Note: usual restrictions on crossposting; do not crosspost this on the
"raw" list.

The latest issue of "Yoga Journal" magazine has a fascinating article
in it that should be read by ALL raw fooders. The article is titled
"Health Food Junkie", and is on pgs. 42-48 of the October 1997 issue
(issue #136). The author is Steven Bratman, M.D. Dr. Bratman is an
M.D. who uses alternative medicine and dietary therapy in his practice.
He is the author of "The Alternative Medicine Sourcebook: A Realistic
Evaluation of Alternative Healing Methods".

I will cite a number of quotes from this provocative and fascinating
article, as follows. My occasional explanatory remarks/comments are in
square brackets [*].

"...I no longer have faith that dietary therapy is a uniformly wholesome
intervention. I have come to regard it as I do drug therapy: as a useful
treatment with serious potential side effects...

...by focusing single-mindedly on diet, such practicioners [dietary
therapists] end up advocating a form of medicine as lacking in holistic
perspective as the more traditional approaches they attempt to correct...
...
Orthorexia Nervosa

Many of the most unbalanced people I have ever met are those who have
devoted themselves to healthy eating. [I strongly agree with his
assessment!] In fact, I believe some of them have actually contracted
a novel eating disorder for which I have coined the name "orthorexia
nervosa"...Orthorexia nervosa refers to a pathological fixation on eating
proper food...

[re: the difficulty in switching to a strict/restricted diet]

...Most must resort to an iron self-discipline bolstered by a hefty
dose of [false] superiority over those who eat junk food. Over time, what
to eat, how much, and the consequences of dietary indiscretion come to
occupy a greater and greater proportion of the orthorexic's day...

The act of eating pure food begins to carry pseudospiritual connotations...

This "kitchen spirituality" eventually reaches a point where the sufferer
spends most of his time planning, purchasing, and eating meals. The
orthorexic's inner life becomes dominated by efforts to resist temptation,
self-condemnation for lapses, self-praise for success at complying with
the chosen regime, and feelings of [false] superiority over others less
pure in their dietary habits.

This transference of all life's value into the act of eating makes orthorexia
a true disorder [i.e., a true mental illness]...

Where the bulimic and anorexic focus on the quantity of food, the orthorexic
fixates on its quality. All three give food an excessive place in the scheme
of life...

I myself passed through a phase of extreme dietary purity... [I have been
down that same road] ... After a year or so of this self-imposed regime,
I felt clear headed, strong, and self-righteous. [The controversial
spiritual leader Da Avabhasa, refers to this as "lunch-righteousness".]
I regarded the wretched, debauched souls about me downing their chocolate
chip cookies and french fries as mere animals reduced to satisfying
gustatory lusts...

The poetry of my life was disappearing...

The need to obtain meals free of meat, fat, artificial chemicals had put
nearly all forms of eating beyond my reach. I was lonely and obsessed...

...I had been seduced by righteous eating.

The problem of my life's meaning had been transferred inexorably to food,
and I could not reclaim it."

I suspect that many of us will recognize ourselves in the material
above, or perhaps others we have encountered on the e-mail lists.

The above article eloquently makes a number of the points that underlies
my approach, and my message to other raw fooders:
* don't obsess on food
* diet should be a small part of your life
* the diet must serve you, not the other way around. Don't be a slave to
dietary dogma (many rawists are slaves to dogma, and are in denial about
it).
* if raw doesn't work for you, try something else. There are lots of other
diets to choose from.
* raw is your diet, NOT your religion. Raw foods can be a great diet, but
it makes a really lousy religion.

Also, I criticize zealots because, in my opinion, 1) they have an eating
disorder, 2) they are not promoting health/common sense; rather they are
promoting food obsessions and their own eating disorder! (I have long
felt that zealots had eating disorders; I didn't get the idea from Dr.
Bratman's excellent article.)

Finally, in closing, let me suggest that this article is so important that it
should be in every raw fooder's library. This is definitely worth buying a
copy of the magazine.

Comments are welcome on this topic. Every raw fooder should read this article
and honestly examine their own behavior for obsessions and signs of
"orthorexia". I suspect that some will not like what they see, and continue
in denial. Others will face their reality, and work to change.

Regards,
Tom Billings
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