Stupid Email Hall of Fame

Today’s installment of the Stupid Email Hall of Fame comes to us from The Domina. She writes:

My mother-in-law sent me this…it isn’t her worst, but she was trying to scare monger my sister-in-law who has a 1-yr old so it irritated me more than usual. Her email below!

“There is a longer article accompanying it. Who knows, maybe this is why so many people have cancer today.

Ten Reasons To Throw Out Your Microwave Oven:

Continually eating microwave processed food causes permanent brain damage.

The human body is unable to metabolize the unknown by-products created in microwaved foods.

Male and female hormone production is shut down and/or altered by continually eating microwaved foods.

The effects of by-products remain in the human body long-term.

Minerals, vitamins and nutrients are reduced by microwaving so that the body gets little or altered components that cannot be broken down.

The minerals in vegetables are altered into cancerous free radicals by microwaves.

Microwaved foods cause stomach and intestinal cancerous growths. This may partially explain the rapid increase of the colon cancer rate in America.

Long term consumption of microwaved foods causes cancerous cells to increase in human blood.
It also causes immune system deficiencies through alterations in the lymph glands and blood serum.

Eating microwaved food causes loss of memory and concentration, emotional instability and a decrease of intelligence.

Not a pretty picture…add the “badness” of cooking in plastic and it seems to be a recipe for health disasters.”

Hmm…so microwaved foods are killing us? I decided to check my trusty email debunker, Snopes, for some insight. There wasn’t an exact entry for this email, but there was a related entry about cooking food in plastic containers. It contained valuable information from the USDA and Johns Hopkins regarding microwave cooking and plastic containers. I found another article from the Alabama Cooperative Extension, which says:

Indeed, frying is the only form of cooking that has ever been associated with the production of trace amounts of dioxins in food. The problem stems from the fact that oils and fats typically used in frying contain triglycerides.

“Once these substances reach high temperatures from frying, the fats attached to this glycerol backbone begin breaking down into peroxide and other substances, including, in some cases, dioxins and PCBs, another known carcinogen,” Weese says.

Under the circumstances, she says, consumers would be better off putting away the frying pan and broiling your food instead.

So microwave away, and if you have a stupid email forward you’d like debunked/mocked, send it to me at bubblegumculture@gmail.com.