World News

haven't evolved
I'm not so sure. We've been eating like shit since way before mcdonalds, and natural selection gonna naturally select.

It may be coincidental, but there's an abnormally high (higher than western population) prevalence of diabetes in people transitioning to a western lifestyle.

I don't think I agree with this "nobody has time" thing. Most people don't get that excuse, you can usually make time, most people just choose not to. Do you make time to shower and brush your teeth?

I understand that there are food deserts and some people legitimately work multiple jobs and have kids and that fast food or microwavable dinners and generally unhealthy foods are quick and convenient and affordable but cooking your food doesn't take that much time and not drinking soda frequently takes no time.

Also it's not like veggies and lean meats like chicken are expensive for most people in the US. You can genuinely fill up your basket with lots of leafy greens, veggies, mushrooms and some animal protein for significantly cheaper than with junk food and microwavable dinners, hot pockets, deli meats and cheeses and bread. Unless you live in Alaska maybe.

Not being dismissive of peoples' struggles, a ton of us are being overworked for less money than we're worth, but if you need to you'll make time, you figure it out. Yeah there's sugar in everything processed, cool, you have affordable options that admittedly take a bit of effort to prepare and don't taste as good, but we can eat those and we can eat less. Overeating, constant junk snacking and portion size is also a huge issue in our culture.

Especially for people living in poverty/low income. Most of the tools that make cooking more efficient can be really cost prohibitive, so people working long hours/multiple jobs don’t have time to make every meal themselves and who don’t have access to things like Instapots or even just quality ovens that heat quickly and evenly, etc etc. factor in food deserts and many people just don’t have realistic alternatives to quick, cheap, sugar-laden foods.

And some people just don’t even know how to realy cook. My husband grew up in severe poverty with very neglectful parents who would literally do things like hand him a box of snack cakes when he was 9 years old and that was his “dinner.”

He has no idea how to do most things in the kitchen (and to be clear he does probably 90% of the cleaning in our home, it’s definitely not weaponized incompetence due to laziness). I grew up cooking with my parents and being involved with it as soon as I was old enough to stir the batter for the pancakes. So much of it is so second nature to me that I forget there are a lot of nuances to cooking well that I take for granted.

Eg, We watched the episode of Schitt’s Creek where Moira and David can’t figure out how to “fold in” the cheese and my husband asked me what it meant because he had never heard of that before, either. Knowing certain techniques, knowing how to use different tools, having basic recipes memorized, knowing what kind of spices go together for what kind of dish, if you don’t already know these kinds of things it’s time consuming to have to look it all up and learn. Overworked people don’t have that luxury of time and access to good learning resources.