This was an amusing USENET post.
The writer is a great writer, but disregards the truth in pursuit of
entertainment.
I wish Atkins were a cult. I have yet to find a low carb social group here
in the Silicon Valley. We need a church!
"Bob in socal" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:The Atkins Cult
By Patrick Hynes
Published 10/15/2004 12:06:32 AM
http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=7253I'll admit it. I'm a man of ample carriage. At this time every two
years I and my fellow political hacks tend to, how shall I say this,
bulk up? Sure, after the election we'll hop back on the treadmill and
gobble down salads again. But for now the pressures of demanding
clients, the stressful anticipation of the next poll, and the
sleepless hours in editing suites and campaign headquarters will mean
excessive corpulence for a few more weeks. It is a bipartisan problem.
But what can we say? We suffer for our work.Sadly, too many of my compatriots turn in their desperation to fad
diets to offset the ruinous effects of campaign life. One such
regimen, the Atkins Diet, has ensnared so many of my friends and
colleagues, I am compelled finally to speak out. This strange cultural
phenomenon leads perfectly normal and intelligent people to consume
things like steak and Diet Coke for breakfast, cheese cubes for lunch
and bacon with a side of pork rinds for dinner.You see, Atkins isn't really a diet at all. It's a cult. And political
professionals all over Washington, D.C. have drunk the Kool-Aid,
sweetened with Splenda, of course.Don't take my word for it. Just run down the Cultic Studies Review's
checklist on how to identify a cult and cross-reference it with your
own personal experience with this cultural blight known as Atkins.Mind-numbing techniques are used to suppress doubts about the group.
How else would you describe a grueling two-week "induction phase"
during which dieters are to consume 20 or fewer grams of carbohydrates
a day? In his book Dr. Atkins' New Diet Revolution, Robert Atkins
acknowledged that probable side-effects of this induction are lethargy
and diminished mental acuity.The group is pre-occupied with bringing in new members. My own copy of
Dr. Atkins' New Diet Revolution (its "bible," if you will) is battered
and worn. I am probably its third or fourth owner. It has been pushed
from one friend to the next with the proselytizing fervor of a
Jehovah's Witness.The group is preoccupied with making money. Ahem. "Atkins-approved Low
Carb Bread"? "Atkins-approved" choices on your local sprawl diner's
menu? Notice the little ® on those labels? They aren't approving this
junk for their health. Or yours. The Atkins Nutritionals gets a cut.
Of everything.The group is elitist, claiming a special, exalted status for itself,
its leaders, and its members. There's an almost Gnostic component to
the Atkins Diet. It's a club with secret knowledge about how to lose
weight. All other tried and true weight loss avenues (Weight Watchers,
exercise, Slim Fast) are heretical for ignoring the immutable truths
as laid out by Robert Atkins. The Atkins cultist snickers at the very
concept of the FDA's food pyramid. He who follows it is an ignoramus.The group has a polarized us-versus-them mentality, which causes
conflict within the larger society. One need only look at the
mysterious circumstances surrounding the release of Robert Atkins'
medical report upon his death to know the larger society has been
affected. Apparently People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (who,
I admit, have their own issues) had something to do with revealing Dr.
Atkins died at 260 lbs. In fact, there is an underground war raging
between the PETA establishment types and the Atkins revolutionaries. I
once brought up an argument against the Atkins Diet often used by PETA
to a cultist friend, who then actually accused me of being a tool for
the Department of Agriculture.Members' subservience to the group causes them to cut ties with family
and friends, and to give up personal goals and activities that were of
interest before joining the group. There was a time when a couple of
pizzas and about fifteen beers apiece were all my friends and I needed
for a good time. Then came Atkins. The beer was replaced with gin or
vodka. Only the cheese and meat toppings of the pizza were consumed,
leaving triangle shards of dough in the box. Eventually, it stopped
being fun. I don't even see many of my friends anymore, so tight are
they wrapped in the clutches of the cult.The group is focused on a living leader to whom members seem to
display excessively zealous, unquestioned commitment. Robert Atkins is
dead. So here, at least, is one point in favor of the cultists. And
yet again, the death of Dr. Atkins is mired in mystery and intrigue.
He slipped on an icy sidewalk. One doesn't generally die from slipping
on a sidewalk (unless your bones have turned to cheese, as may have
been the case with Atkins.) But his spirit lives on at Atkins
Nutritionals, a global enterprise that carries on his, um, mission.I worry about my friends and colleagues in the campaign business. Is
it not enough that we belong to a strange subculture of political
hobbyists and news fetishists?Patrick Hynes is a Senior Account Executive with the Republican
consulting firm Marsh Copsey + Scott. He is also the proprietor of
www.crushkerry.com.