A fatty, fatty conspiracy

Everything seems to be bad for you to an extent, but I really wish they'd stop pumping this stuff into all of our food.

Fructose and high fructose corn syrup are not the same thing. Sugar (sucrose) is a naturally occurring compound, equal parts glucose and fructose. High Fructose corn syrup is an unbound version of fructose and glucose with a different molecular structure. It is not natural. It is manufactured through a chemical process that breaks down natural components of sugar, and extracts and converts the remaining bits into "usable" substances. And then they turn it into a nasty viscous syrup. In natural sugar fructose is a disaccharide. In HFCS it is a monosaccharide.

Fructose is processed mostly by the liver. The liver converts a bunch of fructose into triglycerides. The fructose from HFCS is processed in a different way than that of natural sugar. In HFCS, the fructose is shunted. It skips processing that occurs in the cells of the body to extract the fructose and send it to the liver. It goes straight to the liver. And it is already not bound to glucose so it is processed quickly into fat.

Also, HFCS is about 55% Fructose, unlike natural sugar. HFCS is converted to fat in your body faster than any other sugar.
So on top of that, things that don't even need sweetened have HFCS in them, as a preservative. Food can store longer, making it cheaper. For example, white bread. It is chock full of sugar. As well as a lot of other products you wouldn't expect to find it in.



And how about this:
“Most corn is grown as a monoculture, meaning that the land is used solely for corn, not rotated among crops. This maximizes yields, but at a price: It depletes soil nutrients, requiring more pesticides and fertilizer while weakening topsoil.

“The environmental footprint of HFCS is deep and wide,” writes Pollan, a prominent critic of industrial agriculture. “Look no farther than the dead zone in the Gulf [of Mexico], an area the size of New Jersey where virtually nothing will live because it has been starved of oxygen by the fertilizer runoff coming down the Mississippi from the Corn Belt. Then there is the atrazine in the water in farm country — a nasty herbicide that, at concentrations as little as 0.1 part per billion, has been shown to turn male frogs into hermaphrodites.”

Milling and chemically altering corn to form high-fructose corn syrup also is energy-intensive. That’s not to say that corn is evil and other foods aren’t; all crops require energy to grow and transport. What makes corn a target is that federal subsidies — and tariffs on imported sugar — keep prices low, paving the way for widespread use of high-fructose corn syrup and, in the process, keeping the American palate accustomed to the sweetness it provides.

Corn is a useful crop with high yields, although it uses more fertilizers and insecticides and causes more soil erosion than other crops, according to David Pimentel, a professor in Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. “Organic corn is not a large part of the industry, but it should be,” he says. Pimentel published a study in 2005 demonstrating that, over 22 years, growing corn organically produced the same yields as conventional growing and used 33 percent less fuel.”

When Coke switched to HFCS it gave them a 70 million dollar advantage over Pepsi (30 years ago or something) Diabetes is a scary thing. My Gpa has 1 1/2 feet because of diabetes. Or more so because of his trouble coping with diabetes, but still. I want 2 whole feet.
“HFCS, a liquid sweetener commonly used in soft drinks that contains both fructose and glucose, has been accused of causing diabetes, particularly in children, and a recent study further supported this theory.

The study investigated 11 different soft drinks and found “astonishingly high” levels of reactive carbonyls, which are thought to cause cell and tissue damage.

Reactive carbonyls are associated with diabetes, as they’re found in higher levels in the bloodstreams of people with the disease. Reactive carbonyls are linked with the unbound structure of fructose and glucose molecules in HFCS, and are not found in table sugar.”
Fructose also inhibits satiation (that nice full feeling you get after a good meal). That makes us eat more. If your diet lacks important nutrients (which it will if you eat a shit ton of processed foods) you will keep getting cravings until you give your body what its lacking.

[…] President Bush signed a bill requiring taxpayers to pay farmers $4 billion a year, over a ten-year period, to grow more corn. More corn when the U.S. is desperately trying to find ways to get rid of the current surplus corn produced here. More corn when farmers are currently selling it for over a dollar less per bushel than it cost them to produce it. A $190 billion bill to grow more corn when planting less corn would increase the price farmers receive for it, and eliminate the extreme surplus. If farmers don’t benefit from this bill, then who does? The Archer Daniels Midlands, Tysons and Coca-Colas of the world. “ - Mercola.com (”Why Corn Is Not Your Best Food Choice“)

This one is long so just play it in the background while you do something else.