Today I was alerted to this older post – from 2007 – on Mark Sisson’s blog. It’s a very interesting post about Mark’s experience at a health retreat spearheaded by the vegetarian guru Dr. John McDougall. Here’s a snippet of Sisson’s experiences at Camp McDougall titled, “My Escape from Vegan Island.”

The attendees were generally divided into two groups: those who were fairly new to the program – many of them had some serious weight to lose – and those who had been on the McDougall program for several years. Many of the latter group, I gathered, had come to McDougall originally with one or more chronic diseases and on multiple medications. Each evening, after the adventure activity of the day (all of which were pretty sedate), Dr. McDougall would deliver a lecture intended to inform the group of the evils of traditional medicine and big pharma – much of which I generally agree with – and to demonize beef, pork, chicken, fish, dairy of all kinds and most forms of soy. I got the general gist after the first evening. He’s not a fan of supplements either. But he does imply that when you eat vegetarian, you can have all you want…and therein lay the source of much amusement for me.

The lecture would adjourn and everyone would line up for the buffet line which would, at virtually every meal, include copious amounts of breads and rolls, rice, potatoes, pasta, beans, some anemic-looking steamed vegetables and a romaine-only lettuce salad. No dressings allowed. The only fat I could see was in the guacamole that served as a spread. The desert table had a variety of fruits and at least two choices of so-called “healthy” cakes. The drinks were generally overly sweetened fruit drinks.

Now I’m not one to judge. Okay, I am, but I usually keep my mouth shut – except herein. I watched at every meal as overweight, unhealthy people piled their plates with at least two pounds of bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, beans, desert cake, and a glass of fruit juice. Sometimes they went back for more. By my calculations these people were consuming 200 to 300 or more grams of (mostly simple) carbohydrates at each of three meals. There was no way these folks were going to lose fat on this trip. It was, in my view, a type 2 diabetes epidemic in-the-making.

This is pathetic and sad. I became aware of McDougall at the time that his first book came out because he was making the rounds on AM talk radio. In fact, I read that book (12 Days to Dynamic Health) when it first came out in about 1990. He has sample meals throughout the book, and as one reviewer on Amazon writes: “Note this sample breakfast on day 3 page 130: ” Orange juice| Hash-Brown Potatoes with Barbecue sauce”. McDougall also recommends processed breakfast cereals and bagels for “meals.” Throughout the book, McDougall is constantly lumping meat, fish, and eggs together with vegetable oils and refined foods as “foods that threaten our health.” McDougall also has a large list of packaged – processed garbage – products that have been “okayed” by him. These include ketchup, BBQ sauce, fruit sorbet, and “natural” (??) popsicles. Another hysterical point he makes is that eating out at Mexican restaurants is great, if you can find one that doesn’t use lard (page 288)! Or, for eating out, he also recommends fruit juices, cold cereals, hash browns, and pancakes and waffles.

Throughout the book (yes, I still have my yellowed 1990 copy), McDougall keeps making the point that his diet consists of “almost no fat” (page 56), but then he says that starches (rice, corn, potatoes, beans, pasta) are “sensible foodstuffs” that furnish us with all the essential fats we need.” Repeat that? The book is so full of this nonsense. This sort of thing borders on professional negligence on the part of doctors who push these lies. Another ludicrous claim he makes (page 65):

If your cholesterol level is above 180 mg/dl, you should consider this a warning sign of potential circulatory problems. (This refers to your total cholesterol level.  Sometimes the findings are broken down into HDL ["good"] and LDL ["bad"] cholesterol levels, but I feel the total cholesterol is the most significant.)

Folks, he is not joking. Beware the philosophy that McDougall brings across in his writings – he is a global warming alarmist and vegetarianism is his left-wing religion. On page 79 of his book, he says that eating animals starves the world’s poor people because greedy Americans eat cows that each consume enough grain that could be used to feed seven hungry people as opposed to one meat-eating American. He also preaches about the lands that are razed to become grazing land for animals, however, he doesn’t take the time to mention what mass agriculture does to the planet’s surface. (See Lierre Kieth, a reformed, left-wing vegetarian, on that issue.)

McDougall, as well as many long-time vegetarians, is probably what I call a classic “undereater.” These people are skinny-fat their whole lives, they don’t really like food, and they don’t ever eat much. But that is their basic nature and norm. I’ve known many of these types. When they try to push their diet on “regular’” folks who are used to a lifetime of the SAD (Standard American Diet / eating too much), these people fail miserably. They fail because they eat more of the vegetarian “food” in order to be satiated … and more ….. and more. They make up for their lack of fat, caffeine, dairy, and junk food by indulging in pasta, bread, cereal, bagels, and starches galore.

The scene Mark described at the buffet line is one I have seen so many times in my life. I can’t even process this level of stupidity anymore. Thanks to Mark for running this and saying it like it is. McDougall hasn’t changed one tiny bit in 20 years. That is why I call him McDougallsaurus Rex.