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Look. Paleo dick. Whoever you are, there is a very good chance you need to fuck off. For some weeks now, I have been visited and contacted by you, a rubbish thinker who cannot even spell the names of their Big Pharma Agro-Industrial Complex adversaries let alone meaningfully decry them. I would like this to stop. I don’t know which tedious tank of raw human mind-waste it was that dumped this stink on my blog and nor do I care but let it be said: fuck off. Fuck off and stop linking to me and shitting in my inbox. We have nothing to say to each other.
To be very clear, I am not interested in remediating your behaviour. I do not personally care if you ascribe healing powers to a crystal, believe that We Are All One or think that some of the problems of contemporary medical practice can be addressed by a celebrity chef whose primary labour it otherwise is to tell unpleasant, boring people on the television their haloumi appetiser lacks appropriate tang. Go for it. Join whichever cult you fancy, pray to the gourmet non-dairy cheese god and pin your hopes for salvation on reality TV. It is your defensible right to consume any nonsense upchucked to your mouth by a critically deluded mass-culture mummybird you wish. If this sick-feed allays the hunger for meaning we both know would starve you if you took even a short break from feeding your suggestible face with easy pseudo-knowledge, fine. FINE.
Eat Like Your Ancestors, even though they demonstrably didn’t eat that way. Fill the heads of your children with irrational suspicion of science, even though it is exactly this irrational suspicion that actively stops meaningful address of climate change. Pretend that measles is the goddess’ own special way of rewarding humanity and that immunisation is not a marvel of medical science but a blight. Just stay out of my way.
Even if we agree, and I believe that sometimes we do, that late agricultural practice is wanting and medicalisation can create as much disease as it cures, we cannot agree that you could find your arse with two hands. With two hands, Google Maps and a year of intensive arse-finding workshops.
It is not your stated goal but you that is fundamentally stupid. No good can come of you and no good can come of our communications. So, please stop troubling me with notes about A Wholesome Future as my opinion that you are a dick whose failure to see beyond the picture-book caricature of good and evil would be cause in a just world for incarceration is unlikely to change.
To call your intellectual weakness childish would do disservice to kindergarten. I do not wish to understand your views because it is my view that your views do not require understanding. They just require faith. Your “views” are useful to me only insofar as they reinforce the fact of my good sense in electing not to have children. If my Little Harriet attended daycare with your Little Sanskrit, I would certainly be arrested for spiking her almond milk with triple antigen and disinfectant.
And, don’t give me “But Helen. Paleo is a long way from anti-vax. Don’t tar us with the same brush”. The intellectual journey from a belief that we need to “get back” to “natural” eating to that which holds that infection with measles is “natural” and, therefore, implicitly good takes about ten seconds. Even if you never take that brief unfortunate tumble into seriously bad behaviour, what you have begun to do is fundamentally rotten. And I can’t abide this stench.
You Paleo people have claimed that you believe in “science” and that it is “science” that provided you with the means to manfully argue with my claim that you are, in fact, monumentally deluded cocks. Now, I am not a scientist and I have not previously, nor shall I ever, argue with your nonsense chiefly in the terms of scientific evidence. Yet, when you are not hurling shit at my inbox, it is you who throws globs of what you mistake for scientific evidence.
In many cases, this “evidence” is simply personal anecdote. One nong told me that he had run a marathon without carbohydrates. That we know that life itself cannot be sustained without carbohydrates aside: personal anecdote is not “evidence” and can be undone by other personal anecdote. I have also recently run a marathon and I was largely fuelled by jelly beans. This is not “evidence” of anything aside from my partiality to jelly beans.
Other mildly less touched antagonists have said to me, “but I have lost weight on the Paleo Diet”. This personal anecdote is evidence of nothing new and just informally affirms the rather ordinary truth that a reduction in calories will often result in a reduction of body fat. I am happy you have attained a hip-to-waist ratio that pleases you. I am not happy that you mistake either this or the sensation that “I just feel better!” as proofs of the “science” of Paleo.
To those many of you who have sent me sometimes specious and often small-scale studies on the benefits of Paleo: a fragment of science is not the same thing as science itself. When isolated and underdone studies are presented as theory, that’s when the trouble begins. This is not science. This is not established scientific theory. This is something you read on the internet that appears to confirm your bias.
I am not deriding your belief so much as I am terribly impatient with your belief that belief is the same as fact. This does not mean I am opposed to wholesome foods and it does not mean that I believe that we should spray everything with glyphosate. This does not mean I think eating vegetables and unprocessed foods is a terrible idea—a recommendation made by dietary science for decades, by the way and hardly a Paleo first. It is, however, to say that bits of science that suit your thinking are not fact or scientific theory.
Other things that are not scientific theory are (a) moving personal stories about your weight loss and improved bowel motions and (b) instinct. Which is to say, you may feel that Getting Back To Nature is the right thing to do—and let’s remind ourselves that palaeoanthropology does not confirm the fancy of Paleo Diet books that no pre-industrial hominid ever ate dairy etc—but you cannot make the legitimate claim that this instinct is backed by science.
You can have your instincts. I have mine. For what little it matters, I eat a diet which, while it is largely meat-free due to a personal and ethical dislike for eating creatures, is high in vegetables that are fertilised and managed without recourse to synthesised chemicals and grown from always open-pollinated and often heirloom seed. My own diet happens to be Paleo-ish in that it tends to whole-foods and is derived from small-scale pre-industrial era agricultural techniques. I am prepared to bet that my veg are more “Paleo” than most. FFS, I wiz on my compost and use microbial and solar heat to help remove pathogens from the soil. In other words, my own dietary life is a dreary hippy experiment in sloppy ethics and pseudo-knowledge. I understand this urge.
For the most part, I keep this organic noodling to myself and the bees. I don’t claim it as science or proof. I know only slightly north of fuck-all about domestic horticulture and its ability to effect meaningful local or widespread change. My food production is a hobby and a means to calm myself the fuck down. But, that’s all it is. It is not science. It is not a retort to science. It is not a “lifestyle” and if I ever begin evangelising about food production and diet as you do, may I be doomed to an eternal McDonald’s drive-thru meal.
Jesus shat, we all know that eating crap is probably a terrible idea. And those who either do not know it or cannot escape it are likely to be those actually consigned to the culinary and nutritional hell of a McDonald’s drive-thru. And, what about such people? How do they figure in your expensive Paleo plan?
There are people who simply do not have the wealth of time or dollars to eat anything but convenient shit and if you DARE fucking pull a supercilious Jamie Oliver and tell me that The Poor only eat that way because they’re ignorant and lazy, then you are a mindless greedy piece of innumerate shit-burger who cannot face the simple calculation that having no money plus having no time equals poor nutrition.
Much of the “developing” world is newly cursed with obesity related illness and the least wealthy citizens of first-world nations are more likely to pork up to a potentially debilitating degree. There are nearly one billion medically obese people in the world, peculiarly, almost the same number there are of starving people on the planet. Obesity has overwhelmingly become a marker of poverty. And you want to tell me that the way to fix this is to listen to some dill in a chef’s hat ladling out non-knowledge on the telly? Two billion people aren’t eating right. And this is just because they didn’t read Paleo Poison For Bubs With Idiot Mums? There are very complex reasons some of us shove shit in our faces. And the way to address these complex problems is not in the bottom of your bowl of bone broth.
No one planned it this way. But, one of the most unfortunate by-products of capitalism, which does not have a human face, is that it fucks the poor.
Another unfortunate by-product of capitalism is that it produces stupid idiots who (a) blame the materially poor for their own plight and (b) confuse anecdata for science. And then, come to my blog, find my email address and ruin my fucking inbox with their raging arrogance which they mistake for informed anger.
Paleo is, at this time, nothing but bullshit. It might “work” for you just as my insect-infested veg patch works for me. And that’s as a sedative diversion. But, you don’t get to say that it is a scientific or ethical cure for the world’s many food and nutrition problems. Well, you can say that but not to me without being told to get fucked. A response you can, and have and likely will, tell me is the angry talk of someone who eats too much sugar. But, leaving aside the fact that I rarely eat sugar, me telling you to get fucked is nothing compared to the idiotic abuse I have received these past weeks from fans of Pete Evans.
When I tell you to get fucked, what I mean is that you must choose. You must either truly examine the veracity of your claims, which currently have no real basis in evidence, or keep your possibly dangerous ideas to yourself.
Yes. Dangerous. Advice by our primary dietetic scientists that the Pete Evans diet for “bubs” is potentially fatal is one worth heeding. And if your answer is “that’s just Big Food talking”, then be aware that that is just big arse talking. You narcissistic, beef-stinking bore.
Go and become the climate science denier you just know is itching to get out. Either that, or have a think.
Now for the sake of sweet sugar, leave me alone. If you persist in saying that science is something that it is not and that Paleo is something like science, we have nowhere to go. Which is why I am now off to the garden.
(If you enjoyed this post and/or you are someone with an interest in exploring the various and widespread kinds of Stupid that infect our era, please consider purchase of this recently published book I wrote with my friend Bernard Keane. And if you hated this post, buy it anyhow because the royalties may serve to keep me relatively quiet. You could also come and listen to me talk about the end of reason next Tuesday, April 28 in Sydney’s Glebe. Book here.)
160 thoughts on “Fuck Off”
Don’t know if you’re a Minchin fan or not but that bit about anecdotes not being facts reminded me of this –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74SQ6w6LdU0
The Palaeolithic era
Ended ten thousand years ago
When we discovered farming
And figured it the way to go
Other developments followed,
We started using metal
Stones good for making tombstones
But let’s see you knapp a kettle
So we moved on and things improved
And we live twice as long today
But is everybody satisfied?
By god there isn’t no way!
There’s gotta be a bad-guy
To blame your fat arse on
Monsanto, genetic engineering or farming is the one
So some loopy retards
Came up with an idea
To simulate a Palaeolithic diet
And revive it right back here
Trained dieticians tell us
There’s nothing wrong with grain
Eat from all 5 food groups
And avoid the pain
But never mind the facts,
grains were part of a paleo diet
Just buy Pete Evans fucking book
ignore the truth and try it
It’ll send you fucking broke
And drive your family mad
As you disdainfully pick and choose
And decree that bread is “bad”
Bring you kids up paleo
Make them fussy cunts
Just don’t be too surprised
When they wind up toothless sickly little runts
Cause sure as shit doth stink
I’ll make a bet with you
If you follow this fucked diet
You’re anti vaccination too.
You think that evil fluoride
Isn’t there to protect your teeth
Illuminati lizard men
Did it to cause us grief
and now we got Pete Evans
Clearly a stupid fuck
Who want us to poison babies
With almonds, livers and muck
So lecture every poor bastard
On why what you know is best
Ignore what the professional’s say
Some TV cook knows best.
A smart-arsed smugger fucker
I doubt you’ll ever meet
Except for that “wellness warrior”
But be quick cause cancer she won’t beat
Not by munching mung beans
And sticking coffee up her arse
Doctors offered treatment
But she decided that she’d rather pass.
And if it wasn’t for the children
I couldn’t give a fuck
But born to you these kiddies
are litterally shit outa luck.
So you can activate your almonds
And shove em up your arse
As far as I’m concerned
On Paleo I think I,ll pass
Thank you Jonny, for so eloquently illustrating my point.
Schrodonger ,I’m so sorry to upset your idiotic apple cart .
The pseudo intellectuals on here who like this sort trash that Helen spews really just shocked me .
I didn’t realise that you people existed .
Iand for your information fool ,im not angry at all .
It seems that you don’t like a few different viewpoints to your own stupid ones.
You think by calling me a few stupid names you and saying begone that I’ll go away ??
It’s interesting that you revert to abuse and name calling perhaps because your little world gets a different opinion thrown at it .
You my friend are the problem with the world,hatred filled diatribe ,put downs and abuse because someone dares to disagree with how you see things.
Maybe ,just maybe there is something in what I’ve written.
Perhaps take a step back and look at it for a moment and think ,why am I so furious about what was said here .
What is it that made me react and get so shitted off.
It’s more to do with you than me mate .
What’s going on inside you .
Point here finally is there is lots of science about Pale.
Helen plays semantics .
I’m making the point that she is shooting the wrong target .
Paleo Pete is dangerous ??!?!?!?!?!?
More dangerous than the shit that gets fed to our kids in western society .
What don’t you get Schrodonger ????
Your put downs are more about you than anyone else .
“You are non-existent ” . Really Shrodonger is that how you handle people with different opinions tell them they’re non-existent.
Check again mate ,maybe you and Helen are the ones missing something here that is very simple rhat you’ve made very complex .
Possibly the complexity is in your own head buddy .
Meantime keep your insults and put downs to yourself .
Try applying that in your life as well ,you’ll be much happier .
Jonny, you’re a fucking idiot. Go away. Your grasp on the complexities of life is non-existent. Your grasp of English language and the complexities of grammar are non-existent. Your basic comprehension skills are non-existent. You are non-existent. You’re a troll, mythical and angry because someone dares to cross your bridge. The only point you’re making by haranguing everyone on Helen’s blog is that you’re truly stupid and arrogantly troll-like. Be gone.
And Helen just one other thing I’ll leave you and your other scientists here to digest.
I think it’s funny that you guys are soooooooo indignant about Mr Dangerous Paleo Pete ,baby threatener that he is.
So as I said I don’t follow Pete Evans ,don’t really give two shits what he says,but ……. I think that the Paleo thing or ,calorie restriction etc.lowish carb ,unprocessed food is a pretty good idea.
So you hate that he proclaims it as science ,and endangers little bubbas with his chopped liver cereal .
Yet our little kiddies are brainwashed and bombarded in the media by wonderful health promoting food outlets such as Maccas ,KFC,Dominos,Pizza Hut etc etc ad nauseum .
And our wonderful Australian culture of beer and wine thrown down ya gullet for every occasion you can think of ,and promoted in our sports culture as being the way to be great man is to throw down some beers with ya mates as being the ultimate .
And then when you eat and drink all that shit and your all good and “normal ” like you like it Helen ,then you can go off to ya doc and say doc ,geez fuck me I’m sick fix me !!!!
Then your good doctor can say eat healthier and excercise but you can say ,too hard doc and anyhow you just told me I got diabetes and high blood pressure and I’m starting to get depressed about it .
And what you want me to give up wine and beer ,ya fucken kidding me Doc ,give me some pills instead .
Doc obliges so away you go ,here’s some diabex for your diabetes and some micardis for your blood pressure and and some Zoloft for your depression and some normison to help you sleep .
And don’t worry if that doesn’t work I’ve got more diabetes tabs for you and ,in fact I’ve got a whole bunch you can take .
Hey nearly forgot the Lipitor for your high cholesterol .
Gee you poor unlucky bastard with your unlucky genetic disposition which gave you bad health ,thank god we have drugs for you .
Sorry about the side effects but what choice do you have .
So doc your saying I can keep drinking beer and eating pizza and these drugs will keep me going .
Shit yeah no worries ,suck it down mate ,enjoy your life .
So Doc what about this Paleo Pete wanker ?
Oh yes he’s a wanker alright ,he’s just in it for the money ,the dirty baby endangering bastard.
Unlike the fast food companies and alcohol industry they are in it for the good of humanity ,they love us and want us to have good happy lives watching the fucken footy and sucking piss down ,and the missus can suck down a bottle of lovely red every night ,washes down nicely with the Prozac !!!
Yea so fuck Paleo Pete what the fuck does that wanker know,it’s not scientifically proven is it .
Screw him the assehole ,telling us all to eat all that veggie shit and claiming its science
Imagine claiming that if you ate all healthy and stopped drinking piss every night that you could turn diabetes and other diseases around ,imagine that,the gall to claim that ,you must be crazy and stupid to say stuff like that ,and of course your just after our money you greedy bastard,Pete .
That’s the wellness industry ,lying bastards after our money ,with no science .
Shit yes give me my pizza ,beer and drugs ,they love me cause theyre on the telly every night and they tell me it’s good to eat and drink that stuff.I mean look how happy everyone is when they drink beer and eat Maccas .
Give me my drugs ,they’ve got science and double blind studies .
Fuck you Paleo Pete and your evil messages ,and stay away from our innocent kiddies .
Thank God you wrote that article Helen ,you saved humanity from Paleo Pete .
You want to know what’s disturbing Helen ,that’s what’s disturbing ,not a man who you think has discovered all the answers .Just giving a different viewpoint .
Maybe your shooting at the wrong target if you really care about babies .
Mate. You’re thick.
Great comment Helen .
I dips me lid to your superior intellect and your ability to say fuck a lot .
Well done for your amazing insight into the world !!!
Gee Helen you sound pretty black and white in your blog .
Maybe you should take your own advice ,you really just described you and your friends here to a tee.
BTW I have no cause ,I’m not a Paleo Pete fan .
I’m actually giving just a few different viewpoints to the mantra chucked out on your blog.
Well then Ben enjoy your diabetes and your drugs to to fix them ,by all means .not upset ,saddened by how people like you have bought the BS though,knock yourself out Ben.
Jonny. I know there is great comfort in believing that one knows the truth and that all others are deluded. There is, by contrast, great discomfort in knowing that we are all deluded by a world that is far too complex to understand in the easy terms of black-and-white. Perhaps leave us to our shades of grey while you inhabit a world of certainty and truth. You’ll be much happier there and frankly, I’ll be happier without the reminder of one of the most disturbingly simple things in the world: a man who believes he has uncovered all the answers.
Things are infinitely complex. Damn it all to hell.
Goodbye, now. You’re doing your peculiar cause no good.
LOL “Western Medicine started, like, 100 years ago”. I love it when people get upset and insist its YOUR narrow viewpoints that need opening up.
i did buy your book. I thought it was very good and that your bits were better than Bernard’s. His chapters though not dry were more measured than I expect for 12.84$.
However, I am still uncomfortable as seeing the worlds problems as stupidity, as grovelling professions of my own ignorance and confusion are the only way I can get Very Important People bothered enough to explain anything to me.
There are three types Pete !
Btw what causes type 1 ?
Jonny, we’ve established that you have a vague awareness of type 2 diabetes but can you do yourself a favour and go read up about type 1 now?
Oh, and whilst you’re at it, please look up Belle Gibson. Good reading material for you. Who is she? Just a con artist who just did an interview in which she admitted that she lied about having cancer and curing herself of various cancers through food.
I’m giving Gibson about two months before her Tell All Memoir on the pain of suffering Munchausen syndrome is released. She will probably recommend “clean eating” to avoid the “disease” that caused her to lie about having a disease that she fixed with clean eating.
God. Everyone can just fuck off. The world is insane.
The world is insane because that don’t all think the same as you????,thank god the world doesn’t think the same as you ,with your close minded views Helen .
Jonny
You do realise that there are 2 types of Diabetes and one of them isn’t caused by diet?
But oh sorry, facts….they just get in the bloody way all the time don’t they?
Oh you have established that have you ???
You know nothing about me or what I’m talking about .
But I certainly know that you Camille are arrogant ,condescending and have your head firmly up your butt.
Then you tell me to go look up Belle Gibson,which proves what exactly ???
You believe what you’re told in the media and poo poo anything that isn’t “science “.
Science gets it wrong too.
But I guess for some people they need to rely on ” science ” because they are clueless .
There’s a doco where a bunch of diabetics all went on strict organic vegetable diets for a month ,some were type 1 and they made it off insulin .Shouldnt happen should it .
Anecdotal yes .
The type 2 all were able to get off meds .
All anectodatal not science,good to know though .
So instead of being skeptical ignorant fools,why not look it up and check it out ,but I guess you’d rather take drugs and be right about the way you think things work .
Hey Miso eat a box of Krispy kremes daily for a year Mr Scientist and then when you are sucking down Diabex like smarties you can tell us it’s just anectodal that you are now type 2 diabetic..
How ridiculous your arguments are ,pseudo intellectuals you are your own worst enemies.
BTW blaming Paleo for the way your friend felt was ANECTODAL ,no ?
I’m sure he’ll be glad of the brief. :) Your blog piece is a classic. And I love A Short History of Stupid. Shame the stupid won’t be reading it. Cheers!
Spot on !!
Uh oh they’re here already… Big Paleo is all seeing and all knowing.
Ramblings = this article
Reading all the comments was very interesting. It appears that’s Jonny is the only one who completely missed what the article was actually about. This is evident in his ramblings! Oh gosh….
interesting spin and quite witty. Unfortunately your heckling lets you down and is unintelligent in the process. Such is the mind of an angry imbecile. Ps. Paleo is good for mood swings too. Maybe you should try it
and type 3 as well
I liked the way it was going but couldn’t finish it, it was too long. I like your stuff, don’t get me wrong, but if you want to sell something it’s better to keep it short and sweet. If I wrote a rant that long Helen, would you have the time or inclination to read it?
Paleo leads to climate science denier…? On the contrary, those Paleo “dicks” are the WORST of the “science is settled” tossers…
maybe type 1 too
no I didn’t I know exactly where she is coming from .
Try it before you deride it
The idiot is you .
If you don’t think that the epidemic of diabetes isn’t due to our shitty western diet than I think you are the idiot here .
Great reply !
Next time I have money, I’m buying this book :)
That comeback wins the internet today!
Man, that guy missed your entire point. By miles.
Woah. Jonny. Some basic critical thought, please.
I mean, I’m thoroughly anti-civ and you still sound like an idiot. Yeah, science as an institution is megafucked. And eating healthy keeps you healthy. But paleo isn’t going to cure the world of diabetes, sorry. That’s more of a crazy argument than that eating paleo is endorsing climate change, which was at least a statement made by Helen in the heat of sardonic wrath, and fucking hilarious.
Gosh ! I love it ! Love every word ! I wish there would be billboards written by you on the long long highways so people can’t miss or ignore. Your “fuck off” is brilliant ! Good on you for speaking on behalf of normal people reality! Well said ! Bravo !
Or even better for we members of the reality-based community if they would just presribe themselves a permanent diet of paleo-internet
This is so good, I wish I had written it. Another great response to Paleos is to ask if they ascribe to Paleo dentistry or Paleo hairdressing.
Helen, your book was an amazingly well-written highlight of the vast chasm between smart and stupid.
This rant however seems to be more a torrent of blunt language thinly diguising the enthusiastic splitting of hairs, and pretty disappointing to read after the book.
Also, no idea what flavour of crack Jonny’s on in the comments section here.
So that’s your point,food isn’t medicine ?
How ridiculous !
I assume your intention is to point out that anyone that says eating healthily or in a certain way is full of it for claiming that this could influence their disease state or prevent it.
And we must only seek answers from our medical profession and in particular drugs because that is scientifically proven while food has nothing to do with science .
I think you need to broaden your narrow minded viewpoints and perhaps listen to people who gain great benefits for various diseases and by changing what they eat.
Medical doctors are trained in a certain way ,doesn’t mean that everything they say or learnt is God sent truth .In fact this is a great way to get yourself really screwed just blindly believing the “science”.
Personally I don’t need double blind studies and some knob end to tell me that cutting out the crap food that exists in western society is a great way to prevent and cure disease.
Your comments are totally bogus .
Food is and always had been medicine .
Western medicine started like 100 years ago and while some of it is fantastic ,a lot of medicine is created because of the ridiculous toxic crap that we put in our mouths .
For example diabetes would be nearly non existent if diets changed and perhaps even if people stuck to a paleo diet or something similar .
Your whole argument just seems a battle of some kind of stupid semantics.
If people ate differently there would be close to zero diabetes for example,that is just one disease.
It relates also to heart disease and many other chronic conditions which “medicines ” do not cure .
The cure would in fact be lifestyle change which includes many things but one of them being a change of diet .Paleo would be a reasonable change to the staple western diet which is pretty pathetic on the whole.
But I tell you what Helen go grab a bag of 10 Or so Krispy Kremes and sat that every day for a year and take some blood tests before and after and we can get some diabetes meds out for you and then you can just believe that what you eat isn’t science .
Your whole argument is crazy
I’ll let Hippocrates know.
Of course, you know now that you’ve added “Paleo” “Crystals” and “Reality TV” to a blog post you’re never going to see the back of Google ads about them!