Hello beautiful people,
While you may have woken up to the mainstream narrative in the food industry, most people haven’t.
Most people still accept the conventional narrative that animal foods are harmful, and plant-foods are universally healthier.
There's a good reason they think that, they just might not know it.
To illustrate my point:
What do you think the health rating of a grass-fed beef burger is?
Any guesses?
You’d think one of the most nutritious foods we can get would have one of the highest health ratings right?
2/5…
Hmm okay, but what could be better?
Pepsi (not even a diet one!).
Alright…
Even better than that?
Oat milk. What's in it? You’ll see the third ingredient on that list is none other than canola oil.
Wild.
You might be wondering, how did we get here? How did we get to a point where natural, nutritious food is demonised while highly processed foods are promoted as healthy alternatives?
Two weeks ago, I listened to Belinda Fettke answer that very question, or a large part of it at least.
The answer will surprise you.
Belinda told us the story of her husband, Dr Gary Fettke. Dr Fettke is an orthopaedic surgeon that was banned from giving diet advice in 2016.
Why?
He reversed his patients diabetes (how terrible!).
He did this, not with heaps of pharmaceutical drugs, but by prescribing eggs and cheese, and pushing for reduced sugar for diabetic hospital patients - you know, the thing that causes diabetes.
Not only did he vastly improve the health of his patients, he did it on live television.
So naturally, AHPRA - the body that regulates doctors in Australia, banned him from giving diet advice for life.
You’d be correct in thinking that doesn’t make sense.
He was banned because members of the Dietitians Association of Australia (DAA), who didn’t like Fettke's dietary recommendation to reduce diabetic patients sugar levels and put them on a low-carb high-fat diet, reported him to AHPRA.
So Belinda did some digging.
Here’s what she found:
The DAA were in bed with many processed food companies (check out this report from 2015).
Some of their partners include Nestle - a big supporter of the health star rating initiative, Kellogg’s - the massive cereal manufacturer, PepsiCo, and Coca Cola.
Now you can guess why they’d do this.
Yes, profit.
But was that always the reason? And is it the only reason health star ratings don't make sense, and a medical professional was banned from giving diet advice that cured his patients?
As with most things, it goes deeper than that…
It starts over 170 years ago with a woman called Ellen G. White, one of the co-founders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
As a result of a childhood accident, she dealt with chronic pain and illness and even had bouts of paralysis for a large portion of her life.
While speaking in 1869, she noted “having had five shocks of paralysis. I have been with my left arm bound to my side for months, because the pain in my heart was so great.”
Life was a struggle.
But her faith kept her strong, and she experienced several ‘health reform visions’ over a 15 year period.
Her first two were fairly straightforward. They told her about the dangers of tobacco and alcohol, and the importance of cleanliness and hygiene. Seems fairly sensible...
Her third one was the most detailed and powerful. I’ll get to this in a second.
Her fourth one was a call to action from God for the Adventists to start their own centre for promoting health principles and helping sick people recover. They needed a place to care for the sick and teach health reform in the context of their beliefs. And so came the Western Health Reform Institute (later known as Battle Creek Sanitarium).
Remember that name for later.
Back to her third vision. This came at a time when both her and her husband were battling ill health, both mentally and physically. A good portion of the vision was counsel for them specifically on their health issues.
“I saw that now we should take special care of the health God has given us, for our work was not yet done."
“Especially should we turn our attention to our health, and take time to devote to our health that we may in a degree recover from the effects of overdoing and overtaxing the mind.”
But the rest covered general health principles and how, in her belief, they would bring us closer to God.
But in a nutshell, the vision told her about:
- The connection of health to the spiritual life
- The link between lifestyle and disease
- The negative effects of alcohol, tobacco, stimulating drinks, and rich food
- Temperance (self-control) in every aspect of life—eating, drinking, and working
- A simple vegetarian diet
- Avoidance of unclean meat, such as pork
- Cleanliness and hygiene
- The healing power of exercise, pure water, fresh air, and sunlight
- The dangers of recreational drugs (particularly those used in Ellen White’s time)
- The power of the mind and the importance of a positive attitude
- The role of health reform in the Adventist mission
The reality is, I agree with her on a lot of those things. You probably do too.
The link between lifestyle and disease? Yep.
The connection between physical health and spiritual health? Yep.
The dangers of some recreational drugs? Yep.
The healing power of exercise, pure water, fresh air, and sunlight? Yep, yep, yep, and yep.
And after making all these lifestyle changes, and shifting to a plant-based diet, Ellen felt profoundly better, as you would do when you make an intentional choice to live a healthier life.
“My health has never been better than for the past six months. My former faint and dizzy feelings have left me. … It is seldom I have a faint feeling. My appetite is satisfied. My food is eaten with a greater relish than ever before.”
She believed a big part of this was that she had greatly reduced her consumption of meat...
It couldn’t possibly be cutting out any of the other crap and starting to exercise outside more, could it?
Now remember, she was a leader of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, and considered by many to be a prophet of sorts. So from their point of view, she had received visions from God, she had made changes to her lifestyle, and seen huge benefit from it. It would seem obvious that this is the way forward.
And so was born, the push for plant-based foods.
Guess who else was a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church?
John Harvey Kellogg. That name might sound familiar to some of you.
He became the director of Battle Creek Sanitarium after Ellen White founded it. It was there that corn flakes were first created, which then led to the formation of Kellogg’s cereal company in 1906.
He hadn't just adopted these principles personally—he built an entire commercial empire around them, reshaping what Americans, and every other western country considers 'healthy breakfast foods.'
You might remember from earlier that Kellogg’s is one of the companies that has partnerships with the Dieticians Association of Australia - the ones that came after Dr Gary Fettke.
But that’s not all…
Edward Halsey, a baker in Kellogg’s Sanitarium, and a Seventh-day Adventist, moved to Australia in 1897.
He went on to found the company ‘Sanitarium Health and Wellbeing Company’.
Their flagship product?
Weet-Bix.
Can you guess the health rating of Weet-Bix?
If you guessed 5/5, full marks to you.
Oh, and just for fun, here is the health rating for Kellogg’s Froot Loops…
2.5/5. Healthier than grass-fed beef!
So now you know:
How the religious visions of one woman over 160 years ago, led to the creation of global food corporations that reshaped public 'health' and a system where plant-based foods are heavily pushed, and how that led to the silencing of Dr Gary Fettke (and my complete confusion in the grocery store).
Feel free to use this as ammunition next time someone tries to tell you that your diet goes against mainstream food guidelines.
We won't fix the system, too many people are making far too much money to allow that to happen (Kellogg's made $1.34 billion last year). Even if we could, it would be far too slow.
But you can fix your little corner of the world.
How?
There are two ways:
- The biggest one, be the change you want to see in the world. Build a new system. Your own food systems and your own communities - systems that produce natural, regeneratively grown food that nourishes your family, your community, and the environment.
That's what we've done at Wild Minds Community, if that's what you want to do, get in touch. We'd love to help. - If you don’t have the resources to build your own, support your local regenerative farm. Buy as local as possible, and get others to do the same.
Phew! That was a long one, but as we know, the rabbit-hole runs deep.
Hopefully you found that interesting. There is a lesson to be taken from this, which we’ll explore next week.
That’s all for today.
Eat a steak, get some sunlight, keep well.
To your freedom and independence,
Rob
Wild Minds Community
PS.
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DISCLAIMER:
This wasn't written to demonise the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
This is just one explanation of how mainstream views of nutrition have been shaped.
This newsletter is not anti-religion, nor is it my intention to invalidate anyone's beliefs.
