Ric:
>Tom...this is just my point.  You've helped make it better than I:

>I also think Ehret was a little touched...that was just my initial reaction
>to his first reading, but, by gosh, while he did nothing to stir me up, he
>certainly DID stir you up; enough, apparently, that you got into action
>about your life and began exploring the connection between your nutritional
>habits and your problems.  So, bravo for Arnold!  :)  The guy obviously
>made you start thinking more realistically, "crackpot" or not.

Tom:
Actually, you seem to have missed the point: I experienced harm and damage
because I got into fruitarianism with a negative motivation. I am convinced
that it is better to eat cooked food than be a mentally deranged raw-food
zealot. Negative motivation yields negative results.

Ric:
>Guess I'm sitting here on a shaking fence, Tom, but it seems to me that
>we're getting ourselves dangerously close here to something outsiders might
>interpret as at least potentially hypocritical: I sense an anger in your
>remarks about the NFL crew, and yet one of your own major complaints above
>about their own m.o. was that it was an engagement in "fear/hatred" and
>"hostility/zealotry."  To me, at least, don't I detect the very same sort
>of anti-fruitarian "hostility" and even "zealotry" in your own tone?

Tom:
No fear, as the NFL nonsense does not fool me.  I don't fear or hate
fruitarians; I know, from hard experience, that it is a difficult and risky
diet, one that often leads people down the primrose path to harm: dental damage,
zealotry, eating disorders. I criticize fruitarianism, in an honest way, to
alert people of the risks involved. If someone chooses that diet, it is their
decision and their responsibility. By the way, in my original posting, I
neglected to add that it is my opinion that the NFL approach is intellectually
dishonest. Also, outside of this list and a few NH critics what one hears about
fruitarianism is the "party line" (which is mostly nonsense), an unrealistic
positive view of a risky diet.

I have learned the hard way, that one should have a positive motivation for
their diet, and one should be honest as well. The raw foods community is not
being served by dishonest, negative approaches.

I avoid zealotry as the poison it is. I have seen far too many zealots in
the raw foods movement. In criticizing fruitariansim, I am trying to honestly
present a view that is contrary to the "party line".

Ric:
>But, in both cases, after the dust settled, the authors made a lot of
>money....AND TURNED LOTS OF PEOPLE ON TO THE IMPORTANCE OF SOUND "NATURAL"
>NUTRITION in their lives.  To me, it was a win-win deal.

Tom:
And if it leads these people to dental damage, eating disorders, hostile
zealotry (the direction that NFL appears to be going in)- it is a lose-lose
situation. I neglected to mention that after leaving fruitarianism, I went back
to cooked (veg) foods for 2-3 years, before returning to raw (NH style instead
of fruitarianism). I returned to raw; many others might not.

Ric:
>Maybe all these years have seen me mellow a bit...I hope so.  I'm far less
>inclined to point my fingers at others than was the case in my younger
>years;

Tom:
It is easy to stay mellow if you are not the object of incredibly nasty
attacks by zealots. I suggest you look at the actual behavior of NFL on
this list (in the archives) before supporting them. You might change your
mind. A fruitarian friend used to defend NFL, until he read their book
and was literally disgusted by the hostility in it.

Tom Billings
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