Bacon

Bacon schmacon. We can take it or leave it.

Potentially edible! Food woo

Fabulous food!

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Delectable diets!

Organic food Palm oil Steve Jobs Onion

Bodacious bods!

ECA stack Urban caveman movement Joe Rogan v - t - e

Bacon is a pork product commonly known by the public to be a guilty pleasure; it's tasty but also unhealthy. If you're Jewish or Muslim, you're missing out.

Cancer[edit]

In 2015, the World Health Organization stated habitual processed meat (including bacon) consumption increases the risk of colorectal cancers by eighteen percent.^[1][2]

In 2018, The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) found that there was sufficient evidence that processed meat (e.g., bacon, sausage, ham, corned beef, hot dogs, and jerky)^{[note 1]} causes cancer of the colorectum.^[2]:497 IARC found that there were also "[p]ositive associations have been observed between consumption of processed meat and cancer of the stomach." Additionally, IARC found that there was limited evidence that consumption of red meat (including bacon) has a positive association with cancers of the pancreas and prostate.^[2]:497 What this means is that the more processed meat (and possibly even red meat) that you eat, the more likely it is that you will get cancer.^[2]:497

Processed meats are also known to contain three different classes of chemicals that are carcinogenic in rodents: heterocyclic aromatic amines, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and nitrosamines.^[2]

Health claims[edit]

Bacon has good fat[edit]

Bacon fat breakdown^[3]

50%	Monounsaturated
40%	Saturated fat
10%	Polyunsaturated

While it is true that 50% percent of bacon fat is monounsaturated (a "good" fat), and also contains some omega-3 fatty acids (very good fats). Bacon also has a very high percentage of total fat, as well as bad or saturated fat (40%).^[4] Bacon is also high in salt, and a high salt diet is associated with high blood pressure.

Bacon (and other processed meats) can still be incorporated in a healthy diet, it just has to be consumed in low amounts and only occasionally.^[4] This moderate consumption is not practiced in America and Canada due to Bacon mania.

Bacon has nutritional value[edit]

Bacon is an excellent source of protein and contains decent amounts of minerals.^[3][5] The beneficial nutritional aspects of bacon are outweighed by the negative aspects of bacon,^[4] and those beneficial aspects can all be easily obtained from more healthy sources such as olive oil, poultry and fish.

Propaganda[edit]

Following a trend in the 1980s in the US of healthier eating and the understanding that saturated fat and cholesterol were unhealthy, the price of pork bellies (from which bacon is derived) collapsed to as low as 19¢ per pound. US pork producers had to export the pork bellies to Easter Europe to make any profit at all. Enter marketing: the National Pork Board began pushing bacon into various products, especially fast food hamburgers.^[6]

• "It's better with bacon."
• "Everything goes with bacon."
• "Even cats are improved by bacon."^[7]

• 

  Uh… maybe not.

• 

  Definitely not.

Pray unto thee[edit]

Legal notice from the RW Morals Committee

This information is provided for amusement only and under the strict understanding that it not be read, understood, remembered or acted upon. If you have read this page, please go to the discussion page where you need to sign a form stating that you have not understood this page. Thank you.
—The RW morals committee

Notes[edit]

References[edit]

For those of you in the mood, RationalWiki has a fun article about Bacon.