Valentine’s Day is a day unlike any other that pops up in the calendar if you are lucky in love. Or perhaps even if you are unlucky in love and are unfairly reminded of your forever-single status. But we hope that’s not the case! We hope Valentine’s Day celebrations of the past and present have been good to you, and your spouse, or partner, or other loved one. They’ve certainly been good to many people.

Around the world, hundreds of millions of people celebrate Valentine’s Day with greeting cards, chocolate, flowers, little love notes, and other sweet gifts and trinkets meant for that special someone in their lives. But where does all this come from? Why do we do it like this? And how long has it been going on?

In this list, we’ll take a deep dive into the history and development of Valentine’s Day. From a pagan tradition that grew into a Christian-adjacent celebration, the day has been marked special on the calendars of a variety of cultures for several thousand years. In more recent times, of course, commercialization has come. And chocolate. Did we mention chocolate?! Yummy! Anyway, go grab a piece of candy or two and settle in for a long ride through the romantic realm of Valentine’s Day!

Related: 10 Real-Life, Romantic Love Stories from World War II

10 An Uncertain Pagan Origin

The origins of Valentine’s Day are, frankly, pretty hard to pin down. The day has been celebrated or at least acknowledged in one form or another for centuries and centuries. Many historians now believe that the day as we know it—or, at least, the foundation of what we have come to know it as—began as a Christian attempt to make a religious event out of a former pagan holiday and popular fertility festival called Lupercalia.

That festival occurred early in the spring every single year and turned out to be a great tradition. Some historians even acknowledge that the festival was a joint bash meant to celebrate and honor Faunus (the Roman god of agriculture) and Romulus and Remus (the founders of Rome itself).

Regardless, Lupercalia was always a big hit. And when the Christians slowly but surely swept into power during Rome’s reign, they pushed to Christianize the holiday festival and give it the fixed February 14 date to appeal to pagan believers—and help convince many of them to join up with the new Christian cause.^[1]

9 Made after a Martyr

The reason St. Valentine’s Day is named as such is thanks to a Christian martyr who died while trying to protect love nearly 2,000 years ago. Valentine was the name of a clergyman—history identifies him sometimes as a priest and sometimes as a bishop—who was mad that the Roman emperor Claudius II banned marriage.

Claudius did so after his reign began in AD 268 because he believed that unmarried men made for better soldiers. While he may have had a point about the aggression single, unmarried men could take out on the battlefield, he didn’t exactly make many friends in the realm of Rome when it came time to enact that position. And one of the people who hated the marriage ban the most was Valentine.

Valentine believed that it was unfair to prevent people from finding partners and falling into love. So he decided to break Claudius’s rules and perform secret marriage ceremonies anyway for couples who sought the commitment. Eventually, Claudius figured out what was going on, and Valentine was executed for going against the Roman emperor’s very strict and clear decree.

The Catholic Church officially canonized Valentine as a saint thanks to his martyrdom. Today, Saint Valentine is buried on the Via Flaminia—the same place where he was laid to rest on the date of February 14, 270, the year after his death. And we all now celebrate Saint Valentine’s Day, which has also historically been called the Feast of Saint Valentine, after it really took hold as a tradition beginning in about the eighth century.^[2]

8 But There Are More?

That story seems nice and simple, but it may not be the only one that influenced Valentine’s Day. As it turns out, there are actually multiple Saint Valentines floating out there in history. And their stories likely intertwined in bits and pieces to give us the Saint Valentine’s Day trajectory that we are familiar with today.

In addition to the Valentine, who was beheaded by Claudius II in 269 or 270, there were multiple other legends surrounding love. The Catholic Encyclopedia and other faith-based sources believe there are at least three former bishops, priests, or other individuals who have had stories of theirs tied up in the love-fest holiday.

Most notable was our aforementioned Roman priest killed by Claudius II. But also notable was a former bishop—officially, the Bishop of Interamna, which is the present-day city of Terni, Italy—who was martyred for backing love. He was also buried at Via Flaminia outside of Rome, just like the previously mentioned Valentine.

There was even a legend involving a supposed Patron Saint of Love named Valentine that popped up in the Middle Ages. According to lovely lore, Valentine was the patron saint of lovers—but also of beekeepers and epilepsy. It’s a weird combination, but one that crafted the holiday as we know it now.^[3]

7 Chaucer’s Chance at Love

If you aren’t a fan of Valentine’s Day, then we have for you the perfect person to blame: Geoffrey Chaucer. Good luck sending him a nasty email or a snarky tweet about it, though, because he has been dead for hundreds of years. Chaucer was, of course, a very famous 14th-century English poet.

While he may have most famously written The Canterbury Tales, he is also the person most widely credited for turning Saint Valentine’s Day into a celebration of romantic love. Ever since his push, then, we have all followed with roses, chocolates, heart-shaped candy, and all the rest. Oh, those sweet, sappy, and long-standing traditions!

As we’ve learned so far, Valentine’s Day has a bit of a grisly history, what with the beheadings and the martyrdom and all. But in the 1380s, Chaucer wrote a poem called “The Parliament of Fowls.” In that work, he referenced February 14 as being a day that was about love. Even though it had long been a day of feast for Catholics to celebrate and honor the martyrdom of Saint Valentine, Chaucer wrote about it being more than that.

His declaration of Saint Valentine’s Day being meant for love was the first of its kind ever written down. While English people possibly practiced that already before Chaucer wrote of it, of course, he was likely inspired by their tradition. But regardless, his writing spurred it on for all the rest of us. Now, here we are nearly 700 years later, and Valentine’s Day is going strong!^[4]

6 History WAY Before Hallmark

The first-ever known Valentine’s Day card was (probably) sent from a prisoner in the infamous Tower of London to his wife. The year was 1415, and Charles, the Duke of Orléans, was just 21 years old. He was married by then—well, 21 was kind of a ripe old age in the early 15th century—and he was also imprisoned in the Tower of London.

The duke’s story deals with a whole lot of wild royal family in-fighting and imprisonment that gets way off the beaten path here. But suffice it to say for our purposes today that while he was imprisoned, he fired off a handwritten Valentine’s Day card to his waiting wife on the outside of those impenetrable tower walls.

Sadly, historians don’t still have access to the card Charles (reportedly) sent his wife way back in 1415. But they do have something nearly that old! The oldest-surviving Valentine’s Day card comes in the form of a handwritten letter that is currently held in the British Library. The letter was a Valentine’s Day stanza written by a woman named Margery Brews and meant for her fiance, John Paston.

That it still survives today is a testament to the power of paper and ink, we suppose. But also to Margery’s apparently undying love for John! If she ever told him, “I love you forever” during their lives six centuries ago, well, she sure was right about it!^[5]

5 It All Gets Commercialized

To be fair, it took quite a while from Chaucer and Margery Brews before Valentine’s Day really became a commercial endeavor. The business side of the love-locked holiday began in 18th-century England. There, people began to make (or buy) and send Valentine’s Day cards to their loved ones. Most often, the targets of these cards were romantic interests. Still, they could also be reserved for friends and beloved family members.

Card senders also often sent out chocolates and other confectionery items along with the cards. And the most well-to-do had flowers sent, as well. From English roots, then, the tradition of sending out cards and gifts spread to the United States in the 19th century, and from there, the business side went in full-bore.

Today, Valentine’s Day represents a massive market moment for the greeting card industry. According to Hallmark and other lovesick companies in that realm, nearly 150 million Valentine’s Day cards are exchanged annually. And, it should be noted, those hundreds of millions of cards are only the messages that get sent through the mail.

The companies don’t include the cards kids traditionally send to each other in school and things of that nature. By sheer volume, that makes Valentine’s Day the second-largest greeting card holiday in the world behind Christmas. That’s some serious mail movement and post office power!^[6]

4 Roses Are Red…

Even if you don’t know anything else about Valentine’s Day, and you’re forever destined to live a single life without love and affection (sad!), you probably at least know that red roses are very commonly associated with it. That connection goes back a long, long way through history, too. See, red roses first became associated with Valentine’s Day due to their link to Venus, who was the Roman goddess of love.

Also known as Aphrodite in Greek mythology, the story goes that Venus found her lover Adonis mortally wounded one day. Adonis, who was the male god of beauty, was dying. Horrified at the sight, Venus sat over the body, and her tears began to fall. Those tears mixed with Adonis’s blood, and the combination of the two liquids amalgamated into a blossoming red rose bush.

Combine the female goddess of love and the male god of beauty, and it’s no wonder their resulting mythological rose bush would carry down through the ages. But while roses are the most popular flower (by far) to give out and receive on Valentine’s Day, they aren’t the only arrangement on deck. In recent years especially, less traditional floral arrangements have been made more popular on Valentine’s Day.

Other popular spring blooms like tulips, orchards, and lilies are now routinely exchanged by those wishing to show their love and affection for another person. And while they aren’t as traditional as roses, the bright colors and unique arrangements of these other flowers can make for exceptionally compelling gifts in their own right.^[7]

3 Strange Celebrations

Valentine’s Day, as we know it here in the United States, is celebrated similarly in many parts of the world. Still, not every nation on Earth carries out this same tradition. In fact, in several Asian countries, Valentine’s Day is done entirely differently. Take Japan, for example. In Tokyo and the rest of Japan’s cities, locals use Valentine’s Day as an opportunity for women to give chocolates to men. That tradition started in 1958 when a Japanese chocolate company urged women to make Valentine’s Day a time for women to tell the guys in their lives how they feel about them—with purchased chocolate, of course.

Be cynical about its corporate origins if you must, but the tradition stuck, and today, women in Japan give all kinds of chocolate to men on that holiday every year. It’s not even just their romantic partners, either. Japanese women hand out chocolate to their colleagues at work, their bosses, their male friends, and more to celebrate the big day.

Meanwhile, in South Korea, there is an entire day dedicated for men to receive gifts in response to Valentine’s Day. It comes one month after the February 14 holiday every year, and it is popularly known as “White Day” in Seoul and across South Korea. There, women turn the tables and give gifts to the men they love as a sort of “equal and opposite” response to the focus on female adoration in mid-February. The tables turn!

And then there’s China. While Valentine’s Day has caught on in parts of China and in ways that are somewhat comparable to the manner in which it is celebrated in the West, China has its own anti-Valentine’s Day, too. Every year on November 11, the Chinese people celebrate “Singles’ Day.”

That event is meant for unattached and unspoken-for individuals to spoil themselves. These single people treat themselves to all kinds of gifts and presents and revel in another year of, uh, not being in love. In turn, it has become one of the busiest shopping days of the year in China. Oh, and the chosen date is important, too. Think of it: November 11, as in 11/11. Lots of single digits there! Get it?^[8]

2 A Craving for Chocolate

In 1861, chocolate magnate Richard Cadbury came up with the first idea for a chocolate box that was heart-shaped and was specifically promoted to be sold on Valentine’s Day. Cadbury (yes, of Cadbury chocolate fame) was a marketing genius, and the heart-shaped box of delicious and chewy morsels stuck around, well, forever! Cadbury is obviously still a thing today.

Chocolate has a very close, very symbiotic relationship with Valentine’s Day overall. After Cadbury came up with this marketing ploy at the very beginning of the Civil War, Valentine’s Day quickly began to flourish as a commercial holiday in the United States. People bought box after box of chocolate—both Cadbury’s brand and from many other sources—and now the commercial aspects of the holiday are as we know them today.

Speaking of the commercial aspects of Valentine’s Day, when specifically considering chocolate, the amount people buy and eat in that second week of February is truly stunning. According to industry measurements of chocolate sales in the week leading up to February 14, Americans buy about 58 million pounds (26 million kilograms) of chocolate ahead of each Valentine’s Day. That’s in just seven days!

Just like Halloween in the fall, Valentine’s Day has become a major cash cow for Hershey’s and other chocolate companies seeking to profit from the yearly tradition. And to the tune of 58 million pounds annually, they sure are profiting. What do we get out of the deal? Oh, right, a toothache and a few added pounds around our waists!^[9]

1 Popping the Question!

Because Valentine’s Day is a romantic holiday centered on love and relationships, it naturally makes sense that it is a popular day on which many couples get engaged. And that number is in the millions every year—six million, in fact!

According to surveys, roughly six million couples get engaged to each other every single Valentine’s Day. And the day is broadly popular as the perfect time for a man to show love to the woman with whom he wants to commit. Surveys carried out consistently show that both men and women pick Valentine’s Day as the best day of the year to get engaged. Lovely!

In addition to engagements, Valentine’s Day is also a very popular time for love locks. If you’ve ever walked by a chain link fence in a high-end tourist section of a major urban center, you’ve probably seen at least a few of these. They are popular along the Seine River in Paris, where couples take to the bridges and lock a padlock onto a fence. Then, they often write their initials on the lock in Sharpie or some other marker. Now, many other couples have adopted the love-lock trend in cities around the world.

The lock is meant to commemorate the forever nature of their love. Since nobody who comes by the lock has the key, theoretically, their love will last as long as the lock does on that fence. The ritual has been around for a while now, with couples often throwing their keys into the river to ensure the padlocks can never be popped open.^[10]

When you think of old candy, what comes to mind? A bowl of stuck-together ribbon candies being ignored on your grandmother’s coffee table? Maybe you imagine Necco Wafers, Salted Nut Rolls, or rock-hard bars of Abba-Zaba—the kind of candy you still see at the drug store occasionally. It either fills you with delicious nostalgia or makes you wonder, “Who even eats these anymore?”

Maybe you think of bygone flavors like clove or inexplicable candies like Circus Peanuts. Or maybe you think of retro classics like candy cigarettes and buttons or wax lips and bottles.

This list is not about those candies. It is about confections and sweet treats that have been around for hundreds or even thousands of years. As these items are so old, their origin stories are varied or murky. Their ages also mean that these treats have assumed many names and forms in different cultures over time. One thing that remains constant, however, is human beings’ never-ending love affair with sweets.

10 Jordan Almonds

For many people, Jordan almonds are synonymous with weddings, where they have historically been given as favors everywhere from the US to Italy to the Middle East. The combination of bitter almond and sweet sugar is said to symbolize the bittersweet nature of both marriage and life itself.

Honey-coated almonds and seeds have been enjoyed by people as long ago as 177 BC in ancient Rome. In medieval times, when sugar became more readily available in Europe, confectioners began using it instead of honey to coat almonds.

The process for making Jordan almonds and similar sweets is called sugar panning.^[1] The almonds are tumbled in a pan while a sugar syrup is added. While the nuts tumble about, they become completely and evenly coated in the syrup, which crystallizes and hardens into a thin shell.

This method is thought to have been developed in northeastern France in the early 13th century. It is essentially the same way that modern treats such as M&M’S are made.

9 Marshmallows

According to some sources, marshmallows date back to 2000 BC in ancient Egypt. However, the ancient Egyptian version bore little to no resemblance to the marshmallows we know today.

Then, marshmallow was made from a type of mallow plant which grows in marshes. Egyptians would mix the sap (technically, a sap-like substance called mucilage) with nuts and honey to make a treat reserved for royalty. The mallow root continued to be used through the 1800s to make delicious sweets. It was also used medicinally, particularly to soothe coughing and sore throats, due to its anti-inflammatory effect on mucous membranes.

Gelatin (not sap from the mallow plant) is used to stabilize marshmallows today, though the name remains the same. As for the history of the s’more, one of the most popular uses for the marshmallow, it supposedly originated in the 1920s. A “recipe” for s’mores appeared in the 1927 Girl Scout Handbook. Today, marshmallows are most popular in the United States, perhaps due (at least in part) to their use in common treats such as s’mores and Rice Krispies treats.^[2]

8 Licorice

Similar to marshmallow, licorice comes from a root and has a long history of being used as medicine because of its anti-inflammatory effects. The first mention of licorice can be found over 2,600 years ago on some stone tablets from Baghdad, where the Assyrians used licorice to treat sore feet. Throughout history, licorice root has been used for its medicinal properties everywhere from China to the Netherlands to Egypt, where it was found in the tomb of King Tutankhamen.

The word “licorice” comes from the Greek word glycyrrhiza (“sweet root”). Licorice root contains a naturally sweet compound called glycyrrhizin, which is 50 times sweeter than table sugar. Nevertheless, some find its flavor off-putting, even when mixed with more sugar.

The practice of making licorice root into candy is said to have originated in 17th-century Holland, where it was made into candy ropes. To this day, more than one-fifth of all candy sold in the Netherlands is some kind of licorice.^[3]

7 Torrone

The Italian treat torrone, either a light-colored nougat or a caramel-colored brittle, both studded with nuts, is thought to have been around since medieval times. It’s easy to see how such a confection could date back so far due to its simple ingredients.

Traditionally, for the nougat version, egg whites and honey are whipped over a warm water bath for upward of seven hours before being flattened onto a work surface and cut into a log shape. The hard and brittle-like torrone is made simply with sugar, water, and nuts. Almonds are often the featured nut but far from the only one. The treat may also be enhanced by other flavors such as vanilla or citrus.

Some historians believe that torrone came about thanks to the Spanish turron, which was then introduced by Arabic immigrants to Spain. Others believe that it originated in ancient Greece or Rome. Its exact origins may be unknown, but as for present-day Italy and Spain, it’s nothing short of a Christmastime staple.^[4]

6 Lokum

Lokum is the name for the treat dubbed “Turkish delight” by the British. Though not quite as old as some of the other items on this list, lokum has been around for almost 300 years.

Lokum is made with sugar that is set into a gel by starch. Then it is cut into cubes or lumps and dusted with more starch, powdered sugar, or desiccated coconut.^[5] It may also contain nuts. Lokum is traditionally flavored with rosewater or orange blossom water, but it can be found in many other flavors such as lemon and mint. It is often eaten alongside Turkish coffee.

Lokum’s culinary “ancestor” is a sweet called kesme, which is made with boiled, thickened grape juice that is then cut into lumps. Though kesme is not as well-known now as Turkish delight, it is still made in many places in Turkey today, such as Diyarbakir, Kahramanmaras, and Kayseri.

5 Cotton Candy

The earliest-known instructions for making spun sugar (now referred to as cotton candy, candy floss, or fairy floss) appear in the 1769 book The Experienced English Housekeeper. It instructs aspiring experienced English housekeepers to:

Take a quarter of a pound of treble-refined sugar in one lump, and set it before a moderate fire on the middle of a silver salver or pewter plate. [ . . . ] Set it a little aslant, and when it begins to run like clear water to the edge of the plate or salver, have ready a tin cover or china bowl set on a still, with the mouth downward close to your sugar that it may not cool by carrying too far.

Then take a clean knife and take up as much of the syrup as the point will hold, and a fine thread will come from the point, which you must draw as quickly as possible backward and forward and also around the mold [and repeating this process] till your sugar is done or your web is thick enough.^[6]

This tricky process was made significantly easier with the invention of the first cotton candy machine, which was granted a US patent in 1899. Before that, spun sugar was used primarily for presentation of food rather than as a stand-alone treat. It was only with the invention of the machine that cotton candy became “fair food.”

4 Lavashak

Lavashak is the original fruit leather, a treat that could possibly date back to the days of the First Persian Empire. (Fruit leather has many names throughout the region; lavashak happens to be the Persian one.)

It makes sense that ancient peoples would make fruit into leather as it was both a method of preservation and a tasty preparation. Furthermore, fruit leather could be made from leftover ripe fruits that would otherwise go bad.^[7]

The basic preparation involves boiling down fruit and then spreading it into thin sheets to dry. Stone fruits—such as cherries, plums, apricots, and peaches—are often used, but they are far from the only choices.

Lavashak is probably not even best described as a “sweet” as often no sugar is added at all, highlighting the natural and often sour or tart flavors of the fruits used. Drying the leather in the sun is traditional. But in modern times, an oven may be used to speed along the process.

3 Halvah

There are many cultures which vie to take credit for this classic treat, as is often the case with anything well-known. Halvah has been dated by some historians to 3000 BC, while others say it more likely originated around the 12th century. Either way, this Middle Eastern confection has a long history. As halvah spread throughout the world, it took on different names and variations. Most commonly, it is a crumbly block of crushed and sweetened sesame seeds.^[8]

Halvah may have nuts added or be dipped or marbled with chocolate. It can come in various flavors. Some versions don’t even use sesame. This ancient candy was first popularized in the US in the 20th century thanks to a Jewish entrepreneur from the Ukraine named Nathan Radutzky. He founded a company called Joyva, now the leading manufacturer of halvah in the US. Halvah can be found in Jewish, Persian, and Greek markets in addition to well-stocked supermarkets.

2 Marzipan

Just like halvah, marzipan is claimed by several groups as their own invention. Perhaps the truth is that many different places on Earth, unknown to each other, stumbled upon this appealing mixture of ground almonds and sugar.

One origin story tells of Spanish nuns trapped in a convent in 1212, mixing their only ingredients—almond flour, sugar, and water—to subsist on during wartime. Marzipan is still eaten in Spain. It is customarily enjoyed at Christmastime and molded into traditional shapes such as that of an eel.^[9]

Marzipan enjoys popularity around the world to this day. It can be used as a filling for a number of sweets or may be molded into shapes and painted realistically to resemble miniature fruits, vegetables, and animals.

1 Amezaiku

When it comes to candy that can be shaped and sculpted, marzipan has nothing on amezaiku. Amezaiku is actually the name of a candy sculpting art form dating back to eighth-century Japan, inspired by Chinese techniques. A taffy-like substance called mizuame (“water candy”) is mounted on a stick and heated so that it becomes pliable. Amezaiku artists then use various tools to shape the candy, usually into animals.

Traditionally, artists sit on low stools and sculpt their creations in front of onlookers during festivals. But amezaiku is becoming rarer in Japan. Just a few passionate and talented artists, such as Takahiro Yoshihara and Shinri Tezuka, work to keep the art form alive. The resulting creations may be too beautiful to eat, but watching these artists at work is certainly a feast for the eyes.^[10]

Hannah lives in Seattle with her husband and dog. She enjoys writing and researching in her spare time.

We all know that sugar is delicious but not the healthiest thing to eat. We’re starting to understand its role in weight gain and other health complications. But why has it taken so long? And why haven’t we found better, safer alternatives yet? Here are some reasons the sugar industry works so hard to keep you in the dark and one thing you can to do to counteract their power.

Top 10 Biggest Lies People Tell Every Day

10 Slavery

For something so sweet, the widespread popularity of sugar has a dark and bitter origin story in slave labor. Sugar cane originated in the West Indies and Brazil. At one time it was simply a luxury spice among wealthy Europeans. As they colonized the ‘New World’, particularly the British, a huge profitability that helped finance the growing American colonies was recognized in this spice and it became known as ‘White Gold’.

Because it is a labor intensive crop, a cheap work force was created to ensure that sugar remained purely profitable. Slaves, including children, were the best source of labor that couldn’t say no to the back breaking and sometimes deadly work entailed in harvesting and processing of sugar cane. Many of these plantations and processing plants that operated day and night were located in Louisiana near New Orleans, surrounded by dumps and prisons. And they were treated very cruelly even when fatigued and unable to keep working. It wasn’t uncommon for exhausted slave laborers to lose limbs in the balers and other processing equipment.

Sugar was as lucrative back then as it is now. So the disease of greed won and the sugar trade was not just allowed, but promoted the destruction indigenous cultures and enslavement of many. Looking at that yellow and white bag of future cupcakes in your pantry a little differently now, huh?

9 Congress

Sugar’s popularity also grew its power and influence over the United States Congress. In 1816 there was a tariff imposed on imported sugar, especially from Cuba, at 16-19 percent on wholesale imported sugar. It granted more consumption and power to the sugar produced by slave labor in Louisiana and other slave friendly states.

This also gave birth to a banking scheme, born in Louisiana, that helped clients buy slaves while attracting foreign investments to the industry. A grower would pledge their estate and slaves to the bank as an asset and then borrow back part of the assessed value. Through this activity, sugar plantations could expand their acreage and grow their slave populations. In turn, the banks could bundle all of the assets, make them collateral, and sell slave and mortgage backed securities to investors. Can you get more evil?

When investors complained that the slaves were ‘perishable’, Louisiana actually issued state bonds backing the plantations to ensure investors that there was no risk. This unfortunately encouraged investors, who jumped on the opportunity, allowing the sugar industry to surge. And slavery in the area saw an uptick of 86 percent in the 1820’s. This only continued the trend in the near future. Sugar is looking a lot more bitter now.

8 Slavery Still

There is still slave labor alive and well in the sugar industry today! Spit out that candy and pay attention. In the Dominican Republic, hundreds of thousands of indebted Haitians work in labor camps called bateyes. They work 12-14 hour days harvesting sugar cane for less than $1 and are paid in company scrip instead of actual currency. They arrive, often starving and devoid of identification papers, lured by the promise of paid labor and are intercepted by traffickers who give or sell them to these farms. Unbeknownst to you, you may be buying the products of their forced labor in your local grocery store. Did you spit out that candy yet?

On the very slow moving upside, more awareness is working to change these practices. In Britain, in 2017, the UK instituted the Modern Slavery Act in an effort to ensure there remains a zero tolerance policy for products developed through slave labor. Frankly, it’s the least they can do considering their history in the industry’s inception! Now we need to get the rest of the sugar addicted world aware and on board too. These people will be way better off if consumers use their money to vote down these barbaric practices.

7 Lies

Part of the human condition is sadly lying to get what we want or downplay our wrongdoings. And it is humans running the sugar industry. So they too are guilty of deception. In the 1960s, this conniving industry funded research to highlight the [false] dangers of fat in an effort to diminish concerns about sugar’s role in heart disease. They even went about it in a brilliantly evil manner.

A group named the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF) employed Harvard scientists and had their findings published in the New England Journal of Medicine (1967) without disclosing that it was the sugar industry funding the research. It was done as a review that examined different studies and experiments that implicated sugar as a culprit in coronary heart disease. It suggested that all of the former research pointing to sugar was flawed and implicated fat and cholesterol as the main contributors to the disease. Having such a prominent journal publish the review has allowed the sugar industry to shape and lead the scientific debate about the dangers of sugar and fat for the past five decades! Sugar. Hate. Fueled. Rage. Building. And we’re still waiting on new research not funded by the industry.

6 Poison

Most of us (probably all of us realistically) love to indulge ourselves …cake, soda, alcohol, ice cream and a wide variety of other guilty pleasures. The sugar industry counts on us caving to our weaknesses or feeling the need to reward ourselves whether we deserve it or not. They also make a concerted effort to confuse our understanding of the effects of our reckless sugar consumption.

According to Marion Nestle of Nestle Foods, “Food company sponsorship, whether or not intentionally manipulative, undermines the public trust in nutrition science, contributes to public confusion about what to eat, and compromises Dietary Guidelines in ways that are not in the best interest of public health.”

The reality is that sugar is a poison that promotes fat storage in the liver, creates insulin resistance, increases insulin production, and promotes tumor growth. Go ahead, have another spoonful of that delicious vanilla ice cream …with a side of chemo. The industry is working very hard to make sure you don’t learn these things.

5 Profit Above All Else

The devil exists and he is clearing running the Sugar Association that represents the sugar industry. This creepy and horrifying association, along with a few other big food industry groups, has demanded that the United States Congress stop funding the World Health Organization (WHO) simply because they declared that sugar should contribute to no more than 10 percent of a healthy diet. They want the WHO report withdrawn for the government to continue funding them.

So they’ve made it pretty clear that their only interest is their profits and continued growth with no regard for the health or safety of their consumers. You’re just a pawn in their deadly games and a way to keep lining their pockets. Who wants some chocolate chip cookies?

4 Fake Health Food

Desserts, soda, grandma’s goodies, and other sweet treats where you expect to find sugar aren’t the only sources of sugar in your diet. Many foods that are marketed as ‘low fat’ or ‘light’ actually contain higher sugar levels than their regular counterparts. “Low fat’ yogurt, for instance, often has added sugar to enhance the flavor lost when fat is removed.

Things we may tend to consume large amounts of without thinking about their sugar content have deceptively high amounts of sugar like ketchup, jarred spaghetti sauces, and barbecue sauce. Sports drinks, fruit juice, iced tea, vitamin water (great tricky name), premade smoothies, and flavored coffees are likewise heavy on their sugar content. Cereals, granola, protein bars, and cereal bars also contain higher levels of sugar. And canned soups are as high in sugar as they often are in sodium. Sugar is even added to many canned fruits, as if they didn’t already contain their own sugars. So with all of the sugar hidden in what can be part of a regular diet, adding those delightful desserts is literal overkill. Walk away from the apple pie a la mode!!

3 Climate Impact

As sugar consumption, known or unknown, grows, so does its effect on the climate. And of course, that is not in a positive way. Sugarcane growers typically use nitrous oxide fertilizer which is an extremely potent greenhouse gas that has 300 times more potential to increase global warming than carbon dioxide. There are more sustainable options that are being adopted more commonly.

Let us hope that modern day sugar growers are more honest and interested in the well-being of all humans than their historical counterparts. For that matter, let’s hope they make the entire industry more honest and forthcoming in their practices. Crossing my sugar bloated fingers! That iced scone and double mocha frappuccino from Starbucks were really tasty.

That climate change is going to turn on them anyway. The higher temperatures, especially in winter, can ruin the ripening process of sugarcane. Perhaps pay back for all of the industry’s wrongdoings will be delivered by their own unchecked greedy practices! Irony really is its own sweet reward.

2 Addiction

The addiction capability of sugar is real and promoted by the industry! Like many illicit drugs, sugar promotes the production of dopamine in humans. Dopamine is the pleasure center of the brain that creates cravings and keeps you coming back for more and more. Foods with high sugar content are designed to be hyperpalatable to make you want more. Who can stop at one Oreo?

In studies with animals, sugar was found to be more addictive than cocaine. The animals were not only drawn more to the sugar than the cocaine, but they also experienced withdrawal. The addiction has a tendency to cause overindulgence. Humans likely don’t experience withdrawal often because our sugar is delivered regularly through a large variety of sources. That is only going to make the industry happy to take more of your money and find new ways to distribute more to you. The lobby in the millions to make sure they can continue to do so.

Have you ever tried taking candy from a baby?! Or it makes more sense to ask if you’ve ever tried telling a 4 year old they can’t have a popsicle when they’re used to someone saying yes? Get ready for H-E-double hockey sticks! Or have you tried to cut your sugar intake only to not be able to stop thinking about devouring an entire bag of chocolate chips?

1 Miracle Fruit

It’s fair to bet that you haven’t heard of an amazing, completely natural, safe alternative to sugar that can make anything you eat taste divinely sweet. Can you guess why? By now you’ve probably guessed it is because the sugar industry and lobbyists have put forth a lot of effort to make sure you don’t know about it. Well, say hello to Miracle Fruit! The author has personally experienced this heaven sent little berry and can’t speak enough of it’s wonders!

Miraculin is the glycoprotein in Miracle Fruit that makes everything you eat for several hours afterward taste sweet. We’ll leave the full science lesson for chemistry class. But it is AMAZING! You can eat a lemon like you would an apple completely free from that sour pucker. It will taste like Countrytime Lemonade.

Until very, very recently, all uses of this little miracle were banned by the FDA thanks to Donald Rumsfeld and GD Searle in 1977. They were the makers of aspartame, that other toxic alternative to sugar. Angry yet?! Go get some Miracle Fruit berries and try it for yourself. You’ll be happy again. The miracle is real! And the more people who know about it, the quicker we can do away with the twisted sugar industry with a history steeped in self-serving deception. Be an informed eater and enjoy that coffee with no sugar added!