Unfortunately for us it wasn’t very hard. The companies comprising our modern food industry have grown immensely powerful because we give them our money in exchange for their mostly processed food products. They have been able to achieve this prolific success mainly by figuring out how to get us to buy ever increasing quantities of the foods they produce. If you are overweight or suffer from diet related chronic disease of any kind then this next point and the one following it are really vital for you to understand yourself and your predicament. This is about how your natural propensities and vulnerabilities are being exploited to make a lot of companies an incredible amount of money. As they make money and gain power, we in turn are left getting fatter and sicker every day.
The first point to understand is that we have a natural disposition to simply eat all we can when food is available. This is our legacy from the not so distant hunter-gatherer days. Our evolutionary history dictates that we eat opportunistically, whenever we are able to. Our distant ancestors would consume as many calories as possible whenever they could get them because they were never quite sure when their next meal would be available. The obvious problem is that, unlike our ancestors who may have gone days without a meal, we are surrounded by all kinds of delicious, convenient and cheap food. (3,106)
During thousands and thousands of years marked by food scarcity, human beings developed efficient physiological mechanisms to store energy as fat. Again, this is what how we ate for 99.999 % of our history on the planet. The last 8000-10000 years are only a tiny fraction of that 3 to 5 million year history. Until very recently, societies rarely enjoyed an overabundance of cheap food. As a result we are biologically far more efficient at gaining weight than at losing it. (1,243)
Now, the second point is a natural corollary to the first. If we are “hard-wired” biologically to eat as much as we can due to an unpredictable environment and possible scarcity of food, then it only follows that given a choice, we will eat the most calorie rich foods we can find. That is why when really hungry and when you have the option, you will always gravitate strongly towards a big thick cheeseburger instead of a bowl of diet Jello. So, like most other warm blooded mammals we have inherited a strong preference for energy rich foods. Fats and sugars are the most energy dense foods. They offer more calories by volume than any other macro-nutrients. Not only that, but we have naturally inherited a strong predilection for their texture and taste.
Our industrial food processors are well aware of these facts and have gone for the throat armed with this knowledge. The foods they create play on our natural preferences with a vengeance. They have put foods under our noses which are super-sweet and extra fat. These foods are ultra-dense with the sugars and fats that humans are suckers for. Our ancestors with their wild, natural and whole foods diet never encountered such foods so unnaturally, densely concentrated with these calories. We are victims of our own natural preferences for the worst foods in our modern world. Our food manufacturers are able to easily trick our sensory apparatus such that we happily gobble up their processed creations. Sealing this deal; the final nail in our proverbial and sometimes literal coffins is the cost of these foods. Our hunter-gatherer ancestors paid dearly for their sustenance, risking their lives hunting animals and spending valuable caloric energy. For us, the price for these foods at the local grocery store has never been lower.
Indeed, the price of a calorie of sugar or fat has plummeted since the 1970’s. At the root of these low prices are a quarter century of farm policies designed to encourage the overproduction of corn. Why corn? It is the root source of all of the main ingredients used in processed food, the sweeteners, the starch, and a long list of other chemical ingredients. The result is that snack foods, cookies, soda pop, and other junk foods are the cheapest processed calories in the supermarket. This provides an obvious reason for the lower income segments of our population being the most afflicted with maladies like diabetes and obesity. (3,106-108)
Consider the sneaky methods our modern food industry uses to get us to pay for and consume these unnaturally high quantities of fat and sugar. If you were to eat fat alone in the quantities in which it exists within their processed food concoctions you would feel sick and stop eating it almost immediately. Just imagine swallowing spoonfuls of lard or oil. You would never think of doing that, but you actually are when the fat is mixed in with sugar and salt in some deep fried or packaged food. So, their deception involves highly processed products that are not only high in fat but also in sugar and salt. Examples include donuts, ice cream, cookies, and crackers and many fast foods.
Added sugar and salt make the fat taste much better. Worse, these foods then have a super high glycemic index (tons of sugar), spiking your blood sugar and insulin levels which will consequently result in sharp decreases in blood sugar levels. These sudden lows fool your body into thinking it is hungry again and needs more sugar. Most of us have experienced that faint feeling along with the sudden deep cravings for something sweet and filling. So, we gobble up more of the same high fat and high sugar foods causing this daily cycle to repeat itself over and over again. This is the surest and simplest path to obesity. When on this cycle, anyone would look at a carrot with disdain, craving a processed hot apple pie or donut instead. (2,34)
The newest, cheapest and by far most popular form of sweetener for these highly processed industrial foods is high-fructose corn syrup. This stuff strongly promotes insulin resistance. High fructose corn syrup makes us even more powerless in our ability to deal with this vicious cycle of hunger and cravings for the worst foods. It is also a dangerous catalyst for type 2 diabetes. (2,35) Since 1985 the average American’s annual consumption of this sweetener has risen from 45 pounds to 66 pounds. During the same period refined sugar consumption also increased, on average by 5 pounds per person. An interesting side note to this is that we consume most of it in soft drinks.
To address all of the fiendishly clever methods used to fool you into buying and eating more food would require another book. I think one worth mentioning specifically is “super-sizing”. The basic theory behind this idea has been applied to a great number of the modern foods we are offered. Super sizing was invented by a guy named David Wallerstein; a member of the board of directors for McDonalds. Mr. Wallerstein discovered a very valuable micro-economic idiosyncrasy specific to modern day consumers. While people are very reluctant to buy two or more portions of something they are eating, they will happily buy a larger version of the same item. We are all familiar with the results; Big Gulps at 7-11, Biggee size portions at Wendy’s, gigantic hamburgers, bags of fries and huge bags of potato chips and cookies.
According to Wallerstein, this works because today’s humans have a strong aversion to appearing like gluttons. The really bad news is that we are genetically predisposed to finish our meals, especially when they taste good. In fact, studies show that people and animals presented with large portions will eat up to 30% more than they would otherwise. This phenomenon is also an obvious vestige or residual effect from our “food scarcity” days.
This is just one of many documented examples of how there are people out there right now figuring out how to trick you into buying and eating more of their low grade food products. What alarms me most is that while these companies research and then exploit our natural predispositions to their benefit we are completely pre-occupied with work, family, debt and other day to day struggles. The vast majority of us are none the wiser. (3,105)
(Note: much of the above information has been eloquently exposed by author Michael Pollen in his best-selling book “Omnivore’s Dilemma” and his other enlightening writing)
So what can we conclude from all this? To me it is clear that given our natural propensities for the calories that make us the fattest – hunger is definitely our enemy. Being hungry creates in us a window of vulnerability to these harmful and fattening foods. Just by eating modern processed foods we experience almost uncontrollable hunger swings and will crave them again. So, our natural weaknesses and vulnerabilities are being used against us both before and even after we eat these foods.
Understanding our natural vulnerabilities and predilections, we can defend ourselves against their exploitation by those only wishing to make money by selling us their crappy, dangerous, processed food products. These human weaknesses are the main reasons that diets involving hunger, denial and food deprivation cause you nothing but pain and are doomed to failure. A complete answer to these modern food woes will be to instead eat primarily human Evolutionary foods – naturally raised meats, fruits, vegetables, nuts & seeds. These foods satisfy our hunger, make us feel great, don’t cause hunger swings, are exceedingly healthy and last but not least, will cause dramatic fat loss. To learn more about a natural eating plan, feel free to check out the eco-diet at http://www.eco-diet.com