It’s fairly common knowledge that trans fat is unhealthy, but many people still don’t realize how unhealthy it actually is. Trans fat is still quite common, and as such, it’s important that you’re aware of the dangers that it presents and that you’re able to identify it on an ingredients list.

Unfortunately, the food industry has a lot of incentive to continue using trans fat. Because of the myth that saturated fat causes heart disease, trans fat provides a convenient way for food manufacturers to give their products the consistency of solid fat without having to list saturated fat on the nutrition label. Margarine is an excellent example. Furthermore, trans fat is less expensive, has a longer shelf life, is easier to bake with, and has a reduced need for refrigeration. As such, trans fat provides a lot of potential for reducing production costs and increasing profits. However, the one factor that’s not fully taken into account, which is also the most important factor, is your health.

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Super Size Me is an informative documentary about the negative impact that McDonald’s and the rest of the fast food industry are having on society. Despite the importance of this message, Super Size Me neglects several critical factors that I consider to be more important than the popularity of fast food and it even gives an inaccurate representation of why fast food is unhealthy.

The majority of Super Size Me is based on Morgan Spurlock’s one month binge of eating nothing but food from McDonald’s. This was inspired by lawsuits from two teenage girls who blamed McDonald’s for their obesity. At the time of the lawsuit, one girl was 19 years old and weighed 270 pounds at a height of 5 feet 6 inches and the other was 16 years old and weighted 170 pounds at a height of 4 feet 10 inches.

During this one month experiment, Spurlock ate three full meals per day from McDonald’s, only ordered a super size meal when asked, and never ate food from any other source.

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The low fat diet has been extremely popular for decades and is still strongly promoted by doctors and even the American government. As shown by the Fat Head documentary, it’s a load of bologna and many of us are suffering the serious consequences of our unhealthy fear of fat.

A Misconception About Fast Food

Fast food is undoubtedly an unhealthy and arguably unethical food choice, but not for the reasons you may think. Conventional wisdom tells us that fast food is high in saturated fat and is a major cause of today’s obesity epidemic. However, saturated fat is far from the nutritional villain that it’s made out to be and fast food is no more to blame for obesity than any other type of restaurant food. In fact, many people are overweight as a result of the food that they buy in the grocery store and eat at home.

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The recent KFC grilled chicken promotion has instigated a wave of similar promotions throughout the fast food and restaurant industries. Millions of people swarmed KFC restaurants across the nation for a free meal, and in the upcoming weeks, many other restaurants will be looking to feed off of this frenzy.

The irony behind these promotions is that the free food ends up costing much more than the money saved from not having to buy it.

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