{"id":2691,"date":"2010-03-03T17:21:57","date_gmt":"2010-03-03T22:21:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/?p=2691"},"modified":"2010-03-05T20:04:30","modified_gmt":"2010-03-06T01:04:30","slug":"get-out-of-jail-free-cards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/get-out-of-jail-free-cards\/","title":{"rendered":"Get Out of Jail Free cards."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I was making my coffee the other morning (I&#8217;m an apostate who drinks instant coffee at home, for various practical reasons, most of which have to do with me being a super-clutz who&#8217;s broken more coffee carafes than the coffee carafe industry can possibly keep up with) when I noticed something odd about the coffee label.<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s back up for a moment to detail my reasons for drinking coffee. Reasons which, I think, probably apply to the vast majority of coffee-drinkers.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I like the taste.<\/li>\n<li>I like the caffeine buzz.<\/li>\n<li>I like the ritual, and the emotional comfort of it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>You notice what&#8217;s not on that list? <em><\/em><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-2692\" title=\"antioxidants\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/antioxidants.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"275\" height=\"240\" \/><\/p>\n<p><em>Antioxidants.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s why it tripped me out to notice the big label on the can. <\/p>\n<p>I mean, it&#8217;s been there a while. Sure, I&#8217;ve noticed it before. But I never really <em>noticed it<\/em> until that morning.<\/p>\n<p>Inspired &#8212; and in a half-awake undercaffeinated haze &#8212; I decided to grab the nearest thing and look for a similar label.<\/p>\n<p>Since we ran out of milk the day before, and since we drink Canadian-style wussy coffee (meaning with milk or cream, plus sugar &#8212; black coffee is an abomination unto the Lord and shall not defile this house), the nearest thing was a delicious powdered non-dairy creamer. Which we keep as back-up to avoid a potential coffee crisis.<\/p>\n<p>(Priorities, people. We have them.)<\/p>\n<p>So I grabbed it, and guess what?<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/cholesterolfree.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"cholesterolfree\" width=\"252\" height=\"240\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-2699\" \/><\/p>\n<p>CHOLESTEROL FREE, YO.<\/p>\n<p>Which, you know, I suppose is useful information if you have significant dyslipidemia (that is, high blood cholesterol levels) <em>and<\/em> are sensitive to cholesterol in food (which not all people are, especially not at levels as low as a spoonful of cream or milk in your coffee. Saturated fat is now pretty well-known as the culprit in raising people&#8217;s blood cholesterol, and it&#8217;s been established that the dietary cholesterol panic of the 80s turned out to be misguided.)<\/p>\n<p>The lactose-free label, well&#8230;I take no issue with that. It&#8217;s something useful to have, front and centre, if you want to expand your market to include the many folks wishing not to endure a torrent of gaseous mishaps in the course of enjoying their morning brew.<\/p>\n<p>So, quick analysis, what&#8217;s up with these largely irrelevant labels on things? Especially things that I wouldn&#8217;t really think of as &#8220;food&#8221; in the first place, and which don&#8217;t contribute significantly to your total intake? (I mean, coffee is largely non-nutritive, and a teaspoon or two of fake coffee creamer is pretty damn close to non-nutritive. And, in any case, most people don&#8217;t drink more than one or a few cups of the stuff in a day.)<\/p>\n<p>My hypothesis is that, rather than the default cultural attitude toward food and food-like substances being &#8220;it&#8217;s fine to eat this, and it probably has things in it which are good for me, or, at least, are not actively harmful&#8221; we&#8217;ve reached a point, collectively, where our default attitude tends to be, &#8220;Should I eat\/drink\/ingest this? <a href=https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/food-isnt-poison\/>Is it poisonous?<\/a> Am I <em>allowed?<\/em>&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Coffee (and caffeine itself) has become a particularly loaded substance in certain dietary circles. When I was dieting, I also avoided drinking coffee&#8230;for no specific reason I&#8217;m aware of. Because it was The Thing to Do. Because coffee was vaguely regarded as A Bad, Unnatural Thing. <\/p>\n<p>Part of the package of virtuous self-denial included giving up coffee (and diet soda, <em>and and and<\/em>&#8230;whatever not-particularly-harmful or not-particularly-nutrition-impacting thing someone enjoyed just for the sake of it. Because food had become a tool, and <em>only<\/em> a tool. Everything consumed required instrumental justification.) <\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s a whole lot of anxiety to carry around. Enough that it&#8217;s going to make you second-guess your habitual purchases. Which is not very good for the folks who sell instant coffee.<\/p>\n<p>So, what can the food-industrial-complex use to smuggle its products through the barbed-wire fence of ambivalence erected by its twin sister, the diet-industrial-complex?<\/p>\n<p><strong>A label. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A label that, despite seeming to give you straightforward, useful information about antioxidants and cholesterol, is actually telling you, &#8220;Just this once, you&#8217;re exempted from guilt. You are granted permission to drink this coffee for Specific, Nutritional Benefits &#8212; not for the evil caffeine buzz, not for the comforting emotional associations. Not just because <em>it&#8217;s enjoyable.<\/em> Because it has <em>antioxidants,<\/em> and it&#8217;s <em>cholesterol free.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>In short, it&#8217;s a Get Out of Jail Free card. From a jail I believe they helped build. <\/p>\n<p>To you, the guilt-ridden consumer, from the food industry with love. <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/08\/break50.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"break50\" width=\"300\" height=\"18\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-620\" \/><\/p>\n<p><em>ETA: Awesome reader <a href=https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/get-out-of-jail-free-cards\/#comment-2764>Bookwyrm<\/a> made an equally awesome Get Out of Jail Free card. Read it and weep.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/29548647@N00\/4406309298\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/getoutofjailfree.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"getoutofjailfree\" width=\"250\" height=\"143\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-2745\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><center><em>Kaffee klatsch in <a href=https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/get-out-of-jail-free-cards\/#comments>comments.<\/a><\/em><\/center><\/p>\n<p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was making my coffee the other morning (I&#8217;m an apostate who drinks instant coffee at home, for various practical reasons, most of which have to do with me being a super-clutz who&#8217;s broken more coffee carafes than the coffee carafe industry can possibly keep up with) when I noticed something odd about the coffee [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[74,75,73],"class_list":["post-2691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-eating","tag-coffee","tag-food-labels","tag-nutrition-claims"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pw16f-Hp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2691"}],"version-history":[{"count":55,"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2691\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2749,"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2691\/revisions\/2749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fatnutritionist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}