By Any Other Name
ARGH!!!
I almost fell off the treadmill yesterday when I saw one of the new ads “explaining” how “corn sugar” is “fine in moderation”.
@#$!#$%#@#$!!
Yep, that’s right, the Corn Refiners Association is working hard to give High-Fructose Corn Syrup a makeover, including working to change the name to the much friendlier Corn Sugar. Sounds natural and oh-so-harmless, no?
If the F.D.A. lets this change go through than we will start seeing HFCS replaced with Corn Sugar on food labels in the next two years. In the meantime, the Corn Refiners have to settle for ads like the one I saw, and there are dozens like them, promoting buying and consuming products with HFCS Corn Sugar because it is “natural and the same as sugar”.
News Flash: It is highly processed in a lab. Since when is a lab a natural environment?
News Flash: Table sugar is crap too and now is not the time to be promoting sugar consumption in the country.
News Flash: HFCS contains high levels of mercury. Yuck.
I am not interested in debating the difference between sugar and HFCS, which is what the ads focus on. The real issue here is the gross OVER-CONSUMPTION of sugars and the processed food they are found in. I fear that when most people hear “same as sugar” and “ok in moderation” they actually hear a license to overeat over-processed, high sugar, high fat JUNK food. The Corn Sugar campaign has made “fine in moderation” their motto without giving any hint as to what counts as a moderate amount of this genetically modified, made-in-a-lab, substance.
Although I hate to give the makers of this shit another hit, here is one of their ads and a great spoof that clears up some of the…claims?
High-Fructose Corn Syrup by any other name is still crap.
BOTTOM LINE I may be preaching to the choir here but if you agree with me on this one than put your money where your mouth is and stop buying products with HFCS/Corn Sugar. Stop buying “food” with ingredients that were made in a lab. Tell your friends. Become a food renegade!
Have a (naturally) sweet day! 🙂