It’s Thanksgiving, a time when family and friends gather to enjoy one another, delicious appetizers and a trio of football games.
After hours of catching up with relatives, it comes time for the main event: Thanksgiving dinner. Your grandmother whacks a pan loudly as she urges everyone to gather around the table as your grandfather’s hearing aid explodes in his ear, triggering a string of curse words from him you never knew existed.
Everyone’s excitement builds as the wonderful feast is laid out on the dinner table. But as you sit down and prepare for the feast, someone just has to get into something even more controversial than the presidential election: food politics.
Perhaps it’s your aunt, who’s on a non-GMO kick after watching too many Dr. Oz reruns. Or perhaps it’s your teenage cousin going through a “veg” phase and stubbornly refusing to pass the turkey (or the butter, the potatoes au gratin or the gravy). Or perhaps it’s your dad who lectures about how bad all the sugar is in that perfectly can-formed cranberry sauce — he saw a video on the internet, don’t you know.
If there’s one meal where there shouldn’t be any food snobbery and policing, shouldn’t it be Thanksgiving?
But before you ask your inebriated uncle to pass you some of the good stuff to get you through dinner, consider a few shut-down facts for anyone who tries to serve up a side of food politics.
Genetically modified food is a hot-button issue; this year, a federal law was passed requiring labels on foods with GM ingredients (that’s about a gazillion foods). A small batch of people has for years questioned whether these foods could really be harmful to us. Here’s the indisputable fact: No.
Scientific bodies around the globe have come to the conclusion that genetically modified foods are just as safe as organic foods. And the technology is being used to research things such as putting vitamin A into rice in order to fight blindness in the Third World from vitamin deficiency. Surely, even non-GMO eaters can support that, right?
As for your cousin who’s preaching animal-free food after stumbling across the websites for PETA or the Humane Society of the United States, consider research showing vegans and vegetarians have a higher risk of being vitamin B12 deficient (B12 only occurs naturally in animal products and is vital to brain health).
There’s nothing wrong with a diet full of green beans, potatoes and cranberries, but it’s nice to have a natural source of iron, protein and vitamins.
Last but not least, sugar is one of the latest things to get a bad rap. Public health advocates have called for alcohol-style controls on soda and other sugar-sweetened beverages. Imagine getting carded just to buy a 12-pack of pop.
But the bottom line is a calorie is a calorie, according to dietitians, whether it’s from carbohydrates, fat or protein. Don’t consume too many except on special occasions — such as a once-a-year holiday feast — and you’ll be OK.
With the amount of food fads out there, it’s a miracle enough food gets cooked to satisfy everyone. As we sit down at the table, perhaps we should all just give thanks not just to the cooks, but to the farmers who worked hard to produce this year’s harvest — whatever labels it has.
Wouldn’t that be the best way to start the holiday season?
Will Coggin is research director with the Center for Consumer Freedom in Washington, D.C.
