Milk: The Drink of Rock Stars
April 16, 2008 by Liberty Kontranowski
Filed under A Mother's Wisdom, Children, Diets and Dieting, Drink, Marketing, Media, Web, Your Body
Who ever said that milk was not the drink of choice for rockers and other fabulous folk? If you have any doubts, check out this new ad campaign for the white stuff.
Aimed at convincing kids and teens to reach for Moo Juice instead of soda, the milk crew promises they’re not giving up on their ever-so-famous Got Milk? campaign – they’re just using the Spinal Tap rocker analogy to appeal to the younger crowds.
In the promotion, the “rock band” White Gold is out spreading the good word on milk…and taking the ad world by storm. Interesting concept and one that I, personally, hope will work.
But, of course, the bottom line is that many parents need to revert back to some of their old-school ways and offer milk at mealtimes, rather than sugar-laden juices, sodas and energy drinks.
After all, milk does do a body good.
I think people, particularly kids, need to lay off milk. I did a dairy free challenge for an entire month, dropped a ton of weight, and had tons of energy. Haven’t touched the stuff since. It’s not that it’s bad tasting, but it’s certainly all that healthy with all the sugar put into it. You’d be better of with water, to be honest.
With more and more kids/teens (and lets remember the audience) turning to soft drinks and “energy” drinks throughout the day, I would be pro-milk drinking. Where are they going to get their calcium from? Teen girls have especially been observed as having a higher rate of broken bones because of the calcium deficiency in their diets. Rock on, milk.
So apart from a source with a very clear bias, do you have any good reason to think that we should drink milk?
It sounds like the best argument put forward is that it isn’t as harmful as soda pop. Now there’s a sentiment to rally around!
Milk is a great food for an organism that needs to double its body mass every few weeks. I have a hard time imagining that most teens fall into this category.
According to the CBC, “research is appearing in place like The New England Journal of Medicine pointing toward a link between dairy products and diseases like:
* heart disease
* Crohn’s Disease
* prostate cancer
* premature puberty
* MS
* childhood diabetes”
The piece concludes with a very appropriate comment: “Milk. Nature’s most perfect food? Maybe, if you’re a baby cow. For people? The controversy continues.”
There is a huge amount of research showing that low fat milk consumption is beneficial for weight loss especially with regards to abdominal fat.
It defies some logic since the carbohydrate (lactose) is not especially beneficial, nor is the fat content (primarily saturated). The protein, lactoferrin and other immunoglobulins, calcium and vitamin D apparently are potent enough to overcome milk’s shortcomings.
I drink a lot of milk. Some of those pro-milk ads used to bug me though – I’m very, very lactose intolerant and at the time 100% lactose free milk wasn’t widely available. There was no way I could drink it then.
Now, I try to drink a couple of cups a day. I always drink fat free milk – so there is no health issue there.
Milk is a really good source of protein (as well as calcium). I don’t eat a lot of meat, there is quite a lot of evidence to suggest that beyond small amounts, meat isn’t such a good idea. Forgive me please for plugging my own blog – but I just posted something about longevity and the groups of people who live the longest eat very little if any meat. Milk, still being an animal product, has all the amino acids people need, hence its a great source of protein.
For a reasonably thorough treatment of the milk issue and why many believe what they do, you might read the article “Is Soda Pop or Milk Healthier?” at http://achinook.squarespace.com/
Other natural health issues are addressed there also, all in a strictly noncommercial environment
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My best to you and yours,
Lee C
Personally, if you think about it, milk is so full of fat and calories that if a person drank more than a little on their cereal every day, their risk of obesity and thus their risk of heart disease and diabetes would skyrocket. Like someone else said, milk is great….if you’re a calf who needs to double it’s body mass every few weeks or even a human infant who is growing very quickly and needs the protein and calories that milk provides. It is also great for people who have just had surgery who are unable to eat normally and therefore need the calories. Anyways, that’s just my opinion. Milk makes people fat.