How stupid they were...

For your viewing pleasure, here are some old advertisements:

Now let's all marvel at how stupid doctors and scientists were fifty years ago. Hahaha, they thought they knew EVERYthing, and yet they knew so little....hahaha....the fools. It's a good thing we are now soooo much smarter and that people theses days are soooo much healthier than they were during the time when these ads were made....(can you tell I'm being sarcastic?)

Wait a second! We're not healthier! Far from it, we are fatter and more diseased as a nation than we've ever been. How is this possible when the pictures above are proof of how misguided people used to be? I believe the answer lies in day time television.

I often work evenings, and as a guilty pleasure on these days I often enjoy morning talk shows. I don't know if I was just paying attention for the first time the other day, but my jaw literally dropped and I started laughing out loud when the commercials came on. I then got a piece of paper and began writing what I saw. The ads (I swear I am not making this up) came in this order:

Splenda

The American Cancer Society

The Olive Garden

Weight loss supplements

Honey Bunches of Oats

Miralax

Yoplait Lite

Healthmart Pharmacy

Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice

Diabetes medicine

If you don't know what I'm getting at, read that list again, in order, very slowly. If that's not the most self-evident list of cause and effect you've ever seen, I don't know what is. And yet we think we know what makes us healthy!

I would venture to say (and I really, really hope) that another fifty years from now people will look at these TV commercials and laugh the way we laugh at the ads above. The public in general is still so ignorant to what health means, and the most unbelievable part is that the answer is so simple! In the words of Michael Pollan, "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants." When, oh when, will we get there???