Dear Luv Doc,
The World Health Organization just declared that bacon and other processed meats cause cancer and that red meat might cause cancer. Everybody is all freaking out, except maybe those cows that do the Chick-fil-A commercials. What do you think? Did Bo Pilgrim buy off the WHO or do I need to back off on my bacon chili cheeseburger consumption?
– The Cardiac Kid
Well, CK, to paraphrase the late, great John Wayne on his deathbed, “Fuck death and the jalapeño-cheddar sausage it rode in on” … or something like that. It’s funny, everybody just assumes that the Duke died of lung cancer – mainly because even in his early years he had the gravelly voice of a six-pack-a-day smoker. Six packs a day. Can you imagine that shit? At least he always had something to do with his hands. The amazing thing is that the Duke actually went to USC on a football scholarship. He probably smoked in the huddle.
That’s how people lived back in the day. They just assumed life was going to kill them somehow and threw caution to the wind. John Wayne certainly wouldn’t have looked you in the eye and claimed that he was power-smoking Camels for his health. His colon was packed with processed meats, Scotch whisky, and the Grim Reaper. Why? Because he believed vegetables were for sissies. Here’s the crazy part: He lived to the ripe old age of 72 when he died of stomach cancer.
Did anybody at John Wayne’s funeral wail, “Too soon! Too soon!”? Of course not. They were all like, “72? Fuck. He looked like he was 85.” I bet his corpse smelled like a smoke-cured brisket. It was probably hard to walk by his open casket and not want to dive in there and start gnawing on his ribcage. A sign of a life well-lived.
So yes, processed red meat causes cancer. Which village idiots were still laboring under the assumption it doesn’t? Do you think the CEO of Oscar Mayer truly believes his company makes health food? Of course not. That doesn’t make him one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, but it probably makes him a stable boy.
And lest anyone get the idea that chicken is some sort of saintly snack, think again. Unless you stole it out of your neighbor’s backyard, you’re lucky if your “bird” is anything more than a brain stem with huge breasts. Yeah. That’s right. Your Sunday dinner is Ivana Trump.
So do you need to back off on your bacon chili cheeseburger consumption? Well, it really all depends on when and how you’re planning on checking out. If, like Hemingway, you’re planning on meeting your maker at age 61 by fellating a shotgun on your cabin porch up in the Sawtooth Mountains, you’re doing the right thing.
This article appears in November 6 • 2015.