Sugar, sugar, everywhere

I am of the opinion that American food has more sugar content than anywhere else in the world. When I studied in Germany, I found myself buying Gummi Bears and Kinder chocolate eggs every day to eat as a snack between meals of soft bread, pretzels, bratwursts, fresh eggs, cold meats and cheeses, unbelievably fresh vegetables, yoghurt, pasta, soups, and sauces. I didn't give it much thought while I was in Germany; it just tasted so good to have a handful of Gummi Bears two or three times a day, or to break open a fresh bag of wafer cookies. It was only when I came home to Colorado and immediately ceased my junk food binge that I began to realize what was going on.

I deduced that when I am living normally in America, my food has a much higher sugar content than the food I ate in Germany. I craved sugary foods in Germany because German food is not produced with any extra sugar, and much of it has no preservatives. My American diet already had all the sugar I needed, so when I came back to Colorado my stomach turned at the thought of more sugar. I surmised that German foods include less sugar because of the way German foods have always been (and continue to be) prepared.
My theory is supported by the work done by Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, who examines the contents of fast foods and of American processed foods in general.

With the onset of the early twentieth century came the advent of the fast food chain and the idea that food can be prepared on an assembly line. Connected to the assembly line "manufacturing" of food was the evolution of food into a business commodity. The better food tasted and smelled, the more colorful it was, and the more toys and other incentives were included, the better the product sold. This meant that everyone in the food industry, from merchants to growers and farmers, had to step up "production" quality of food to make it more appealing to the consumer. Merchants of fast food found that when miniscule amounts of sugar were added to their products, the consumer noticed an improved taste, resulting in higher sales of the products. Making foods sweeter proved to be a "cash cow" of sorts for merchants, whether they were selling steaks, onions, apples, or bread. Sugar added at the molecular level improved foods' taste and eventually, their sales numbers. Livestock were fed a diet higher in sugar and plants were genetically altered to contain more sugar.

By the turn of the twenty-first century, this decades-long process of sweetening, altering, and processing foods has fostered a generation of Americans whose lifelong diet has been foods enhanced to include more sugar. Yet this phenomenon has largely been ignored by the mainstream population (indeed, it would cripple the economy of the food industry and the broader American economy if people were to react all at once to the omnipresence of sugar in all their foods), who continue to be baffled by the relatively sudden outbreak of morbid obesity, heart disease, hypertension, stroke, cancer, diabetes, and other diseases linked to the presence of unhealthy sugars in the body. For me the explanation is clear: without low-sugar alternatives to the American diet, Americans will continue to suffer the consequences of a few peoples' business decisions which were at best, entrepreneurial, and at worst, hubris. Furthermore, Americans will continue to slowly kill themselves with their own ignorance and their denial of plain truths which reveal themselves in between the lines of every menu and ingredient label in America.

The recent health disaster linked to pet food and toothpaste ingredients which are imported (tainted) from China further indicate the urgency for Americans to awaken from their comatose apathy and demand that the source and content of everything ingested by American human beings and animals be offered in clear and present terms.

But even if we do know these facts with perfect clarity, as long as we are careless with our waste and exhaust, we will continue to poison ourselves with tainted water and air. The only difference is that we will finally see the scope and impact of our sloth.