Açaí, or, the Latest Fad for Get-Rich Companies to Rip Off Americans, While Brazilians Know Better

Without having to think too hard about it, I can safely say that açaí is my favorite of all Brazilian food items. Made from the açaí berry, açaí is a delicious, thick, purple, smoothie-like drink that has a really rich flavor, and mixes wonderfully with strawberries, bananas, and/or granola. It is especially excellent in the Brazilian heat, when it's too hot to eat a big meal - it's nice and cool, and the relatively high (for fruit) calorie count keeps you going for quite awhile without leaving you wishing you were dead with a full stomach in the heat. It's apparently also full of anti-oxidants, which is great, but I don't eat it because of the health benefits. I eat it because it is unbelievably good.

That said, Randy is right about overstated (or simply false) claims of what açaí can do. He touches upon this, but the one thing I would add is that this seems to me a strictly American phenomenon. Not once have I heard anybody in Brazil, doctors, producers, nutritionists, anybody, extolling the virtues of açaí that I've heard people make about it in the U.S. In Brazil, it's a good energy-drink that, like any fruit, has some health benefits. Beyond that, Brazilians across the board extol the drink for its taste and refreshing qualities, and not much more. There are no claims that açaí helps your joints, makes you look younger, or helps you lose weight.

These claims being made by American companies producing açaí-based products are, simply put, borderline bullshit. They are simply trying to capitalize on a particular cultural mentality in the U.S. that is always trying to find the next no-effort, quick-result way to look younger/feel better/be healthier, all without having to actually do the work required to achieve those results (save for the quixotic and stupid quest to "look younger" - sorry, America, you simply cannot reverse the aging process). These companies know that we will spend almost limitless amounts of money to achieve vanity projects with no work whatsoever. The fact that American companies are pushing products with açaí in them for $86 dollars and upwards is just more reason to believe that the only way these products actually help you "lose weight" is by taking even more money out of your wallet. The fact that these products don't even exist in Brazil should cement the case against them.

So Americans, do what Brazilians - who grow açaí and kind of know a lot about what it can do and can't - do: enjoy açaí for its great taste and refreshing qualities, and don't expect any more.

Bottled Water Sucks

Bottled water is one of the most pointless products we consume. It is often no cleaner or better than tap water. In fact, it not uncommonly comes straight out of the tap, including one company that uses the Houston municipal water system. It is expensive. $1 for a bottle???? That is more expensive than gas. For something you can get out of your tap safely for free. Plus, bottled water is such an invented consumer product. Nobody drank bottled water 25 years ago. Today, everyone does. Has our tap water become less safe? No.

Bottled water also has tremendous environmental costs. While some people recycle those bottles, most just toss them in the trash. Ashley Braun has a great piece at Grist showing the damage these bottles cause.

They take three times as much water as they hold to create. Plastics make up 11% of landfills and no small amount of this are bottles. Much of the bottled water is coming out of the Great Lakes (and what bad has ever been dumped in those?), literally leading to lower water levels. The plastic in the bottles comes from oil.

There simply is no good reason for people with safe water systems to consume bottled water. If you want to make a simple move to help the environment, stop using these bottles. Buy a Nalgene bottle instead. It's still plastic but you can use it endlessly. You'll save tons of water, oil, and space by doing so.

The Stupidity of Baby Einstein

Jen Chaney reports on studies suggesting that the Baby Einstein videos in fact hurt child development. But she doesn't get to why these videos are really bogus. She is right that what Baby Einstein really does is tap into the bizarre psychological needs of parents. But the great issue with this product is that it reflects the commodification of education in the United States.

Thank God I'm not a father. The world is a better place for it. But I am an educator in a field that most people do not associate with making money. Of course, there are multiple career paths for a historian. But many parents don't know that. They see education as a route to financial success, not as something with an intrinsic value in its own right. When their child wants to major in History, English, or Art, too many will wonder what they did wrong. Even if Baby Einstein worked and children's vocabularies increased rapidly, the point would not be to get them reading Dickens at the age of 10. It would be to get them into "top schools," where they could make lots of connections and parlay that into a good job and lots of money.

These attitudes are anti-intellectual, despite their educational facade, and we should fight them on every level.

"I Want To Say One Word to You...Plastics." "Just How Do You Mean That, Sir?"

I'm sure we'd all like to wish a happy 100th birthday to plastics.

That's right. On July 13, 1907, Leo Baekeland submitted his patent to the United States government for the invention of plastic.

We need to thank God for all the consumer products we can own because of plastics. Computers, cars, etc., blah, blah, blah.

But I'd like to thank Baekeland for a few special products.

Where would we be if we couldn't have handy dandy products where we could microwave our eggs?

I'd like to express my gratitude that materials science people have found plastics so useful in creating ever more powerful weapons that are currently being used to kill Iraqi men, women, and children.

And of course, we need to laud plastics for providing young girls with Barbie's unreasonably large breasts. No one has done more to tell women that large breasts are synonymous with attractiveness and therefore give young girls feelings of inadequacy.

Thank you plastics! Where would be without you!!!