The crusade of food bimbos
Food scares and fads both warrant a spoonful of suspicion
This week, Kraft Foods announced that it was changing the formulation of its famous macaroni and cheese. The company will remove food coloring after being the latest target of an online peasants-with-pitchforks campaign run by a blogger calling herself "The Food Babe."
Kraft says it's eliminating the ingredients based on "consumer concerns," not the Food Babe's petition. But the Food Babe's misinformation campaign and scaremongering about the safety of Mac N' Cheese coloring surely contributed to the decision, which has everything to do with perception and nothing to do with science or food safety.
Meanwhile, last Friday, daytime TV personality Dr. Oz came under fire from 10 medical doctors who called for his termination from Columbia University. His alleged misconduct? The promotion of quackery about nutrition and health.
The two cases highlight the need for more aggressive and earlier reactions to the idiocy being circulated by food fear-mongers.
There has been no shortage of faulty food-scare campaigns. Activists complained about mercury in tuna, but they relied on data from whale-meat studies. (The true fishiness of this campaign was revealed when the Food and Drug Administration drafted revised recommendations encouraging more tuna consumption last year.) High fructose corn syrup, or HFCS, was pilloried by food activists, even though it's nutritionally equivalent to table sugar. There have been Internet campaigns against genetically improved crops, despite world scientific bodies coming to the conclusion that the foods are just as safe as others.
Eggs were demonized in the 1970s, now they're considered a health food. In the 1980s, the activist Center for Science in the Public Interest pushed restaurants into switching to oil containing trans fat; the group later made an embarrassing about-face.
Mainstream fads have their drawbacks. Organic food production may use animal manure as a fertilizer, increasing the risk of E. coli contamination. "Pasture-based" animal production not only costs more, but it can expose farm animals to diseases and predators.
With all of the fads, scares and misinformation out there, it's easy to get confused about how to react. The key is not to give in to activists. But that means you can't be dismissive when these campaigns are only in their infancy. A little vision will tell you that the people who name themselves with high-minded sounding monikers, e.g., Center for Science in the Public Interest or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, have a head start in the later "he said, she said" jousting. Consider that these groups have money, ideologically driven staff with long-term agendas, no natural enemies and a willingness to use hyperbole. Left alone, they will get traction. And the agendas range from food to energy and the environment, and to labor. All areas have issues in play with junk science or twisted economic theories masquerading as empirical evidence.
You can choose to be early or late to engage. But because the tipping point is only known in hindsight there is only one good choice.
In the case of Dr. Oz, that means aggressively exposing him for his nonsense. Every time he posits a new wacky idea. The medical doctor leading the charge for Oz to be fired from Columbia bluntly calls him a "quack." Dr. Oz has promoted a number of "superfoods" and "miracle" cures, while also giving airtime to a number of questionable guests (including the Food Babe). Research published in the British Medical Journal this winter reviewed Dr. Oz shows and discovered that more than half of the time Dr. Oz's recommendations were not supported by the available evidence. But his viewership numbers suggest most never got the memo.
Stolen emails posted by Wikileaks last week also provide a glimpse inside the Land of Oz. In them, Dr. Oz's commercial side is revealed as he posits promoting wearable fitness devices. While Dr. Oz would like nothing more than his audience to think he's free of conflict of interest, he has to make money and get ratings or he's off the air. That means Oz has a clear incentive to shill and exaggerate, or worse.
As for the Food Babe, her modus operandi is to complain about a chemical she can't pronounce and sic her legion of followers onto a company demanding change, while hawking her book. But the scientific community has been increasingly pushing back against her nonsense and utter lack of credentials. She's not even a schlock doc — she has no degree in medicine or nutrition. The media has also focused in on her weird ranting against microwaves and other quackish ideas.
Food Babe and Dr. Oz have been put on the defensive but not until it has become too late for some of their targets.
Successful companies always respond to consumer demands. But what's going on here isn't real consumer demand. It's an activist campaign masquerading as consumer demand. Ignore the dynamic at your peril.
• Rick Berman is president of Berman and Co., a Washington public affairs firm.
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