Organic Foods—It’s About The Kids!

 

Can Anyone Ever Remember When It Felt

Like You Could Trust The News?

I may be dating myself but when Walter Cronkite died it caused me to wonder what ever happened to the news and when did it just start to become a blend of marketing and brainwashing?

The latest news report on organic foods is a great example of filling space without checking any facts but the ones you like.

A new study that promises it’s “the most extensive systematic review of the available published literature on nutrient content of organic food ever conducted” has turned out to be less information than what you could easily Google on your own, and not as factual.

Called “Nutritional quality of organic foods: a systematic review” it was prepared by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (Britain’s national school of public health) and examined thirteen different nutrients.  They reported no difference between organic produce and conventional produce despite finding higher levels of three nutrients in organic and none higher in conventional.

The London School based most of its findings on studies from the 1950’s, 60’s, and 70’s and ignored fifteen studies to the contrary published after 2008.

I’m providing a link at the end of this article for all the facts on the study and a review by The Organic Center or TOC.  Please read it and get the facts.

Now that I’ve said that I want to get down to what really tees me off about this whole thing and that’s the fact that it is really meant to divert your attention from what’s really important about the food you eat and our food supply—the fact that it’s poisoned with pesticides, irradiated and genetically modified.

More Important Than Quality?

I’m not saying that the nutritional quality of food isn’t extremely important but the fact is that it’s not as important as whether your being poisoned when you eat, or that the food is altered beyond use by your body, or that eating it may shut off 400 or so genes you have that affect your health.

I’m not exaggerating folks because that’s exactly what’s happening when you regularly consume the stuff. By stuff, I mean about 70% of all the food that’s sold in America.

The kicker—eating the stuff actually raises your requirements for nutrients!

Pesticides

I first started eating organic food back in the 80’s after chewing on some celery and having my mouth go numb for about an hour.  It didn’t take a study for me to realize that wasn’t right and I made the switch.

Since that time I have probably kept my organic intake at about 90% of all my food and with kids and traveling that’s doing quite well.

Avoiding pesticides was my main concern at first but as time goes by things have really gotten weird.  But first the pesticides…..

It doesn’t take a scientific paper to convince me that if something kills bugs and weeds it probably isn’t something I want to eat.  Numerous pesticides have been declared “carcinogenic” (cause cancer) and most would fit the description but of course testing isn’t required!

Yes, I know that’s hard to believe, but you only have to test after numerous things happen like animal deformity and infertility, or maybe death.

Let’s keep it simple.

Pesticides are toxic chemicals that cause cellular damage.

Here is a link of some of the foods most loaded with pesticides.

Make sure you buy organic.

In humans it’s another word for inflammation, which has been associated with diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, ALS, heart disease and every other chronic debilitating disease.

Pesticides often kill bugs by disrupting their ability to utilize acetycholine.   Hmmm….isn’t that a problem with Alzheimer’s?  ah….let’s not go there.

Twenty years ago I would read articles about eliminating pesticides from your diet.  Now the articles all say how to limit your intake to 2 per day.

It’s everywhere!

You think that doesn’t include you?

The EPA recently conducted random studies checking people for 150 known environmental toxins and found an average of 108 in each person.  They admitted they could easily check for another 200 that everyone probably has.  Blood samples taken from umbilical cords immediately after birth in 8 different countries showed an average of 200 toxic chemicals present.

Ever wonder why so many people are sick?

He, She, It?

If that’s not enough to convince you then maybe this will.

Pesticides are notorious for being endocrine disruptors, meaning they mimic hormones used by the body and disrupt the natural balance of hormones.  Since most pesticides mimic estrogen this means the body carries an extra burden of it and has trouble clearing it out.

Normally the job of your liver, it becomes compromised with age, diet, alcohol and drug use, to the point where both men and women have an estrogen imbalance.

It doesn’t take a lot to figure out how this could be influencing the soaring rates of breast and cervical cancer, but men aren’t getting off easy either.

As men age they have a tendency to lose testosterone and gain estrogen.  It’s not that they lose it so much but the lose access to it.

Seems the body produces an enzyme that interferes with your ability to get access to your free testosterone, the stuff you can feel, and with estrogen going up you might feel, um, different.

Eating more veggies can help, so can lowering your alcohol consumption and avoiding pesticides is a plus.

If your over fifty and NASCAR is looking like less fun than knitting you might want to get a blood panel done.  Please—pass on the pesticides!

Irradiated Food

This is a biggie. How do you take something that is lacking in nutrients and overall quality and make it even worse?

Easy, irradiate it.

This is a great example of how to not fix a problem and instead cover it up. Irradiation has been hailed as this great innovation for preserving food when actually it’s just a way to cover up poor sanitation and make bigger profits.

Why make sure you practice good, clean manufacturing when you can just zap it and kill the mold and bacteria? Studies show that Vitamins B, C, E and Niacin are all reduced by 5-95% by irradiation.

Irradiation is just another practice that has been dumped on the general public without adequate safety studies. In fact a 1982 FDA Internal Task Force memo concluded that only 5 of 409 studies on irradiating food showed it to be safe for human consumption. 

Well, I’m a human and I find this rather appalling.

Irradiation has been shown to increase the amount of carcinogenic substances in food—like we need more to begin with.  Estimates run at about 75% of all packaged food contain irradiated ingredients.

Organic food has 0%—none! Please—pass on irradiation.

Say NO to GMO’s    (Genetically Modified Organisms)

Organism’s—what a weird name for food.  Maybe it’s appropriate for GMO’s because nothing is weirder than that.

Say you buy some nuts and they have a fish gene spliced into them. The chips you bought have corn that has pesticides spliced right into the makeup of the plant so it saves on spraying.

Come on folks, it’s supposed to be food.  You know, grown by Mother Nature, builds strong bones and bodies.

I think I hate this one more than anything. That you can’t be sure of what’s in your food even when there is only one ingredient. 

We’re not fooling with Mother Nature here, we have her by the throat with both hands!

Recent studies cited by the Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM), an international association of physicians and health professionals dedicated to the clinical aspect of environmental health, showed that GMO’s posed a threat to the health of various internal organs.  Seems like it can change the liver, kidneys, spleen, and digestive system—just about every organ that plays a part in filtering toxins.

A recent study showed that GMO food fed to rats caused over 400 genes to go haywire—express themselves in a way that is detrimental to the host.  I wouldn’t wish that rat let alone a fellow human.

The studies showed a serious risk in areas of infertility, immune function, accelerated aging, insulin regulation and protein formation. In a nutshell this basically means that if you have a chronic condition now it can make it much worse and if you don’t it could play a role in helping you get one.

How prevalent is it?

Up to 45% of all U.S. corn, 85% of all soybeans, and about 75% of all packaged food on the grocery shelf.

Guess what?

If animals eat it then your eating it in your meat too! Organic food doesn’t have it.

Please —pass on GMO’s.

Now that I got that off my chest I feel better.

Please join me in boycotting pesticides, irradiated food and GMO’s.

There are plenty of other ways to become sick or injured without voluntarily doing it to ourself. It’s not that hard once you get used to it you’ll probably drop a few pounds since most snack food has all three!

Eat well and enjoy life!

Here is the link that I referred to earlier.

http://www.organic-center.org/science.nutri.php?action=view&report_id=157

Let me know what you think by posting your comments below.

Blessings,

Roger