Internet Snipers

Long, long ago I pushed the Galaxy bar away and all other chocolate with high sugar content. I recognised that it was carefully crafted to deepen my addiction. After many months of wrestling to overcome my habits I gave in to The Dark Side. Now a formidable promoter of the cocoa bean I have come to appreciate the deep secrets of pure Organic Cocoa powder from Green & Black and I use it liberally throughout the day – in porridge, in smoothies and desserts. This rich source of magnesium has helped stop night-time cramps and I believe is reducing the severity of my headaches. It’s not yet overcoming insomnia. – Might that be because I’m not taking enough of it ? Joking apart, there are important issues here: Sugar is highly addictive and for generations our food product manufacturers have been formulating their offerings to ensnare us and increase their revenues. In particular our high street fast food outlets have developed their own brand flavours to carve out their market share at the expense of our health. Many of us have indeed become ‘Supersized’ as a result. While the ‘Upsize’ is obvious, the downside is typically many years in the future as our health fails prematurely. People finding themselves in this predicament often also believe it’s too late to change “I’m diabetic,…I have cancer,…. I have heart disease……It’s in my genes, there’s nothing I can do about it”. They prefer to wear a medical label than to take corrective action. Others instead choose to brazen it out – “I know a guy who’s 90 and has smoked 40 a day all his life” etc. – let me know how that works for you! The less obvious issue in the opening paragraph is the appalling lack of understanding of the importance of our food in determining our health and the medicinal properties of common foodstuffs. Additionally there’s often a deep suspicion around anyone who believes that food matters for more than just filling the belly. The notion of defending health through proper nutrition is almost sacrilegious – especially to the pharmaceutical lobbies who potentially stand to lose so much from increased public awareness and changing attitudes. Indeed there seems to be a concerted effort to discredit those who promote a more holistic approach to healthcare generally. We have established a system of medical imperialism in which allopathic medicine enjoys legal protection as the only science-based option for patients. How did the human race survive so long without it? More sinister is the use of ‘media hit men’ or ‘internet snipers’ like Stephen Barrett and David Gorski who seem to revel in defamation of anyone attempting to awaken the masses to the reality of natural healing. Who pays these guys to spit such venom? When their sponsors’ businesses fail, as they inevitably must, will they simply seek other sponsors and begin again? Gorski’s recent hatchet-job ‘Let Food Be Thy Medicine and Medicine be Thy Food’ attacks the very foundation of medicine in a distorted tirade against the truth. It is said that ‘The mind is like a parachute; it works best when it is open’. If that is so then for their sake I hope they find the rip cord before Max Plank’s saying ‘Progress advances one funeral at a time’ becomes their reality.