The holiday season is now over and with that, January, a month that unfortunately for many is associated with strict diets and the entire diet culture, arrives. We are constantly being bombarded with ads and manipulative terms that only feed our insecurities and fuel the whole balderdash that we’re only worthy if we match the incredible unrealistic standards imposed by society. Let’s just admit it, clearly, diets are all about making money when they should be about helping people have a healthier lifestyle.
So, let’s have a look into some diet food terms that are astonishingly toxic and that should be dead and gone by the end of 2022.
Starting off with “The Quarantine 15”. As mentioned in this article, this terminology is essentially used to not only describe but also shame the “pandemic-related weight gain”. This diet term considers that 15 pounds(minimum) are gained in body weight from staying at home during lockdown. The expression made its first appearance on social media in March 2020, just when people’s concerns over food/exercising habits were beginning to rise.
I consider “The Quarantine 15” term extremely inappropriate and even triggering to people that are experiencing or have experienced an eating disorder. What’s happening is that fitness and diet companies are taking advantage of our vulnerabilities and throwing at us manipulative adverts of products and habits to “help” us lose the extra pounds that quarantine brought. All this manipulation is extremely impactful in a society that is so attached to media.
Following we have the term “Guilt-Free”,frequently encountered on the packages of our favorite snacks and beverages. Fundamentally, it promotes the belief that you should feel guilty when eating the “non-healthy” original version of a food to manipulate you into buying the “guilt-free”, supposedly healthier, one. Yet again, this tagline is a marketing strategy which only purpose is making money, consequently contributing to negative relationships with food.
As suggested in the article previously mentioned, you can “Set up an email filter to automatically delete these pernicious diet phrases from your inbox and be done with it.”. This of course won’t solve the problem but at least you can spare yourself and be, even if just slightly, less exposed to “Guilt-free “labels.
Like the previous term, “Better-for-you-snacks “are in no way better for you or your mental/physical health. This tagline leads you to believe that because a product says “light” or “diet” in it, is super healthy, and you can consume it without any “guilt”.
For instance, Diet Coke, supposedly much better for you than the original, since it’s free of sugar and calories, it’s an awful poison in which sugar is replace by a bunch of artificial sweeteners.Nowadays practically every popular sugar-sweetened snack or beverage has a “light” or a “diet” version on the market.
So, what do you think of leaving behind these outdated terms? There are so many clever ways for the food industry to promote their products! Do we really need to resort to manipulation?
Iara Mendes
Written based on this article: https://thetakeout.com/worst-diet-culture-terms-to-avoid-guilt-free-quaranti-1848307200/amp (By Marnie Shure,5 January 2022).