Fat are we being lied to?

“Cholesterol kills and clogs arteries”

“Fat is bad”

“Eggs are bad, meat is bad. Fish is good”

“Staples should be pasta and veggies”

Section 1: The Evils of the LOW FAT DIET

Part 1: The “journey”

“This is the average amount of Fat taken out of the artery of the average smoker in 1 year”. So the grim invisible narrator says in the anti-smoker ad accompanying a rather unsavory montage of a gloved hand gingerly pushing out the lipid obstruction of the artery. Immediately from all the years of listening to Mrs. McKenzie’s explanations on the nature of fats and cholesterol, (since yr 7 camp “Young man put that bag o’crisps away…Such a Healthy way to start the day”, hazarding a little sarcastic rhyme), my mind asked the question “Doesn’t Cholesterol do that?” By that time, the “Seinfeld” had resumed and I sat brain dead fro the rest of the evening, but the seed of inspiration was already planted.

Let’s take a stroll in the past. Smoking was introduced to the west in the late 1800’s, when it was seen as a trifle to pass the time, something that you did alone during the dark hours of winter. A kind of masturbation but without the cleaning up, that was of course after the introduction of the pipe opposed to chewing the tobacco and spitting it out or “making the gums pay the rent”. However, it didn’t really become commercialized until the 1950’s when movies also became advertisements for the filthy habit (Smoking, not the respectable act of flagpole polishing). Thousands of people began to succumb to the fags and before long it was fashionable, cheap and a worldwide occurrence. And before long, people began to succumb to all sorts of heart diseases and lung failures and similar distasteful maladies that we are only becoming aware of.

Another constitutional we shall take, this time on the different path. 1950’s, people just became aware of what they were eating. The typical diet of the day was:    

l        Breakfast: Bacon, Eggs (not a fruit!), Tomato, leftovers form dinner. Muffin or toast with fruit. Milk or juice.

l        Lunch: Cold meats, Salami (Not of the groin kind…midday intercourse is strictly for continentals and their fancy chancy eels.) Cheeses, sandwiches anything of the nature.

l        Dinner: Roast meats, salad, and a glass of red wine.

l        Beverages: Wines in the nighttime, juices, milk or water in the day time.

What with all the technological “buzz” of the day, “electrical juicers” and the extremely novel “Refrigerator” and the ingenious “chemical analysis” all were started in this golden age of innocence. It was then that the Chemical analysis was directed at all foods. And it was then directed at the blood samples and walls of arteries of ample supply of fresh bodies being churned out by the death MAchine LaBOROtory. Blood fat levels through the roof, fatty deposits that would make a French Chef blush, deteriorating cardiovascular tissue (heart and lungs if you must know). And with an innocence and disregard to the scientific method that marked the age, Fat was branded the number 1 public enemy. (Besides the Red’s of course.)

Is it merely coincidence that smoking and fat exclusion happened at the same time? Yes. But if something so obviously a case of “misidentification”, then why is it still alive and kicking today?

Fat exclusion was met with critical acclaim in America and Europe. No one would question the credibility of the “scientific method”. But as technology pushed forward, and so did the pile of corpses, we once again trained our microscopes to the blood vessels of the dead. Our second public enemy was found and named. “Cholesterol” (More in part 3). And last but not least, saturated fats were also found to blame. The world first dietary slogans were created:

l        Fats are not all bad, only saturated.

l        Cholesterol kills

 So “dieticians” and doctors all recommended basically what we are expected to eat now. That is, more fish, bread and pasta etc. more Omega fatty acids, and more polyunsaturated fats etc. But have you actually noticed the men and women who recommend this? We all hear of these new 'scientifically proven' diets, telling us how to eat and keep the fat off. But have you actually seen these so called 'diet kings and queens'? Because let me tell you, I call Dr. Phil "Dr. Deep Fried Phil-ay." Because from his body composition, that’s what I believe he's been eating for the whole term of his natural life. Now, would you really put your fat loss dreams in a man like him eh? (Props to ‘Rome on that one)

We even came up with this so called “food pyramid”…which in my opinion is the second most stupid pyramid in the world after the “free smiley shirt Steve” pyramid scheme, nah that’s harsh…and a bit over the top after all it hasn’t been 6 weeks yet so I can’t complain…yet. Anyhow, if you take a time to look at it, you’ll realize that it’s the epitome of no/low fat and high carbohydrates. "When you look in the mirror, and see your rolls of fat have made you look like some unholy six-teated udder, and you're a man, you know that the so called "low fat" diet isn't working." (Props to Jay again.)

Fig 1 - The Food Pyramid

 So when this Low fat diet doesn’t work, as it obviously won’t (that too is a lie, the belief factor will come and also some people just have done well in the genetic lotto…but that still don’t mean you can eat bread all your life and not crave a hunk of cheese the size of a car battery), people then turn to the other diets, notably the Atkins diet and others.

PART 2 “Our physiology”

If you were God or Mother Nature or whatever or whoever it is that controls our existence and you needed a self sustaining mechanism that governed the survival of a species what would it be?

 Bear in mind survival in this context means the proper body composition for the whole natural term of life throughout all the seasons and bear in mind, high fat in summer is suicide and low fat in winter is similarly self destructive. To survive the seasons and indeed in your environment, (surviving bear attacks and shark attacks and possibly bears holding shark attacks is a bit different…evolution or God has the answers to that one.) it is imperative to maintain proper body composition.

What people seem to be under the impression is that exercise is the leading factor in turning the body back into its natural state of low subcutaneous fat and relatively high muscle. (After all anything other than that shouldn’t be allowed to live on land). Now, lets be hypothetical in the words of a certain Wing Chun “master”, who looked like he had “Chi Sao” or sticky hands not from late night training but from eating one too many dumplings before class. Anyhow, if exercise were the leading factor, that would mean our bodies were geared to lose fat in summer and gain it in winter from exercise. And exercise in the real world would mean running from coyotes, or bears. So do you think that us as a species, or any species for that matter, would make a spring ritual of going out and aggressively seeking out wild animals to wrestle with just to regain the summer physique? Seems that’s what’s happening today, but is it really what happens?

No. No NONONO. It is the food we eat that governs our metabolism that governs our body composition. We eat more in spring due to the new crops etc…and we lose weight. We eat the grains that we grew throughout the agricultural year, and hope to God that you’ve harvested enough because for the next few months you aren’t going to eat anything larger than the brain of the modern day dietician. (Suffice to say, in the past most people in winter only ate barley grains and walnuts…). But if you still eat relatively the same amounts of food and calories, then how does the body know? The answer is in the chemical composition of the greater part of your diet. In the spring through to summer, chances are you would be eating the fat laden stuffs that nature had to offer you. But when winter comes, autumn has a whole horde of goodies for us. Fruit and Grains! Guess what, they are fat free and carbohydrate high, and indeed they are on the bottom of the so called “healthy” eating pyramid. 

So there you have my take on the natural process of the yearly Circadian Rhythm and how it affects our physiology. But now, we have no need for winter hoardings, so how do we keep the flab off? Never thought you’d ask…

PART 3: What the Nutrients Actually Do

Carbohydrates: A source of quick energy.

Protein: Building blocks of cells

Fat: Energy source.

Besides this extremely basic model, most people do not know a single thing other than that. This is a more complete table showing the relative bodily functions it actually causes.

Carbohydrates: Energy source, Hormonal influence, Insulin spike, cell structure. Sleep pattern

Protein: Energy source, Cell structure.

Fat: Hormonal Production, Hormonal influence, Cell structure, Nerve function over 40% of brain tissue, reproductive function, cognitive function, memory function. Allows body absorb Fat soluble nutrients (which is to say about half of them many of them incredibly important)

Well, that table does no justice to what protein does nor does it do justice to the carbs and fat. However, Fat actually does more than 18 bodily functions, and to actually EXCLUDE it from a diet is STUPID! Might as well Tie your wrists to your ankles and wait for me to come to your house and take out my anger. (I’m hungry and there isn’t any butter in Da house.)  Anydangways, that doesn’t explain why you should come to love fat like I have, nor does it explain why I have not been the biggest of carbohydrate lovers. Well let’s start with the bad. Carbohydrates have never been our real source of energy, and do you know why? Carbohydrates are a strictly plant derived substance. But, were our bodies ever designed to subsist mostly on plant material?

Fig 2.1 - The human digestive tract

Fig 2.2 - The digestive tract of a cow

If you compare our digestive system to that of any type of herbivore, you’ll find that not only do we lack the enzyme to actually break down and extract nutrients and vitamins from many plants (cereals for example, all the nutrients are locked with the fiber in the hard outer shell, and as you know, fiber is indigestible and as you now know, we cannot get at the nutrients. So you’re just sitting down to a bowl of milk and sugar. Go figure).

So we aren’t equipped at all to deal with plant foods as our main source of energy. Add to that carbohydrates are only a mere 15Kj/G, opposed to fat which is a whopping 34Kj/G. Our large intestine is too short, we cannot ferment, we cannot do anything with Plant material except get the carbohydrates, some water soluble vitamins (don’t get me wrong, vegetables and fruits are important for some vitamins and fiber, but cereals…I see no need for them. I guess I’m rough to touch…or should I say, Against the Grain…Ah…hilarious shit.) But if we humans actually do crave plant materials, true this statement is, why is that? Well, for one, carbohydrates are addictive, but not in itself is it a drug. However, carbohydrates spike the blood with a shitload of insulin and what does this do? Well for one we don’t’ really know too much about this, but suffice to stops Lipolysis. WHAT? Lipolysis: The process whereby fat is oxidized into energy. And over a long period of time, the all the cells will increase their numbers of Adrenoreceptors, as insulin is a type of growth hormone. However, due to this, we lose a lot of our insulin sensitivity, so we can cope with the dizzying amount of the stuff bloating our veins. And what does insulin sensitivity do? It is the one thing that forces the body into a state of catharsis and forces fat to be oxidized. Until now, the body was pretty cool, we ate things that we wanted…meats cheeses, stuff like that, and despite being bloated with food…we maintained healthy weight. Autumn would come along; we would gain weight from all the grains we ate from harvest. Winter comes and we still live off our resources. But now, we have messed with our traditional diets and we eat all the things we hate, muesli bars (who here has actually craved for a nice sawdust bar eh?), salad sandwiches and huge pasta orgies. If you think about it for a minute, these are all peasant foods, things that people have always hated throughout recorded history, so why the ironic reversal? So limiting carbohydrates will force a state of insulin sensitivity and this state is known as Ketogenesis. This is basically stating that the body has to use fat for energy and this means the liver has to create a lot of bile and this is converted to Ketone bodies and these are in higher concentrations. Hence, Ketogenesis takes place.

Part 4: Why the myth is still alive if all this has been known for sometime

All you have read is undoubtedly somewhat shocking. IT goes against all “wisdom” and flies in the face of what PE class has taught you. However, more shocking is that all this is elementary knowledge, and either I’m the smartest man in the world (I doubt it. I’ve often found myself with pursed lips, a furrowed brow and a thoughtful expression that betrays my being in the zone…i.e. not sentient…going “what the hell am I doing in the laundry?”) Or someone… ”or something!”…is keeping the huge reality under sheets. WHY?

Well, fat free has become something of a fad as has the Carb free diets that are coming up all over the place. It’s more marketing than anything else. Do you think that all the multimillion dollar companies raking in enough money to buy half the solar system want to give it up and while they’re at it admit that they were wrong and abusing the human condition for a few, no wait…a shitload…more bucks? No. Diplomacy is important and I don’t’ blame people selling food that’s fat free, sometimes people honestly don’t know, but human health is at stake. This is something above all money making incentives. Then again, you shouldn’t be surprised. Many pharmaceutical companies also do things of the sort, like selling multivitamins with nutrients that actually cancel each other out, via a process where the nutrients compete for the carrier ion (think of a government incentive to have more people immigrate. In the rush to get here, they all compete for the few airlines available and end up burning down all the airports in the vicinity…Oh Poo!). However, the law allows them to get away with this. It’s not false advertising, all the nutrients are there, they just can’t be accessed. It’s the same deal with cornflakes. A study done in the US, funded independently so as to minimize special interest groups that tested the health of a few rats fed only on cornflakes. The control group was given the cardboard boxes that began to pile up (understandably there must have been a lot of cornflakes.) mixed with a few raisins and sugar. After a while, the control group was healthier…”so throw out all the cornflakes in your house, and eat the boxes my friends”. Cornflake brands always boast of how they contain iron or B vitamins and funnily enough it’s all true. Grains are in fact, very, very nutritious. But as I discussed in the section above, we cannot absorb it. So, we think we eat healthy food; the companies get away with it and make more money…Clever, Very clever.