My school is stupid

[wombifat]

Today our school brought someone to talk to us about "nutrition" even though she had no qualifications in anything health or nutrition related...or anything at all. She told us that the more natural something is, the better it is for your brain. The more processed, the worse it is. She used no real evidence during her talk, and only had anecdotal evidence and referred to studies that had nothing to do with her point (for example the evidence that shows that you need 8 glasses of water a day is that athletes can run for longer if they drink more water...WTF?)

She also told us that we only like processed foods because we had trained our tastebuds to like them, and that subway is bad for you and will do nothing for your brain.


wtf is wrong with my school?

just had to vent

[TrueTears]

LOL, well it is quite important to eat well each day

[ZachCharge]

Ha, I've heard that "the more processed the more crap it is" speech before...then again that person was trying to convince me fruit has magical properties scientist haven't discovered yet and that I should have a lot of fruit despite being a diabetic...

Did anyone try to be a smart ass against the speaker or anything though, sounds like the situation you'd expect some kid to take the piss out of.

[shinny]

While most of it is actually right, the lack of evidence is what's concerning you I guess. However...

She also told us that we only like processed foods because we had trained our tastebuds to like them, and that subway is bad for you and will do nothing for your brain.

Wrong. Things like fat and salt were hard to come by in our caveman days, and so our body adjusted our tastebuds to encourage our caveman ancestors to eat more of this stuff. Our body can occasionally do this now even...I've definitely had cases where I've craved stuff like cereal at midnight for no apparent reason, and pregnant mothers have been known to crave dirt due to a need for minerals (yes, I've heard of a case where a mother actually went down to the park and ate dirt).

EDIT: Actually, I don't think the caveman thing is necessarily definitively true as they can't really get evidence for it either. It's just the most commonly accepted explanation and makes a hell of a lot more sense than what your lecturer stated =P

[Edmund]

Stick your hand up and ask for evidence.

[wombifat]

Ha, I've heard that "the more processed the more crap it is" speech before...then again that person was trying to convince me fruit has magical properties scientist haven't discovered yet and that I should have a lot of fruit despite being a diabetic...

Did anyone try to be a smart ass against the speaker or anything though, sounds like the situation you'd expect some kid to take the piss out of.

Probably the same thing. But yeah, nobody was even a smartass people just asked logical questions. For example, when she said Subway was bad for you I asked what you COULD eat if a salad roll was bad for you and she said it was because the bread was white and I said they had wholemeal bread and she just ignored my question and started crapping on about how wholemeal bread can be bad for you.

Someone said that they knew someone who had never tasted coke before and then tried it and loved it and she basically acted like a politician and just repeated what she had already said without answering it.

And after a bit she said it was the end of question time and we had to move on and didn't take any more questions.

I was really tempted to ask her what qualifications she had but it was pretty obvious she had none.

[Glockmeister]

Ha, I've heard that "the more processed the more crap it is" speech before...then again that person was trying to convince me fruit has magical properties scientist haven't discovered yet and that I should have a lot of fruit despite being a diabetic...

Did anyone try to be a smart ass against the speaker or anything though, sounds like the situation you'd expect some kid to take the piss out of.

Probably the same thing. But yeah, nobody was even a smartass people just asked logical questions. For example, when she said Subway was bad for you I asked what you COULD eat if a salad roll was bad for you and she said it was because the bread was white and I said they had wholemeal bread and she just ignored my question and started crapping on about how wholemeal bread can be bad for you.

Someone said that they knew someone who had never tasted coke before and then tried it and loved it and she basically acted like a politician and just repeated what she had already said without answering it.

And after a bit she said it was the end of question time and we had to move on and didn't take any more questions.

I was really tempted to ask her what qualifications she had but it was pretty obvious she had none.

It'd probably be some degree from whoop whoop university which turns out to be some diploma mill.

[Fyrefly]

Lol! Weird.

Ur story reminds me of something that happened a couple of years ago...

We had some footy players come 2 our skool 2 do a spiel about how good powerade is (or was it gatorade mayb?) and how it replaces lost electrolytes and shit.
They were coming out with all these totally unsubstantiated comments... jst ridiculous sorts of stuff.
I tore thru them with Qs they couldn't answer, then walked out.
My teacher asked me where I thought I was going.
All I said was: "This is a school, not a medium for advertisement."

That teacher never liked me... I think she was quite conflicted that I could b so smart, but such a pain in the ass @ the same time...

[wombifat]

Yeah, I think plenty of teachers felt the same about me. Some teachers can't stand opinionated students.

[ReVeL]

We had some footy players come 2 our skool 2 do a spiel about how good powerade is (or was it gatorade mayb?) and how it replaces lost electrolytes and shit.
They were coming out with all these totally unsubstantiated comments... jst ridiculous sorts of stuff.
I tore thru them with Qs they couldn't answer, then walked out.
My teacher asked me where I thought I was going.
All I said was: "This is a school, not a medium for advertisement."

Haha very nice.

Do you remember what you asked them?

[kurrymuncher]

Lol! Weird.

Ur story reminds me of something that happened a couple of years ago...

We had some footy players come 2 our skool 2 do a spiel about how good powerade is (or was it gatorade mayb?) and how it replaces lost electrolytes and shit.
They were coming out with all these totally unsubstantiated comments... jst ridiculous sorts of stuff.
I tore thru them with Qs they couldn't answer, then walked out.
My teacher asked me where I thought I was going.
All I said was: "This is a school, not a medium for advertisement."

That teacher never liked me... I think she was quite conflicted that I could b so smart, but such a pain in the ass @ the same time...

lol that happened to our school too, but I dont think they were trying to advertise the drinks. People like Fraser Gehrig or whatever.......

[Fyrefly]

We had some footy players come 2 our skool 2 do a spiel about how good powerade is (or was it gatorade mayb?) and how it replaces lost electrolytes and shit.
They were coming out with all these totally unsubstantiated comments... jst ridiculous sorts of stuff.
I tore thru them with Qs they couldn't answer, then walked out.
My teacher asked me where I thought I was going.
All I said was: "This is a school, not a medium for advertisement."

Haha very nice.

Do you remember what you asked them?

Mmm... I don't remember fully, but it was mainly about the levels of sugar and salt in the product.

They were like: "Do you know how many cups of fluid an athlete loses in sweat? 6 cups!" and other stuff.
I was like: "Then wouldn't those products do more harm than good to the average person? I hardly fathom any1 doing enuf exercise on a regular basis to warrant such excessive consumption of salt, or 'sodium electrolytes' as you say. Last time I checked, salt was bad 4 u, and most ppl already have 2 much in their diet as it is. Yeah... and I've never sweated that much b4."

I also questioned the fact that they were encouraging children (teenagers/children same diff) 2 drink a product high in sugar - I pointed out that dentists strongly recommend against this, and health professionals say that water is best for hydrating children.

I think @ the time, there were artificial flavours/colours in some of them as well - hopefully that's changed since then...

I dunno... normally I'd jst make a few weird remarks 4 my friends' ears only, but it jst really irritated me that they were marketing their sponsor's product as a healthier and better substitute 4 water.

I guess I figured that there's enuf bullshit diets and exercises myths out there as it is, without them screwing teenagers' minds about something as basic as the benefits of drinking water...


U no... those guys never did come bak 2 do another session... XD

Edit: I am secretly promoting water - can u tell?
Man, is it gonna make me rich ;-)
Now... if only I could figure out how 2 make ppl pay me 4 water... XD

I think I jst morphed this topic in2 a discussion about sports drinks -.-

[wombifat]

gatorade is probably better to drink than water when you're exercising, but if you don't exercise hardcore there's not much point to it. I mean the main ingredient is water.

[cardiovascular]

You will find Powerade has been scientifcally proven to work.
http://www.nswis.com.au/assets/documents/Powerade_Isotonic_ABSTRACT.pdf
Experiment carried out by the New South Wales Institute of Sport concluded that Powerade performed better than the placebo.

Fyrefly you can be wrong and in this case you are

[Glockmeister]

You will find Powerade has been scientifcally proven to work.
http://www.nswis.com.au/assets/documents/Powerade_Isotonic_ABSTRACT.pdf
Experiment carried out by the New South Wales Institute of Sport concluded that Powerade performed better than the placebo.

Fyrefly you can be wrong and in this case you are

Two words. Non-representative Sample.