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Wheat is not wonderfully nutritious. It provides nothing special and is even somewhat problematic. If the global food industry was capable of keeping wheat out

Wheat is not wonderfully nutritious. It provides nothing special and is even somewhat problematic. If the global food industry was capable of keeping wheat out of their food, that would be fantastic. Unlike dairy, almost all dry foods are contaminated with gluten unless you go to lengths to obtain food that is not.

dcbadacd 8y ago
I'd like to hear about a food that isn't in some way problematic, can you list any?
- code_duck 8y ago
  The problems I am referring to are celiac and non-celiac gluten sensitivity. There are at least a dozen other grains that provide the benefits of wheat without those disadvantages, and that is to what I am referring. Rice, corn, sorghum, buckwheat, millet, teff, quinoa, lentils, and and so on.
  - dcbadacd 8y ago
    So the "even somewhat problematic" part of wheat is problematic to only 1% of the entire population and that's an argument to kill off all wheat, yeah, no, try again.
CydeWeys 8y ago
You're speaking from the perspective of someone who always has enough to eat, so you have the privilege of optimizing for nutrient ratios. Billions of other people aren't so lucky, and they just need more calories period. Wheat is great that, along with rice, soybeans, and other staple crops that are better in the growing/volume sense than in the nutritional sense. Not all of humanity can afford boutique heirloom artisanal hand-grown crops that are $10 per pound. If we're going to optimize for anything, it's for feeding as many people as possible -- there are far fewer celiac sufferers than there are people who go without enough food. Optimizing the food chain to protect you would result in many more people dying from starvation, because you'd be eliminating an efficient, widely grown crop that feeds many. Wheat is the second most important crop in the world, behind only rice.
- code_duck 8y ago
  Actually, I’m speaking from the perspective of someone who is dying from starvation despite being surrounded by available food. There is nothing special about wheat. All of the resources spent on growing wheat could be expended on many other crops which would provide equal or greater nutritional benefit. The reason wheat is a globally important crop is simply because people have made it that way for arbitrary reasons, like raising European cattle in North America.

dcbadacd 8y ago

I'd like to hear about a food that isn't in some way problematic, can you list any?

code_duck 8y ago
The problems I am referring to are celiac and non-celiac gluten sensitivity. There are at least a dozen other grains that provide the benefits of wheat without those disadvantages, and that is to what I am referring. Rice, corn, sorghum, buckwheat, millet, teff, quinoa, lentils, and and so on.
- dcbadacd 8y ago
  So the "even somewhat problematic" part of wheat is problematic to only 1% of the entire population and that's an argument to kill off all wheat, yeah, no, try again.

CydeWeys 8y ago

You're speaking from the perspective of someone who always has enough to eat, so you have the privilege of optimizing for nutrient ratios. Billions of other people aren't so lucky, and they just need more calories period. Wheat is great that, along with rice, soybeans, and other staple crops that are better in the growing/volume sense than in the nutritional sense. Not all of humanity can afford boutique heirloom artisanal hand-grown crops that are $10 per pound. If we're going to optimize for anything, it's for feeding as many people as possible -- there are far fewer celiac sufferers than there are people who go without enough food. Optimizing the food chain to protect you would result in many more people dying from starvation, because you'd be eliminating an efficient, widely grown crop that feeds many. Wheat is the second most important crop in the world, behind only rice.

code_duck 8y ago
Actually, I’m speaking from the perspective of someone who is dying from starvation despite being surrounded by available food. There is nothing special about wheat. All of the resources spent on growing wheat could be expended on many other crops which would provide equal or greater nutritional benefit. The reason wheat is a globally important crop is simply because people have made it that way for arbitrary reasons, like raising European cattle in North America.