Bitter Truths About Chocolate - No 3

While it may not surprise you that much that Big Chocolate, like any "Big" industry, doesn't give a crap about your welfare, the lengths these companies go to step over your bloated, greasy corpse to raid your wallet rank with some of the stupidest and most nefarious in the business world.

Milton Hershey, for instance, often claimed that "an ounce of chocolate provided more energy than a pound of meat." He even made a wrapper for his bar stating it. But then again, for Hershey, chocolate was serious business and he hated it being classed as mere confectionary. Workers were not ever allowed to use the word candy in reference to chocolate. In 1926, Milton, who may have been more naive than malicious, went to the Supreme Court to convince them to officially make chocolate a food. The court declined on the basis that Hershey only brought his opinion along for evidence.

The National Confectioners association took it a step further, stating that candy is actually good for you, helps you lose weight and actually prevents tooth decay. That's right. Your doctor, nutritionist and dentist are just living in Oppositeville. You're only 20 Snickers away from perfect health, a six pack and a winning smile.

Also riding this crazy train was the Mars Corporation, who took this message of health to the extreme, creating a marketing campaign linking their chocolate bars to apples, oatmeal and milk. One ad, featuring a glass of milk turning into a Milky Way, caught the attention of the Federal Trade Commission, who forced Mars to stop implying their products are nutritious in their commercials.



So, Mars made a pamphlet instead that claimed eating chocolate every day was about as good as eating an apple a day. Then they sent them to dentists around the country so they could distribute them to patients.



Cadbury's neglect for public health took the lazy man's approach. When a leaking pipe in one of their factories appeared to be causing a rare strain of salmonella in some of their products, Cadbury informed authorities and the public of the danger...five freaking months later. By this time, 30 people had fallen ill.

In court, they pled guilty to all charges put against them and promised to do better in the future. Also of comfort, Cadbury's multiple recalls for neglecting allergy warnings, a melamine scare for 11 of its products and their continued use of trans fats in their chocolate, despite packages that state a value of zero. Nice.