EducationNation, My Way
By Elizabeth Szlek
For The Rome Observer, September 28, 2010
I am sure that everyone has heard about the “national conversation” sponsored by NBC News now going on in New York City, EducationNation, Loads of people are “dialoging” and “sharing” their thoughts on the miserable state of our public educational systems. Of course, no one asked for my opinion, but I am delighted to add my thoughts to this general brouhaha!
There are many awful things about public education, and we in this area can see the results of a system that fails to educate its pupils. While we in this area are blessed with some of the finest schools in America (New Hartford and Clinton spring to mind), I think it is safe to say that most citizens could conclude that many schools are not producing well educated citizens, ready to take on the world.
What Are Some of the Problems?
I listened briefly to some of the news segments last night, and this is what seems to be a running theme: Bad teachers, unbustable teachers’ unions, and bad teachers with tenure. That was pretty much what I heard. Having studied the National Education Association (NEA) for many years, I can safely say that their liberal agenda has definitely lowered the quality of education available in public schools. The NEA is a powerful force in politics in Washington, and any attempts to wrest control of education away from their grip is going to be quite a battle. Getting rid of tenure and bad teachers is only the beginning.
If we think about tenure for a moment, the absurdity of the institution just springs out at you. I remember the fights for tenure when I was teaching at a large university. College professors, however, once had reason to seek tenure, which involved the ability to conduct research independently of university control. With tenure, the administration couldn’t dictate what avenues of research you could pursue if you had tenure. If you wanted to spend years researching some obscure worm or bug, they just had to let you do it!
I don’t know why tenure moved down to the public schools. I don’t think this freedom of research idea holds in the lower areas of education. Why tenure? Certainly, no one can say that teachers are paid poorly, and their retirement packages are excellent. So, what does tenure have to do with anything? If they are bad teachers, just like if they were bad salespeople, or bad pipefitters, or any other salaried position, they should be able to be fired. Yes, schools are rife with politics, but if someone is doing a great job as a teacher, even if he or she is fired, the teacher can find another job where talents will be appreciated. If teachers are incompetent or mediocre, why force your precious children to be educated by them through the tenure system? Don’t kids deserve the best?
Perhaps This is the Real Problem
I have been reading about the effects of poor nutrition on the human body, and it occurred to me that perhaps nutrition plays a much greater role in the dumbing down of our society than ever thought. The actual fact is that millions of Americans are truly suffering from malnutrition. Think about that for a moment. Millions of parents conceive their children while they themselves are in a state of malnourishment. The child gestates in the womb of a woman who continues to be malnourished throughout her pregnancy. Then, after birth, the infant is malnourished on such poisons as soy formula, or bottles of fruit juice. The child continues to eat poorly until he or she arrives at the red schoolhouse, ready, supposedly, to learn. The malnourishment continues through the free breakfasts and lousy school lunches, and at home, Mom and Dad are bringing in pizza and wings for supper on a regular basis, or worse, Mac and Cheese or other highly processed foods.
Now Princess or Junior reaches the age where they can pick their own diets, and soda and chips and especially loads of sugar, processed snacks and processed breakfast cereals form a large part of their caloric intake.
They continue this diet and soon, produce their own malnourished offspring, who have mentally and physically degenerated far more than even their parents.
We all expect these poor malnourished children to become effective learning machines for eight hours a day, when their tanks are running on empty most of the time? We must be crazy! Furthermore, I have not even mentioned the fact that many, many children do not even eat breakfast of any kind before jumping on the school bus – not because their parents have no food in the house, but because they don’t want to get fat!
Or, because the thought of a nourishing breakfast makes them want to puke!
I have had many young clients, with some emotional problems, who regularly do not eat breakfast OR LUNCH. They wait until they come home from school at 3PM to give their starving brains some fuel. Now, just imagine what harm this is doing to their entire physical and mental being. No nourishment for a brain that is expected to master the calculus!
Or, I have had clients who become grossly obese due to the horrible diet their parents allow them to eat. One boy, who weighed over 300 lbs. at age fifteen, told me he had eaten “some doughnuts” for breakfast. And the mother of this boy actually stocked them for him! This is madness!
If we consider the lunches now being considered for schools, we can see that they are loaded with such “goodies” as soy burgers, pizza and chicken McNuggets. Our nation’s dieticians have bought into the idea that soy is good for you. In that form, burgers, it isn’t, but those who make up these menus have merely capitulated to the whims of the malnourished children they serve. Why should kids eat pizza at school?
Because there is so little understanding of what truly nourishes the human body, we cannot get out of the giant hole we have dug for ourselves. Few understand the ravages of a diet based on sugar, hydrogenated oils, refined flours, aspartame and MSG. Obesity is just the tip of the bad news iceberg. Heart disease, diabetes and other degenerative diseases are just waiting to take over young lives.
People seem to be searching for the proper foods to eat, but they have been so brainwashed by the ridiculous food pyramid that they are almost helpless to come up with a way of eating that meets their body’s needs. We need to eat to live! Children need to eat to develop their intellect, to protect their health and spirit. It is no wonder we see a huge growth in mental disorders, since our very mental health often depends upon our diet.
My word for the EducationNation debate would be: Look at what your students are eating. Perhaps nutrition education should be instilled in them all along the way!
Elizabeth Szlek is the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Eat Less, Exercise More?
Eat Less, Exercise More?
By Elizabeth Szlek
For The Rome Observer: September 20, 2010
This morning I read in my daily paper that Americans are getting fatter and fatter. Obesity and mere overweight are rampant. We are being told what to do, and it is quite simple: Eat less and exercise more! This sounds so simple, so good, and so easy.
Unfortunately, several things stand in the way of this advice working.
First: Human physiology.
Second: Our modern way of life.
Third: Our food supply.
If we look at these three factors, I think we can begin to understand why we are getting fatter and fatter, and perhaps, how we can begin to reverse this deadly trend.
A Look at Exercise
I mentioned that I spent my whole summer in the woods researching this topic, both for myself and for the sake of my mother, who turned 90 in July. Let me just say this: My mother went for visits to her cardiologist and nephrologists, and in both cases, they were astounded at her condition! She looks better than she has in a couple of years!
What are we doing to create a health(ier) 90-year-old? Well, the same thing you all should be doing to be healthier yourselves, and possibly to prevent your untimely deaths, or the development of diabetes, heart disease and other degenerative conditions: Eat better!
Exercise, is, of course, an important component of health. No one can argue that we need to move and work to use up the calories we consume. But, even in the case of a totally sedentary ninety-year-old, amazing progress can be made with diet alone.
Me, I bought a beautiful red bike and trucked around town all summer, so that was my contribution to exercise. In the fall, I have to clean up my huge overgrown garden, so that constitutes my exercise. During the winter, I repair to my cellar, where I multitask on my treadmill, studying the music I have to conduct as choir director. Then, more gardening in the spring. Not a bad system. I hate to “exercise”, but I have realized that I will either have to lead a monklike existence of total denial, or gain weight. I’m not ready for monkhood yet, so, exercise it is. This used to be taken care of automatically when I lived in Manhattan. I would walk for miles everywhere, because it was so interesting. In the ‘burbs, there is much less of interest for me and I get bored looking at manicured lawns. Back to the cellar.
What does Physiology Have To Do With It?
So, let’s consider human physiology. What is making so fat? One prime suspect is our diet, and by this, I really mean the “hidden” components of our diet, with the prime suspect being fructose. When I wrote about high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) before, the public relations firm representing this industry kindly sent me a packet of information, pointing out how wrong I was about HFCS, and that it was just a misunderstood, regular old sugar. By the way, they are now calling it “corn sugar”, so as to obscure just what is in your food, so watch out for that. Anyway, it seems that HFCS is pretty much ignored by our hormone systems when we ingest it. Insulin gives it a free pass, as does leptin. Both these hormones regulate blood sugar levels, and insulin also signals the release of ghrelin, the hormone that tells you when you should stop eating, the satiety hormone.
Now just think, you ingest massive amounts of HFCS, and you don’t get the signal that you are satisfied, and you keep eating and eating. Meanwhile, the fructose is sent to your liver, where it is turned into fat. Fructose in beer is responsible for the characteristic “beer belly” that many develop when they overconsume beer. A beer belly is a precursor to a host of degenerative diseases. Now I look at these bellies and want to run over and warn these men to get to a nutritionist , fast!
HFCS is hidden in almost every processed food you can imagine. This leads us to the third leg of the obesity stool: Our food supply in America.
What is in There, Anyway?
All I can say is: Watch out! Unless you are shopping in the outer aisles of the supermarket, you are exposing yourselves to massive amounts of bad food ingredients.
HFCS is chief among them, when it comes to obesity. However, it doesn’t stop there. Aspartame, MSG, hydrogenated vegetable oils, genetically modified soy and corn, adulterated dairy products, loads of sugar in EVERYTHING, and many other deadly chemicals inhabit almost every box of food you buy. In addition to these bad things, what we really have is a LACK of good things.
By this I mean, our processed diets of today have taken shortcuts (for the sake of the industry), and are selling us foods that, in the past, were nourishing. Now, they are just fillers, and they are pretty much dead.
For example, pickles. I have made pickled products in the past, but never really understood what I was doing. It said, put the beets in a big jar and throw in some sugar and vinegar and thought I was making pickles. But I wasn’t. In order to make pickled beets, you need to ferment them. This is a process using lactobacillus bacteria. Now, it takes three days to make pickled beets, but they are actually GOOD for you, full of enzymes, and healthy. I make sourdough bread and homemade yogurt and cheeses, also fermented products full of beneficial enzymes. Processed foods are not made using the age-old methods. They are all actually “fast” food. And we all know how good THAT is for us. Are we all too busy to make food that is good for us?
There is a movement in the food world entitled “Slow Food”. It is concerned with producing food made the “old” way. It just so happens the old way is a better way. I went to visit a friend the other day, and he presented me with some raw milk, straight from the farm. I turned it into cultured buttermilk, cream cheese and whey, and homemade cottage cheese. Will I die from this daring move, since the milk was not pasteurized? We shall see. But if I don’t, it may mean that I am eating far better than others who must use dairy products which are stripped of much of their nourishment.
Perhaps “Eat Less, Exercise More!” isn’t the battle cry we need. Perhaps it should be simply, “Eat Nourishing Food!” I think that says it all…..
Elizabeth Szlek is a trained chef and has taught Healthy Cooking and nutrition. She is also the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
By Elizabeth Szlek
For The Rome Observer: September 20, 2010
This morning I read in my daily paper that Americans are getting fatter and fatter. Obesity and mere overweight are rampant. We are being told what to do, and it is quite simple: Eat less and exercise more! This sounds so simple, so good, and so easy.
Unfortunately, several things stand in the way of this advice working.
First: Human physiology.
Second: Our modern way of life.
Third: Our food supply.
If we look at these three factors, I think we can begin to understand why we are getting fatter and fatter, and perhaps, how we can begin to reverse this deadly trend.
A Look at Exercise
I mentioned that I spent my whole summer in the woods researching this topic, both for myself and for the sake of my mother, who turned 90 in July. Let me just say this: My mother went for visits to her cardiologist and nephrologists, and in both cases, they were astounded at her condition! She looks better than she has in a couple of years!
What are we doing to create a health(ier) 90-year-old? Well, the same thing you all should be doing to be healthier yourselves, and possibly to prevent your untimely deaths, or the development of diabetes, heart disease and other degenerative conditions: Eat better!
Exercise, is, of course, an important component of health. No one can argue that we need to move and work to use up the calories we consume. But, even in the case of a totally sedentary ninety-year-old, amazing progress can be made with diet alone.
Me, I bought a beautiful red bike and trucked around town all summer, so that was my contribution to exercise. In the fall, I have to clean up my huge overgrown garden, so that constitutes my exercise. During the winter, I repair to my cellar, where I multitask on my treadmill, studying the music I have to conduct as choir director. Then, more gardening in the spring. Not a bad system. I hate to “exercise”, but I have realized that I will either have to lead a monklike existence of total denial, or gain weight. I’m not ready for monkhood yet, so, exercise it is. This used to be taken care of automatically when I lived in Manhattan. I would walk for miles everywhere, because it was so interesting. In the ‘burbs, there is much less of interest for me and I get bored looking at manicured lawns. Back to the cellar.
What does Physiology Have To Do With It?
So, let’s consider human physiology. What is making so fat? One prime suspect is our diet, and by this, I really mean the “hidden” components of our diet, with the prime suspect being fructose. When I wrote about high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) before, the public relations firm representing this industry kindly sent me a packet of information, pointing out how wrong I was about HFCS, and that it was just a misunderstood, regular old sugar. By the way, they are now calling it “corn sugar”, so as to obscure just what is in your food, so watch out for that. Anyway, it seems that HFCS is pretty much ignored by our hormone systems when we ingest it. Insulin gives it a free pass, as does leptin. Both these hormones regulate blood sugar levels, and insulin also signals the release of ghrelin, the hormone that tells you when you should stop eating, the satiety hormone.
Now just think, you ingest massive amounts of HFCS, and you don’t get the signal that you are satisfied, and you keep eating and eating. Meanwhile, the fructose is sent to your liver, where it is turned into fat. Fructose in beer is responsible for the characteristic “beer belly” that many develop when they overconsume beer. A beer belly is a precursor to a host of degenerative diseases. Now I look at these bellies and want to run over and warn these men to get to a nutritionist , fast!
HFCS is hidden in almost every processed food you can imagine. This leads us to the third leg of the obesity stool: Our food supply in America.
What is in There, Anyway?
All I can say is: Watch out! Unless you are shopping in the outer aisles of the supermarket, you are exposing yourselves to massive amounts of bad food ingredients.
HFCS is chief among them, when it comes to obesity. However, it doesn’t stop there. Aspartame, MSG, hydrogenated vegetable oils, genetically modified soy and corn, adulterated dairy products, loads of sugar in EVERYTHING, and many other deadly chemicals inhabit almost every box of food you buy. In addition to these bad things, what we really have is a LACK of good things.
By this I mean, our processed diets of today have taken shortcuts (for the sake of the industry), and are selling us foods that, in the past, were nourishing. Now, they are just fillers, and they are pretty much dead.
For example, pickles. I have made pickled products in the past, but never really understood what I was doing. It said, put the beets in a big jar and throw in some sugar and vinegar and thought I was making pickles. But I wasn’t. In order to make pickled beets, you need to ferment them. This is a process using lactobacillus bacteria. Now, it takes three days to make pickled beets, but they are actually GOOD for you, full of enzymes, and healthy. I make sourdough bread and homemade yogurt and cheeses, also fermented products full of beneficial enzymes. Processed foods are not made using the age-old methods. They are all actually “fast” food. And we all know how good THAT is for us. Are we all too busy to make food that is good for us?
There is a movement in the food world entitled “Slow Food”. It is concerned with producing food made the “old” way. It just so happens the old way is a better way. I went to visit a friend the other day, and he presented me with some raw milk, straight from the farm. I turned it into cultured buttermilk, cream cheese and whey, and homemade cottage cheese. Will I die from this daring move, since the milk was not pasteurized? We shall see. But if I don’t, it may mean that I am eating far better than others who must use dairy products which are stripped of much of their nourishment.
Perhaps “Eat Less, Exercise More!” isn’t the battle cry we need. Perhaps it should be simply, “Eat Nourishing Food!” I think that says it all…..
Elizabeth Szlek is a trained chef and has taught Healthy Cooking and nutrition. She is also the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Fishy Business
Fishy Business
By Elizabeth Szlek
For the Rome Observer: September 13, 2010
I started getting all sorts of messages from many different sources a couple of days ago. Something bad is afoot in America, and I fear we will all be the worse for it.
Many of you have read my articles on genetically modified (GM) foods. Here in America, most of us are quite complacent about the fact that we are consuming all sorts of genetically modified foods, such as corn, soy, beets and other foods. In Europe, however, there is a great resistance to these “Frankenfoods”, as they are called, for the simple reason that no one on earth knows what impact they will ultimately have on both our bodies and our environment. The gloomiest among us feel that these “new” products can eventually kill us all. Others point to such reactions as allergies, novel reactions, altered nutritional status, other significant health problems (such as the tryptophan debacle of some years back) or even death. Not small issues.
Some weeks ago, some Spanish anti-GM activists completely destroyed a vineyard, the first in the country, which was planted with GM vines. This made the news all over the world. But, wait, did you hear about it in the mainstream media. I think not.
Vested interests in promoting GM foods in America have done a really great job of keeping these kinds of things from the consciousness of us all, by simply controlling the media. If we don’t learn about it, we don’t have to worry, right?
A Fish Story
Because I am at the one year mark in my self-imposed research study of what constitutes true nutrition for humans, I have come to believe certain things. One is, for sure, that GM foods are not good for our planet, for our bodies, and especially, for generations of children to come. So, in the past couple of days when I started reading up on the latest scary news, I decided I had to share it with all of you. Here is the story:
The FDA, remember them? The agency charged with protecting Americans from harmful foods and drugs. Well, the FDA is poised to approve the first genetically engineered animal, salmon, for consumption by the American public. This is being done in a quite roundabout way, by considering the GM product, fish, as a veterinary drug, not as the food it actually is. And, it is being done with minimal disclosure to the public. And it is happening right now. The hearings are scheduled to begin on September 19th. Veterinary drug approval happens behind closed doors, with little requirement to release data to the public. Thanks….\
The company pushing this is AquaAdvantage, and what they have done is insert a gene from a much larger fish into the salmon so that it keeps growing and growing and growing, and thereby producing more fish, or more bang for the buck. Exactly what kind of bang it will produce, in our bodies, is of course, not known. Again, as with all these genetic modifications, there is a cover story, and then there is the truth. For AquaAdvantage, the story is more food for hungry, starving people of the world. For others, these are some of the “advantages”:
AquaAdvantage says that the fish will be sterile. OK, but they will be so large, that other fish will be lining up to eat them first. And to breed with them first. This could crowd out the “normal” fish from breeding, and over time, they could die out. It is estimated that transgenic (GM) fish could cause the regular fish to die out in under twenty years.
That’s just a starter: Transgenic fish, while originally sterile, could mutate over time and become able to breed normally. This is one of the unknowns with all GM products. No one knows what will happen in ten or twenty generations. Things change.
Also, these would be farmed fish, supposedly, but farmed fish escape by the millions every year, to go back to the wild, and so we can assume that the GM fish would do the same in large numbers. So, now we have these GM fish escaping and breeding and eventually, because they are so large, taking over in all parts of the sea.
What Could Go Wrong?
So what? You can say "it doesn’t matter"! We’ll all benefit from the big fish. But remember, there are at present no safety data on these fish. Eating them could be extremely harmful to us in the ways other GM foods are harmful: Allergies, intestinal problems, damage to internal organs, unexpected production of toxins in the body, and then, of course, death.
It’s not hard to imagine all these things taking place, because they have all taken place already with other GM crops. Only thing is: These are fish out in the wide ocean. There is no controlling them, as with planting crops, and we know that even in that case, there is cross pollination going on, and these GM crops spread beyond their boundaries with ease. For example, in Oaxaca, Mexico, which was a treasure trove of hundred of different types of corn, many of these old heirloom varieties have been invaded by GM pollen and are producing GM corn.
If you understand anything about how the FDA works, you must understand that they approve first, and ask questions later. In this case, we can see Pandora’s box being opened and the ills of man’s insane belief in the wonders of science possibly being unleashed to harm us all.
Wild salmon, not farmed salmon, is one of the most wonderful foods humans can eat. It is beyond frightening that some company can get the approval by our FDA to go out and endanger a true gift of God.
If this information is troubling to you, and I can’t imagine that it is not, you can register your opinion at www.regulations.gov and go to Docket Number FDA-2010-N-0385. I hope you will implore them to leave the fish alone, and I pray they will listen, because there are other Frankenstein ideas waiting in the wings: Goat, pigs, trout and tilapia genetic modifications are ready to go! And there goes our food!
Elizabeth Szlek is a chef and has taught nutrition and healthy cooking. She is also the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
By Elizabeth Szlek
For the Rome Observer: September 13, 2010
I started getting all sorts of messages from many different sources a couple of days ago. Something bad is afoot in America, and I fear we will all be the worse for it.
Many of you have read my articles on genetically modified (GM) foods. Here in America, most of us are quite complacent about the fact that we are consuming all sorts of genetically modified foods, such as corn, soy, beets and other foods. In Europe, however, there is a great resistance to these “Frankenfoods”, as they are called, for the simple reason that no one on earth knows what impact they will ultimately have on both our bodies and our environment. The gloomiest among us feel that these “new” products can eventually kill us all. Others point to such reactions as allergies, novel reactions, altered nutritional status, other significant health problems (such as the tryptophan debacle of some years back) or even death. Not small issues.
Some weeks ago, some Spanish anti-GM activists completely destroyed a vineyard, the first in the country, which was planted with GM vines. This made the news all over the world. But, wait, did you hear about it in the mainstream media. I think not.
Vested interests in promoting GM foods in America have done a really great job of keeping these kinds of things from the consciousness of us all, by simply controlling the media. If we don’t learn about it, we don’t have to worry, right?
A Fish Story
Because I am at the one year mark in my self-imposed research study of what constitutes true nutrition for humans, I have come to believe certain things. One is, for sure, that GM foods are not good for our planet, for our bodies, and especially, for generations of children to come. So, in the past couple of days when I started reading up on the latest scary news, I decided I had to share it with all of you. Here is the story:
The FDA, remember them? The agency charged with protecting Americans from harmful foods and drugs. Well, the FDA is poised to approve the first genetically engineered animal, salmon, for consumption by the American public. This is being done in a quite roundabout way, by considering the GM product, fish, as a veterinary drug, not as the food it actually is. And, it is being done with minimal disclosure to the public. And it is happening right now. The hearings are scheduled to begin on September 19th. Veterinary drug approval happens behind closed doors, with little requirement to release data to the public. Thanks….\
The company pushing this is AquaAdvantage, and what they have done is insert a gene from a much larger fish into the salmon so that it keeps growing and growing and growing, and thereby producing more fish, or more bang for the buck. Exactly what kind of bang it will produce, in our bodies, is of course, not known. Again, as with all these genetic modifications, there is a cover story, and then there is the truth. For AquaAdvantage, the story is more food for hungry, starving people of the world. For others, these are some of the “advantages”:
AquaAdvantage says that the fish will be sterile. OK, but they will be so large, that other fish will be lining up to eat them first. And to breed with them first. This could crowd out the “normal” fish from breeding, and over time, they could die out. It is estimated that transgenic (GM) fish could cause the regular fish to die out in under twenty years.
That’s just a starter: Transgenic fish, while originally sterile, could mutate over time and become able to breed normally. This is one of the unknowns with all GM products. No one knows what will happen in ten or twenty generations. Things change.
Also, these would be farmed fish, supposedly, but farmed fish escape by the millions every year, to go back to the wild, and so we can assume that the GM fish would do the same in large numbers. So, now we have these GM fish escaping and breeding and eventually, because they are so large, taking over in all parts of the sea.
What Could Go Wrong?
So what? You can say "it doesn’t matter"! We’ll all benefit from the big fish. But remember, there are at present no safety data on these fish. Eating them could be extremely harmful to us in the ways other GM foods are harmful: Allergies, intestinal problems, damage to internal organs, unexpected production of toxins in the body, and then, of course, death.
It’s not hard to imagine all these things taking place, because they have all taken place already with other GM crops. Only thing is: These are fish out in the wide ocean. There is no controlling them, as with planting crops, and we know that even in that case, there is cross pollination going on, and these GM crops spread beyond their boundaries with ease. For example, in Oaxaca, Mexico, which was a treasure trove of hundred of different types of corn, many of these old heirloom varieties have been invaded by GM pollen and are producing GM corn.
If you understand anything about how the FDA works, you must understand that they approve first, and ask questions later. In this case, we can see Pandora’s box being opened and the ills of man’s insane belief in the wonders of science possibly being unleashed to harm us all.
Wild salmon, not farmed salmon, is one of the most wonderful foods humans can eat. It is beyond frightening that some company can get the approval by our FDA to go out and endanger a true gift of God.
If this information is troubling to you, and I can’t imagine that it is not, you can register your opinion at www.regulations.gov and go to Docket Number FDA-2010-N-0385. I hope you will implore them to leave the fish alone, and I pray they will listen, because there are other Frankenstein ideas waiting in the wings: Goat, pigs, trout and tilapia genetic modifications are ready to go! And there goes our food!
Elizabeth Szlek is a chef and has taught nutrition and healthy cooking. She is also the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
The Bullies Are Back!
The Bullies Are Back!
By Elizabeth Szlek
For the Rome Observer: September 13, 2010
School days, school days, good old Golden Rule days? If you are over fifty, you may remember that song, which was taught to us all in music classes. Do they even have music classes these days? In any case, let’s look at this ancient sentiment, and see what we have: While attending school, children were expected to act on the principle of the Golden Rule. Do we at least remember that one? “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Ring a bell? Now let’s flash forward to any school yard, any school bus, any playground, and we will find quite a different sentiment obtaining. Something like “kill or be killed”, or a milder version, “Get them before they get you.” In a word, the seeming end of civility and friendship and kindness among children.
I am not crazy. I know there were bullies way back when. But I think they were a rarity. Today, due to our horrific media culture, the role of the bully is glorified, over portrayed and not shown for what it is: Dysfunction and mental disorder.
Every fall I regularly get kids in who go back to school and are instantly labeled as targets for the bullies. I see bullying everywhere, and hear about it a lot, from adults as well as children. So, I thought I would break down some of the more important aspects of this terrible behavior, so that both kids and adults can get a handle on it when it is happening.
What is a Bully?
The simplest definition is a person who is practicing verbal and physical abuse. Let’s look at what a bully does: He or she is essentially a coward, a person who needs to violate the space of another. We can even say that a bully is afraid to be alone, so much do they want to be in your space. Bullying even extends to wanting to be in your mind.
For example, one of the first things bullies do is define you. They tell you who you are: A nerd, a wuss, a – well, just insert here all the horrible labels you can think of.
I had a young boy come in last week and tell me he was hounded by kids in the next class who called him a homosexual slur. And a name connected with being developmentally disabled. So, the bully is defining this boy.
I told the boy that bullies don’t live in reality, they live in a pretend universe, where they believe that what they are saying is true. This is their mental disorder. They can’t get into reality, and they need to define it for others, usually so that they don’t feel so alone and inadequate. If they generate an audience to hear their pretend names for others, the spotlight is off them, and maybe they can feel OK if others buy into their little game of “pretend”.
This is why we should,in the final analysis, feel sorry more for the bully than for the victim. Of course, the pain these bullies cause is terrible. But, the trick to get out of victim status is to realize that the bully is living in a self-created fantasy land. The victims get to be real people, not fakers, because no one can define another person! Now, this sounds like an easy thing to accomplish, but for victims of bullies, it sometimes takes a little help in understanding what is actually going on.
When someone wants to get in your space, and pushes you, you have just met a cowardly bully. Adults meet them on the road, too. They are the aggressive drivers who want to be in your space on the road. I often have little encounters in a place near where I live. I am in the through lane, and there is a bully in the merge lane. Common sense and living in reality would dictate that I have the right of way. But the bullies don’t like than, and they try to “beat me” out for the lead. They want to be in my space.
The Bully in My Head
Besides trying to define someone, bullies like to take up residence inside our heads, too. Again, they are afraid to be alone, cowardly. So, they start to tell others what they are thinking. Funny, isn’t it? How could anyone else know what I am thinking? Well, if you are a bully, you need to be inside of someone else’s mind, so you come up with things like: “You’re trying to start a fight!” or “You’re just saying that to make me mad!” These are pretend world bullying statements. Lots of young girls who start relationships with bullies find themselves in a Neverland of a bully’s ideas. They begin to wonder if they are going crazy, because the bully is always telling them what they are thinking. It’s weird!
Recently we have had some tragic events in our communities involving adult bullies who tried to control women. These bullies were so afraid to be alone, and so cowardly, that after they tried and tried to get into the head of their wives and girlfriends, they gave up and just killed them. This is how afraid of being alone bullies are. Rather than face life without the woman they were trying to control, they killed her, and then themselves. And don’t think that bullies in the schoolyard are any different than those who are adults with guns. It’s the same thing. The bullies are larger, but still not grown up, and they are still cowards.
The Code of Silence: Why Don’t Victims Speak Up?
Parents much understand that kids are buying into the Code of Silence. This is a tacit agreement among bully victims not to speak out. It is a big mistake, however, since they are helping the cowardly bullies maintain their control over others through intimidation. We need to find ways to break the code of silence. If a child, or an adult, for that matter, is being bullied and forced to live in the pretend world of the bully, he or she needs to tell someone. Tell someone, and then tell someone else. Being bullied is nothing to be ashamed of, and it needs to be addressed before too much damage is done. Parents, especially, should be the first to know if there is bullying at school. Kids can even tell if they see another child being bullied, because maybe the bully’s victim is too afraid. We need to speak up!
Bullies need help. They need to find a way to live in the real world, where something like the Golden Rule can still matter. If you are being bullied by anyone, please reach out and tell! “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is still a wonderful motto for a happy life.
Elizabeth Szlek is the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com
By Elizabeth Szlek
For the Rome Observer: September 13, 2010
School days, school days, good old Golden Rule days? If you are over fifty, you may remember that song, which was taught to us all in music classes. Do they even have music classes these days? In any case, let’s look at this ancient sentiment, and see what we have: While attending school, children were expected to act on the principle of the Golden Rule. Do we at least remember that one? “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Ring a bell? Now let’s flash forward to any school yard, any school bus, any playground, and we will find quite a different sentiment obtaining. Something like “kill or be killed”, or a milder version, “Get them before they get you.” In a word, the seeming end of civility and friendship and kindness among children.
I am not crazy. I know there were bullies way back when. But I think they were a rarity. Today, due to our horrific media culture, the role of the bully is glorified, over portrayed and not shown for what it is: Dysfunction and mental disorder.
Every fall I regularly get kids in who go back to school and are instantly labeled as targets for the bullies. I see bullying everywhere, and hear about it a lot, from adults as well as children. So, I thought I would break down some of the more important aspects of this terrible behavior, so that both kids and adults can get a handle on it when it is happening.
What is a Bully?
The simplest definition is a person who is practicing verbal and physical abuse. Let’s look at what a bully does: He or she is essentially a coward, a person who needs to violate the space of another. We can even say that a bully is afraid to be alone, so much do they want to be in your space. Bullying even extends to wanting to be in your mind.
For example, one of the first things bullies do is define you. They tell you who you are: A nerd, a wuss, a – well, just insert here all the horrible labels you can think of.
I had a young boy come in last week and tell me he was hounded by kids in the next class who called him a homosexual slur. And a name connected with being developmentally disabled. So, the bully is defining this boy.
I told the boy that bullies don’t live in reality, they live in a pretend universe, where they believe that what they are saying is true. This is their mental disorder. They can’t get into reality, and they need to define it for others, usually so that they don’t feel so alone and inadequate. If they generate an audience to hear their pretend names for others, the spotlight is off them, and maybe they can feel OK if others buy into their little game of “pretend”.
This is why we should,in the final analysis, feel sorry more for the bully than for the victim. Of course, the pain these bullies cause is terrible. But, the trick to get out of victim status is to realize that the bully is living in a self-created fantasy land. The victims get to be real people, not fakers, because no one can define another person! Now, this sounds like an easy thing to accomplish, but for victims of bullies, it sometimes takes a little help in understanding what is actually going on.
When someone wants to get in your space, and pushes you, you have just met a cowardly bully. Adults meet them on the road, too. They are the aggressive drivers who want to be in your space on the road. I often have little encounters in a place near where I live. I am in the through lane, and there is a bully in the merge lane. Common sense and living in reality would dictate that I have the right of way. But the bullies don’t like than, and they try to “beat me” out for the lead. They want to be in my space.
The Bully in My Head
Besides trying to define someone, bullies like to take up residence inside our heads, too. Again, they are afraid to be alone, cowardly. So, they start to tell others what they are thinking. Funny, isn’t it? How could anyone else know what I am thinking? Well, if you are a bully, you need to be inside of someone else’s mind, so you come up with things like: “You’re trying to start a fight!” or “You’re just saying that to make me mad!” These are pretend world bullying statements. Lots of young girls who start relationships with bullies find themselves in a Neverland of a bully’s ideas. They begin to wonder if they are going crazy, because the bully is always telling them what they are thinking. It’s weird!
Recently we have had some tragic events in our communities involving adult bullies who tried to control women. These bullies were so afraid to be alone, and so cowardly, that after they tried and tried to get into the head of their wives and girlfriends, they gave up and just killed them. This is how afraid of being alone bullies are. Rather than face life without the woman they were trying to control, they killed her, and then themselves. And don’t think that bullies in the schoolyard are any different than those who are adults with guns. It’s the same thing. The bullies are larger, but still not grown up, and they are still cowards.
The Code of Silence: Why Don’t Victims Speak Up?
Parents much understand that kids are buying into the Code of Silence. This is a tacit agreement among bully victims not to speak out. It is a big mistake, however, since they are helping the cowardly bullies maintain their control over others through intimidation. We need to find ways to break the code of silence. If a child, or an adult, for that matter, is being bullied and forced to live in the pretend world of the bully, he or she needs to tell someone. Tell someone, and then tell someone else. Being bullied is nothing to be ashamed of, and it needs to be addressed before too much damage is done. Parents, especially, should be the first to know if there is bullying at school. Kids can even tell if they see another child being bullied, because maybe the bully’s victim is too afraid. We need to speak up!
Bullies need help. They need to find a way to live in the real world, where something like the Golden Rule can still matter. If you are being bullied by anyone, please reach out and tell! “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is still a wonderful motto for a happy life.
Elizabeth Szlek is the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com
Monday, September 6, 2010
Don't Eat the Nanos!
Don’t Eat The Nanos!
By Elizabeth Szlek
For The Rome Observer, September 6, 2010
Some time ago I mentioned that drug companies were figuring out ways to detect whether someone had taken their pills or not, so that they could monitor people taking various medications. This was pretty disturbing, at the time, because it awakened all the “Police State” scenarios bobbing in my head. I pictured Big Brother waving some wand and determining that some hapless mental patient was being coerced into taking a deadly drug, and now, no amount of sleight of hand could save him or her from being found out as a resister. The pills could talk, and tell the whole story. That was my little personal nightmare version – or so I thought.
Turns out: That was just exactly what Big Pharma had in mind, and now, the product of their dreams is becoming more a reality every day. The tool to deliver the Big Brother pills? Nanotechnology. You know, the technology everyone around here is furiously trying to make into our next “big thing”. Maybe we should take a closer look at this new scientific wonder, before we jump into the nano pool.
What is a Nano--?
Of course, there is no such thing as a nano, because “nano” is merely a prefix denoting a fraction. In this case 10-9, or ten to the negative ninth power. This means that anything with the prefix “nano-“ represents a BILLIONTH of something. So, these very, very tiny particles are a billionth of the size of regular particles. In a word: Small. And therein lies the rub. Just like with genetically modified foods or soy burgers, or other demented products men had never tasted for millennia, nano particles have never been taken into human bodies before. And, just as when someone takes a psychotropic drug, for example, NO ONE KNOWS WHAT WILL HAPPEN WHEN THEY DO!
I spent the last two days reading a fabulous book which I will talk about in much greater detail in another article, but suffice it to say, when the white man and his white flour and white sugar arrive in any previously untainted culture, from the Eskimos to the Maori, from the Masai to the Scots, what follows is a complete degeneration of the human body. And now, we have the latest assault on our bodies: Nanotechnology.
There are so many things wrong with this picture, one hardly knows where to begin, but, here goes!
What Could Go Wrong?
Of course, there are many applications for nanotechnology, and not all of them involve ingesting the particles. If we look at some of the ways they are being used, we see the aforementioned use of nano-encrypted barcodes in patented drugs. The ostensible reason for this inclusion in a medicine is to see if the patient has taken it when directed. Of course, we must look to another, much more important reason for the use of nanotechnology here: Drug companies can find out if someone is counterfeiting their patented products, and go after them. I think this motive is by far the more salient one, don’t you? Who cares if Grandma misses her Percodan? But if Granny is buying hot copies of Percodan on the corner, Big Pharma wants to know! With nanotechnology, they will know!
Here are other current uses for nanotechnology: Sunscreens, food packaging, fabric protectors and other uses. You have probably used products in which nanoparticles are included. Since the particles are so very tiny, they behave differently that the “big” particles, and they have unique properties. Unfortunately, while there is a raging development of new uses being churned out daily across the planet, as usual, science is slow to test these new wonders for their affects on the human body. And, we may all be the losers if it turns out these bits are deadly. Of course, some results in this direction are already trickling in, and the news doesn’t look good.
For example, one type of nanoparticle, called a fullerene, which is used in the electronics industry, changed the entire physiology of the fish which were exposed to it. In two days, at an exposure rate of 0.5 parts per million, the brains of the fish suffered significant brain damage. That was in 2004. Have you heard about it? I hadn’t, until yesterday. Another study which came out in 2007 found that nanoparticles of iron are toxic to nerve cells and nerve function. We all know that our bodies use and need a certain amount of iron, but our cells do not know how to handle the nanoparticles, because they are a novel substance for which our bodies have no method of control.
One of the researchers on that study ruefully admitted that nanoparticles “may not be as safe as we had once thought”. Was that factoid beamed out at you? I never heard it.
Human brains have a wonder protective mechanism called the blood-brain barrier. Many harmful substances are kept from entering the brain, where they would do much harm. Nanoparticles are so small that they can cross this protective barrier and wreak havoc in our brains. Worse yet, these particles are highly reactive with other chemicals, and they cause the proliferation of harmful free radicals, which many of you know cause many degenerative diseases. In addition, some diseases are caused by small breaks in the blood-brain barrier, but the nanoparticles can get through anyone’s intact blood-brain barrier, leading to potentially devastating consequences.
Eating and Breathing Nanos
It is not hard to imagine that if nanoparticles are used in food packaging, food films and containers or other storage materials, they will transfer into the food they are touching. While their uses include killing bacteria and increasing shelf life, it is obvious that they may be lessening our own shelf life, and killing us, instead. If you are consuming lots of food in packages, you are probably getting a much larger dose than those who stick to foods without plastic packaging.
And, for you “health nuts” taking “nutraceuticals”, I have to tell you that nanoparticles can be found in many vitamins and supplements to supposedly improve nutrient assimilation and delivery. Ya just can’t trust anyone, can you?
And, of course, no one is even mentioning the fact that those who work to produce foods and products laced with nanoparticles are no doubt breathing them into their lungs, or absorbing them through their skins or through their mouths. Are these workers being decontaminated after every shift? Does OSHA have guidelines for this technology? Before we bring this industry to our area, let’s make sure our natives are not going to go the way of asbestos workers, or miners, and develop horrific conditions due to exposure to these toxins.
In a word, science again has raced ahead of common sense. Do we really need this stuff to live better lives? The jury is still out, but it isn’t looking too good from where I’m sitting.
Elizabeth Szlek is the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
By Elizabeth Szlek
For The Rome Observer, September 6, 2010
Some time ago I mentioned that drug companies were figuring out ways to detect whether someone had taken their pills or not, so that they could monitor people taking various medications. This was pretty disturbing, at the time, because it awakened all the “Police State” scenarios bobbing in my head. I pictured Big Brother waving some wand and determining that some hapless mental patient was being coerced into taking a deadly drug, and now, no amount of sleight of hand could save him or her from being found out as a resister. The pills could talk, and tell the whole story. That was my little personal nightmare version – or so I thought.
Turns out: That was just exactly what Big Pharma had in mind, and now, the product of their dreams is becoming more a reality every day. The tool to deliver the Big Brother pills? Nanotechnology. You know, the technology everyone around here is furiously trying to make into our next “big thing”. Maybe we should take a closer look at this new scientific wonder, before we jump into the nano pool.
What is a Nano--?
Of course, there is no such thing as a nano, because “nano” is merely a prefix denoting a fraction. In this case 10-9, or ten to the negative ninth power. This means that anything with the prefix “nano-“ represents a BILLIONTH of something. So, these very, very tiny particles are a billionth of the size of regular particles. In a word: Small. And therein lies the rub. Just like with genetically modified foods or soy burgers, or other demented products men had never tasted for millennia, nano particles have never been taken into human bodies before. And, just as when someone takes a psychotropic drug, for example, NO ONE KNOWS WHAT WILL HAPPEN WHEN THEY DO!
I spent the last two days reading a fabulous book which I will talk about in much greater detail in another article, but suffice it to say, when the white man and his white flour and white sugar arrive in any previously untainted culture, from the Eskimos to the Maori, from the Masai to the Scots, what follows is a complete degeneration of the human body. And now, we have the latest assault on our bodies: Nanotechnology.
There are so many things wrong with this picture, one hardly knows where to begin, but, here goes!
What Could Go Wrong?
Of course, there are many applications for nanotechnology, and not all of them involve ingesting the particles. If we look at some of the ways they are being used, we see the aforementioned use of nano-encrypted barcodes in patented drugs. The ostensible reason for this inclusion in a medicine is to see if the patient has taken it when directed. Of course, we must look to another, much more important reason for the use of nanotechnology here: Drug companies can find out if someone is counterfeiting their patented products, and go after them. I think this motive is by far the more salient one, don’t you? Who cares if Grandma misses her Percodan? But if Granny is buying hot copies of Percodan on the corner, Big Pharma wants to know! With nanotechnology, they will know!
Here are other current uses for nanotechnology: Sunscreens, food packaging, fabric protectors and other uses. You have probably used products in which nanoparticles are included. Since the particles are so very tiny, they behave differently that the “big” particles, and they have unique properties. Unfortunately, while there is a raging development of new uses being churned out daily across the planet, as usual, science is slow to test these new wonders for their affects on the human body. And, we may all be the losers if it turns out these bits are deadly. Of course, some results in this direction are already trickling in, and the news doesn’t look good.
For example, one type of nanoparticle, called a fullerene, which is used in the electronics industry, changed the entire physiology of the fish which were exposed to it. In two days, at an exposure rate of 0.5 parts per million, the brains of the fish suffered significant brain damage. That was in 2004. Have you heard about it? I hadn’t, until yesterday. Another study which came out in 2007 found that nanoparticles of iron are toxic to nerve cells and nerve function. We all know that our bodies use and need a certain amount of iron, but our cells do not know how to handle the nanoparticles, because they are a novel substance for which our bodies have no method of control.
One of the researchers on that study ruefully admitted that nanoparticles “may not be as safe as we had once thought”. Was that factoid beamed out at you? I never heard it.
Human brains have a wonder protective mechanism called the blood-brain barrier. Many harmful substances are kept from entering the brain, where they would do much harm. Nanoparticles are so small that they can cross this protective barrier and wreak havoc in our brains. Worse yet, these particles are highly reactive with other chemicals, and they cause the proliferation of harmful free radicals, which many of you know cause many degenerative diseases. In addition, some diseases are caused by small breaks in the blood-brain barrier, but the nanoparticles can get through anyone’s intact blood-brain barrier, leading to potentially devastating consequences.
Eating and Breathing Nanos
It is not hard to imagine that if nanoparticles are used in food packaging, food films and containers or other storage materials, they will transfer into the food they are touching. While their uses include killing bacteria and increasing shelf life, it is obvious that they may be lessening our own shelf life, and killing us, instead. If you are consuming lots of food in packages, you are probably getting a much larger dose than those who stick to foods without plastic packaging.
And, for you “health nuts” taking “nutraceuticals”, I have to tell you that nanoparticles can be found in many vitamins and supplements to supposedly improve nutrient assimilation and delivery. Ya just can’t trust anyone, can you?
And, of course, no one is even mentioning the fact that those who work to produce foods and products laced with nanoparticles are no doubt breathing them into their lungs, or absorbing them through their skins or through their mouths. Are these workers being decontaminated after every shift? Does OSHA have guidelines for this technology? Before we bring this industry to our area, let’s make sure our natives are not going to go the way of asbestos workers, or miners, and develop horrific conditions due to exposure to these toxins.
In a word, science again has raced ahead of common sense. Do we really need this stuff to live better lives? The jury is still out, but it isn’t looking too good from where I’m sitting.
Elizabeth Szlek is the Director of The Door Counseling Center of Utica, NY. Questions and comments can be directed to her at (315) 768-8900 or at info@thedoorcounseling.com.
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