Joe Rogan treats his body like a temple. There is a reason the UFC commentator looks like no other 57-year-old you’ve met, complete with bulging muscles, six-pack abs, and not a wrinkle on his face. So serious is the JRE podcast host about his health that he literally hunts his own food and raises chickens to make sure he is putting the best calories in his body. While he is a big critic of the antibiotics-laden factory farming practices, he reserves his strongest criticism for what he considers the worst types of food. The $400+ billion fast food industry and ultra-processed foods.
However, it was good to see Rogan’s stance on the fast food industry get some intelligent, well-thought-out, and pretty lengthy pushback from World Central Kitchen founder, Chef Jose Andres.
“It’s not calories, it’s the type of calories, it’s processed food that you could keep on the shelf forever, because food’s not supposed to be able to sit on the shelf like that forever. And the kind of food that can is not healthy for you, that’s why it doesn’t rot. It doesn’t rot ‘cuz it’s not alive,” Rogan said.
But Chef Andres pointed out another aspect about the popularity of junk and ultra-processed food that doesn’t get talked about much. It is cheap and it is easily accessible. “But eating too much of anything, I could argue with you that it’s a big conversation… We can have the same conversation and use the conversation from two different points of view. It’s been obviously very easy [to] attack the fast food industry to the junk food industry, to call it whatever, on the pandemic and the obesity, to the soda industry.”
“But at the same time, they are not the only ones part of the problem, either. Look at me, I’m overweight… I’m not overweight because [of] junk food. I’m not overweight because of fast food, I’m not overweight because of sodas. I’m overweight because I ate too much, because the food I eat is very good food. You can get fat on carrots and gazpacho, too. So we leave this conundrum, right,” Chef Andres said on episode #2315 of the JRE podcast.
“We have people that are poor right now, that used not to happen, and if you were poor, you were skinny and maybe you were hungry. Now we are in this situation that you have people who are poor, and it’s difficult to explain, and some seem that they be overweight because the food they are able to buy is very cheap, because it’s all this junk food. And that’s part of the problem, right?”
“And they are not only overweight, but unhealthy because they’re bad calories, bad quality food, because they cannot afford anything else. And sometimes it’s not only about affording, it’s because they don’t have access to anything else… I say every American child deserves to be fed, and no American family should be poor and hungry ever again,” he pleaded.
MMA: UFC 274-Newsom vs Garcia, May 7, 2022, Phoenix, Arizona, USA UFC announcer Joe Rogan during UFC 274 at Footprint Center. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports, 07.05.2022 13:58:07, 18361472, UFC, Joe Rogan, MMA PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxONLY Copyright: xMarkxJ.xRebilasx 18361472
Indeed, what Chef Andres is talking about is a well-documented and studied phenomenon. Lower-income families in America have tighter food budgets. And since ‘bad’ calories (such as those found in fast food) are cheaper than ‘good’ calories on a per-calorie basis, many poorer families have no choice but to choose junk food simply because of the cost differential.
Fast food and ultra-processed food consumption are also linked to chronic health issues like diabetes and high blood pressure, which is a huge disadvantage of eating this type of food. But Chef Andres feels that if the choice is between bad calories and fewer calories, he would much rather prefer the former simply because some families may not be able to afford enough calories otherwise. Speaking of controversial takes on health issues, Chef Andres wasn’t the only one who had hot takes on health issues.
Why does Joe Rogan think ADHD is a superpower?
“I subscribe to the idea that ADHD is a superpower, I really do, because I think the people that can’t focus on nonsense, generally speaking, they can focus on things they love. Really focused, they get really excited about certain things, but everything else they can’t be bothered with,” Rogan told Chef Jose Andres
Rogan is talking about one particular aspect of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) here, namely, hyper-focus. As the name suggests, hyper-focus leads to intense, almost unbreakable concentration on a particular stimulus or task, which leads to high-quality and highly productive results. But it is very much a double-edged sword.
Hyper-focusing on one task can lead to individuals with ADHD neglecting other important tasks like hygiene, eating, sleeping, and social obligations. Not to mention, it is also important what thing you are hyper-focused on. If, for instance, you hyper-focus on your academic work or a script you are writing for your work, that could be a net positive.
But if you’re hyper-focused on, say, YouTube or a video game, that could have adverse effects on your life. But Rogan is concentrating on the positives of the condition and proclaimed proudly to Chef Andres that “whatever ADHD is, I have it.” What do you think about Chef Andres and Joe Rogan’s discussion on fast food and ADHD?
The post “No American Family Should..” – Joe Rogan’s Attack on $400 Billion Industry Opposed Openly by Chef Jose Andres appeared first on EssentiallySports.
