Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

If an investigative journalist could choose any other career to use their talents and gifts, then it would most likely be that of an attorney. They possess the natural skills for digging deeply into arguments and making compelling statements for the prosecution. That's precisely what New York Times bestselling author and science writer Gary Taubes has done in his soon-to-classic book The Case Against Sugar. This book has been sorely needed for many years and Taubes is the perfect author to articulate what needs to be shared as only he can. For fans of Taubes who have read his two previous nutritional health classics--Good Calories, Bad Calories: Fats, Carbs, and the Controversial Science of Diet and Health and Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It--you already know his position on the negative implications of carbohydrates on the current state of chronic disease and health decline. In The Case Against Sugar, Taubes takes direct aim at the biggest culprit carb that is plaguing the health of those dealing with obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and more--it's SUGAR! Some people might scoff at the idea that we need an entire book all about the dangers of consuming sugar claiming that it's obvious to most people that sugar is not good for you. But do they really know that? Walk into any grocery store, sporting event, amusement park, fast food restaurant, and anywhere else food is sold and you'll mostly see nothing but ambivalence regarding sugar from a great majority of the population based on their purchasing habits. Sugar has become so pervasive in our food supply that it's next to impossible to find anything to eat that doesn't have sugar in it (even spaghetti sauce, baked beans, yogurt, BBQ sauce, ketchup, fruit juice...the list goes on and on!). As I just noted, sugar has become so ubiquitous in our society now that people don't even think twice about consuming it while simultaneously greatly fearing dietary fat as something they shouldn't consume. Taubes addresses the idea of how we became propagandized to believe fat is the enemy in our diet. Since the publication of The Case For Sugar, we've now learned that The Sugar Association paid off Harvard scientists to squelch the connection between sugar and heart disease and vilify saturated fat. It's fairly easy to see why The Case Against Sugar is needed now more than ever before. (Read the September 12, 2016 New York Times column on this topic entitled "How The Sugar Industry Shifted Blame To Fat": Google the title and you'll find it!) If you're familiar with the work of Taubes, he goes very deeply into the subjects he writes about to get to the very core of the main issues at hand. He explains how we got to where we are today and puts the primary blame for the main instigator of pretty much all modern disease on sugar. That instigator is a condition known as insulin resistance (IR) where the pancreas has to work so hard at pumping out insulin to cover all the sugar we've been consuming that it's become worn out and doesn't function as it was intended anymore. The result of this is a much more difficult path to keep blood sugar and insulin levels normalized that requires people with IR to have to significantly cut down on the foods that turn to sugar in the body--all culprit carbohydrates. Or, as I like to refer to them, crappy carbage! One of the excellent points Taubes makes in The Case For Sugar that will hopefully begin a public conversation of this concept is the modern argument against sugar has everything to do with "empty calories" they supposedly contain and not the hormonal effects it is having on our bodies. Bringing in the calorie argument gives license for people to continue eating sugar in the mythical "moderation" (which Taubes is very skeptical and no fan of). But the reality is the role sugar plays in your health goes so much deeper than their caloric effect, particularly for those people with insulin resistance where the damage is done. I know this fact all-too-well as someone who used to drink 16 cans of Coca-Cola daily before discovering these principles Taubes is sharing in his books requiring me to eat a low-carb, high-fat, ketogenic diet for the rest of my life in order to stave off the health consequences of the damage that happened to my body from eating sugar. Methodically looking through all the faulty science used to defend sugar, Taubes again goes into bulldog mode pulling back the curtain on the Wizard of Oz to expose the facade we have been led to believe about sugar. What's most interesting is there were researchers like John Yudkin who understood these problems with consuming sugar way back in the 60s/70s, but he was quickly ignored and blacklisted by those who wanted to push the anti-fat message as a means for propping up sugar-peddling companies that stood to greatly benefit financially from the ignorance of the general public. And it worked because junk food full of carbohydrates is the norm on store shelves today! Now that we realize that Yudkin was right all along, Taubes is attempting to explain where we go from here to undo all the nutritional indoctrination. It's gonna be a steep uphill battle, but this book could very well be the beginning of the unraveling of the sugar ruse. The Case Against Sugar should absolutely be required reading of every doctor, dietitian, teacher, parent, and anyone who wants to hear the truth about sugar that they're just not gonna get from mainstream media or any of the so-called leaders in the nutritional health industry. Gary Taubes has put his stamp on this subject as only he can presenting the evidence for the reader to absorb and come to their own conclusions. After reading this book, you can still choose to eat sugar. But at least you'll be armed with information about the entire picture on this subject instead of the one-sided view we've dealt with for the past 50 years. Consider this book the first shot across the bow challenging The Sugar Association head-on with facts and history that cannot be refuted. Now it's simply a matter of undoing decades of misinformation to stem the tide of chronic disease we are currently living through because of the promulgation of sugar.