Elf Sternberg

Orac has his Friday Dose of Woo feature, and rather than steal it directly I've decided to quote my own favorite source of woo, General John D. Ripper, when opening up on the topic.:

I drink a lot of water, you know. I'm what you might call a water man, Jack. That's what I am. And I can swear to you, my boy, swear to you, that there's nothing wrong with my bodily fluids. Not a thing.

Yamaraashi-chan sees a counsellor from time to time and her office shares space with a chiropractic shop that, in my opinion, looks like one of those places that specializes in making its profit from customers who keep coming back long after they've gotten all the benefit they can from the fundamental care that chiropractic can deliver.

Today was the first time we'd been inside since the new year. As we waited in the lobby I looked at the material for the chiropractor and one of the things was a photocopy of some advertising material for something called "Isagenix."

The photocopy was a hoot. It claimed that you're fat because your body is full of "impurities" that your body is trying to dilute by increasing your overall mass, and that when you lose weight the density of those impurities goes up which in turn causes your body to put your "fat production metabolism" into overdrive in a desperate bid to reduce those impurities to survivable levels.

The trick to losing weight, it claimed, was a product called Isagenix. What a great name! "Isa" sounds techonological, like "isomer" and "isandrous" and "isathous" and a lot of other geeky words. It's got that "gene" thing going, and it ends with an X. And what does Isagenix do?

It's a "whole body cleanser!" "The World Leader in Nutritional Cleansing!" "Cleansing to Burn Fat Naturally!" It's main ingredients are aloe vera, herbs and supplements, and choline. Basically, it's a purgative: you drink this stuff, and soon you'll be spendind a few hours on the toilet. Supposedly, this is your "cleansing"-- your bowels are temporarily immaculate.

Along with this colon cleansing, you get various other protein mixes, lowfat shakes, and something called "IsaFlush!", which "encourages regularity."

How much do you pay for this privelege of potentially shitting yourself? A 30-day supply will set you back $350.00-- even more than Alli!

Okay, here are the basics: despite a century of quackery, there is absolutely no evidence that your body is "contaminated" in the way these people describe. You do not have "impurities" that can be flushed out by drinking large doses of aloe vera, and there is zero clinical research supporting the contention that the development of fat is in anyway linked to the presence of anything more than excessive calories. Period. These people promise too much and deliver too little. Nowhere do they mention exercise, yet their websites all proclaim that you'll build muscle. They don't list the "impurities"-- what chemicals, what substances, what infectious agents-- because they can't. They just want you to believe that your problem is caused by something other than eating too much and moving too little.

Worse, Isagenix is sold in a multi-level marketing manner, just like way too many other weight-loss products that try too hard to sell you on their promises. If you google for it, you'll find all sorts of variants on their name in various URLs as different kinds of suckers try and sell you their stash of the exact same thing. (You'll also find the hawkers of other "colon cleansing" diets dissing Isagenix for its nasty taste and recommending you try their "more natural" versions of rectal Draino.)

Anyway, I'm mostly a little annoyed because Yamaraashi-chan is absorbing this marketing material as fact, and has no grounding on which to debate or dispute it. That's my job, I know. She's also merrily clicking on the "you have just won!" spams now that she's got Internet access. Sigh. She's about to get a real education.