Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Passion in the unlikeliest of places...

Hmm, apparently some people feel VERY passionate about their chemicals! I received two comments on my last post that were... informative. I published them both if you'd like to read them.


So to sum up, there are two (possibly one) person or company that thinks I'm an idiot for not following the pack on this. But you know, it IS possible for someone (namely myself) to have indeed read the research and can STILL believe that this product is harmful to some people. Indeed, I think it's harmful to ALL people. Just because the studies didn't seem to find anything namely wrong with the subjects does NOT mean a product is harmless.

I am referring to sucralose here, not the drink Celsius. [To creators of Celsius; I am sure your test subjects did lose weight and all the other jazz that is listed on your website and in your comment. I was only concerned that your can design tries to persuade me that you have a completely natural product. No, you are right it doesn't say that, but by proudly stating you don't include HFCS and aspartame you INFER that your product is all natural, but then you add sucralose to it. Why not use honey and tout the benefits of B-vitamins? Oh, because then if you add enough honey to make it sweet enough it'd be too many calories? Yeah, so this brings up a problem rampant in America; God forbid it's not sweet!]

I am aware there have been studies done on sucralose. And I am aware that the FDA has cleared sucralose. But you see, I dont trust the FDA to make decisions entirely free from per$ua$ion of the big ol' lobbies. If you aren't aware, sucralose was discovered when researchers at London College were testing for new insecticides. Sweet!

As far as the studies on sucralose's general safety is concerned, it is indeed impossible to monitor every living cell in the body, so don't you think something may have started to deteriorate or go awry that the testers didn't test for or notice? Do you take someone elses summary of a study and take that summary as gospel? Maybe if you don't want to read the study, but then don't go blasting others for not being up to date with their science. Even if you google 'is sucralose dangerous' you will bring up plenty of posts by people that have had troubles with it in addition to scientists that disagree with it having been labelled 'safe'.

I personally cannot stop people from using sucralose. However, I will tell people that I know three people that can, with little doubt, link their particular (and all different) health troubles to sucralose. One of them is myself. Seven painful months missing days at work, in and out of the hospital taking a battery of tests from STDs to cancer to no avail until one day my mother told me to stop using sucralose and BAM! I started having relief in less than three days although it took upwards of a year to heal thoroughly. So pardon me if I dont bow before the summaries of these studies that claim this product is safe.

If one person reads this and stops using sucralose I will be satisfied.

Sunday, October 18, 2009

What constitutes "Artificial"?!

So I was just scanning through a Women's Health mag at the gym I work at. An advertisement for a new calorie-burning soda caught my attention. Of course, I go to the website and look at their science and ingredients. Regardless of whether or not I think this beverage is a good idea or if it works, looking at the drinks marketing made me wonder what constitutes "articial" and "flavor"?

On the website for the drink Celsius, you can see the image of their lovely can and then turn it around to get the whole "picking it up in the store" effect. Great. So it says (along with check marks so that we can be sure they're referring to their own product) "No Sugar. No Carbs. No Aspartame. No High Fructose Corn Syrup. No Artificial Colors or Flavors." But they DO use sucralose, the artificial sweetener from hell.

I am SO mad when marketers use the No-this, No-that technique to show how wonderful their product is.

  • But if I wouldn't want Aspartame in my drink, why for **** sake would I want to drink Sucralose?!! DUH!!
  • If I refuse to drink Artificial colors or flavors, why would drinking Sparkling Orange flavored chlorine molecules be alright? Um, it ISN'T!

If you have a natural product it's natural and there' s NO bs in it. If you have a fake-o product, don't dress it up to be natural. One dreadfully poisonous ingredient is enough to ruin all your natural ingredients. And yes, in case you missed my previous rants, Sucralose is an awful poisonous sugar alternative that I think will have major lawsuits in the future. While I dont expect the Celsius makers to change their ways (because they don't care how good your health-report card is as long as you keep purchasing their product) I would like you to steer clear of products that are no good for you.

If you want to burn 100 calories go walk a mile. The 100 calories the can claims it can remove will NOT help your cardiovascular system get stronger. It will not help you build muscle and therefore shape...yeah, all those sexy dips, curves and lines you like are created by muscle.

Personal training is the only magic weight-loss ingredient I can think of that's genuine. Your trainer helps you to lose weight (or gain if that is your goal), build confidence, balance, strength, agility, coordination and helps you continuously long after you've met your initial goal. Why? First because its rewarding, second because its fun as hell to help folks learn about themselves and their bodies.

Your trainer loves you!

Now put that celsius ad down and go for a walk!