Inverted Nonsense

Don't fall prey to MAHA's pomp and circumstance.

On the surface, the advice laden in RFK Jr.’s shiny rebrand of federal nutrition guidance—which arrived with all the subtlety of an inverted food pyramid—isn’t that different from what it ever has been. The basics are still there. Eat vegetables. Eat fruits. Choose whole grains over processed ones. Get enough protein. In this inversion of scientific understanding, the devil does not make himself plain. Instead, he lurks among the details, smelling of raw meat: ProteinMania, its gospel of animal flesh and fat, and the undertones of the greater conservative project are now codified in federal health policy.

Enough With The Protein Propaganda

The new guidelines promise to cut through decades of allegedly corrupt dietary advice by consulting a different set of industry-friendly experts and arriving at recommendations that happen to align perfectly with red-meat-loving, raw-milk-chugging MAHA talking points. The pyramid itself is a reflection of this pivot, looking like the MAHA faithful’s version of a Live, Laugh, Love sign. Or, the science-doubting convert’s rendition of a Rae Dunn bullet blender.

It’s a ridiculous sight, fitting with its ethos. Yet, it’s all so deeply reflective of current American consciousness and the rabid appetite for anti-intellectualism. Eating too much protein can strain the kidneys, especially in people with preexisting kidney conditions. Eating too much red meat, which is high in saturated fats, comes with cardiovascular risks, potential digestive issues from insufficient fiber intake, and possible links to certain cancers.¹ While nutritional science has spent years inching toward consensus on what actually constitutes a healthy diet, this administration has decided that what Americans really need is official permission to double down on steak and butter, with a side of thinly veiled contempt for the very concept of scientific expertise.

The Canva quality image of smushed together food groups and the aesthetic website that looks better suited to a trendy brand studio would almost be funny if it were meant only to live online forever. But it won’t. These ideology-based recommendations will shape what food is served in school cafeterias, military mess halls, and every institution that feeds people with federal dollars. More people will look to federal guidelines when deciding to be healthier or how to feed their families.

This piece of propaganda will end up on millions of plates.

We’re looking at the type of health future this administration envisions, one that emerged when wellness got its neoliberal makeover in the 1980s. During the Reagan era, draconian cuts to Medicaid, community mental health programs, and other public health services were implemented, and the decades-long project of reframing health from a collective right into a personal responsibility began. Scholars call this the “responsibilization” of the self under neoliberal governance, in which individuals are held responsible for solving problems stemming from systemic failures. Health was once understood as requiring robust public policy, community support, and collective infrastructure. When it was reframed as a matter of personal choice and self-discipline, the message became clear: if you’re sick, it’s your fault for not working hard enough to prevent it.

How Wellness Became A Market

Now it’s your fault for not eating real food.

It doesn’t matter if you can’t afford it because of cuts to SNAP, or if you’ve been laid off due to increasing economic precarity, because, in this framework, there’s no room to consider the role systems play in determining health. The Trump administration has gutted the public health workforce and dismantled critical programs, hollowing out the capacity to adequately address population-level health. Deregulation will deepen exposure to pollution in marginalized communities, worsening chronic disease rates. The elimination of health equity programs and the purging of public health data erase the very evidence of these disparities. The same officials championing the new dietary guidelines are oddly mute about cuts to SNAP and Medicaid. At the same time, RFK Jr. himself has played an outsized role in undermining confidence in vaccines and weakening food safety regulations. This administration’s decisions consistently align with industry interests rather than protecting human well-being.

So, understand what you’re looking at right now. It’s not public health policy, but ideological performance art that serves corporate interests while abandoning any pretense of collective responsibility for Americans’ health.

1. I’m not telling you to not eat red meat. I’m telling you to not eat it very often.