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No, I don't see the point you're trying to get across. To keep using the Beyond burger example; you imply emulsifiers are no good. Is sunflower lecithin proble

No, I don't see the point you're trying to get across. To keep using the Beyond burger example; you imply emulsifiers are no good. Is sunflower lecithin problematic? Methylcellulose is kind of another one here, but it's literally insoluble fiber, something you imply is problematic for a food to be missing. The only ingredients that might be present as preservatives I can see are salt and vinegar/lemon juice. Are they problematic in the amounts used? Is beet juice a problematic colourant? Now, if we were talking the emulsifiers being PGEs, sodium benzoate as a preservative and red #40 for colour, then maybe there would be a better case for not eating Beyond burgers. Or maybe canola oil simply isn't what you consider to be healthy. Point is, the problem is what specifically is present or missing. Not whether it fits into some ill-defined notion of processed.

cheese_goddess 5y ago
> Is beet juice a problematic colourant? "Problematic colourant"? Of course it's problematic. Because it's a colorant. For food! Why do you need to add color to food? > Point is, the problem is what specifically is present or missing. Not whether it fits into some ill-defined notion of processed. But this is what the standard you don't like is doing. It's classifying food according to what is present or missing. In particular, nutrients that you need to have in your food and stuff you don't need to. Is it the fact that it's a general classification rather than a case-by-case analysis that is bothering you? Would you prefer it if there was a long list of foods with an annotation "processed", "ultra-processed" etc with a small discussion of what's in them that shouldn't be in there and what's not in that should?
- phonypc 5y ago
  Problematic as in negative health consequences. If there aren't undesired consequences, what is the problem? I like to add turmeric powder to my rice for the sole purpose of colouring it. Is that some travesty? Is my rice now ultra-processed? >But this is what the standard you don't like is doing. It's classifying food according to what is present or missing. No, that's explicitly not what it's doing. It tries to classify things by level of processing. The fact that the examples given often don't fit their criteria only serves to make it look more ridiculous.

cheese_goddess 5y ago

> Is beet juice a problematic colourant? "Problematic colourant"? Of course it's problematic. Because it's a colorant. For food! Why do you need to add color to food? > Point is, the problem is what specifically is present or missing. Not whether it fits into some ill-defined notion of processed. But this is what the standard you don't like is doing. It's classifying food according to what is present or missing. In particular, nutrients that you need to have in your food and stuff you don't need to. Is it the fact that it's a general classification rather than a case-by-case analysis that is bothering you? Would you prefer it if there was a long list of foods with an annotation "processed", "ultra-processed" etc with a small discussion of what's in them that shouldn't be in there and what's not in that should?

phonypc 5y ago
Problematic as in negative health consequences. If there aren't undesired consequences, what is the problem? I like to add turmeric powder to my rice for the sole purpose of colouring it. Is that some travesty? Is my rice now ultra-processed? >But this is what the standard you don't like is doing. It's classifying food according to what is present or missing. No, that's explicitly not what it's doing. It tries to classify things by level of processing. The fact that the examples given often don't fit their criteria only serves to make it look more ridiculous.