CLASSIC: The Sick, Sweet Secret of the Sugar Cover-up

Everyone knows sugar in excessive amounts can have damaging effects on your health -- but just how bad is it, and why do people in the US still consume so much? Join the guys as they delve into the strange story of the decades-long sugar conspiracy. They don’t want you to read our book.

They don't want you to read our book.: https://static.macmillan.com/static/fib/stuff-you-should-read/

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oh boy. So when this classic episode is uh, hitting,
hitting your earbells, hitting your ear drums, uh, you are
probably if you're in the US, you're probably aware that
it is trick or treating season, right, Halloween big big

(00:20):
time for candy. As a matter of fact, the end
of the year in the West is always a big
time for candy. People like desserts. They're like the sweets
you get together. People are like, you know, happy Hannukah,
Merry Christmas, whatever, And here, you know, it's the time
of year when even people who don't ordinarily eat sweet

(00:41):
things make an exception. And if you are not from
the US and you have ever visited, you have probably
been surprised by learning how sweet everything is. There is
some form of sweetness, whether an artificial sweetener, plain old
sugar or cane sugar or what have you. It's in everything,

(01:05):
and we have to ask how we got there. Matt,
is this one of the ones? This feels like almost
similar to the glitter episode. I don't think. I don't
think when we started the show that either of us
knew just how deep the sugar conspiracy goes. No, we

(01:26):
did not know, but as we have learned, it's in everything.
It's in everything. So let's find out just how sweet
this sugar conspiracy goes sweet. Yeah, it goes real sweet.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies, history is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or

(01:49):
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. Hello,
and welcome back to the show. My name is Matt
Rama ding Dong. Y'all, my name is no. They call

(02:10):
me Ben. You are you and you're the most important
part of this show. Thanks for dropping by to stuff
that they don't want you to know. It's really good
to see you. I'm really sorry about that, Ramo Lama day.
I was just trying something new. I thought it was good.
I was talking. I was talking to to him or
her that is listening. Come on, oh my bad to

(02:30):
all of them. Wait, look at me making it all
about me. You've got a song in your heart. My friends,
hut it out. We are we are vast, we contain multitudes,
according to Walt Whitman, and we're not any of us
a single solitary thing. But due to the nature of
today's episode, we do want to establish at the beginning

(02:52):
that we are not doctors. This is true, no m
d here at least no any I'm not a physician's assistant,
not in our nh. Yeah, well I guess we should
amend that because your nol is a music doctor. I'm
a doctor of funk. Yeah, and that's not even true.

(03:13):
And that's a that's a love doctor, doctor of love. Well,
you know we're gonna leave it there, man, But seriously,
this is not medical advice. This is, however, a pretty
scary story, and it starts off so sweetly. Today we're
talking about sugar. We're gonna tell it to you completely.

(03:35):
So maybe we could talk about some of our personal experiences.
Are you guys fans of sweets sweet things? I used
to be much more so, but in my cantankerous old age,
I feel like I have sort of soured to the sweet.
I'm much more of a savory guy. Back before my
house stuff works days, mountain dew was my lifeblood with

(03:56):
the monster days after that, right, h yeah, monster without sugar. Though,
I've never been a sugary energy drink person, but the
mountain dew, my god, I don't. I don't particularly eat
sweet things. I used to love soda. That was the
one exception. And the I'm sure my dentist is grateful
for that. But the the one thing that I always

(04:16):
found weird in social situations is if someone offers you
a piece of cake because it's somebody else's birthday, you're
kind of obligated to at least take a piece. And
that would be the only time that I have is
sweet because people were with the soft rules of society
obligating me to do it. You know. I just said
all that stuff, and last night I was at a
farmer's market and bought a big old piece of teremy sue. Yeah,

(04:40):
that's mostly coffee, though, see, every once in a while,
mostly coffee. You gotta reward yourself, I feel. I feel
that every once in a while. Yeah. And so we
all in the United States and abroad, we all continually
run into sweet things, right, And the basis of those
sweet things most of the time is sugar. But what

(05:03):
is sugar? Why? It's a simple carbohydrate. Ben It's responsible
for that sweet taste in all those foods that you
daily beloved. Why is it called a carbohydrate, Matt Wells Simple,
it's because it's got a carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. Well,
it's like it's like in terms of calories. So one

(05:23):
teaspoon of white sugar has about sixteen calories, about four
per gram. And it gives you that quick boom, that snap,
that snap crack, that ramamding dog, that rammeding dogs. It worked. Uh.
It gives you that quick dose of energy so your
body can process in. Your body can process it faster

(05:43):
than complex carbohydrates or proteins. But friends and neighbors be
aware if you eat too much sugar, the excess energy
may be stored as fat. Remember that part because it's
very important later. But sugar isn't just a sweetener, right,
It's also of super useful preservative. So, for example, sugar

(06:04):
helps to hinder the growth of bacteria in jam um.
It can also be used as a bulking agent or
an additive to food that gives certain kinds of textures. Um.
And sometimes even it's added to accelerate fermentation or to
change the boiling or freezing point of a particular dish.

(06:24):
You want to talk about fermentation. Uh, we gotta get
into beer really fast. I had no idea how much
sugar was in beer. Oh yeah, yeah, until i I've
really got into I p a s for a little
bit there and there was a list that came out
in I think maybe that was looking at specifically the
big Foot Sierra Nevada beer, which was one of my favorites,

(06:48):
and the thing it was like eating a slice of
cake every every beer you had. That's true, even the
beer that is advertised as light will have a higher
high have a level of sugar involved. That might surprise people,
because that's how you make it right, right fermentation. So
when we hear the words sugar, most of us probably

(07:10):
think of table sugar. You know that white stuff. Yeah, yeah,
the crystalline, insanely sweet thing we buy grocery stores. But
the truth is there are multiple kinds of sugars. We
have a couple of examples here too. Fructose, the stuff
is found in all kinds of fruits. You can find
it in honey as well. My personal favorite galactose because

(07:32):
it sounds like it comes from space, and that's actually
found in milk and also dairy products. And then there's
good old glucose, which you find it honey, fruits and vegetables.
It is a good friend of fructose, that old glucose.
You also got lactose, again coming from milks. You can
also find or you can also make this from glucose

(07:52):
and galactose, which is fun. Then you have maltose or
maltos found in barley, malt sucrose, which is made up
of glucose and fructose and found in plants, and the last,
but not least, the absolute best, zilos found in wood
or straw. Why do you like that one because it's zilos.

(08:14):
It's not like a transformer or something. Yeah, why are
you a zilos supremacist? Now? Well kidding? Yes. Besides, besides
beets and sugarcane, sugar can also be derived from honey
and a lot of fruits like dates or coconuts. Uh,
and tree SAPs can also be sources of sugar. And
this table sugar stuff, let's just call it grocery store sugar. Uh.

(08:37):
It's it's called sucrose and it comes from sugar beets
or sugarcane, and sucrose appears and all these other plants too,
along with some of the other people you heard from
our greatest hits just a second ago. Glucose and fructos,
and it's actually in every plant since sugar and oxygen
are products of photosynthesis, but unlike sugar, beets and sugarcane.

(08:58):
A lot of other plants don't sucros in a large
enough quantity to harvest, so it's more like a trace.
So the sugar we're going to discuss today is mostly
going to be derived from those sugar beets and that
sugar cane, which is probably the one you may have
heard of the most. That's when I think of sugar,
I think of sugar cane. Um, And I'm not really

(09:20):
sure why. I don't know what pop culture reference taught
me about sugar cane as a kid. Well, there's a
sonic youth song called sugar cane maybe lacky sugar cane
standing in the rain very nice, so so thank you know. Um. So,
these sugar beets are grown throughout the world, in Europe, Asia,
the Middle East, parts of North Africa, and South America.

(09:43):
Than sugarcane, on the other hand, you need a tropical climate,
you need semi tropical climates, something that's nice and warm
and wet, and it's grown in the southern United States,
South America, Africa, South Asia, and also the South Pacific.
Hold on, hold on, okay, let's stop this train for
one second. We would be remiss if we didn't mention
something that I know you're thinking about already, Ladies and gentlemen.

(10:08):
High fructose corn syrup HFCs, as its name applies. This
stuff comes from corn spoiler, not sugarcane or beats. Was
creating the nineties sixties, and it's an additive now found
in so many processed foods, including a boatload of sodas.
It's become popular for food manufacturers because it's cheaper than

(10:29):
the table sugar. It's also pretty controversial because people believe
it contributes to obesity and that the body treats this
mix of the specific kind of fructose mix differently so ordinary. Yeah, yeah,
and you'll hear are all kinds of stuff about it.
If you go to the sugar lobby, they're gonna tell

(10:50):
you that it's essentially glucose with a little more fructose
than regular corn syrup. Yeah. I think that mixes like
fifty five uh fructose to glucose something like that, and
then regular corn syrups almost all glucose. Right, Yeah, it's not.
It's when they say, hi, they just need more than

(11:11):
half exactly. So we have all we have this wealth
of sugars, its wealth of sweet opportunities. How much do
we eat in the US? Funny you should ask that
I have a stat right here in front of me.
The per capita consumption of refined sugar in the United
States of America has swung between twenty seven and forty

(11:34):
six kilograms sixty and a hundred and one pounds, respectively
in the last forty years. According to data from the
United States, in oh eight, people were consuming over sixty
pounds of added sugar per year. And this does not

(11:54):
include fruit juices, which as we know, contains its own. Yeah,
and today the US is the number one sugar consumer.
And these recent statistics, just to give a sense of
perspective over time, indicate that the average person consumes about
a hundred and twenty six point four grams daily. Uh.
This can fluctuate over time, and we should probably make

(12:15):
a note about the danger of averages. This country is huge.
It's we're talking about a population of almost three hundred
and twenty million people, uh, three eighteen point nine as.
But when we have a sample size that large, what
that means is de pay on the methodology of this average.

(12:39):
That means there could be someone who just somehow eats
a negligible amount of sugar all year, and maybe someone
who eats six times the daily dosage every single day.
You know. Yeah, because if if we look at the
caloric intake of a hundred and twenty six point four
grams of sugar, it's roughly five hundred and five. I mean,

(13:00):
this is gonna be a little off. Let's say over
five hundred calories per day of just sugar. It's crazy, man.
And you can find some great statistics on sugar consumption
in the US as well as sugar consumption in the
rest of the world. So if we take that other number,
a hundred and twenty six point four grams per day
in the United States, the next runner up would be

(13:22):
Germany with a hundred and two point nine grams, so
still still pretty high up there. And then if we
go down to the bottom, uh, in India, for instance,
people will have only five point one grams of sugar
per day. So there's a lot of variants here across
across the world. But when we get closer closer to

(13:47):
the twist here, how much should we eat? That's a
great question. Well, the World Health Organization has some opinions. Uh.
They recommend that you have less than ten percent of
your total energy intake from free sugars. It's the equivalent
to about fifty grams around twelve level teaspoons for a
person of healthy body weight consuming about two thousand calories

(14:09):
a day, but ideally it should be less than five
and you have additional health benefits. This is tricky because
a lot of stuff that you don't think would have
a lot of sugar in it is just inundated with
this everywhere. And fifty grams yes a day, Yes, that's

(14:33):
like a pile. That's like a massive mountain of sugar.
If you think about it visually, it is, but then
you think about how much we're actually eating is the
average grams? I mean, that's it's insane, probably largely because
if it's maybe it's preservative qualities. So like if you
like microwave meals, for example, it's got sugar in it

(14:56):
because and you wouldn't think that my lasagna would have
sugar in it, but it's in there because it's helping
to preserve the frozen food. Well. Yeah, and specifically the
w H I was talking about free sugars here, that
phrase free sugars is very important. We're not talking about fruits.
We're not talking at anything that has naturally occurring sugars. Um.
It's sugars that's added in a production, right right, added
the food or drinks by the manufacturer, or the cook,

(15:19):
or even the consumer, because you know, to each their
own when it comes to eating habits, a lot of
people will just pour sugar and stuff. I'm sure you
gotta take that coffee, black man, It's the only way. Yes.
According to the American Heart Association, the maximumount of added
sugars you should eat per day are for men, a
hundred and fifty calories per day. That's thirty seven point

(15:40):
five grams or nine teaspoons. Okay, not too bad. For
women is a hundred calories per day or twenty five
grams six teaspoons. We've been talking about a lot of
numbers here, so let's put all these numbers into perspective. No.
I love that you pointed out that is a pile
if you imagine it visually. So one twelve ounce can

(16:00):
of coke Coca Cola, for instance, contains a hundred and
forty calories from sugar. A regular Snickers bar regular size
contains a hundred and twenty calories from sugar God, so
one soda a day if you're a dude, according to
the American Heart Association, already put you like close to

(16:21):
your limit. That's so upsetting to me. I think, you
know what. I think. That's why after working here, I
stopped drinking sugary sodas. Yeah, that was a big deal
for me. Um. I just switched to uh soda water
like Lacroix or sam Pella Greena or whatever, and um,
that satisfied my craving for the bubbles. I really like

(16:44):
the bubbles. I find it very refreshing. But I just
literally don't drink soda ever. If maybe I rarely go
to a fast food restaurant, I might get a coke
with my fries and mom Burger, but I mean maybe
twice a month. Yeah, I also used to drink it
quite frequently. But I'm I'm glad that I'm I had

(17:05):
an amicable breakup with soda. We're still friends, you know,
we might might hang out once a month or something,
but we're not gonna live together anymore. Yeah, I've got
a really bad relationship with aspartame. Now all the other
the weird one, what is it's uh zylatl zilatol. Yes, though,

(17:25):
and this is without even touching on artificial sweeteners. We
want to give you these numbers just from these various
types of sugar, not even counting artificial sweeteners. And I'm
glad you pointed that out, Matt, because we want to
paint the picture of just how popular this substance is,
how um, how much it permeates the the food market,

(17:47):
especially in the US, but in other places as well.
How do we get to the place that we are currently,
So glad you asked, And we're going to talk about
that right after a quick word from our sponsor. Once

(18:08):
upon a time, more than five thousand years ago, Polynesians
used sugarcane as a sweetener, and the substance eventually made
it to India, and from India it spread westward, aided
by pillaging and trade that came with the conquest of
Darius the Persian Emperor and Alexander the Great, who overthrew

(18:29):
the Persian Empire and who, by the way, died when
he was only thirty two. So let's fast forward to
fourteen nine three. Cristobald Cologne, on the wise known street
named Christopher Columbus brought sugarcane to the Caribbean, and it
was a perfect environment for growing this crop. The ferral
ground led to the development of a massive sugarcane industry

(18:50):
in what they called the New World. Over the next
few centuries, plantations sprouted up throughout the Caribbean, the West Indies,
and South America, and they were fueling sugar. They were
also fuelling the slave trade. These two trades were inextricably intertwined.
During these years, sugar finally became cheap enough to be

(19:12):
accessible to most Europeans. And until then they've been considered
a luxury. And do you know what they called it?
White gold? For real, they called it white gold. That's
what the British colonists called it. And it was the
engine of the slave trade and brought millions of millions
of people from Africa to the America's beginning in the

(19:33):
early sixteenth century. Like think like fifteen oh five. And
this means that the history of every nation in the Caribbean,
much of South America, and parts of the southern United
States have been forever shaped by sugarcane plantations that were
started as cash crops by European superpowers. Now it's crazy
to think about how much money was generated here for

(19:55):
the owners of these companies that were producing it, the
the different far owners. There's a lot of money going around,
and that profit was so significant that it may have
even actually helped America achieve independence from Great Britain because
it allowed money to buy the stuff that's required to
start a war. You know, I have in my head

(20:17):
this this idea that if if there was a way
to do it without just atrocious chattel slavery, it would
be kind of cool to have your profession as sugar tycoon.
You know those exist, don't they? They do? They do
in the present day. What's the what's the massive company there?

(20:38):
There's a huge company that gets crazy subsidies in the US.
It's the one that's in all the stores, the grocery
store sugar that we always talk about. Is it Dixie,
Dixie Dixie. There's gotta be a tycoon at the end
of that tunnel. Yeah, it's Dixie Sugar. There's I'm sure
there are others been they're out there. Yeah, a big bag. Yeah,

(21:03):
you know, look for the look for it in the
big bag. Dixie sugar, the old blood prash sugar. That
look for it in the giant bag, for it in
the giant bag. From seventeen fifteen, there were near constant
wars consuming much of Europe. British naval blockades forced Europe
to look for an alternative to cane sugar. The eventual

(21:26):
solution they found was the sugar beat, and since this period,
Europe has gotten much of its sugar from beats. So
let's look at it today. Despite the evidence that too
much sugar can have damaging and dilatorious effects, it remains
immensely popular around the globe. We are literally, on a
primal level, wired to love this stuff. Uh, you know,

(21:48):
our ancestors or even things you came before us. Uh.
You naturally associate uh sweet sensation or taste with something
being safe to eat. Yeah. Yeah, if it's bitter, you
don't want to eat it. If it's sweet, that means
the bugs are probably attracted to it and they eat
it right that it isn't that kind of how it

(22:09):
went exactly. So here's some examples of the bad things
that can happen related to sugar intake. First, let's start
with diabetes. As a twenty nine point one million people,
or nine point three percent of the US population of
diabetes and that's diagnosed undiagnosed would say eight point one

(22:30):
million people, and about a third of the people who
have diabetes are undiagnosed obesity. This is a stereotype that
comes into play with the US which if you're not,
if you haven't ever visited here, I promise you it's
it's a pretty cool place. You'll you'll have fun, it's great.
Not all the stereotypes are true. More than two thirds,

(22:52):
or sixty eight point eight percent of adults are considered
by the government to be qualified as either overweight or obese.
UM more than one third, thirty five point seven percent
of adults are considered to be obese, and then you
can see you can see the stats here. One of
the biggest killers of any American, regardless of genetic history,

(23:18):
creed age, etcetera, is heart disease. It is the leading
cause of death for both men and women in this country,
about one in every four deaths, and it's the most
common type of heart diseases coronary heart disease c h
d UH. In two thousand fourteen, it killed about three
sixty five thousand people in this country. Someone has a

(23:41):
heart attack every forty two seconds and each minute someone
dies from a heart disease related events. And of course
cavities curse you soda geez. So this is this is bad.
Sugar is bad. Sugar is is leading to this stuff.
Sugar definitely plays a role. It would be irresponsible for

(24:03):
us to put everything at the feet of shore, but
it definitely, it definitely plays role. And now our question
is just how bad is this stuff? And how did
we start eating so much of it? Can I say
it been? Can I take? Here's where it gets you
do it? You do? It's where it gets crazy. In

(24:25):
September of three, doctors released a paper in the Journal
of the American Medical Association, or since we're fans of acronyms,
jamma jambo, so yes, so jamma this This paper was
called Sugar Industry and Coronary Heart Disease Research colon a

(24:48):
historical analysis of internal industry documents, and this paper revealed
frightening evidence of a cover up. Not a conspiracy theory, Oh,
friends and neighbors know, a real life conspiracy. Finally got
one right, Here's what happened. So there was evidence that

(25:09):
sugar had had a role to play in c HD
coronary heart disease. We know it now, but other people
knew it back in the nineteen fifties. The industry and
the people that they were paying to research knew it.
And things were not looking so good for the sugar manufacturers.
The science showed that what they were selling and the

(25:31):
way they were selling it was potentially very dangerous. So
they took action. They came clean and told the public
that they would be responsible and they would uh, they
would work with the f d A to restrict unreasonable
amounts of sugar I'm kidding. Instead, they they had a
trade organization that was called, get this, the Sugar Research Foundation.

(25:54):
Sounds legit. Yeah. What did they do? Well? They they
went ahead and paid a group of three Harvard scientists
the equivalent of about fifty thousand dollars in today's dollars,
which is not a bad salary to publish a review
of research on sugar in nineteen sixty seven looking at sugar,
fat and heart disease. How do these all go together?

(26:17):
And what are the causes? What are the what types
of cholesterol are affected? Right? And we can also we
should explain. Uh. Review of research is sort of an
anthology kind of thing. They collect different papers that have
been written on a subject or a group of subjects
or theme. The studies used in this review of research

(26:40):
were handpicked by the Sugar Research Foundation and they also,
through their influence, had an article published in the prestigious
New England Journal of Medicine. They sponsored this article. It
was a literature review that singled out fat and cholesterol
as the call is of c H d uh. And

(27:03):
they also downplayed evidence that sucross consumption was playing a role.
They were They were like, ah, you gotta watch out,
it was fats And they did not disclose that they
sponsored this. Yeah, that's one of the big things. They
also set the objective, so they pretty much told the
researchers what they were going to find, you know what

(27:23):
I mean? And they yeah, And they got drafts that
they worked over and had editorial influence on, and the
whole thing happened undercover. Essentially, what they ended up producing
was somewhere between a hit piece and an advertisement in
an insiduous way. So Van just to clarify, is this
something along the lines of a lobby spot on? Well,

(27:47):
that's uh, that's a great it's a great point. So
let's say that the three of us are sugar tycoons. Yes,
perfect just took a different path in life. And now
here we are at a smoking cigars. We all suck
on lollipops. Yep, yep, right, we all have very bright
colored suits. I think I would go for a Willy

(28:08):
Wonka vibe the original movie adaptation, not the not the
new one. I'm going penguin. You're going full penguin. Where
are you going to? No? I Dol's love us, wear
my cities, swear cities. You're the everyday tech, every day
sugar tech. Perfect. Well, the three of us say, well,

(28:29):
we need some we we will have power in numbers
and we will join uh. We will join our finances
to fund a trade organization that will represent us. And
this trade organization can do lobby union on our behalf
with legislatures, you know, like here are if we want

(28:49):
favorable tax breaks in a district, if we want uh
some consideration or uh special prices on loans for building infrastructure.
It's not necessarily a bad thing, but as potential to
be very, very damaging. But how does a a group
such as ours get in such cahoots with what's supposed

(29:10):
to be an independent review like the the Jama Money money. Yes,
throw money at it. Because this goes back to some
of the stuff we discussed with Edward Bernese. What Bernese
did that was so brilliant was he realized that if
people thought they were getting unbiased medical advice, then they

(29:34):
would be more likely to follow it than they would
the instructions of of a transparent ad Right, it's insidious,
it's a bait and switch, and it worked really well,
arguably works today. So the sugar industry kept going. They
didn't just do this one paper. They didn't do just
this one area. They sponsored a research program in the

(29:57):
sixties and into the seventies that can tenually cast doubt
about the hazards of sucros like oh, sugars, I mean, okay,
don't eat too much sugar. But guys, really that's the
dangerous one here, that's the problem here. Yeah, the sugar industry.
I'm reading from uh that link bend the sugar industry

(30:18):
and coronary heart disease research paper. Uh. The industry would
spend six thousand dollars at the time, which is now
five point three million dollars to teach people quote who
had never had a course in biochemistry that sugar is
what keeps every human being alive with energy to face
our daily problems. It just sounds so happy pena step

(30:41):
with sugar and and ultimately what they're doing is they're
they're fighting for market share, right And when you think
about market share, I'm going to use a video game
example right now, consoles there would be the Xbox, the PlayStation,
the what the Nintendo sw Yeah, the Nintendo Switch, and
a bunch of other ones console or non console games

(31:03):
like on a PC or something or mac. But each
of those has a certain percent of the market share. Right. Well,
in this case, for these sugar industry people, their market
share is what people put in their bodies as food, right,
and the entirety of food. And so by reducing or
making you afraid of fat, they're going to increase overall

(31:23):
the market share of the food overall, which is crazy
to think about. And this is not this is not
to say that consuming excessive amounts of fat is good
for you, No, not necessarily. Let's also not forget the
old food pyramid, which the tippy tip tip top contains fats, oils,
and confectionery or that's what they're calling it now, which

(31:46):
would be sugar. So if they're in a battle with
the minds of the public in terms of like, well,
I can only have a little of of fats or sugar,
Which one do I perceive as being better or worse
for me? Which one am I going to choose? So
that's it's like a it's a psychological battle wherein these
sugar folks are hoping that you will choose sugar because

(32:11):
it's perceived to be less harmful, and fat sort of
gets the gets thrown to the bus. And then as
we know over time, if fats been determined to be
there are good fats and there are facts that are
good to have as part of your diet um. And
then you know, I think it becomes out on top, yes,
Will said, and in great point bringing in the food pyramid,

(32:33):
which could be it's a podcast all its so, And
I think when we get to that, U, where are
we now? We're telling you the story of something that
actually happened, like no ifs ands or butts, no allegations,
no rumors. People planned in a in a sweet smoky

(32:54):
backroom to beguile and mislead the US public, and they
did so successfully. So where does this leave us down.
We'll tell you after a word from our sponsor. First off,

(33:19):
you might be wondering, hey, Matt hay Been, he know
what happens to the the s RF. The s RF, Well,
it hit the fan, ben, it hit uh, it hit
the name fan. Because that trade group is still around
today under a different name. It's called the Sugar Association.

(33:40):
They have a fancy website. If you're interested, go check
it out. Um, there's lots of information in there. Yeah,
you checked it out. I did to spend a little
too much time on there today and I wanted a donut.
And here's the other thing. It's bigger than sugar. And
it's bigger than a single historical incidents, right. And I'm

(34:02):
not casting any aspersion on the current Sugar Association because
we don't I don't have, you know, evidence to do that.
And I'm sure that the same people who are working
there in the sixties, I'm gonna go ahead and say
that they're not working there now in probably correct, probably correct.
I feel safe with that one. But why is it

(34:22):
bigger than sugar? It's bigger than sugar because private food
manufacturers continue to influence nutrition guidelines today, and it's happening now,
perhaps more than you think. So be very careful when
you hear those new alarmist pieces about what's good or
what's bad for you. We've joked about it before. It
seems like every week, every month, there's some sort of

(34:43):
cycle of coffee'll make you live longer and be smarter
when you're elderly, or coffee will kill you somehow, right.
I like the ones about tequila, All right, we'll just
leave that one there. No, Apparently, like you know, you
can see studies about saying a glass of wine is
good for your heart, or like now they're saying tequila

(35:03):
is good for you. I hadn't heard this one. I'm
gonna have to go buy a bottle. I guess yeah,
for your health, very health conscious. Uh yeah. And then
it can apply also to sodas, right, beverage manufacturers, it
can apply to um pork manufacturers. It's it's kind of

(35:25):
tough to see to to figure out if food where
this would not apply. You know, Yeah, I cannot find one,
and just thinking about all the different kinds of berries.
They are great for you, but they do have a
lot of naturally occurring sugar right, which is fine. And
the thing is that ultimately the best the best process

(35:49):
to take is if you hear oh uh, like, puit's
a random vegetable m artichoke. Oh, it turns out that
artichokes give you these vast superior powers of hearing or whatever.
Sweet right, Or if you hear something that's that's very bad,
like is all cancer related to consuming cheese it's Those

(36:13):
are both pretty unrealistic, cartoonish headlines. But the point is
your best processes, that is to take that and before
you share it around with people, before you start going
to throw out all your cheese its or by all
the artichokes in your town, figure out who wrote it.
Do that old fake news thing That turns out that

(36:34):
thing I said about tequila not not true? Not true?
Really yeah, snope says mostly faults. Wait wait, so partially true.
Also artichoke is a flowers. Oh boy, well that just
makes the headline even more cartoonish. So the answers you

(36:58):
find might surprise ries you. There might be a situation
where you see a very strange, sort of anonymous sounding
block name blase a name where we go, oh, all right,
well this was according you know, this is according to
the the Committee for the Committee for Accuracy in Grain

(37:19):
Related Health. And then you do some searching on them
and you go, oh, they're owned by uh, you know,
as some rival to cheese. It's right, they're owned by
like horrible Redenbacker. But the the point here is that
this stuff, this stuff can have the appearance of unbiased

(37:40):
quantitative data, and it's not always true. I have to
ask you, guys, what do you think about the state
of I guess the state of mass produced food here
in the US. That's what I wanted to talk about.
I feel like we're at this weird point in history
in this country where we are pushing back towards manufactured foods.

(38:03):
Not that we're not purchasing them anymore or consuming them.
We are pushing back with the organic movement and trying
to move away from this kind of stuff. But it's unfortunately,
it feels like to me at least, something that can't
truly come to fruition because we have so many humans
that we need to feed, so many animals we need
to feed to feed the humans, and we're going to

(38:25):
have to continue to process this stuff. And sugar is
a pretty ideal source of calories I mean, it really is.
If you just need to get calories and energy to
move and function, then it seems like it's a no
brainer that we need sugar and we should keep eating it.
And talking about this makes me wonder how many times

(38:46):
we've said the word sugar in this episode And does
anybody else have a craving now that we've spent this
long examining this, Uh, sugar, sugar, sugar, I'm done. I
thought that was good. How it was How did the
riff go that we were doing earlier? Baby boom boom boom. Sure, fantastic, guys. Uh.

(39:14):
The the point here of courses is not to vilify sugar,
and yes, what these people did in the sixties and
seventies for this particular instance, we're in the wrong. Uh.
The point is just to just to do our best
to be aware of this stuff, and it can be challenging.
You know, we live in a place where a lot

(39:35):
of very large companies have bought up a bunch of things.
You know, you might be surprised how many seemingly different
products in your local grocery store are ultimately owned by
one corporation, Right, even products that seem to compete. Uh,
this amount of influence and power can be leveraged in

(39:56):
unexpected and surprising ways. I think I'm going to uh,
I might, I don't know, I might drink a soda.
Don't do it, You're right. What what you What you
can do right now is go to sugar dot org
and look at the member companies and you can find
yourself a whole list here of sugar tycoons. We've got

(40:18):
Domino Sugar, which is now I guess, the American Sugar
Refining Incorporated. There's Amalgamated Sugar Company. Is Imperial Sugar on
the Imperial Sugar is most definitely on here. Remember that
insane fire at the Imperial Sugar Refinery and Savannah that
UM sent a bunch of people to burn unit like

(40:40):
it was a whole disaster sugar dust, and it created
all kinds of new interest in regulations about sugar manufacturing
because apparently sugar dust is incredibly flammable and it can
collect on eaves and beams in the building and there
it's combustible. So one little poof it can you know,

(41:02):
be all over UM. So this is two eight. I
was working for Georgia Public Radio at the time, and
the most advanced burned unit in the area was in Augusta, UM,
where I was based, and so we covered that story
pretty extensively. It was a big, huge, huge deal, man.
I mean, I'm sorry, I'm just looking at it online.

(41:23):
UM check it out. It's called the two thousand eight
Georgia Sugar Refinery explosion. And this concludes our episode, but
of course not our show. We hope that you enjoyed
what we explored today. We also hope that if you
want to learn more about sugar, you avail yourself of
our parent website, how Stuff Works, which has a pretty

(41:45):
pretty solid article on how sugar works. There's also stuff
in there about how fruit toast corn syrup works. But
there's a whole branching set of articles you can get to.
You are invited, officially, ladies and gentlemen, to fall down
a sugar rabbit hole worth us, as well as to
the other podcast our sister and brother podcasts that exist

(42:06):
here at how Stuff Works. And I also like to
take this opportunity to plug a new podcast that friend
of the show, Lauren Vogelbaum, has been on talking about
diamonds um is on now called food Stuff that just
launched today. That the day that we're recording this Wednesday,
March the first. Uh. Their first episode is about champagne

(42:27):
and sparkling wine and uh, it's pretty cool stuff. Yes,
check it out. They'll also have some videos coming out.
And you know what, that Diamond episode holds up, It
really does. It holds up in a frightening and terrifying
And I just have to quickly mention that Annie is
also on this producer. Annie who worked on stuff Mom
Never told you for its entirety, She's now on this

(42:49):
show behind the mic. Yeah, like me, making the jump
from producer to performer. Yes, but she's a paid actor already,
so she's gonna be awesome. And we think that if
you like our show, you will love this one. So
check us out. Check it out food stuff. You can
find it wherever you find our podcast, and let us

(43:10):
know what you think. They're also pretty cool people. If
you have an idea for an episode they should cover
in the future right in let him know. There's a
lot of weird food stuff out there, there is. Uh.
And speaking of listener mail, I think it's time for
shut Atconnas. Our first shout out comes from Lorenzo from Sweden.

(43:31):
He says, Hey, I'm listening to your podcast while I work.
So here's the story that they don't want you to know,
and it's alchemy related. The anatomical Machines of San serv
San Servo Chapel. Never heard of this. These things exist
and are exhibited in Naples, Italy. If you visit this
chapel in the underground chamber they're located. Uh. Probably the

(43:53):
most famous anatomical machines. Either. These are not early robots
or something similar. They are skeletons of a man and
and woman in an upright position. The artery and vein
systems are almost in perfect condition. I just want to
really quick. This sounds like what's the human exhibit? The
human bodies? Bodies bodies. Yeah, that's what I'm already seeing
in my head. Um. These machines were made by the

(44:16):
doctor Giuseppe Salermo of Palermo under the direction of this
other guy. With the discovery of deeds and notes, it's
possible that these things were created in seventeen sixty three
or sixty four. That is a long time ago. What
makes it even more interesting interesting is that until now
scientists have no idea which procedures or materials were used

(44:38):
to make these things um to obtain such an exceptional
preservation of the circulatory system, and he's left a place
where we can go and learn more about it. That's yeah,
I'm gonna go check that out. I'm gonna go check
that out. And I already feel the rabbit hole opening.
Their mystery is a foot and thank you for writing

(44:58):
and learns our next out out, this one is a
This one's a little bit long, but I'm so I'm
going to read selected parts of it if that's cool.
Our second shout out today is a little bit longer.
I'm going to read just some excerpts of it from
night Bringer two thousand. Night Bringer two thousand says, I
just finished listening to your did the US abandoned soldiers

(45:21):
in Vietnam War episode and reminded me of a story
I heard from a friend of the family that was
in Vietnam. Prompted me to write in was the part
where you discussed the possibility that perhaps some soldiers were
left behind because release or return home could implicate the
US being involved in war crimes. To me, this seems
plausible for some individuals who didn't return home. Based on
the story I'm about to share, and he says, he

(45:43):
branded it's only here safe for him. But he believes
that when this person was telling the truth. And here's
the story. At one point during his service in Vietnam,
as they were pushing inland, they were in a valley.
At the top of the inland side of the valley
was a village that they were tasked with securing. Because
the dense jungle terrain and the defending Vietnamese had an

(46:04):
elevation advantage their unit, the US unit was having a
lot of difficulty even progressing toward the village, let alone
securing it. They tried for several days but were unable
to gain any ground, and finally the officer in charge
conceded that they weren't going to secure the village without
additional help. He made a call to his superiors informing
him of the situation. Was told assistance would be sent

(46:24):
and that they would need to hold the ground for
a couple more days. After a few days, they get
word that helicopters are coming and they need to secure
landing zone. When the helicopters arrived, only a small squad
of six to eight soldiers get out. His friend doesn't
know if these are Navy Seals, Delta Force, Force Recon
or some other special forces unit. He supposed they might

(46:44):
have even been mercenaries. But they were definitely not regular infantry.
They weren't wearing fatigues, they didn't have name tags, they
did not identify nor introduced themselves. They only talked briefly
to the highest ranking officer in the area. So they're
talking about you know, the soldiers were understandably upset because
they thought, how are these six to eight guys going

(47:05):
to help us? And then one of the Special Forces
guys overhears the overhears the folks arguing about it, and
he walks over and interjects with a comment along the
lines of you guys have been here what two weeks,
and you couldn't take this hill, So they have to
fly our asses out there to cover you and do
your job. We're going to take this hill and one night,

(47:25):
and then you guys are going to feel real extra stupid,
and he walks away. Fast forward. Once it starts getting dark,
these Special Forces guys are packing it in to go,
he says. Once it's starts they all disappear into the
jungle and what becomes an otherwise uneventful night. The next
morning is daylight's dawning. They come walking down the hill
into camp. They tell the first group of infantrymen, the

(47:47):
village is yours. Now. These guys were pretty confused because
they hadn't heard a single shot the night before. The
Special Ops guys go report to the commanding officer. Uh.
The commanding officer tells him to pack up and proceed
to the village. They're expecting and distance, so they're easing
the way up to the hill carefully. No resistance to
the village. Once they got there was silent. It appeared empty,
he said. A lot of guys were confused, wondering if

(48:09):
the villagers had just happened to choose to abandon the
village that previous evening. As they started sweeping the village,
they were checking huts, and they found the village was
not empty or abandoned at all, he said. As they
went from hut to hut, they found the villagers, the
entire village, men, women, and children all dead. It appeared
that most, if not all, died from knife wounds, with

(48:29):
a lot of them having slashed throats, and many of
them still in their beds. He doesn't know exactly what
happened that night, but the thought and talk amongst the
regular infantrymen is that the special forces guys must have
silently killed the guards and then went from hut to
hut and killed the villagers while they were sleeping. He
said there were many of dozens of people in the village,
all of them dead after a single night and not

(48:49):
a shot heard. He said this is the most disturbing
thing he's ever seen and that he'll never forget it.
So wow. So this is talking about a war rhyme,
and this is why, according to night Bringer two thousand,
he believes it's completely plausible that some people would have
been left behind if they were compromised in the execution

(49:13):
of an operation like this. This is scary, scary stuff.
Thank you for writing to us, Nightbringer, and folks say,
I know that one was a little bit longer than normal,
but try to edit it a little for time, and
we think it's an important story. So pretty grizzly, I'll
say that, And on a to end, on a slightly

(49:35):
less gruesome note, we have a shout out from Stephen
or Stefan from Melbourne, Australia. He says, hi guys, a
massive fan of the show, absolutely love it. Request a
shout out to my girlfriend Chris Chrystalla. Chrystalla, what do
you think, Chrystalla. We hope we got it right. Stephen
or Stefan shout out, Gosh, we're really butchering this one.

(49:57):
Um I would love to hear more episodes on the
following topics UFOs and aliens check w W two Nazi conspiracies,
would love to do that, such as the Nazi bell ship.
Are you aware of that one? Then? Oh? Yes, this
is the idea of this. This is the idea that
the Nazi Party discovered uh an energy that essentially changed

(50:19):
the rules of gravity, and that it was a bell
shaped object that was either used to produce this or
was itself the vehicle Nazi Bell. Interesting. And then finally
one that we've been talking about a lot lately, ghosts
and paranormal activity. Um I would say, chances are good
to get something on every single one of those at

(50:40):
some point this year. Yeah, we haven't done a full
Nazi Bell when we did Magic, No, we didn't. We
haven't done audio podcasts on any of this stuff. We
haven't have we here we're gonna go back through. We're
gonna do all this stuff. You're gonna love it. Stefan
and Chrystala shout out. Crystal Stephen s Fo thank you

(51:00):
so much for writing in with those excellent topic recommendations.
And I can't believe that we forgot to do those.
It's great. Uh and this concludes. Gosh, how cool is
it that there are people in Melbourne listening to us?
It's pretty cool. Thank you. We appreciate your time. I'd
love to go visit there sometime. Absolutely, So if you

(51:21):
want to write to us, you have anything to share,
a comment, an opinion about something, or a story you'd
like to weave that maybe we'll say on the show,
or something your fellow listeners need to know. Then you
can find us on Facebook. You can find us on Twitter,
you can find us on Instagram where Conspiracy Stuff at
the first two, Conspiracy Stuff Show at the third one,

(51:43):
and you can check out every single audio episode that Noel,
Matt and I have ever done on our website Deep
Breath Stuff. They Don't want you to Know dot Com.
And that's the end of this classic episode. If you
have any thoughts or questions about this episode, you can
get into contact with us in a number of different ways.
One of the best is to give us a call.

(52:04):
Our number is one eight three three st d w
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(52:25):
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