Six Notorious Health Posers

by Bob McCauley, CNC, MH

There are health professionals who truly can help people become healthier and others who have nothing to do with health other than pretending to promote health when in fact it is the same old same old.  Nothing personal against any on this list.  I don’t know any of them personally.  Here’s a short list of those who, in my opinion, are anything but health gurus who people should listen to:

1. Dr. Andrew Weil. When I saw him in person a few years ago he looked like an overweight, tired, old man.  Do you want to grow old and look like that?  I certainly don’t so I don’t listen to him for the most part.  He doesn’t like Alkaline Ionized Water.  He doesn’t like raw foods.  He doesn’t like Spirulina or chlorella. Dr. Weil is a big name and tiny industry.  He puts his name on countless bars and other supplements.  What does Dr. Weil believe we need to do to be truly healthy?  Read one of the numerous books he’s written over the years that contradict one another and never put their finger on what true health is all about.  Listening to guys like Weil  will never lead you to health.
2. Dr. Joseph Mercola – I have written about Mercola before.  He doesn’t like ionized water.  He doesn’t promote raw foods. He isn’t vegetarian or vegan. He promoted “lean” meat and “wild” fish.  He sells fish oil and a bunch of other supplements.  He stopped taking a lot of chlorella because he found it had “a lot of iron”.  He exposes the worse of the worse of the medical world and the health world, and for that he should be commended.  But is a perfect example of a doctor who tells people that they need to eat “some cooked foods” and animal protein.  Listening to guys like Mercola will never lead you to health.
3. Dr. Robert Young. He does promote ionized water and veganism.  But he hates algae, Spirulina and Chlorella.  His book, The pH Miracle, was self-conflicting.  In an interview with Kevin Gianni that I responded to he made a complete fool out of himself in some of the answers he gave including that people begin to look like the foods they eat (really?) and people who eat meat “stink.  You can smell them.  They are rotting inside.” Meat eaters don’t stink and no they aren’t rotting inside.  People who don’t bath stink and people who eat junk foods and various other kinds of garbage is the reason why people rotting from the inside.  I’m against the consumption of animal protein, meat, fish, eggs and dairy, but to make such claims is absurd.
4. Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld – Fox News in-house doctor is an overweight, nearly obese man who talks about medicine and medications as though they are indispensable to life and actually lead to health.  Which one of his pills that he recommends has cured one of its takers?  He pontificates on nutrition for individuals as though he actually knows what he’s talking about.  The man is obese and he is lecturing us on nutrition?  Okay.  All he does is research that week’s topic and regurgitate what the medical established and “science” has to say about a particular nutrient such as CoQ10 or Vitamin A.  He’s a joke. Listening to guys like Rosenfeld will never lead you to health.
5. Victoria Boutenko. Women love Victoria, and I like her too.  She’s a nice woman who promotes the raw food diet along with the rest of her family.  What about drinking water?  Not necessary.  What about exercise?  She doesn’t.  What about probiotics?  Doesn’t use them.  What about Spirulina and Chlorella for protein?  Doesn’t need them.  Eat Kale.  What about personal hygiene?  Not important.  Her comments about why her hair turned gray and then went back to black are ridiculous.  She’s overweight.  How can a raw foodist be grossly overweight?  It’s not possible.  Victoria is a nice person who I interviewed years ago  and who has written some good books on health, but follow her down the road of health: for raw foods yes, anything else, absolutely no.
6. Jordan Rubin. When I interviewed him for my radio program he seemed like a nice guy, but he sold out to NBTY, Inc., a huge public corporation, formerly known as Nature’s Bounty, Inc. They have owned the Garden of Life brand for a few years now, merging them into Attrium Innovations (also a public company), as official buyer of Jordan Rubin’s company.  All these corporate moves were done quietly so as not to make it look like health crusader Rubin was nothing more than just another guy who’s more interested in making money than making people healthy.  Rubin is not a raw foodist, but he has an entire line of products called the Raw Code Vitamins.  He is not a vegan and he does not promote vegetarianism, although he has in the past.  He does not promote vigorous exercise.  Rather he prefers walking because the Jews walked in the desert for 40 years or something.  Rubin was once very sick and looked awful.  He changed his diet and got healthier.  He started small, got big and sold out to a giant corporation that, like all corporate behemoths want primarily to do one thing: Make their bottom line glitter.  Some Health Guru Rubin turned out to be.

Honorable mention:

Daniel Vitalis. Daniel isn’t really a health poser.  Never met him but he seems like a sincere guy who use to be a raw food vegan and now he eats cooked animal protein because he says he almost died on the raw food diet after 10 years.  He must have not been doing it correctly because I’ve been a vegetarian for 31 years and a vegan for 15.  I’m 53 (2011) and still run 6 minute miles and still spar with guys less than half my age.  I must be doing it right when it comes to the raw food vegan lifestyle and Daniel must not have a clue what he is doing.  I certain don’t agree with his ideas about “wild, raw, unfiltered spring water”.  First you need to filter your water; second, I promoted Alkaline Ionized Water.  He does know his stuff about herbs and mushrooms, probably more than I do which is fine.  But don’t promote a cooked animal protein diet and tell me you’re a health guru because you are not, at least not in my book.  I don’t understand how other raw foodist can share a stage with him and promote longevity and great health.  Consuming cooked animal protein does not lead to true health.

Frederick Schilling, Founder of Dagoba Organic Chocolate.  Definitively not a health guru, but made himself out to look like one with his high-minded, look-down-his-nose “healthy” chocolate.   At least when you walk into a Godiva store you know you’re in a snobby place and that’s how they present themselves.  Dagoba has the same priggish attitude while lecturing us on their environmental sustainable and socially responsible chocolate, whatever that means in regards to chocolate.  Shilling is not a health poser but he tried to tell the world that chocolate is healthy and his products were never to be challenged in any way because they were organic and based on environmentally sustainable and socially responsible principles.  Started in 2001, Schilling wanted to prove to the chocolate industry that high end chocolate could be socially responsible and profitable at the same time.  Dagoba Organic Chocolate quickly grew to become an international icon for environmentally sustainable and socially responsible chocolate.  Then Schilling sold out to chocolate giant Hershey Chocolate in 2006 for $17 million dollars.  So much for environmentally sustainable and socially responsible chocolate.  Schilling was actually quoted saying that he intended to change the corporate climate at Hershey and in the commercial chocolate world.    Their chocolate was recalled for salmonella contamination.   Guess that whole environmentally sustainable and socially responsible thing didn’t work out for Dagoba, but rest assured.  Shilling got his millions, and a sellout is a sellout in any business and in life.