Vicki:

 Peter:
> >I and most of the people I know who have read it consider it not only
> >the worst book on raw foods but also one of the worst books they have
> >ever read.

> As it says in the book, "The truth always has enemies."

... That's why Tom has enemies...

I don't want to take part in a lenghty discussion here, since I haven't
read the NFL book. But anyway, in any book about diet, the author always
describes miraculous healings, athletic performances, promises perfect
health, etc... but we don't know how many failures, health and psychological
problems people run into.

I read myself Burger's "Manger vrai", and for the first months, I believed
almost everything he said. I thought that I would have perfect health,
that each meal would be an incomparable pleasure, and that each time I
would eat a cooked meal I would have some detoxification symptoms and
that raw foods would taste less good for a few days after that meal. I
believed that so hard that I almost invented some detox symptoms, and
almost convinced myself that raw foods became less pleasant after the
cooked meal. But I soon realized that many of Burger's claims were wrong,
or at least very exaggerated. For instance, I found that:

 *with raw food, I don't have perfect health. I did have many improvements,
but my health could still improve a lot by adjusting the % of macronutrients,
the number abd the size of the meals, etc.
 *I didn't have detx symptoms after the few isolated cooked meals I had
 *The taste of raw foods was not affected by isolated cooked meals
 *Raw food is pleasant, but not always. Sometimes, it is better than
any cooked meal I ever had (I had a great pleasure with some fruits,
with aged eggs and with salmon).

Without having read enthusiastic books about raw food, I would probably
stil eat cooked now. But on the other hand, may people have begun to eat
raw without knowing the potential difficulties; their new diet was
detrimental you their health, but they believed it was detox symptoms,
and kept losing weight, teeth and I don't know what.

Personally, I wouldn't find very reassuring to believe that my natural
diet produces detox symptoms after x years. On the contrary, I like this
list because people can share their REAL experience, talk about the
benefits as well as the drawbacks, to see that you are not alone on earth
not to be able to achieve perfect health.

> Fruitarian?  I didn't get that out of the book at all.
> Sure, it's a fruit based diet, but certainly not 100% fruit!
> They classify anything which contains the seed within itself for regeneration
> of the plant as a fruit, so obviously a "high-fruit" raw-plant food diet is
> inevitable, unless one is eating high quantities of sprouts.

I think that Stephen Airlin said he eats 90% fruit and 10% nuts, but he
eats more non-fruit foods than his co-authors because doing so helps
him to keep his bodybuilder's weight. And in the past discussions on
the list, he kept trying to prove that the natural diet of humans is
fruit, and that humans shouldn't eat animal food at all. In my opinion
(I wasn't on the list at that time), all his arguments fell one after
an other. My conslusion is the following:
 *100% fruit is not the natural diet of humans; humans can thrive on
non vegetarian diets.
 *There is no hard proof that we actually NEED to eat animal food, but
strong arguments in favor of that.

Anyway, eveyone is free to try a vegan diet, to see if it works on the
long run. But do not mistake real deficiencies for detox symptoms!

> Peter:
> >I see no sign of this. On the contrary I see Tom as the Ralph Nader of
> >raw foods who deserves a lot of appreciation for his tireless work to
> >get the raw foods movement out of the dark ages it has been in for so
> >long.

> I agree, but instilling negativity, fear, and doubt of raw foods does no good
> to people who are trying to get over the hump.
> He is dire need of some Tony Robbins audio tapes!
> Or perhaps David Wolfe's motivational tapes that are even better than Tony
> Robbins' tapes in my opinion.

I think that Tom is one of the most qualified and experienced persons on
the list. He may appear to instillate fear, especially to those who
"don't see the other end of the tunnel", but the list is also here to
show that the other end actually exists: we are here to certify that
fact, to guide you to the exit, but to warn you that you won't find
the paradise there.

I particularly appreciate Tom's non-dogmatic attitude: don't make raw food
an ideology; if you find better to eat steamed veggies and/or supplements,
go ahead. A far cry from NFL's "cooked food is poison!", etc.

Best wishes,

Jean-Louis