Super Bowl Sunday and the Science of Nutritionism

Super Bowl Sunday is all about food – if you believe your local supermarket, that is. Each year, millions of Americans abandon their New Year's resolutions about losing weight by piling their plates high with chicken wings, hot dogs, barbecued ribs, cornbread, and all manner of finger foods. Supermarkets, those staples of modern life, absolve us of our guilt by reminding us that food is supposed to taste good. And why shouldn't they? For the rest of the year, the disciples of a dark science called nutritionism will teach us that food is really just a nutrient-delivery system.

In "Unhappy Meals", Michael Pollan shines the harsh light of reality upon nutritionism, industrial edibles, and food-industry marketing. During the 1980s, Pollan writes, advertisements for that tangible substance called "food" began disappearing from the aisles of the American supermarket. As consumers purchased product packaging with phrases like "low fat" and "high fiber", the age of nutritionism was born. Nutrients, Pollan claims, "gleamed with the promise of scientific certainty; eat more of the right ones, fewer of the wrong, and you would live longer and avoid chronic diseases". Carbohydrates are bad. Protein is good. Fats are bad. No, wait - monounsaturated fats are good. The theology of nutrition changes, but our faith in the quantifiable remains.

Pollan's critique lasts longer than a Super Bowl halftime show, but is as revealing as a Janet Jackson wardrobe malfunction. "The problem with nutrient-by-nutrient nutrition science," summarizes Marion Nestle, a New York University nutritionist, "is that it takes the nutrient out of the context of food, the food out of the context of diet and the diet out of the context of lifestyle." Nutrients, when they stand naked and alone, may actually do us more harm than good. Beta carotene, an antioxidant that works in concert with other plant chemicals and processes, can behave as a pro-oxidant when ingested alone. A vegetarian diet may lengthen the life of a Seventh Day Adventist – but abstaining from tobacco and alcohol probably helps, too. The Mediterranean Diet, the latest prescription for a heart-healthy America, must also be understood in context. As Pollan notes, the original study was conducted on Crete during the 1950s among people who ate wild grasses, fasted regularly, and labored long hours in their fields. Sound like anyone you know?

Enjoy the Super Bowl, America! Your local supermarket thanks you for your support.

Steve Melito - The Y Files