, amphibians, and other wildlife.
I have also discovered (and reveal in my book) that the chemicals used to grow so-called “conventional food” are responsible for the majority of our climate-change problems, the majority of our water-pollution problems, the majority of our plant and insect disease problems, and the majority of our economic woes.
Sounds crazy, but it’s true. You’ll have to wait until the book comes out to find out the details. But in the meantime, for your sake, for your kid’s sake, and for the planet’s sake, keep on eating organic!
A person after my own heart. I have often asked the question, “Would you rather have your child die of starvation at 8 or cancer at 80?”
Sure Chemicals are Chemicals. I am sure you love your bowl of nitrogen in the morning.
Exactly. And, I'd be willing to bet that there's a lot more organic produce sold, than grown.
I do worry about the chemicals on things I eat directly. I’ve learned to garden without them and don’t have a majority of pest problems. I’ve gotten so efficient at gardening the old way I can and have sold at a profit, especially at today’s prices.
The other thing is that the store varieties suck in flavor and nutrition. I know plenty of old heirlooms that produce well and are superior in quality in every category.
Nutritionally, you get out what you put in. Poor soil yields poor quality, nutritionally worthless produce.
More B.S. from the “I’m smarter then the masses, so you had better obey me crowd”.
I don’t know how it turned out in other areas of the country but our Wal-Mart went organic a while back and it went over like a lead balloon. You can still buy organic at the health food store but Wal-Mart...not so much.
If you live in an area where there are thunderstorms you breath in that nitrogen. It is a natural substance. A lot of plants produce it, beans for one. All plants require it. Organic food is grown using nitrogen, they just get it from manure or rotten fish guts or some other source.
The stuff is old because after the first flush of "Oh, what a good girl am I" experienced by trendy, fad-following housewives wore out, they're not buying the stuff anymore.
Leni
The earth's atmosphere is 78% nitrogen. If it scares you that much, may I suggest that you stop breathing.
I have been avoiding soy also. Soy can interact with the thyroid gland. I read a study (granted it was compiled by a non-profit supported by American Dairy Farmers) that claimed soy stunted human growth. The report showed stats of Asian height vs. Asian American height. Asian Americans each much less soy than Asians, and they tend to be taller than Asians.
How come you swore off organic, I do have my suspicions but I’ve honestly never been on an organic farm.
It’s the estrogen like effects of soy that is a major concern. My red flag went up when I read “smaller penises” in the article. This, girls getting their period much too early, allergies, and gender identity are directly attributed to massive soy intake - particularly baby formula. Mama’s don’t let your boy babies eat soy products.
We have switched to many products that don’t have xenoestrogens in them, specifically body care products. We use natural products like Burts Bees. Skin is the largest organ of the body and what we put on our skin is not filtered out. When we ingest bad things, the liver filters out some of that. The skin does not have that capability. Since switching, I have noticed a dramatic change for the better with my “female problems”. I think xenoestrogens where making my problems worse.
OTOH, I wonder if eating soy might be beneficial to adult women, for this exact reason.
A close friend went vegan a few years ago, and eats a LOT of soy. She seems quite noticeably more feminine to me.
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I avoid soy for that reason. I don't buy products that contain it, both for my sake and my husband's.
I grow my own foods because I don’t like what’s in BiLo and Walmart. Also, I’m sure to have clean foods instead of pesticided, larvicided, day laborer poopy pants veggies.
FWIW, there are quite a few organic and widely eaten foods, notably onions,spinach and garlic, the use of which would not be allowed if they were produced synthetically.
They contain some rather nasty chemicals, if consumed in quantity.
Sufficient apple seeds, not to mention Vitamin A, will do a dandy job of killing you stone dead.
Depends on where you live. Whole Foods in New York organics is cheaper than the limp, conventionals offered here where I live.
One must remember that soy beans are poison similar to Castor beans. The beans are processed heavily to be human consumable (not true for soy sauce as it is fermented). In fact soy pulp was first used as a filler to make cardboard. There are other means to boost estrogen levels in females that do not involve soy.
What more does this ditz want? I don't have the acreage for a cow.
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