From the article:

There’s lots of money to be made selling fast food and then treating the diseases that fast food causes. One of the leading products of the American food industry has become patients for the American health care industry.

So poignant!  Have you ever wondered why in the world it is that hospitals, whose sole reason for being is to keep people healthy, consistently serve highly-processed, un-fresh, terrible-tasting food to their patients?  We have…

And so the government is poised to go on encouraging America’s fast-food diet with its farm policies even as it takes on added responsibilities for covering the medical costs of that diet. To put it more bluntly, the government is putting itself in the uncomfortable position of subsidizing both the costs of treating Type 2 diabetes and the consumption of high-fructose corn syrup.

Luckily, signs from the Obama administration suggest that food reform is, in fact, on the future agenda (i.e. Michele Obama’s White House garden, President Obama’s remarks about a possible soda tax.)  And we certainly hope so, because if the food industry giants of today have their way, they’ll be stamping processed, sugar-filled children’s breakfast cereals like Cocoa Krispies and Froot Loops with tragically misleading labels like “Smart Choices”!  …Oh wait, they already are.

[New York Times]

Yes, it’s true, guys.  Steve Wasik, the CEO of SIGG, officially announced in a two-page letter on the SIGG website that all of their water bottles manufactured before August of 2008 contain BPA.  What’s even more noteworthy is that the company has apparently known for years about this BPA presence and did not disclose the information until now.

Not surprisingly, SIGG has come under much fire since the release of Mr. Wasik’s letter.  The blogging world has been full of criticism for the company, and established news organizations like The Boston Globe, Mother Jones, and Salon.com have all covered the story.  And in a meaningful move, Patagonia terminated their contract with SIGG over the controversy.

In response to this negative backlash, Mr. Wasik published a second letter with a decidedly more humble, apologetic tone.  Here’s an excerpt:

After reading and responding to hundreds of emails and viewing nearly as many blog & Twitter posts, I realize that my first letter may have missed the mark.  What I should have said simply and loudly to all of our loyal SIGG fans is:  I am sorry that we did not make our communications on the original SIGG liner more clear from the very beginning.

SIGG has initiated a voluntary exchange program (not a recall), in which consumers who own these pre-August 2008 bottles can send their product back to the company for a BPA-free product in exchange.  We wonder how many of you own BPA-containing SIGG water bottles.  And if you do, do you plan to utilize SIGG’s exchange program, or will you instead apply the dollars you would have spent on shipping your bottle back to the purchase of a new water bottle from a different company?

It’s wonderful that many of us (yogis and otherwise) are hip to the food activist cause, but today we’re celebrating the fact that the venerable mainstream news establishment TIME Magazine just published a lengthy five-page article about the reality of the industrialized food system. TIME Magazine, guys! This is big-time. From the article:

The U.S. agricultural industry can now produce unlimited quantities of meat and grains at remarkably cheap prices. But it does so at a high cost to the environment, animals and humans… Add to the price tag the acceleration of global warming — our energy-intensive food system uses 19% of U.S. fossil fuels, more than any other sector of the economy.

And perhaps worst of all, our food is increasingly bad for us, even dangerous….

Some Americans are heeding such warnings and working to transform the way the country eats — ranchers and farmers who are raising sustainable food in ways that don’t bankrupt the earth. Documentaries like the scathing Food Inc. and the work of investigative journalists like Eric Schlosser and Michael Pollan are reprising Sinclair’s work, awakening a sleeping public to the uncomfortable realities of how we eat.

Click below to read the full informative article!

[TIME Magazine]

1) The Washington Post highlights yoga people who make a difference! It’s often observed that the overwhelming majority of stories covered by the news media are negative ones, but this Washington Post piece is a shining example to the contrary.  We’re so pleased that a newspaper as established and respected as the Post took the time to write about these amazingly impressive “do-gooder” yoga organizations.  The groups featured include Sprout Yoga, which works to bring free yoga classes to post-traumatic stress and eating disorder sufferers, Upward Bound, which brings yoga to low-income kids, and Street Yoga, which teaches at-risk homeless youths, sexual abuse victims, and more.  We hope that the next time a news journal writes a piece on this topic, they remember to include Yoga Bear, a non-profit dedicated to bringing yoga to cancer survivors.  [Activists Aim to Make Yoga An Exercise in Accessibility]

2) Mercury is basically in every single fish in the universe. Yikes!  Is it the case that while we try to identify specific fish and their home waters as relatively low-risk when it comes to mercury, the truth is that mercury can be found in all fish everywhere?  What’s a lacto-ovo vegetarian to do? [Federal Study Shows Mercury in Fish Widespread]

3) (From the “Is This Really News” Department): Ex-wall street exec quits her job to teach yoga. Really, now – should this story truly be news? People change career tracks every day, and teaching yoga is certainly a popular career option, hence the abundance of yoga teacher training programs offered across the country.  But for some reason (probably a combination of the Wall Street/ivy league/young woman elements of this story), a plethora of news organizations have written about this, including the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, and New York Magazine.  Check it out yourself to learn more about one woman’s choice to ditch the high-powered banking exec life in favor of the peace-and-love yoga life. [Princeton Grad Quits Morgan Stanley to Teach Yoga to Bankers]

4) Random fact of the day: Did you know that the uber well-known economist Paul Krugman (a Nobel Prize-winning Princeton professor who regularly writes op-ed pieces for the New York Times) is married to a yoga teacher?  This bit of trivia goes along with the  “Major Political Figures With Yoga Practices” post we ran earlier this year. ) Robin Wells Krugman is an economics professor at Princeton who also happens to teach Forrest Yoga at Four Winds Yoga Studio in Princeton, New Jersey. For proof of this exciting addition to the roster of yogis in politics, just read this.

5) The Landmark Form. It’s a “transformational” personal-growth weekend-workshop around whom the accusation of “cult” has often flittered.  Many of you are probably familiar with this workshop, and some well-known yoga businesses even sponsor their employees to attend it.  Interestingly, the notable magazine Mother Jones recently sent one of their reporters to the Landmark Forum armed with the task of experiencing and writing about it.  The title of the article is “The Landmark Forum: 42 Hours, $500, 65 Breakdowns: My lost weekend with the trademark happy, bathroom-break hating, slightly spooky inheritors of est.”  The article isn’t quite the scathing expose that Landmark opponents might hope for, but it’s certainly critical and eye-rolling in its tone.  Check it out here if you’re so inclined!

6) In the health and science department, the New York Times ran a piece titled “Does Exercise Reduce Your Cancer Risk?” (the answer is a tentative yes) and another about a newly-revealed fact about an insidious connection between the brain and stress: “The sensation of being highly stressed can rewire the brain in ways that promote its sinister persistence.”  Oh no!  (“Brain Is a Co-Conspirator in a Vicious Stress Loop“)

7) From the “Scary Water Bottling Companies You Might Not Want to Support With Your Dollars!” department: A brutal military dictatorship backs Fiji water.

Fiji Water isn’t just devastating to the environment of Fiji, the planet that endures the cost of shipping it, and the environments of the places where it is consumed. It is also the product of a brutal military regime that monitors all outgoing Internet traffic from the island for criticisms of the water business and immediately arrests people who transmit them, bringing them in for intensive questioning and the occasional prison-rape threat, as journalist Anna Lenzer discovered.

[Brutal Military Dictatorship That Backs Fiji Water]

Apparently this Whole Foods controversy didn’t peter out over the weekend like some people were probably hoping it might.  We wonder what might become of Whole Foods’ controversy-stirring CEO John Mackey in light of the unceasing media coverage this story is receiving.  Will the board decide to oust him at their next meeting and replace him with someone who doesn’t randomly decide to publish pointed op-ed pieces in conservative newspapers at politically-sensitive times which alienate Whole Foods’ entire customer base?  One has to wonder.

While we’re on the topic, we thought we’d share with you an informative web page we stumbled upon while doing some Whole Foods research.  It’s a thorough list of some other questionable aspects of Whole Foods about which you might not have been aware. We appreciate this website’s rather level-headed approach to Whole Foods. They are clear to point out that:

We’re not suggesting that anyone stop shopping at Whole Foods and we’re not calling for any kind of boycott – we just want consumers to realize that even a company that puts on a socially-responsible face doesn’t always live up to its own hype.

If Whole Foods’ recent health care controversy doesn’t really bother you, you might discover something that irks you a bit more on this site…

1) You know how so many people in the yoga community love attending live kirtans (call-and-response chanting concerts in the Hindu tradition) at their local yoga studios?  And you’ve noticed how American kirtan musicians with adopted Indian names (Krishna Das, Jai Uttal, etc.) have become household names among yoga students across the U.S.?  Well, how interesting would it be to read an article about the popularizing of kirtan in America from the perspective of the Indian community?  To find such an eye-opening piece of writing, you need look no further than August 4th’s issue of the Wall Street Journal (American’s New Idol?)

2) Could it possibly be? Has a new study revealed the true connection between yoga and thinness?  Although it’s an intriguing idea, we’re kind of skeptical.  Although yoga and thinness have a correlational relationship, we’re not so sure that it’s also a causal one.  But here’s a quick excerpt from the LA Times article (The Real Reason People Who Carry Yoga Mats Always Look Thin) to give you the gist of the argument:

Mindful eating helps people to stop eating once they are full, even if delicious food remains on their plates. They try not to let tempting advertisements lure them to food; they avoid eating while they are distracted by a TV show or other diversion; and they don’t eat to distract themselves from emotions like stress or sadness….

The mental focus required to hold a difficult yoga pose could also help people avoid “eating more even when the food tastes good” or “eating when you’re not hungry,” he said in a statement.

We agree that mindful eating is an essential aspect of healthy living, and we would even concede that a consistent yoga practice definitely teaches one to “tune into” one’s body on a subtle level.  But we don’t think this is explanation can be applied to the entire population of thin people who practice yoga.  There’s got to be some other factor at work there as well…  Any ideas, guys?

3) Both the Atlantic Monthly (Will Uncle Sam Pay for Your Yoga?) and Time Magazine (Americans Spending on Yoga, Echinacea, and Acupuncture) wrote about some recently-released data regarding Americans’ out-of-pocket spending on health care.  Apparently, our country spent about $34 billion on “complementary and alternative medicine” in 2007, and both magazines pondered how this fact might play into the health care debate which has been cycling through Congress lately.  The answer is that it probably won’t impact the current debate much, if at all. But hopefully such data will make a difference a little further down the line as the scope of medicine in our country changes in the coming years.

4) Remember the whole “state licensing of yoga studio” fiasco which has been taking place in the great state of New York over the past few months?  Well, apparently a New York law firm is offering to file suit against the state on behalf of the yoga studios affected by the New York government’s recent actions, and they’re doing so on a pro bono basis.  Their suit will ask for an official declaration that the licensing of yoga teacher training programs is unconstitutional.  If you’re a New York yoga studio who received one of those scary cease-and-desist letters back in May, you might want to consider jumping on board here!  Click here for more information.

5) Michael Pollan, everyone’s favorite food writer (okay, maybe he’s not everyone’s favorite food writer, but he’s probably everyone-who’s-not-part-of-the-industrial-food-industry’s favorite food writer), just published a fascinating piece in the New York Times about the famous Food Network, home to many a celebrity chef and quite a few competitive cooking shows, and whether or not this food-oriented television channel truly ends up helping people cook at home.  It’s an admittedly lengthy article, but it’s well worth a thorough read if you can spare a few minutes.  (Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch)

**We felt like this was a particularly good issue of “Interesting News Items You Might Have Missed”, didn’t you?  The variety of topics discussed here was interesting, and each individual piece was quite compelling.  Bye now!

The New York Times just ran an article titled “Where Thin People Roam, and Sometimes Even Eat“.  Apparently, a new study which utilized body-mass index data found that the borough of Manhattan houses the thinnest people in all of New York City.  In fact, people in Manhattan are thinner than the collective body mass indexes of both New York state, and surprisingly, the entire nation of the U.S.!  (To clarify, this doesn’t mean that Manhattanites are the thinnest people in the country – it just means that if you compare the average body mass index of the population of Manhattan to the same figure for the country as a whole, Manhattanites are thinner.  But is this really a surprise?)

The NYT article offers a few possible explanations for the thinness of Manhattan:

First and foremost, they said, Manhattan is a place where people walk. Even subway riders need to climb stairs. Storefront yoga studios, parks and pedestrian-friendly streets make working out relatively easy.

Note the plug of our favorite lifestyle activity, yoga!

The article goes on to interview several Manhattan residents about their methods for staying thin.  ($300 workout coaching methods are mentioned, and one interviewee exclaims, “Look at my cute little triceps!”  Ahem.)  Through these mini profiles, readers are left with the distinct impression that Manhattan as a whole is… oh how shall we put it… quite superficial?

Anywho, reading this article reminded us of another interesting piece we read just last week in one of our favorite magazines, The New Yorker.  This piece was titled “Why Are We So Fat?“, and it was penned by writer Elizabeth Kolbert.  It’s basically a survey of several books published in the last few years about the enormous weight gain our country has experienced since the 1980s.  Many of the hypotheses posited in these books are not new ideas to us, but one segment in particular caught our eye.  Kolbert relays a brainstorming session which took place during the early days of McDonald’s:

Customers were purchasing a burger and perhaps a soft drink or a bag of fries, and then leaving. How could they be persuaded to buy more? Wallerstein’s suggestion—a bigger bag of fries—was greeted skeptically by the company’s founder, Ray Kroc. Kroc pointed out that if people wanted more fries they could always order a second bag.

“But Ray,” Wallerstein is reputed to have said, “they don’t want to eat two bags—they don’t want to look like a glutton.” Eventually, Kroc let himself be convinced; the rest, as they say, is supersizing.

Wow, we had never thought about the role that social pressure might play in the realm of the human appetite.  Fascinating!

In this article we also learned about a burgeoning (and somewhat questionable) academic field called “fat studies” (along the lines of “black studies” or “women’s studies”…)

The movement known variously as “size acceptance,” “fat acceptance,” “fat liberation,” and “fat power” has been around for more than four decades…  According to the authors of “The Fat Studies Reader,” the real problem isn’t the sudden surge in obesity in this country but the surge in stories about obesity. Weight, by their account, is, like race or sex or bone structure, a biological trait over which individuals have no—or, in the case of fat, very limited—control…  Undeniably, the fat—the authors of “The Reader” are adamant advocates for the “f” word—are subject to prejudice and even cruelty.

Overweight people in America are certainly subject to discrimination.  But the concept of “fat studies” departments at universities and the idea that undergraduates could choose to major in “fat studies” at college is kind of mind-bending!  Kolbert goes on to elegantly outline some appropriate criticisms of the field:

But, just because size bias exists it doesn’t follow that putting on weight is a subversive act. In contrast to the field’s claims about itself, fat studies ends up taking some remarkably conservative positions. It effectively allies itself with McDonald’s and the rest of the processed-food industry, while opposing the sorts of groups that advocate better school-lunch programs and more public parks. To claim that some people are just meant to be fat is not quite the same as arguing that some people are just meant to be poor, but it comes uncomfortably close.

Anywho, it seems to us that ‘fat’ is a becoming a bit of a buzz topic at the moment.  We wonder which other media outlets will join the discussion?

[New York Times]

[The New Yorker]

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the term, uddiyana bandha is an exercise in which yoga practitioners actively draw in their lower abdomens.  The practice is commonly taught in many yoga classes throughout the country.  In fact, in some styles of yoga (specifically Ashtanga), yogis are instructed to hold uddiyana bandha throughout their entire yoga practices – from the opening sun salutations to the ending backbends and inversions.  (As a side note, uninterruptedly engaging uddiyana bandha for the entire duration of a yoga class is quite a tall order, and most yogis (ourselves included!) unconsciously disconnect from this hold multiple times during each practice. But those rare yogis who manage to indefinitely hold a strong uddiyana bandha exhibit the remarkable quality of literally “floating” through their yoga practices.  It’s crazy but true, guys!)

Aside from this “floating” or “lightness” quality that our bodies experience when we engage our cores, uddiyana bandha is also taught because it’s believed to protect the back during potentially intense yoga poses.  The idea is that strengthening the abdomen helps to stabilize the back and therefore avoid back strain.

But is uddiyana bandha really the best tool for a healthy back?  A recent New York Times article begs to differ.  According to the article, which is entitled “Is Your Ab Workout Hurting Your Back?”, strong core muscles do not necessarily correlate with healthy backs:

…there’s growing dissent among sports scientists about whether all of this attention to the deep abdominal muscles actually gives you a more powerful core and a stronger back and whether it’s even safe.

Whether it’s even safe? If core strengthening and uddiyana bandha turn out to be unsafe, many a yoga studio will need to significantly re-arrange its class schedule.  (Good-bye “Yoga for Core Strength” classes; hello “Yoga for Weak Bellies”??)

If your core is stable, your spine remains upright while your body swivels around it. But, McGill says, the muscles forming the core must be balanced to allow the spine to bear large loads. If you concentrate on strengthening only one set of muscles within the core, you can destabilize your spine by pulling it out of alignment.

The key word mentioned here is “balance”.  The article seems to be telling us that core exercises are important for the health of the back, but that our definition of the word “core” is too limited.  Because we have focused solely on the deep abdomen muscles when teaching core strength, we have neglected other important areas within our cores, like the specific muscles which surround and support the spine.  This has resulted in unbalanced muscle development, and therefore potentially compromised spine safety.

To answer the question with which we titled this post, yes, yogis do need to re-think uddiyana bandha.  While the practice is a helpful one, it’s not a complete path to back health.  For a genuinely happy, supported back, we’ll need to incorporate other key poses into our practices, and the article makes a few helpful suggestions:

Instead, he suggests, a core exercise program should emphasize all of the major muscles that girdle the spine, including but not concentrating on the abs. Side plank (lie on your side and raise your upper body) and the “bird dog” (in which, from all fours, you raise an alternate arm and leg) exercise the important muscles embedded along the back and sides of the core.

Both of these examples sound like wise poses to serve the back-strengthening purpose, but we’re going to have to re-name that second one, because we somehow can’t see ourselves practicing “bird dog asana” without laughing!

[New York Times]

To be honest though, the study didn’t really turn up anything especially damning about reusable bags (but we’re sure its sponsors would have liked it to!)  Funded by the Canadian Plastics Industry, the research basically found that if a small amount of water sits at the bottom of a folded reusable bag for an extended amount of time, certain types of bacteria could develop, some of which could be harmful if they were to come in direct contact with food.

In teenager speak, “Um… no duh!  Did it really take a specially-funded scientific study to discover this?”

In short, to be super safe, clean your reusable bags from time-to-time!  Just like you would your yoga mat – another surface which could potentially accumulate harmful bacteria if moisture remains trapped inside a rolled-up mat for a certain length of time.  Hey, maybe someone should sponsor a study about the scary risks of yoga mats!  Hello, Pilates Mat Industry?

[NewsDay]