In an attempt to curb the mass rush for food change and reform, psychiatry has green lighted a public relations push to spread awareness about their new buzzword “orthorexia nervosa,” defined as “a pathological obsession for biologically pure and healthy nutrition.” In other words, experts are moving toward saying that our demand for nutrient-dense, healthful food is a mental disorder that must be treated.
CNN, Fast Company, Popular Science, and other top outlets have all began to trumpet the talking points on cue relatively recently:
“Orthorexia nervosa is a label designated to those who are concerned about eating healthy. Characterized by disordered eating fueled by a desire for “clean” or “healthy” foods, those diagnosed with the condition are overly pre-occupied with the nutritional makeup of what they eat”.
In short, if you turn your back on low quality, corporate food containing known cancer causing toxic additives and a rich history of dishonesty rooted in a continuous “profits over people” modus operandi, then you may suffer from a mental illness. The cherry on top is that if you have the pseudo-science labeled disorder of orthorexia nervosa, you will be prescribed known toxic, pharmaceutical drugs from some of the same conglomerate corporations that you are trying to avoid by eating healthy in the first place.
Orthorexia has not yet found its way into the latest edition of the psychiatric bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), yet is commonly being lumped in with other eating disorders. Stepping back and looking at the ones pushing this label on us shows highly questionable motives.
Psychiatry as a whole is deeply in bed with a pharmaceutical industry that makes the drugs to “treat” every one of these “disorders.” It is often these companies that are wielding influence behind the scenes to invent more mental health categories with their toxic products as the answer. This latest media push to popularize orthorexia as a mental disorder with a goal to marginalize or derail the food revolution appears to have been dead on arrival.
The psychiatric community has even deemed creativity to be a mental illness.
As the people continue to walk away from the broken medical and agricultural/food systems like any abusive relationship, the food makers are willing to do anything to maintain their waning control. Organic and non-GMO food markets have exploded in the last 5 years, so much so that any corporation wishing to not follow the trend risks financial hardship or ruin. In addition, pharmaceutical companies are feeling the strain as less people want their toxic medications and crippling side effects.
Perhaps some individuals do take it too far to the point of self-harm, but the problem we face with a toxic food system is a much larger threat. In closing, let’s be aware of some of the overall BS fed to us by the pharmaceutical bankrolled industry of psychiatry. When healthy eating and creativity are mental issues, something is amiss.
Additional Sources:
OMg that’s because they want everyone unhealthy other wise they don’t make any money out of healthy people do they …BIG PHARMA want everyone sick
SOYLENT GREEN!
*to serve man – I’m not talking about our Savior Jesus Christ either! – Closer to a Twilite zone episode!
On the other hand, pesticides and chemtrails make sure we’re kept unhealthy anyways.
Hey, they gotta cover all their bases. Not enough people are willing to pop what they’re pushing.
Mainstream society sucks and so do our families and peers. They always try to force these habits upon us and get us to agree with them when we always want to be healthy.
This is how vegetarians have been made to feel for decades.
I think they mean obsessed to the point it’s not healthy, like bulimia or anorexia nervosa, for instance if you count every milligram of vitamins per square inch of all of your vegetables and it takes 6 hours or something, I would ask the person who came up with this condition to clearly state what qualifies as symptoms, everyone wants to eat healthy so it would be silly to have 90% of the general population fall in the bracket of actually having this. Love it how everything gets blown out of proportion, and quite frankly I think it is silly.
You would be surprised to know how easily you can convince most of those people to turn on their health conscious friends. Pay enough media outlets and you will have angry sheep telling people to just eat the fries and shut up.
I see this among my conservative friends all the time.
So easily brainwashed by corporate thinking are they.
i agree with you, except that part about most people wanting to eat healthy. i am pretty convinced most people want to eat easily, and because or this they can be lazy and not bother looking into what exactly they are eating…. not everything sold at whole foods is actually good for you. i think the troublesome part is that, as someone else mentioned, the pathological side could be placed under some other obsessive label, ex: scrupulosity is under OCD….. i also find it a bit disconcerting that it even be implied we might get carried away with the nutritional value in what we are eating. if that is a mental illness, shouldn’t the lack of concern for the nutritional value that is in the foods seen over the last 4 decades have been a mental illness. people have been eating rice that is plastic and that is NORMAL??
As long as the most abnormal among us get to claim they know what is normal for us, we will always allow this sort of behavior and will always hold such nutcases in high esteem…turning our kid’s minds over to them, shooting them up with mercury, etc. etc. all because the doctor said so.
I know it is really so much better that your kid should get measles – side effects brain damage, deafness, and blindness, not to say death; rubella side effect if the little darling passes it on to a woman bearing a child at the end of the first trimester just about certain profound deafness and reduced mental capability than that thy should have a vaccination which never contained mercury in a form that remains in the system. Now even that substance (of which there was a minute trace) has been removed from the vaccine. To tell the truth I think that most of the replies here prove the psychiatrists’ point. Conspiracy theory run rampant.
I got measles, so did my 6 siblings and all the kids in my little school…we had a great time off. Today, in my 60s, never having had a single vaccine in my life, I have all the parts I came into this world with, I can work circles around those half my age and I don’t force drugs, mercury, coal dust, fluoride, etc on anyone else.
They have made a simple little childhood disease into a monster because they know that stupid people fall for fear-mongering tactics and over-react as reliably as Pavlov’s dog. Just like with the polio vaccine…33,000 people died of polio in the entire history of polio, but over 8 million have died as a result of being vaccinated for polio because the vaccine contained the cancer virus and they new it when they injected all those people. (read Dr. Mary’s Monkey for the whole story).
The vaccination push by schools has nothing to do with ‘protection’ it has to do with the fact that every day a child is absent, the school does not get it’s transfer payment for that day.
If all this is conspiracy theory, it behooves you to advise the Vaccine Court in the USA immediately because they foolishly paid out over $3 billion in vaccine damage in the last 10 years alone…and that was because the plaintiffs kids were almost dead and they couldn’t dispute the damage. Hundreds of thousands more are damaged but their parents can’t afford the legal costs … Honestly, break the conspiracy theory wide open, run over there and straighten them out so that no more taxpayers money is paid to those families whose kids are faking their brain-damage. Do not waste a minute more with the likes of us…get to those you can impress with your wisdom.
Only those who know nothing of the history of mankind believe that ‘organic food’ is a fad, believe that psychiatrists are not murderers, especially now that they are prescribing bain-damaging drugs to newborns by the thousands, believe that the lines in the sky are natural, believe that the #7 poison on earth should be drunk daily and believe that the #1 neurotoxin in the world should be injected into the bodies of little children and it not be called assault and attempted murder.
my wife, my self, my daughter and 2 grand daughters had never had a vaccine in out lives and we are just fine, never got sick, besides a cold here and there..All vaccines are poison now a days and you are a fool to take them.. The worse one is the flu vaccine, what sheeples don’t know that there are always 5 different kinds of flu and they only make a vaccine for two of them,t hats why sheeples get so damn sick. More sheeples need to do there home work on vaccines and BTW, if you don’t want your children to get vaccinated, go to www. gov.org and print out a form to NOT get vaccinated and theres nothing no body can do to you …Look at new born babies, they want to give them 88 shots and most of the children will either die or get so sick they will never be normal.Use to be 1 out of 8000 would get autism, now its 1 out of 80, what does that tell you..ITS ALL POISON SHEEPLES..
You are an idiot. drink the koolaid with the rest of the sheep
oh get over it! first of all to say that it “never contained mercury in a form that remains in the system” is too imply that there are some kinds of mercury that are ok and there are not. 2nd, as they phased out the mercury, they increased the aluminum. so pick your poison.
meanwhile, everyone had measles, mumps and chickenpox when i was a girl. i don’t remember my parents being overly concerned. i stayed home from school, i took oatmeal baths. all in all, it was a non-event
now, it is the biggest fucking deal; people screaming that 100,000 people a year died of measles before the life saving vaccine. all those alarming death rate stats include populations that are impoverished and maybe you’re right- since the USA now ranks 2nd in childhood poverty, perhaps we are going to see kids too malnourished to withstand even regular childhood diseases. it might be better to eradicate poverty. what’s the point of surviving measles via a vaccination only to die of famine a few days later?
if you don’t think there’s a conspiracy afoot, you’re not paying attention. there are measles outbreaks in this country every year. from the CDC’s own website:
“During January 1–August 24, 2013, a total of 159 cases were reported to CDC from 16 states and New York City (Figure 2).
Patients ranged in age from 0 days to 61 years; 18 (11%) were aged
<12 months, 40 (25%) were aged 1–4 years, 58 (36%) were aged 5–19
years, and 43 (27%) were aged ≥20 years. Among the 159 cases, 17 (11%)
persons required hospitalization, including four patients diagnosed with
pneumonia. No deaths were reported."
get it? in the first 8 months of 2013, there were 159 reported cases of measles in 16 states. do you remember the owner of facebook making a public statement? no? i don't either. do you remember front page scare articles? no? funny, i missed them too. what about people actually calling for mass quarantine of non-vaccinated but otherwise healthy individuals, stopping just short of yellow stars? nope, didn't happen
159 people in 16 states walking around with this deadly, horrifying disease and no one batted an eye. you probably didn't even know about it. you went through your days with the false sense of security. meanwhile some stranger on a train might have infected you!!!!! my god! call the measles police!!
why is it an issue now? because drug companies are losing patents, because people are trying to be healthy and taking fewer drugs, because they've got no new blockbuster drugs in the pipeline but they do have 300 vaccines in development.
and because of a prearranged deal made with the government, vaccine makers are not liable for any damage their products might do- the tax payers get stuck with that tab
just imagine- a captive audience! remember, you begged the government to make vaccines mandatory, no exemptions so the entire population, old or young, sick or healthy has to be vaccinated for whatever we say, whenever we say and we can't ever be sued if anything goes wrong!!
it's a drug company's wet dream! vaccines for possible alcoholism! vaccines for shoplifting! vaccines for grief, for teenage rebelliousness, for criminal tendencies, for fatness, for thinness, for depression, for abnormal happiness
the possibilities are endless, the money is beyond imagining
be careful what you wish for, anna lee
I think you are not right. I think they are shilling for big ag.
Americans are waking up, slowly yes but finally….I think this a total bunch of BS and an attempt to lull people back to sleep. I think we are so, so close to getting to the 10% necessary to blow the whole lid off the GMO and other poisons we are being fed. It takes 10% of a population to make a trend and we must be really close.
Quite frankly, I think it’s silly that you’re judging this. You don’t know what it’s like to suffer from it. Here are some of the symptoms:
Some traits of those struggling with Orthorexia include the following:
Spending considerable time–often 3 or more hours per day–thinking about healthful foods and planning what to eat.
Experiencing guilt, fear or self-loathing when straying from this diet.
Placing the virtue of the food above the pleasure of eating it.
Sacrificing relationships and once-enjoyed activities in order to eat the “right” foods.
Gaining self-esteem and a sense of control from eating healthy foods.
Looking down on others who don’t eat the same way.
Becoming socially isolated in order to follow an eating plan.
It’s AWFUL. If you’re eating 1200 calories of fruits and vegetables and running on the treadmill for an hour EVERY SINGLE DAY RELIGIOUSLY, refusing to weight train because you think it will make you bulky, isolating yourself from your friends and family because you can’t eat foods that aren’t considered “healthy” (no, not even ONCE or you feel so guilty and so shameful), counting ever single calorie every single day, and it looks like you’re just being a health minded human so no one would think that your relationship with food/exercise/healthy lifestyle is actually turning UNHEALTHY, then yes, you have Orthorexia. I did and it was like living in a prison to your “healthy” lifestyle. Day in and day out. It was awful. And it was actually turning unhealthy. I had no muscle, no fat, I ran every single day, I ate fruits and vegetables and olive oil and maybe some oatmeal every single day. I ran EVERY single day for an hour. I would freak out if I had even a bite of something unhealthy, and then run to the treadmill and run at least an extra half hour to burn it off. It was an AWFUL relationship with food and it sucked the life out of me.
Please think before you post something that says these things can get “blown out of proportion”. Too much of a good thing can become a bad thing, and this applies to healthy eating as well. It can reach a side of the spectrum where it becomes a psychological problem. I only say this because I definitely suffered from it, although it took me at least two years to realize it. It’s not easy to comprehend there are people out there who put themselves through something like that, especially when so many Americans just want to LOSE weight and START eating healthily, but there are people out there who do take it too far. I just wish there was more awareness for it, because it’s so easy to overlook or to scoff at (hence this stupid article, which really makes me angry reading it). People can be so insensitive to the possibility that this mental condition is actually real.
Sucks for you. I eat clean and weight train and look and feel pretty damn good.
Sounds more like you had anorexic tendencies. A lot of dumb people think muscle will sneak up on you and make you into this giant steroid-taking man. Literally not possible, and the easiest shit in the world to get rid of if you decide you don’t like the look.
Krista, maybe you have a compulsive/obsessive type of personality which allows you to overdo something to the point of a disorder. I don’t believe for a second that one can be considered mentally ill for eating well and having a healthy disease-free body.
I say tell the psychiatrists who invented this BS “disorder” to eat GMO and fast foods, and in a few short years they will no longer be with us. Problem solved, and we can carry on eating organic veggies and living a healthy lifestyle.
Let the grim reaper be the judge.
Hey look! There’s one other person here with a brain. Thanks Krista, sorry there are so many twits out there who are incapable of understanding you because of their blind, foaming-at-the-mouth beliefs.
There is a goal with these powerful people who control all the corporations and drug companies- All part of AGENDA 21-
They want two things.
1. MORE PROFIT/control
2. sick/dying people- easier to control
This has to be the dumbest thing to come from Psychiatry Academia in a long time.
It’s pretty hard to beat the claim that ‘day-dreaming’ is a mental illness however…psychologists are pushing for this right now.
Just wait until they declassify paedophilia…
P.S. most psychiatrist are humanistic atheist. These tactics were used in communist countries to imprison those that opposed the state.
most of us humanist atheists are more interested in freeing the mind from religious/institutional control, not enslaving the masses. The Cold War is over. Welcome to the 21st century.
Most of “us”? Not with you on that. Humanist atheist is a subtle trap for “I’m smarter than you” attitude. Love is the most vulnerable stance. That is why my benefit of the doubt goes to Jesus. His whole life was lived to prove that love is the ultimate answer. Humanist atheist always has a selfish motive at the root because it does not sacrifice as Christ did. That is the ultimate litmus test. Sacrifice. For the sake of love. And if you say it’s the humanist atheist belief that made you love and sacrifice, then I say Christ will welcome you, because your heart is aligned correctly.
and your preaching is your not so subtle way of expressing your moral superiority, as if only Christians understand love, sacrifice or morality. Thanks for your welcome in the name of a fictional deity, but I prefer reality and not some magical man in the sky. oh, and way to go on that not being judgmental thing.
These idiots are just following the communist agenda. We all have to do with less while the regime can have what ever they want. Anything that goes against the agenda, is a mental illness, when in fact they are the one’s with the mental illness…. This crap has got to stop and Americans must stop being politically correct and do what is right for all of us….. We all must come together to beat this fraud and hold people accountable for their actions…. Just look at how many of your children are brain dead with all the ADHD drugs ect. They have destroyed your children…. These people who are sick in the first place are changing meaning and rules to make their agenda’s go forward when they go against the natural man……
This has nothing whatsoever to do with Communism. You make yourself a laughing stock with such an assertion.
meh, yeah it kinda does and no she isnt being laughed at but perhaps u are.
COMMUNISM? Oh my God-you are decades behind. This is corporatocracy, oligarchy, facism-pick from those, but it’s nothing remotely resembling Communism. Thanks for the nostalgic belly laugh, though!
Don’t forget the killer vaccines, chemtrails, mercury dental filings, pink slime in meat, sodium rat poison flouride in our water and canned goods, aspartame in kids medicines and all of our processed and restaurant foodsm and much more.
You left out the morgellons.
Ever met someone with orthorexia? It’s like watching an anorexic; it’s a compulsive nervous disorder and a horrific way to watch someone you care about waste away. This article puts a big stamp of approval on self-harm. Be careful in your search for collusion that don’t get anyone killed you shit.
You are an absolute Moron, what Pharm company do you work for? Just curious
America is getting more retarded and evil ever single passing day. The organic healthy food that many people buy in America is typically the norm for most food in other countries. But here we have to be extra careful to eat healthy because almost everything is gmo toxic crap.
Return to the backyard gardens grown with heirloom seeds could solve many problems in the American diet situation.
Did you know they are trying to make it illegal to grow your own food?
Yes I did know government was trying to make it illegal for citizens to grow their own food.
But, as with anything … if 360 million Americans all at one time get enough of the government BS and decide to grow their own food or do anything else regardless of what our insane megalomaniac overlords dictate. I would think it would be hard to stop those citizens from growing their own food.
But you’re not all doing it… you’re still in front of this screen! Make it happen! They’ve got you where they want you! distracted!
To a large degree, the American people are fluoridated through their drinking water.
Due to this (among other) drug induced hazes it will most likely take something really startling to wake many of them up to the dire situations facing Americans.
If starvation reaches American shores, say perhaps through a financial collapse, where the food stamps cards no longer work, perhaps Americans will not be able to ignore a empty stomach.
Gardens may become popular in that case.
I started last summer. I have also stopped shopping walmart, refuse to fly, do not subscribe to any newspapers or magazines and am leaning toward shutting off cable for good. We better do something. I think the flying thing is a real easy place to start. TSA is going to be armed so we should organize and try to put together a no fly month. Thanksgiving would be excellent. Just imagine how fast TSA would be gone if the busiest travel time of the year was a complete flop. The airlines would be screaming their heads off and those morons would be gone. It’s a great place to start and we do have the power to stop it anytime we like…if only we are willing to deny ourselves just one time…..
Cori, they already have in some states. if you grow your own in those states they will send in a riot police to take them away from you.I grow my own and always will..
Yep that is true. Illegal to grow food, illegal to trap rainwater, illegal to do almost everything these days. When are we going to say we’ve had enough? We could start real simple by ridding ourselves of the TSA. No fly month and we should do it over the busiest travel time of the year. I bet the TSA would be gone in two weeks tops if everyone just refused to fly. It would only take once. They are going to arm those idiots. We can work on other ways to start pushing back on this crap too. This is getting to be very un-funny in America. I don’t think most people realize how serious this really is and it’s getting worse very fast now.
Actually, studies have shown that organic food is no safer or better for you health than ‘non’-organic and GMO foods. (in fact, the pesticides organic foods use is even more toxic than roundup)
You obviously don’t know what the word “organic” means unless you are simply attempting sarcasm here. Organic foods are not sprayed with pesticides or use chemical fertilizers, etc. They use “pesticides” made of things like water with garlic in it that repels bugs and fertilizer that is compost, completely natural. Assuming you are serious, you go right ahead eating chemically laden food if that’s what floats your boat. I will continue eating food that isn’t doused in chemicals.
Propaganda in the government Theater Of The Absurd has reached a point that sane people could possibly need to mentally turn off and tune out the so called Masters of the Universe insane statements.
The statements they make have become so ridiculous it’s seems to be a mental illness to ever give validity to anything they may say in the future.
They have gotten to the place that they appear to be nothing but a joke. And, the whole world will soon be laughing at them because they are losing the war for the minds of men.
>believing nutrition is important and you shouldn’t trust profit-driven chemlab agrofood businesses with your health
Why, there is something wrong with them! Shut it down!
>believing you are a magical gender-switching entity that can change your own biology at a whim
>believing you are actually the physical embodiment of a housecat
>believing that if you just have doctors mutilate your penis you can become a woman
This is not a mental illness! This is perfectly normal and healthy, goy– I mean gentleman! :^)
Yeh, I sure there all sitting around eating dounuts and candy bars and chips stuffing there faces with the same shit they make us eat with the cancer cell garbage that we are lift to buy in the stores . I say kiss my f::ken ass with all this GOVERMENT bull shit . I like to stuff there mouths with the same food they make us eat till they chock !!!!
PUREHELIX
If you have a mental disorder, they can take your guns away…
Good catch, had not thought of that…
you got it, easier to justify confiscation
And they can take your kids away…
maybe a gun culture IS a mental disorder
Actually constant fear of your life and purchasing a firearm is labeled as paranoid scizophrenic they took away my gun privilges when cop lied on police report in fl I had a gun that I bought legally and had a concealed carry license and a certificate of competency did it matter nope if they can’t arrest u they baker act u and force u to comply by calling u crazy
Fuck ’em, they’ve lost already and they’re running scared ’cause they don’t want the general public to know it. They wouldn’t be publishing such stupid crap if that wasn’t the case.
Are
you kidding me, Are you serious, Anyone who believes these OFFICIALS
have the Mental Disorder!!! I wonder who paid these OFFICIALS off to
say such PROPAGANDA & LIES, our Government…you know their Motto;
Tell a HUGE LIE and tell it for a LONG TIME and the MASSES of people
will believe it!!! DON’T BELIEVE THIS, IT’S A LIE FROM THE PITS OF
HELL!!!
THE GREEN HORSE IS RIDING!!!
Are you kidding me, Are you serious!!!, Anyone who believes these OFFICIALS
have the Mental Disorder!!! I wonder who paid these OFFICIALS off to
say such PROPAGANDA & LIES, our Government…you know their Motto;
Tell a HUGE LIE and tell it for a LONG TIME and the MASSES of people
will believe it!!! DON’T BELIEVE THIS, IT’S A LIE FROM THE PITS OF
HELL!!!
THE GREEN HORSE IS RIDING!!!
Can’t you folks understand the words “pathological obsession”? That means that your fixation on healthy food reaches the point where it interferes with healthy life. This is not an attack on healthy eating. It’s about obsession in a clinical sense.
yes we can understand that. just as there is a clinical term for people who need to always correct others. however, the fact is… that people will take this and run with it and start pointing fingers and being ridiculous. my coworker that i mentioned would be convince that she was right, never getting past the title. but thank goodness for you betty, she’ll understand now!!
jesus christ betty, it is about me as i was sharing a personal story. and being that this is a fun article not a professional page and you came all gang busters to tell us all we were being foolish not seeing the real issue… which by the way i have witnessed with others close to me and it is not a laughing matter…. i’d like to make a ‘jack nicholson’ recommendation that you have a glass of wine and try to kill that huge bug up your ass. i happen to be a huge fan of people understanding that good food is the first step in proper health care…. so forgive me, and anyone else that didn’t answer the way you believe we should. good thing betty’s around.
Jesus Christ, Liesl, what does your personal story have to do with how a mental disorder gets added to psychiatric guidelines for professionals and academics? The only bug up my ass is a general appreciation for science and some difficulty in tolerating fools.
you have bored me betty and as i said, people were having fun… and then you showed up.
Gee Liesel…could it be there is a mental illness diagnosis for ‘being a pain in the ass” and Betty is suffering this…poor soul??? There’s one for shyness…there’s one for what psychiatrists do…it’s called psychopathy… hmmmm. LOL.
Pretty sure anything is possible! 🙂
Mental illness is NOT scientific…stop spreading myths. Even the author of the DSM has admitted it is all BS with no scientific support whatever….just opinions…sick, stupid opinions. Mental illness is nothing more than normal reactions to poverty, trauma, mental, psychiatric, physical and sexual abuse. OCD is nothing more than a deep seated feeling of being unsafe at all times and the brain tries to make the person safe as part of the survival imperative.
There are no scientific supports whatever for any mental disorder, none. And even the main author of the DSM admitted it was all BS…a total fraud. Mental disorders are nothing more than moral judgements of one on another, with the ‘other’ usually being stupid enough to accept being called a name. Stick and stones and psychiatric drugs will break my bones, but names will never hurt me unless I believe the idiot calling me the name actually is more equal than me. Let us not forget that a pathological need to demean others with labels and unsupported opinions is a real disorder…thing is, those very sick people calling people demeaning names that last a life-time are getting paid big bucks to do so…we are all nuts to allow this and to allow children to be subjected to their abuse.
The thing is–who are they to decide when someone’s “obsessed” with their food choices? Who’s drawing the line in the sand? The psych field? The pharmaceutical companies? It’s really none of their business if I should decide to eat at home and avoid most restaurants because I don’t want to eat pesticides, GMOs, factory-farmed meats, and french fries that contain 20 ingredients rather than the 2 or 3 that are actually necessary. It’s none of their business that I spend a goodly amount of time looking for affordable organic foods. I’m not “mental” because I want to eat better food than what’s currently available at the majority of restaurants. It’s not MY fault that I have to spend so much time tracking down nutritious and organic foods–our food supply is atrocious, so it’s hard to quickly find foods that I feel are acceptable for myself and my son. Of course it takes time to find such foods and then learn to transition yourself away from processed and fast foods. It’s all about learning a new way of life–it’s not a freaking obsession, for pete’s sake. It’s not about interfering with a healthy life–it’s about *creating* one.
If it does those things to someone it’s likely because they were already “mental”. Creating a whole new illness category for already existing ones (like OCD) is just non-sense. It’s just another label to give people and another reason to create a new designer drug that will undoubtedly be coming to a TV advert near you…
the use of the word “mental” might be frowned on, esp by the millions suffering from OCD or other anxiety disorders that still handle life remarkably well and are successful and overall content people . but i get exactly what your point is, and i wonder if psychiatry, with all it’s failings, just shot another hole in its credibility. as for conversing with betty, she doesn’t have all the answers, she just talks like she does. and i am with you on the idea of labels and boo to new drugs that only poison too many people.
That’s why I put the word mental in quotation marks; because I don’t think most people categorized as OCD are actually ill, though of course some of them might be. I don’t happen to think there’s anything wrong some of the OCD “symptoms”. In fact, I think more people should be organized and worried about doing things right the first time they do something (perfectionist), etc. Everything has a psychiatric label nowadays, even if the qualities are things that humans should be striving for….
hahaha, well glad to hear the ” ” were to qualify the lunacy of labeling people ill. however, what you described is actually not OCD, but OCPD and OCD comes in all ranges and sadly can be debilitating. i try to err on the side of caution when it comes to anxiety disorders cause i have no idea what the other persons is struggling with. OCPD is obsessive compulsive personality disorder, they have no pain in doing their compulsions but are a pain in the ass to live with because they demand everyone else does it their “the proper” way.
if anyone is struggling with OCD…… and you know it…..there are wonderful treatments that work that do not involve drugs.
big pharm first, then big food…. and they want us to think that being concerned by what enters our bodies is a mental issue??? please. but what do i know? other than healthy lifestyle of good food and physical activity makes me happy.
And you were educated where?
What does that have to do with anything I think? Reread my comment and you’ll see that I wrote “I think” before almost every one of my statements.
what credibility???
And I am proud to say I am mentally ill, really, really mentally ill. I watch my food quality, travel an extra 20 miles to buy at an organic farmers market, read every label, have my own organic market, refuse to eat any chicken that has been abused….I love being mentally ill. I am 65 and 30 year olds can’t keep up with me! Did I tell you I love being mentally ill???
You totally rock! That’s my kind of crazy!!!!
Amen. You work your ass off to get what you think is important. That’s what I’m talkin’ about! And no attitude about what the world owes you.
Ordinary for you isn’t ordinary for me that’s the rub. Established lines by design, fence you in. I prefer relationships with real people, not robots of the system.
Yeh, it impacts my ability to work that I have to be hypervigilant to ensure I don’t end up poisoned…in the old days all food was organic and no matter what we ate, it was safe and nutritious.
Agree with everything in your post except that it’s not your fault that you have to spend so much time tracking down nutritious and organic food…historically EVERYONE has had to spend “so much time” tracking down nutritious and organic food…it’s called growing it!!! That takes a lot of time!!! Most modern people are pissed that they have to spend so much of their precious time obtaining this, but human history states unequivocally that this is what is necessary to insure your food quality and quantity. Just face the facts and do what is necessary to be above average. In my world that means working my ass off, or “toil” as the bible puts it.
Um….I *do* do what’s necessary to obtain healthy food, including growing some of my own. In fact, I spent over a thousand dollars a few years ago creating multiple raised garden beds out of cedar, plus over $200 for indoor growing supplies. I also patron the organic farmers in my community. My point was that part of this new psych label includes the symptom of “taking so much time to find good food”. IMO, that’s a ridiculous part of the equation because it’s particularly necessary in today’s society because the majority of our food supply is crap. I don’t fret over it and I don’t mind spending the time necessary to source and grow good food. It did piss me off in the beginning that it was so much harder to source things I couldn’t grow in my tiny backyard, but not so much anymore; I’ve learned to live with the fact and just do my best to work with what we have at this current moment in agriculture.
Should we then be certain we eat at least one poisonous substance each day to avoid being called obsessive??? What about the people who are obsessive about eating badly…are they normal?
How can wanting to eat healthfully be unhealthy? We shouldn’t have to “obsess” about it at all-our food supply has been so bastardized by Monsanto, Cargill, etc. that you have to work really hard at eating healthfully, otherwise every bite is full of synthetic hormones, antibiotics and other chemicals.
Yes I agree. This is an interesting article but there should be no confusion between the desire to eat healthy and the pathological obsession to eat healthy. These poor unfortunate people usually have other psychological problems and they do need professional help. There is no attack by the psychological community on healthy eating. I am sorry (I do enjoy reading your articles here) but this is one commentary that just needs to be read as an interesting story. We should not worry that our quest for healthy food is seriously being attacked.
In a sense, it has to be an obsession. It’s hard to find good, nutritious, high-quality food. You HAVE to read a lot of labels, you HAVE to scour around to get a relationship with a good, ethical farmer. And, then, when you do find a company that is using organic, you find out they sold out to BigAg. So, ya, call me obsesses because I care about what I put into my body
Finally someone who gets the article. Most of these posts are ridiculous and are missing the point of what it means to have a “pathological obsession”. This article is not about some of the people out there who choose to eat clean. This is about disordered eating to the point that it interferes with the persons life in a negative way.
Not so much. A quote from the first article says:
[Unlike anorexia, which addresses how much you eat, orthorexia is about what you eat. And nutritionists and psychologists say that they’re seeing it more often, especially in the face of restrictive food trends, like gluten-free, and growing information about where food comes from, and how it’s grown and processed.]
So they’re saying if you care about how your food is grown and processed or if you’re on a restrictive diet (usually because of a medical condition that calls for it) then you’re orthorexic. That’s a pretty big blanket statement and it encompasses a LOT of people nowadays–to the point where they would drug up or “counsel” many hundreds of thousands of people because they think restricting your diet is somehow wrong and they think that caring about your food sources is abnormal. But of course, eating junk processed food all your life is never given a psychiatric label, is it? *That’s* totally normal…
To top it off, they start out in that article with a story about some lady who brings her own food to a party because the food there is probably brimming with crap and she’s trying to eat healthier. Oh boy, lock her up in the nuthouse!
I say big f***** deal. Why should it matter what someone is eating if they’re not hurting anyone around them? What difference does it make to the shrinks if someone goes gluten-free because they’re intolerant or have celiac? What business is it of theirs if I care about my food sources and want to avoid pesticides by eating organic? They essentially took the stories of 2 or 3 people who really do take things to an extreme and are now making a mountain out of a molehill by giving this yet another psych label rather than diagnose them with their real problem, which is probably just OCD.
People transitioning to healthy eating aren’t disrupting “healthy living”; they’re creating a healthier life–and yes, that does take time and effort, and there is much care involved in it. To call that an obsession is ridiculous when so much effort is necessary to transition to a healthy diet. It takes time, effort, money, and vigilance to source good food since our food supply is filled with so much trash. If better food was more freely available, then people wouldn’t have to work so hard to find it and they wouldn’t have to work so hard at avoiding the junk found in most food nowadays.
Do you realize how hard it is to find organic foods at restaurants? It’s almost impossible, therefore many people choosing organic will forgo the restaurant scene in lieu of home-cooked meals where they control the ingredients. That’s NOT an obsession, no matter how much the psych industry calls it such. It’s called giving a sh*t about the food you eat and there’s nothing wrong with that. IMO, more people *should* care about what they’re stuffing into their mouths every day. Maybe then we wouldn’t have so many sick people in this world.
(edited to fix spacing errors)
Anyone being “pathologically obsessed” with healthy eating would be “pathologically healthy”, and would be way better off than if they ate poorly. The medical fraternity are really scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to dredge up some new reason to take their dangerous and unneccessary pills.
It’s the taking of pills on a compulsive scale that is a disease in the clinical sense today. Throw your pills away, and step out into a new life. Become drug-free.
hahahah, i had an coworker tell me i had an eating disorder and was anorexic because i did not eat sugar filled treats all day. i suggested that perhaps her diet was what made her feel so lousy she went nuts!!! at 5’5″ and weighing in at 135#, there is no way to call me anorexic. and eating healthy, real food makes me feel better, so no thank you… i don’t want a soda!
Well, they have already convinced her-more idiots to follow, no doubt.
Yeah I agree. I think that if these critical people ate better, they would be far happier and nicer to people in general.
So true. I’m constantly berated for “not eating enough” and “having a bad diet” when, in reality, i have an exceptional (nutritionist devised) diet. The irony in their statements is rather amusing, and the disregard people have to what they put in their bodies these days is alarming. We will all pay for it in the form of their tax-funded medical bills. Joy
I could eat so much better than I do. But I could be eating a lot worse too. Once or twice a year I’ll find myself rushing through the fast food line because it’s the fastest thing out there– then I find myself in the bathroom more times than normal throughout the day. Give me whole foods any day! I never drink soda either, but I love bubbles– Mineral water works for me 🙂
It’s known that fongus and even cancer cells gain their nutrition of sugar. Most people in their 50s ( here where I live) are overweight, having nail issues and the number of cancer cases continues increasing among them 🙁 And when you go to the grocery store in the morning, you see those people like making line in front of the bakery sh.t counters…also buying tons of sugary stuff. Coincidence?
Yes, Moochelle Antoinette Obama determines what you eat. Notice she NEVER knocks GMOs. She never speaks out about the unknown dangers of GMOS. She’s totally fine with them. Now the commies want to label you mentally ill if you don’t want to get vaccinated up and stuffed full of GMOs. The PC commies are redefining reality. Now homos are considered normal and heteros are mentally ill if you don’t like them (called homophobia). Now you’re mentally ill if you don’t want to turn in your guns. Now you’re mentally ill if you don’t like GMOs. Now you’re mentally ill if you want to eat and live healthy. The only shots that I support are lead shots for mentally ill liberals. Liberalism is a mental illness.
Michelle Obama had an organic installed at the White House immediately when she moved in…
Wouldn’t doubt it. She wants to eat organic, but doesn’t want you doing it. You just eat the garbage she tells you and don’t complain.
Wow, the NWO slave drivers must be running scared to come up with something like this. They want to make sure everyone can be classified as having a psychiatric disorder. Self preservation is now a mental disorder. What a bunch of crackpots. If I had any doubts before , after hearing this I will probably believe every conspiracy theory I hear no matter how bizarre. It’s like a bunch of five year olds are running the show.
Did you know that running from a slave master was deemed to have a mental disorder at one time? I guess that once slaves were freed the psychiatrists had to remove it from their book of fiction. Homosexuality was also a mental illness diagnosis at one time…
I didn’t know that but it doesn’t surprise me.
The psychiatric community is a group, like any other, with an agenda. They’re as full of BS as the next “community.” Their primary cause is filling their wallets.
Because fixating on eating healthy is more dangerous than not giving a crud and eating anything so long as its edible?
Apparently so…
Psychiatrists are CRAZY!
i first commented, and was silly, cause this is nonsense. but then i became a bit annoyed because a certain “know it all” keeps talking down to everyone….
listen, first it was big pharm poisoning us, now big food has done a good bit of damage to our overall health. it would be great if neither had pull in politics, but they do. and if i have to see another ‘monsanto care about food commercial’ i will hurl (not in the gag me with a spoon way)
people should be concerned with their food’s nutritional value. if what you are eating isn’t healing your body, by which i mean feeding it the nutrients for it to remain in good health…. then it is likely harming your body. this doesn’t mean you can never indulge in desserts. but moderation is key.
the fact that america has landed in a position where we have reason to even question the nutritional value in foods, sadly even natural foods …. is quite damning.
this is not suggesting that a person is watching what they eat to fend off any fat, or counting calories, or not going to work cause they are so obsessed. this is suggesting that it is possible to care too much about the food quality that we put into our mouths…. and if you believe that then you are likely happy as a clam with big pharm and its promises to heal you after you buy all big foods poisons that will never allow your body to experience the health it should. and even tho i am not a conspiracy theorist…. i could totally see those two working this one out with psychiatry so they all can hold on tp their fat wallets.
I think the devil is in the details on this one. Under what circumstances — and what types of patients, are receiving that diagnosis. If it’s someone who just shops at Whole Foods, that’s obviously absurd, ridiculous and you can happily grab your pitchfork. If it is someone who is unable to function in their daily lives because of a fear of eating the wrong thing, that’s a different story. That person probably needs actual help.
I agree. However, it is likely that the food is just a manifestation of another umbrella condition where obsessive focus and worry is crippling the individuals freedom.
The american psychiatric community is what’s sick it seems, again. whoever declared this should be locked in a rubber room as incompetent and pumped non-stop full of their psychotropic compounds. that should settle that problem real fast.
They were locked in a rubber room when they dreamt this up…the folks supervising them wrote it down as they were dreaming it up…
Maybe you can only get into psychiatry school if you swear to force feed drugs to the rest od the population that have chosen to heal themselves with simple organic food instead the “sick-drug-sick-drug, diet interspersed with high fructose corn syrup or soda or both. This is great material for comedians but if it is real, it is a disgusting statement about how twisted backward we are determined to be for corporate funding? Enough!
While I’m SURE this is happening, exactly WHO are the “officials” cited in this headline???
While I have a healthy skepticism of all things “big pharma” and “big food,” this article seems a little hyperbolic and out of context. As in, I don’t think psychologists are calling everyone who has an organic salad on their plate a “nutcase” and sending them straight to the pharmacy. Instead, they are likely diagnosing the people who take that to an unhealthy obsession, such that it gets in the way of their lives. Aka: panic attacks over ingredients, hypochondriac behavior if they think they ate the wrong thing, etc.
Sure, but how many people do you *actually* think are obsessing about food that much? The ones that do probably already have a psychiatric label–they don’t need another one.
That’s kind of my point. This article gives a nugget of information and a headline that will rile people up, but leaves everything else completely out of context and subject to wild speculation. As you said, how many people are *actually* obsessing that much? What circumstances (or parties) were actually involved in the added classification? What does it *actually* mean in the real world? Would be interesting to have a followup piece that actually interviewed both someone in the medical community, and someone who received that diagnosis. As in, allowing for an actual informed opinion. It’s a little hard to be angry about something based on no actual details, unless you’re just looking to be angry.
Yes, it would be nice to have more information rather than sound bites from the psychiatric field…
You have this feeling we are being ruled by Alinksy MORONS???
Pick the food, freeze it, microwave it, pressure cook it, but don’t eat it.
Obviously the “officials” are using. They don’t know good from bad anymore except that good is bad.
I’m sure there’s a already Pill and treatment plan in the works.
who gives a f what the DSM says? shrinks are whack! i can eat whatever the hell I want, including healthy, organic, nutrient-dense non-gmo food and ‘experts’ can suck me.
Oh, really? “Psychiatry has green-lighted”…riiiiiiight. Oh, didn’t you get the memo? Journalism green-lighted a rule that you have to attribute quotes and stances to actual, individual people, organizations, or published works, not pull shit out of thin air. Academia agrees with Journalism in this regard, and Literature would like to add that pandering to paranoia is a total cop-out.
There is no pope of psychiatry. It’s a big huge wide field of academic study, including everything from the pet-theories of Psych 101 kids to established institutions like the American Psychiatric Association. I’m not a fan of pill-pushers, either, but this page just smacks of snake-oil.
When taking statins, aspirin everyday becomes a norm, somebody eating fruits and vegetables instead of drugs are considered by them as abnormal.
Well just call me “Orthorexia nervosa .. That’s what i am, and proud of it 🙂
This is an important discussion and reflection to have. I have 2 friends, women, smart, athletic and educated, who know alot about food choices. Both are truly under weight, suffer from amenorrhoea and get into deep, deep conflicts about what and how to eat every time a meal comes up. They choose not to eat what their bodies need and instead choose to suffer medical consequences…..
What is your definition of “underweight”? Not “pleasantly plump” like tens of thousands of other American women? And who are they having conflicts with about their meals? If they’re athletic, it seems unlikely that they’re suffering too many medical consequences because of their food choices…
Really considering leaving and giving up my citizenship. Not sure it’s all that great to be a citizen of the US of A anymore. Used to be the best but not so sure anymore. I’m thinking a small island in the Pacific………..next thing you know, they will approve GMO apples. Oh! Wait! That’s been done already.
I wonder if tree bark is healthly,cause theres going to be a FAMINE in america and it will be the prefered source of food soon,cause no one believes it could ever happen here……but its going to,better get to the plant stores and stock up on seeds,WHILE YOU STILL CAN,your beloved daddy in washington DC is going to cause it too….HIM and his DEMON friends………….
So any one now, who is, say for example, against Monsanto foods, they can just discredit them by saying they have a mental disorder. Nice…..NOT!!! This is ridiculous!
Anyone wanting to be and is a psychiatrist must be and is by definition “mentally ill”.
Sick and malnourished people are easier to lord over and control. Their minds are usually dull and spirits often weak.
A disorder for the obsession of labeling things as disorders.
The guy who wrote this (Jeffery Jaxen) supports anti-vaccination. His entire career is based on what he ‘feels’. Science, empirical research and logic is apparently not part of his bag of tricks. Utter fucknut.
LOL!! Right….so we should ignore the science that says vaccines aren’t always safe and effective and the research that says pesticides are harmful. Okie dokie….
When it comes to authority figures that are mental in their controlling states like this, I say “rubbish to this, I don’t believe it, your words mean nothing to me.” Paying no attention to people who create such rubbish in our worlds is the best thing we can do to make a difference in this world.
What a garbage article. I mean… ”In short, if you turn your back on low quality, corporate food containing known cancer causing toxic additives and a rich history of dishonesty rooted in a continuous “profits over people” modus operandi, then you may suffer from a mental illness.” NO, NO, NO, NO and NO. Don’t try to ”dumb down” something you don’t understand. This is a real illness, and the perfect case of someone with that illness would be a person who stops drinking water because they can never find water pure enough. Not someone to read labels FFS. Where is journalistic integrity? Or is this article paid for by lobbyists?
This article skips over the part that makes it a mental disorder. When your behavior, any behavior impedes on your ability to function normally.. such as feeling like you can never leave the house, being constant anxious and fearful of everything around you, unable to socialize, go to work, etc. THAT is a disorder. That can happen with people who are excessively clean, excessively disorderly, people who are obsessed with their food, and many other things. People who are focused on eating only healthy food and who are able to maintain the rest of their lives in a reasonably orderly fashion are NOT disordered. This article is trying to scare off the people who are making great strides to change their eating habits back into the Wonder Bread and Jack in the Box coma they were in before. There is nothing wrong with eating exclusively healthy.