Friday, January 24, 2020

Health, Fitness, and Bullshit


How often have you seen advertisements promising that you will lose a ridiculous amount of weight in a short amount of time or an advertisement for a ‘detox’ tea? How many ‘experts’ do you see giving advice that often conflicts with one another?  These days in the health and fitness industry, bullshit is rampant and it can be hard to determine who is knowledgeable and providing correct information and who is lying for their own personal gain; whether is it to sell you a product, a workout program, or just to mislead you. Most of the products ‘fitness experts’ try to sell you are supplements and the rise in social media usage has given these people the world’s largest stage as a platform to push their products.

According to the New York Times, “the dietary supplements that are the backbone of wellness make up a $30 billion a year business despite studies showing they have no value for longevity.”1  The vast majority of the supplements being sold promoting things such as weight loss are snake oil, a term used to describe products that make false claims and provide no real value to the consumer. To the average consumer trying to better themselves and get healthier, the overload of conflicting information can halt their progress or even stop it entirely because of bad information they may be receiving; ironically making them unhealthier in the process.

Frankfurt writes in On Truth, Lies, and Bullshit, “The fact about herself that the bullshitter hides… is that the truth values of her statements are not of central interest to her.”This quote holds true to many of the gurus trying to mislead people into buying their products or programs as they are knowingly bullshitting to profit off of you. However there is a gray area. There exists people who may be misleading you, but unintentionally. They may just be ignorant to new research and have outdated information at their disposal. Frankfurt also writes, “for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false”2. It is important to be aware of these people’s intentions and whether they seem to be genuine or just trying to sell a product.

References:

1. Gunter, Jen. “Worshiping the False Idols of Wellness.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 1 Aug. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/08/01/style/wellness-industrial-complex.html.

2. Frankfurt, Harry. “On Truth, Lies, and Bullshit.” The Philosophy of Deception, 2009, pp. 37–48., doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195327939.003.0003.





2 comments:

  1. I think that this is a really important topic. Obviously there is a lot of fake information circulating around the internet, but this information could be super harmful when it is directly related to your health. A lot of the detoxes and protein powders that influencers promote don't even provide a full list of ingredients, so it's difficult for consumers to fact check their benefits. Overall, I really enjoyed this post. However, you mention at the end that we need to be aware of influencers' intentions. I think your post would benefit if you elaborated on this. How can we raise awareness and filter through all the information we're given?

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  2. Really engaging title and visuals throughout the blog. I really like the topic and is very relatable and brings up a good question to society. What could separate real from bullshit for these snake oil products in terms of health and fitness? I believe a way to improve your blog could be to dive deeper into Frankfurts article rather than use it for support towards the end. Another thing that could grab the reader’s attention would be to talk about an example of a popular influencer who is clearly bullshitting about a product for personal gain - like the Kylie Jenner photo at the top. Overall I thought it was really great!

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