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29 Mar 2011I am usually pretty well immune to this sort of stuff these days, but this really made my blood boil. From the article “Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin”, in time.com’s “Health and Science” (in which the science is obviously optional), we have this sidebar:
What. The. Fuck. First, allow me to not mince words here: linking to an article about how carbohydrates “help you lose weight” flanked by two articles about diabetes is beyond ironic: it borders on criminally negligent. It’s hard not to get conspiratorial when you see shit like this. Health.com is a (formerly women’s) health magazine bought by Time, Inc. in 1991. I don’t even know where to begin with how fucked up the article itself is, but like most nutritional “journalism”, it’s mostly garbage. Paradoxically, I agree with its conclusion that exercise won’t make you thin. But so the fuck what? Exercise is good for you, and being thin is not what it’s important: being healthy is. So, in one convenient package brought to you by Time, Inc, we have them:
- Implying that thin is ideal (Attack the body image.)
- Suggesting that you don’t really need to exercise (Appeal to laziness.)
- Justifying it by saying that exercise just makes you eat more calories (Blame the victim, and toss in the ol’ energy-in/energy-out calorie-counting fallacy.)
- Completely ignore the constitution of one’s diet as a factor – in particular, ignoring the wealth of science demonstrating that excess carbohydrate intake is literally responsible for type 2 diabetes and obesity – while simultaneously: (Deliberately mislead.)
- … linking to an article claiming that carbohydrates can help you lose weight. (Lie.)
You just can’t make this shit up.