The Appetizer 🥗
Church of Scams: The Grift that Keeps on Giving
*New series name! Do you like it?*
Understanding the ancestral practice of drinking weird shit in the name of healthism
One of the sacred pillars in the Church of Scams is the appeal to nature fallacy. It’s this idea that if something’s “natural,” it’s automatically better, and if it’s “artificial,” it’s basically garbaggio. But let’s be honest—just because something is natural doesn’t mean it’s safe or even good for you! And yet, this belief has persisted through the ages. People will happily gulp down weird drinks just because they’re labeled as “pure” or “unprocessed.” Whether it’s some pricey cold-pressed juice or a sketchy mix of powders, the message is always the same: the closer it is to its raw, untouched form, the more magical the benefits. And that’s when the wellness influencers swoop in with their promises—because, sure, drinking their supplemental blend of proprietary powders is definitely the magic key to unlocking your healthiest, sexiest body.
But here’s the kicker—the appeal to nature fallacy isn’t just about pushing “natural” products. It’s also about preying on people’s disillusionment with the system. The wellness industry knows that we’re fed up with mainstream practices and there is money to spend, so we are way more likely to latch onto whatever “natural” solution they’re selling, no matter how out there it is. This makes consumers prime targets for conspiracy theories and misinformation, all in the name of finding an alternative to a system they don’t trust. It’s the same old story: only the wealthy get to “opt-out” of mainstream practices, leaving everyone else to deal with the consequences.
Let’s talk about how this “natural is better” thing is still going strong today. Case in point: raw milk.
Yep, raw milk is the hot new trendy superfood. In case you didn’t know, raw milk hasn’t been pasteurized. TLDR: Pasteurization is this process named after Louis Pasteur—a French scientist—where you heat food to kill off the gross germs that can make you sick. By the early 20th century, the U.S. was like, “Yeah, let’s do that,” and made pasteurization mandatory because, let’s be real, no one wants a side of salmonella with their cereal. But now, somehow, risking your health is a trend again because raw milk is back on the scene.
However, upon further reflection, drinking raw milk today can bee seen as the modern-day closed practice (closed to poor people who couldn’t afford it) of sipping radium water in the 1920s.
Back then, Dr. Luther S.H. Gable was all about promoting the so-called benefits of radium water. Yes, radium—the glowing, radioactive stuff—was actually sold as a health drink. It was hyped as a miracle elixir that would boost your energy, make you look younger, and perform all sorts of magical feats. Spoiler alert: it didn’t. Instead, it gave people radiation poisoning—major yikes. So while today’s raw milk enthusiasts might be risking a nasty bout of food poisoning, at least they’re not drinking a radioactive cocktail? I would say that’s an improvement, wouldn’t you?
And yet the sacred creed remains intact: the gospel that anything unprocessed, wild, and “natural” is inherently divine, no matter how risky or ridiculous it actually is. The devoted disciples of detox continue their holy practice of healthism! And none of these trendy “natural” solutions actually fix the deeper issues with the food industry. They don’t address the dissatisfaction with the quality of the mandatory practices or the fact that these practices continue to harm the most marginalized communities. So, while those with access and ability get to sip on their raw milk and green juices, everyone else is left to navigate a broken system that these wellness fads do nothing to change.
🌮The Main Course 🌯
The rising cost of inflated egos in anti-diet nutrition spaces
There’s a certain smugness that has crept into the dietetic world—a kind of self-fellating righteousness that insists if you just know what’s best for your body, you’ll automatically do what’s best. It’s a nice idea, but like most things that seem too good to be true, it misses the point entirely. Knowledge, as powerful as it is, often takes a backseat to the messy, complicated reality of life. Yet, somehow, we’ve convinced ourselves that the right information is all we need to make the perfect choices, ignoring that the ability to choose at all is a privilege not everyone has. I fear we’ve lost the plot.
For years, I was caught up in the same trap. I explained to anyone who’d listen the difference between a dietitian and a nutritionist, always implying that one was better, more trustworthy than the other. It’s true that becoming a dietitian requires more rigorous training, but it doesn’t mean dietitians are inherently more reliable. After all, as I’ve learned, there are plenty of untrustables in any professional field. It took time, but I eventually stopped saying, “You should only trust a dietitian,” because the truth is, trustworthiness isn’t only about credentials—it’s about context.
Even within the anti-diet community, where I once found solace in rejecting diet culture outright, I started to notice the same inflated sense of certainty.
Anti-diet/ Intuitive Eating/ Weight Inclusivity became the new gold standard, the new moral high ground from which we could look down on those still caught in the weight loss trap. I proudly wore my anti-diet label like a badge of honor, reveling in the idea that I could provide care in the absence of weight loss. It felt radical, almost revolutionary, to reject the relentless churn of diet culture.
As an outpatient dietitian, I began grappling with the complexities of navigating weight management MNT in office and my own non-diet beliefs in life and online. And when the new bombshell entered the villa (Read: GLP-1s), the social media discourse around doing Anti-Diet, Intuitive Eating, and Weight Inclusivity "the right way" began to feel stifling—restrictive, dogmatic, and, dare I say, increasingly out of touch. I remember the pushback was swift when GLP-1 use for weight management within a weight-neutral framework (say that 5 times fast) was brought up during a panel at a conference. We were accused of being neoliberal puppets, feigning nuance, and purposefully misinterpreting the ten commandments Principles of Intuitive Eating. And honestly, maybe?? Could there be a chance we are completely off base? Maybe. Maybe I am part of the problem. I mean I am fully aware that I could be in the wrong—that by offering weight management MNT, I am causing harm by reinforcing diet culture and weight bias. But ignoring the reasons someone might choose to lose weight doesn’t make those reasons disappear. It just means we’re complicit in a different kind of denial.
Over time, we’ve stumbled upon a rather unsettling truth: intersectionality has devolved into the Oppression Olympics, where the gold medal is awarded to the loudest “victim”. And what’s the result? We’ve birthed a new kind of miserable delusion: a non-political weight-inclusive group, for those who are above the messy, politically charged landscape of bodies and health.
But here’s the thing: there’s no such thing as apolitical when it comes to our bodies, our choices, and the society we live in. And we (and by “we” I mean me) were really fucking stupid to believe this was anything more than a mask for the same ol’ white feminism, repackaged and served up under the guise of intersectionality and inclusivity.
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