John Robbins, one-time heir to the Baskin-Robbins ice cream fortune, made waves in 1987 with his book Diet for a New America. Blending misinformation with activist rhetoric and junk science, Robbins tried to make the case that meat eating was harmful to humans and planet earth. An excellent point-by-point rebuttal of Robbins’ claims, by the way, is available on-line courtesy of H. Russell Cross and Floyd M. Byers, two Texas A&M University professors. Now Robbins is back with another bag of nonsense, this time bearing the title The Food Revolution. In addition to the supposed evils of meat and dairy, Robbins is now railing against genetically improved foods. Judging by the book’s first chapter (available free from Robbins’ web site), he has adopted the tactic of blaming “the meat and chemical industries” for everything he doesn’t like about America. Robbins actually equates the “moral imperative” of imposing meat-free and all-organic diets on Americans with the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, and anti-child-abuse laws.
