Yes, agave nectar and fructose are strong with the dark side of the force.  Last week, I posted a tweet that said ”fructose is poison”, and small group of people disagreed with me, and asked me to provide how much is safe, and proof of why I think it is poison.  One of them suggested that I’m a “Lustig Devotee”, but I don’t even know Lustig, so no, I’m not a devotee.  So here’s my reasoning about why agave nectar and fructose are evil, mostly agave nectar actually.

First, I should explain why some people think that agave nectar is good for diabetics (that’s the evil part).  The agave nectar companies as well as many raw food activists swear by this stuff, and they do their very best to convince us that it’s healthy for us.  They say it’s good for diabetics because it doesn’t raise your blood sugar much.  It’s true that it doesn’t raise blood sugar much, but it’s not true that it’s good for diabetics.  I’ll get to that in a moment.  The important thing to know about agave nectar is that it’s 90% fructose.

So if it doesn’t raise your blood sugar, or cause an insulin release, what happens to it?  Fructose cannot be processed into energy by your muscles.  Instead it’s processed by your liver, and turned into fat to be stored in your fat cells, to be converted into energy at a later time.  They’re actually called triglycerides.  Wait a minute.  Your liver turns all that fructose into triglycerides?  You know, the stuff that’s stored in your fat cells, and that raises your risk of heart disease, as if your risk isn’t high enough having diabetes?!  Yeah, that stuff!  Now, imagine using agave nectar as a sweetener in everything, replacing your household sweeteners with it.  (Remember, it’s 90% fructose!)  This is what the marketing companies want you to do.  To buy agave nectar as your primary household sweetener, because it’s a “healthy alternative”.  Christ!  Every time I hear that I want to scream.  The marketing companies that market agave nectar want you to believe it’s good for your diabetes and instead it could kill you.  You’re trading a short term health benefit, no blood sugar spike, for a long term health risk, heart attack resulting in death.  I have experience in death, so please excuse me for being a little dramatic, but I want to stop you from having to go through that.  It sucks big time!  When they checked my cholesterol in the hospital after my cardiac arrest, my triglycerides were 289 I think, and my HDL was 29.  That’s the exact recipe for heart disease.  I had heart disease, and the first symptom was cardiac arrest!  If high quantities of fructose in agave nectar can add to your triglycerides, wouldn’t you want to discontinue use of it, or never even try it?  You’re already at risk because you have diabetes.

So how much is safe?  I have no flippin’ clue, and no scientist or medical professional will give you a straight answer to that question anyway.  All I know, is that I prefer sweeteners that don’t make friends with you like Senator Palpatine, only to try to kill you later as the Emperer.  Yes, fructose is in many other whole foods in natural form, but those foods aren’t 90% fructose.  It’s that 90% part that I’m going to protect myself from.  It’s like PURE FRUCTOSE and PURE EVIL.  No thank you!!!  So that’s why I called fructose poison in my tweet, but I should have been more specific and called agave nectar poison, because that’s what is truly evil.  The fact that it’s touted as a healthy alternative for diabetics, when it’s just as bad for you as sugar is.

********** Now ya know, and knowing is half the battle.  Go Joe!!! **********

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