On junk food

[nancylebov]

http://academic.sun.ac.za/medphys/junk.htm

The real definition of junk food (or, of any of its synonyms) should recognize the fact that the adjective is applied exclusively to food items that children, and especially teenagers, find appetizing. Thus, codliver oil, despite its undeniable greasiness and artificially added vitamins and preservatives, is not junk food, because children loath it. Cake, which children love, is, on the other hand, a non-basic (or junk) food, despite containing flour, eggs, milk products, fruit, and sugar (which, with the inexplicable exception of the sugar, are all individually classed as "basic" food items).

Another factor which distinguishes "junk" from "basic" (or "nutritious" food), is the amount of effort the lady of the house expends on preparing that food.

I'm not sure this is true, but it's at least plausible.

Comments

[avram]

Cake, which children love, is, on the other hand, a non-basic (or junk) food, despite containing flour, eggs, milk products, fruit

Someone's been listening to Bill Cosby.

Hmm. Now that I follow the link, I find myself wondering why the article has so many quoted phrases without so much as a single citation or attribution. Koeslag writes that

Potatoes, if they are peeled and roasted in the home, are "highly nutritious", but if they are bought appetizingly ready to eat, then they are "empty calories"

...but we're not told who is claiming that home-cooked potatoes are nutritious, or that bought=prepared potatoes are "empty calories". Nor are we even told what kind of potatoes. Are we comparing home-cooked baked potatoes as part of a larger, more diverse meal, compared with a bag of potato chips or a serving of fast-food french fries?

I also notice that Koeslag makes no mention of fresh fruit, probably because it would wreck one of his theses -- that "junk" food is food that a mother has to work preparing. It takes little to no work to give a kid an apple, or some grapes, but nobody considers those "junk food".

I also notice that bright red all-caps Comic Sans makes it pretty tough for me to take a person seriously.

[avram]

...Which isn't to say that there's no social or political component to the classification of junk food. Personally, I suspect that a lot of (liberal, American, middle- and upper-class) rejection of "junk" or processed foods is just anti-corporatism. (I was going to say "sublimated anti-corporatism", but you can see it right there on the surface in a lot of the rhetoric.)

[enegim.livejournal.com]

Neither true nor plausible IMO.

[madfilkentist]

The term "junk food" isn't intended to describe, but to induce guilt and modify behavior. There's little hope in looking for objective characteristics behind such a term.

But I don't think it's targeted specifically at children. Are there adults who find cod liver oil appetizing?

[redbird]

It may not be aimed directly at children, but it is definitely aimed at parents, to influence what they feed their children. It's aimed at school districts, to influence what they feed students, both as school breakfasts and lunches, and in vending machines.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I only use the term for fast food. I'd never say cake was junk food, but I certainly say that burgers are.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

How about a homemade burger (perhaps ground at home) on a homemade bun?

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I think it's completely true for some discussions, by some people, of "junk food."

Our kids ate a lot of "fast food" (which seems to be most people's epitome of "junk food"), as well as chips and candy and such, growing up. We now have four slender, healthy, physically active adults (well, the youngest is a few months short of 18). How could such a thing be? Well, the simple and obvious answer is that no single experience, or category of experiences, exists of itself, with no interaction with the rest of life.

People tend to assume not only that someone who eats "junk food" eats almost nothing else, but that the person has a spectrum of other "unhealthy" practices (scare quotes because I don't accept that what people call "junk food" is intrinsically unhealthy). But that usually reflects no knowledge of the actual individual person who eats the food, but rather the speaker/writer's belief that there is food that's "junk," that entire categories of food fall under that title, and that eating it means something other than "this is what I'm eating right now."

We've raised our kids with the idea that there is no such thing as "junk food," no such thing as a food that is intrinsically unhealthy (in the absence of individual conditions and reactions related to specific foods). It might not work for everyone, but it has certainly worked for them.

[gildedacorn.livejournal.com]

I think you hit the nail squarely on the head. "Junk food" is food that the speaker doesn't like, whether for nutritional or other reasons.

My definition of "junk food" is fairly mainstream, but includes things like processed cheese (which many people consider good) and does not include homemade desserts (which many people consider bad). In both cases my concerns are the presence or absence of preservatives and excess salt (two qualities shared by most traditional "junk food").

(Burgers as "junk food?" Only the ones from a fast food place. Not the ones off a grill or a broiler. Mmm.)

[avram]

Oh, there's also a class aspect to this. In the US, "junk food" is food that poor people eat, especially the urban poor.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I was just thinking about how cheap cake in plastic is more like junk food than an Entemann's cake, and a cake from a fancy bakery isn't junk food at all.