11.26.08
Mixed stuff from surfing the web.
While surfing the net, I stumbled across an article on agave nectar. I remember Brian bought a bottle of it once, but aside from a tiny taste, I never made it a habit to eat. None of us have in the household, for that matter. We have mainly stuck to raw honey, maple syrup, or sucanat for sweeteners. One of the reasons Brian bought it was due to some claims that it was a good substitute for sugar for diabetics. Since no one in my immediate family is diabetic at this time, we never paid much attention to it. Although my mom warns me that I should be careful since she is diabetic, and she says it runs in her side of the family. Well, I don’t eat a lot of sweets anyway, so I guess I am being careful, heheh. Anyway, this article I stumbled upon claims that it is a fraud to claim that agave nectar is health promoting. It quotes other articles that make claims like this:
“….What I want people to understand is that mislabeling a sweetener like agave syrup is about money and profit, to the real determent of your health.”
The post is called, Agave Nectar: The High Fructose Health Fraud by Chris Gupta and then another article by the same title by Rami Nagel. Just scroll down lower on the link. The article further explains what agave nectar is and why it’s so detrimental to health.
As I’m sure many other internet users have experienced, it’s easy to spend hours surfing the net because so many articles lead from one source to another. The above article had a link to a new book called, “Cure Tooth Decay,” by Ramiel Nagel. Upon browsing through that site, I was happy to see that someone actually compiled a book dealing specifically with healing teeth “naturally.” Previously I had only read bits and pieces of the possibility of tooth regeneration from sources such as Dr. Weston Price and Melvin Page, DDS. The results of Price’s work can be found in his book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration and through the Weston Price Foundation online. Some of the results of Page’s work can be read at the Price-Pottenger website in an article by Bob Jackson on Melvin Page, DDS. Prior to discovering the studies of Price and Page, there were some brief references I’ve read to tooth regeneration in a couple vegetarian sources as well. This is a subject that has fascinated me because I grew up thinking that teeth did not regenerate. But while I was recovering from AA, I did develop a toothache for which I was afraid to go to the dentist due to my low white count and my reluctance to use conventional antibiotics. What eventually happened was my toothache resolved on it’s own without my going to the dentist. This happened to another tooth as well at a different time, so I felt pretty confident that there was some truth to the idea that teeth actually can re-mineralize naturally. To top it off, when I finally did go to the dentist because I wanted all my amalgams removed, the dentist told me that my teeth were in pretty good shape considering I hadn’t visited the dentist in several years. I had not developed any new cavities and not much plaque, either. I took that as a good sign that my diet was somewhat adequate, although since I’m still not in perfect health, I continue to search for health-promoting sources and substances. Anyway the problem regarding our popular belief and practices regarding tooth decay, aside from bad eating habits, is that once a cavity is discovered, it’s standard procedure for the dentists to just fill up the holes in our teeth, and that in turn prevents proper re-mineralization of the tooth. So I am happy to see that someone actually compiled information specifically regarding curing tooth decay naturally. This is something I think is long overdue and hopefully will be a benefit to many, many people.
Since I found that one post interesting, I had to go to the home page of Chris Gupta’s blog. Oh my, did I say I could get lost for hours surfing the net? Well, Chris’s blog definitely had lots of info that could keep my interest for hours. For instance another bit of info that I learned from his blog is about the Canadian Genocide. Huh? Well, evidently, there is a documentary by Kevin Annett and Louie Lawless called, UNREPENTANT: Kevin Annett and Canadia’s Genocide (January 2007). The Epoch Times expounds a little more of what the documentary is all about in it’s article titled, Documentary Exposes Ugly Secret of Colonialism in Canada, by Joan Delaney. Here’s a short excerpt from the article:
“According to Kevin Annett, co-writer and producer of Unrepentant: Kevin Annett and Canada’s Genocide , the time has come for Canadians to learn the truth about what really happened to the aboriginal people from the start of colonialism until today.”
I tell ya, I try to look up something sweet, but so many things lead to something bitter. It’s one thing when bad people knowingly do bad things, but then even more depressing is when people do evil things because they “think” it’s for the good. In particular, I’m thinking of the Canadian genocide story that Annett is trying to reveal through his documentary regarding the church clergy mistreating the aboriginal children in the name of what they thought was “proper” according to their religious standards. That is, the idea that to take these children away from their own parents and home in order to teach these kids how to be civilized people under the name of Christianity is supposed to be “good” is so twisted to me. What makes matters worse is that the clergy, according to survivors, mistreated the children. If the figures are correct, half of the children died under the care of these clergy. According to Delaney,
“Of the 100,000 who went through the schools, it is estimated that at least 50,000 were killed. Many of those who died were buried in unmarked graves on or around the school grounds; most of the bodies were never returned to the families.”
It’s bad enough that so much evil exists in this world, but I am even more appalled when the evil is committed with the guise of goodness, democracy, and the like. I know I should know better, but it’s still disturbing to me. I can just imagine those clergy thinking they were actually doing good things. It reminds me of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin where Mr. Shelby comments to Mrs. Shelby about the sermon one of their ministers gave regarding the necessity or the “rightness” of slavery. There were people who actually felt so superior over other people (their black slaves) that they thought they had to keep them under slavery for their own good. Oye. I’m not sure how these people come to those conclusions, but it’s like saying that we should make poor people slaves because we need to take care of them. Very strange logic, but it just goes to show how people can justify just about anything they want to do. I think that’s why studying the Bible and really trying to understand it is so important because it seems that we can easily stray from what is good if we didn’t have the Bible to remind us what is right and proper. I think too often people today mainly go by what they “feel” is right, including Christians and other religious peoples. Too often the Bible is taken out of context and passages piece mealed to fit any agenda. But feelings can change from day to day and from person to person. Thus I think that living soley by “feelings” can lead to lots of trouble. The Bible tells us in Proverbs 12:15:
“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes: but he that hearkeneth unto counsel is wise.”
So it seems to me that in everything, we should check with how it lines up with the Bible.
And so ends my web surfing and hodge-podge of blogging material tonight. In case I don’t get a chance tomorrow, I wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving!
Marlakins
