I have never been very good at calories. I never cared to learn to be honest, as I thought it would be a lot better for my potential OCD tendencies not to know. What does 1,000 calories mean to the average consumer anyway? Do we look at calories as a calculation of energy or as just a number? Every morning I hear one of NPR’s sponsors advocating for calorie labels on the front of drink bottles, which got me thinking.
My first thought is: “It’s already on there and we all know where to look to find it, so why do we need it twice? Are we really that lazy? Or dumb?” My second thought: “Wait a minute! What’s so bad about calories anyway?”
Our culture continues to obsess over calories and the counts are everywhere—packaging, restaurant menus, even fast food restaurants. I am 100 percent on-board with the consumer’s right to know, but I can’t help but wonder: do we know what that number even means?
A calorie is a measure of energy, or: “a quantity of food capable of producing such an amount of energy,” according to Dictionary.com We learn this in Junior High science class, but for some reason that connection doesn’t always seem to stick with us when we look at the calorie count displayed on a large burrito. The term “calories,” has become nearly a dirty word. It doesn’t have to be the case, in other countries, Mexico for example; nutrition labels say energy (“Energia”), rather than a calorie count. For me, (as an American) it sounds less offensive and frightening, not to mention offers a truer definition of what that number actually means.
When it comes to food, drinks, and calorie labels, we have exceptions. We fight to have calories on certain things, fast food joints, for instance. However, there are other foods that we are quite happy not knowing that calorie count. For example, did you know that there are no labels on alcohol bottles? Check it out – wine, hard alcohol, and a lot of beer (unless advertised as “only 90 calories”) do not have nutrition labels with a calorie count. In fact, they are not required to carry nutrition facts, only a warning label of the immediate affects of alcohol, but not the long term health affects of consuming various amounts of unknown elements. Recently, there has been more talk of changing this, but for the time being it seems that we would rather not know. Ignorance is bliss, as Plato’s cave (or the Matrix!) has taught us. We only spend the time caring and fighting for the certain things: matters that will benefit us, such as knowing the calories count at restaurants, or that we can use a scapegoat for our problems – the fight against high calorie foods to fight the high obesity levels. But I find it funny that we tend to shy away from matters that could take away something we like, or shine a negative light on a common and enjoyable habit – putting a calorie count on a happy hour is something that no one seems to want.
That calorie number is important, certainly, though just as with any study, the results should be both quantitative and qualitative. Simply going with one number is not going to offer the whole story behind the product, hence why the nutrition labels display not only the calorie count, but also the vitamin percentages, and ingredient list, among other thing. My concern with the fight to put a spotlight on only the calorie count, we will lose focus on the important nutritional value of some foods. Once we balk at a single number, we will be less likely to consider any other redeeming quality. Understanding the calorie count needs to be looked at as a whole. The entire nutrition label is important.
Sources and Further Reading:
Locke, Michelle. “Alcohol industry struggles with nutrition labels.” Courier-Journal. 23 Feb 2011. http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20110224/FEATURES03/302240022/Alcohol-industry-struggles-nutrition-labels
“How to Understand and Use the Nutrition Facts Label.” U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
http://www.fda.gov/food/labelingnutrition/consumerinformation/ucm078889.htm
Burros, Marion. “Nutrition Labels Proposed for Alcohol.” 07 Aug 2007. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/01/dining/01label.html
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