This is very much a stopped clock situation.
Also, how are they gonna regulate and enforce this, considering the FDA is gonna stop administering food safety?
I’m in Canada where we have restricted some food dyes. I miss the old colours of Froot Loops and Smarties (similar to M&Ms, not rockets). But it’s fine because those colourants really do only exist to make junk food look good.
It’s not clear to me the exact scope of what they consider to be artifical dyes though. Is a dye produced by a genetically modified bacteria natural enough?
Conservatives have been saying that Dems want to force them to eat bugs, so it’s a little strange to be tacitly encouraging the use of Natural Red 4 which is made from crushed beetles.
The fun thing about “natural” vs “artificial” dyes is pretty nothingburger in reality. The manufacturers of chemical dyes, scents, etc. just generate the chemical by whatever means. If it’s a “natural” flavor/scent/color it is derived from something like a beetle or a flower. If it’s “artificial” it is derived via a chemical process. The end product is the same.
Reminds me of some years back when Starbucks answered the cry of, “but we don’t want artificial flavors/colors in our coffee!” so they started using a red dye for one of their drinks that was derived from crushed up beetle shells. People then freaked out, “I don’t want to drink beetle shells!!!”
TL;DR: The end product is the same, whether it be natural or artificial. The real concern, is if the product should really be consumed at all.
The Big Brains like RFK Jr. likely lack the mental capacity to understand such concepts, so all the dyes will become “natural” and stick around, and just increase the number of purée’d parakeets. Basically, another shitty cup game.
TL;DR: The end product is the same, whether it be natural or artificial. The real concern, is if the product should really be consumed at all.
This is hot crap. They are different chemicals, the end product is not the same and you’re spouting misinformation.
Most of the artificial dyes that people have banned in countries other than the USA are derived from petrochemicals. Natural dyes have been in use far longer and have been shown to have fewer negative health outcomes.
Eg. Red dye containing bugs (cochineal, E120) has no known health effects except to an extremely small percentage of the population whom are allergic to bugs, hence it is marked as an ingredient when used, to alert those with allergies. Its replacement alternatives are:
- red dye #2 (amaranth, E123) which was made from coal tar, and is now made from petroleum byproducts. It is a suspected carcinogen and is banned in most of the world including the US.
- red dye #3 (erythrosine, E127) was first extracted from coal tar and is derived from phenol, currently extracted from petroleum byproducts and it is a known carcinogen and restricted heavily in what it can be used in since the early 1990s in every developed nation except the USA, until this very announcement by the FDA and RFK jr which will bring the USA in line with the rest of the world’s protections. California also separately banned it in October 2023.
- red dye 40 (Allura red) is an entirely synthetic dye invented by a chemical corporation in 1971 by azo coupling between diazotized 5-amino-4-methoxy-2-toluenesulfonic acid and 6-hydroxy-2-naphthalene sulfonic acid. I don’t know what that means in order to determine if its feedstocks are petrochemicals, but mice studies showed bowel disorders and DNA damage which caused several countries to ban it over the years, however it’s currently believed to be safe if the maximum daily limit is adhered to.
And that’s just red dye.
You’re talking about different chemicals as a comparison not a 1:1. I’ll concede that some dyes may indeed exist only from chemical derivation. However, many do not. We’ve already put more thought into this than RFJ Jr. has, btw. (Not all dyes referenced below are foodsafe, to be clear, just a quick comparison chart.)
Random table of dyes that can be derived both ways:
Dye Name Natural Source Synthetic Production Chemical Formula References Indigo Indigofera tinctoria (plant) From aniline via Baeyer-Drewsen synthesis C₁₆H₁₀N₂O₂ PubChem, Shepherd Textiles Alizarin Rubia tinctorum (madder root) From anthraquinone C₁₄H₈O₄ Wikipedia, PubChem Tyrian Purple Murex sea snails Bromination of indigo C₁₆H₈Br₂N₂O₂ Wikipedia, PMC Article Cochineal (Carminic Acid) Dactylopius coccus (insect) Complex synthesis; often insect-derived C₂₂H₂₀O₁₃ PubChem, Wikipedia Curcumin Curcuma longa (turmeric root) Lab synthesis possible C₂₁H₂₀O₆ PubChem, Wikipedia Lawsone Lawsonia inermis (henna leaves) From 1,4-naphthoquinone C₁₀H₆O₃ Wikipedia, ACS Betanin Beta vulgaris (beetroot) Rarely synthesized due to complexity C₂₄H₂₆N₂O₁₃ Wikipedia, PubChem Quercetin Various plants (e.g., onions, apples) Can be synthesized; mostly extracted C₁₅H₁₀O₇ Wikipedia, PubChem
And a dumpster fire provides warmth.
Aww they’ll have to remove the “less than 2% petroleum based ingredients” on Twizzlers.
And yet some people wonder why we’re not big into importing US foodstuffs into Europe.
Because tariffs, duh!
I know, right, just the other day I was thinking to myself - I need more petrochemicals in my snacks, it’s a darn shame about those tariffs.
Did this worm farm just do something decent?
I’m going to assume that worm brain will move to ban more than the programmatic petroleum-based additives and ban anything that has a synthetic sounding name.
It says “remove them”, not “forbid them”. The Nation’s food supply is going to be dunked in ammonia before you can eat it.
Adding a “/s” because given the times this sounds weirdly plausible…
I mean you already bleach the chicken to try and offset the horrendous food safety standards through the rest of the chain…
Wow. Finally this administration does something that seems like a good idea.
Nobody tell them they will be following the EU’s lead by doing this.
Ehh… natural food colorings are often a lot more allergenic then the artificial ones. So if somebody has a allergy to annato or cochineal some such this could be bad news for them.
Yeah, it’s extremely rare when I read “Trump administration…” followed by an action I agree with. Broken clock and such.
Except they will probably not regulate natural dyes, or even force listing of the replacements. Some of the replacements will not be healthy.
So like usual, it looks good at first sight but will sicken and poison many children and adults instead.
food allergies too!
Definitely hope for the best that we’ll actually get healthy food from this, but expect the worst in that they will fuck it up and somehow make us sicker.
If we can’t have lead paint, we can always have lead food dye /s
I have a relative who developed a deadly allergy to dill suddenly, as in her throat starts closing if she’s in the same room as a pickle deadly. She has a lot of difficulty contacting companies to find out if dill is one of the “natural flavors” in their products, because many will simply stonewall any attempts to learn if she can safely consume their product
You can’t eat dyes in food when you have died from a pandemic
Two things he stands for that I am in alignment with, banning artificial food dyes and pharma ads. If he succeeds in both those things, he can still fuck off, but do I want those to succeed.
Ban food dyes, artificial or not, or at least limit them somewhat. People have this illogical knee-jerk reaction to the words artificial and natural as if those imply some kind of value judgement. There’s tons of natural stuff you don’t want anywhere near you and plenty of artificial stuff that’s super beneficial, people need to stop assuming natural means healthy and artificial means unhealthy.
Also yes, ban fucking pharmaceutical ads.
I say that all the time, so instead I’d like to steelman the “natural > artificial” perspective.
There are, let’s say, a few hundred things or so in nature that are good for humans. Apples, nuts, etc. This makes sense, since humans evolved in nature. There are natural bad things too, but when people say “natural is healthier” they obviously understand that poison exists in nature. We can extend this list of good things to include artificial things which seem “natural” because people have been eating it for generations with no apparent problems, like tofu – or cooked food. If you stick to just eating these few hundred known good things, you most likely won’t cause problems for yourself, even if you’re missing out on artificial superfoods and modern medicine etc.
In contrast, we’re constantly inventing artificial things, and we haven’t had generations to prove they’re worth. Now there’s thousands, millions of things to put in our bodies. Theoretically, they’ve all been FDA (or analogous organization) approved, and the FDA is quite conservative, but even if the FDA is 99.9% accurate (which it ain’t), things still slip through the gaps all the time. So anything artificial is a bit risky, since it hasn’t had generations to prove itself.
I think all that is true, but it’s just one side of the picture, since it ignores the benefits of artificial foods and drugs. Seems to me like this comes from a case of extreme conservatism or deontology. If you’re extremely conservative and/or not remotely utilitarian, it makes sense to go all-natural, right?
Agreed. I debated specifying artificial or what not. I would argue that beet powder is a dye. Nothing wrong with it. The problem exists when the extremes are exercised within the definitions. Companies can’t just color in the lines. Gotta find some way to corrupt it for profit.
Sure but petroleum derived colours contaminated with carcinogens can fuck right off because of at least two obvious reasons. Join us in banning them
What evidence is there that the dyes cause cancer?
I don’t know why I have to google this for you, but here you go https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23026007/
This review finds that all of the nine currently US-approved dyes raise health concerns of varying degrees
EU, Australia and NZ have banned these dyes derived from coal and petroleum because animals consuming them got cancer, or other health issues. Given safe alternatives exist that aren’t derrived from petroleum, there’s no reason to keep using them.
I don’t know why I have to google this for you
This is a social media website. I was conversing. If you didn’t want to respond, you didn’t have to.
That’s honestly the least unhinged policy he’s likely to push.
For once I’m actually down with something he’s said. A broken clock strikes right twice a day or something kinda thing.
Making Mountain Dew Code Red and Flamming Hot Cheetos bright ass fucking red has always seemed so pointless to me. The only reason people would find uncolored food unappealing would probably come down to conditioning since we were kids. In the US we have literally always had food that was heavily colored all over the grocery store and has always been hard to avoid. And colorized beverages in cans I always found incredibly dumb as 80% of people will never even see the liquid in the first place since they drink it right out of the can.
Yeah, fair enough.
It’s the one position he holds that isn’t completely crazy (and that shot of him being forced to pose with a Big Mac was pure comedy). He’ll kill millions with his vaccine views, but I can get behind this.
Of course if a Dem announced this, conservatives would be drinking paint in solidarity with dye manufacturers.
Exception to be made for ‘Cheetos Orange’
I can just imagine a rant from him about how the crazy liberals don’t want Cheetos to be orange.
The EU accepts his concession.
Canada and the EU did that year’s ago.
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