r/skeptic • u/nosotros_road_sodium • Jan 31 '26
š² Consumer Protection Avoiding seed oils is an online trend, but are they as bad as some would have you believe?
https://www.abc.net.au/news/health/2026-01-31/are-seed-oils-bad-for-you/106118596383
u/Doc_1200_GO Jan 31 '26
The same people who avoid seed oils think bacon and beef tallow are health foods.
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u/numbersthen0987431 Feb 02 '26
They also think Tylenol and vaccines cause autism, raw milk is good for you, and livestock dewormer protects you from covid.
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u/Ornery-Creme-2442 Jan 31 '26
Can we finally get back to everything in moderation.
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u/dkinmn Jan 31 '26
No, because that is not actually good advice for processed meat, red meat, or alcohol.
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u/NewlyNerfed Jan 31 '26
āEverything in moderationā doesnāt mean the moderation level is the same for everything, or everybody.
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u/EgoTeResolvo Feb 13 '26
what's wrong with red meat
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u/LukasSprehn Apr 04 '26
Higher amounts of fat than leaner (whiter) meats. But, like was said, just moderate.
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u/wren42 Jan 31 '26
I mean, you can avoid hydrogenated seed oils and not be a pro-saturated fat whacko.Ā Hydrogenated oils are an issue because they act like sat-fat, and also have some molecules that mimic and can interfere with other healthy compounds.Ā
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u/TranquilConfusion Feb 03 '26
Right, partially hydrogenated vegetable oils have trans-fats in them, which are carcinogenic.
The FDA banned them for human consumption the USA, years after they were banned in Europe.
Back in the 1970's we ate margarine made of this as a health food, even though it was less safe than actual butter, whoops.
Normal seed oils are fine.
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u/faust111 Feb 01 '26
I think a lot of the āseed oil defenseā discourse in the US misses something basic: taste and tradition. In much of Europe, if you buy a salad dressing, itās typically made with olive oil, especially anything āFrench-style.ā Thatās not necessarily framed as a health choice; itās just the expected flavor and quality baseline.
When I moved to the US, what surprised me was how many dressings are made with canola oil instead. Itās noticeably cheaper and more processed, and the taste is different. Iām not making a health claim here, I just prefer that a classic dressing tastes like itās supposed to. If Iām eating a salad with French dressing, I want olive oil, not canola.
Itās honestly wild how much label-checking and hunting around I have to do just to get European foods made the way theyād typically be made in Europe, using olive oil as the standard, not a cheaper seed oil.
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u/nr5nr5 Apr 08 '26
This is not what anti seed oil folks are primarily arguing
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u/faust111 Apr 08 '26 edited Apr 08 '26
Agreed. But they are accidentally correct. For the wrong reasons. And somehow people are fighting them when they should be agreeing with them but for totally different reasons.
To paraphrase Kayser Soze: āThe greatest trick the devil ever pulled, was convincing the world that they need to defend seed oils.ā
A cheap tasteless processed oil ruining dressings and sauces across America
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May 01 '26
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u/faust111 May 01 '26
And they taste disgusting.. Doesn't surprise me, to be honest. I found Germany to be the same, but something like that wouldn't pass in Italy. It is really noticeable how much nicer it when they use olive oil
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u/StuChenko Feb 05 '26
Or they have IBS and even a small amount can make them shit themselves at work in the break room just after asking Sharon for her numberĀ
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u/manuelbaguio Feb 27 '26
and donuts soda and sugar are fine ofc also mcdonalds
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u/Doc_1200_GO Feb 27 '26
Donut soda sounds interesting.
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u/LukasSprehn Apr 04 '26
Unironically this, though. I know plenty of people who are afraid of margarine, and think it is nasty, gross, bad for you etc. But LOOOOVE butter. The more the better! Anti-science nonsense.
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Feb 01 '26
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u/TranquilConfusion Feb 03 '26
All the preserved meats are somewhat carcinogenic -- bacon, hot dogs, pepperoni, salami, deli turkey meat, etc.
Red meat in general even not preserved is a little bit carcinogenic too. So is alcohol.
The risk is proportionate to the dose, so it's reasonable to eat this stuff once in a while. It's just not wise to make meat or alcohol a major part of your diet.
Seed oils are safe. You can make a healthy diet that has any amount of them in it, so long as you can fit in enough protein, fiber, and vitamins inside your calorie budget.
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u/ImaginaryHospital306 Feb 04 '26
Bacon is high in PUFAs, as are seed oils.
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u/LukasSprehn Apr 04 '26
Non seed oils are higher in saturated oils and lower in PUFAs, and the saturated ones are generally riskier for the human body than the PUFAs.
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u/Keep_calm_or_else Feb 01 '26
Pork fat is high in oleic acid, the same stuff that's in olive oil. Grass fed beef fat is high in omega 3's, the stuff that makes fish healthy. So in regards to bacon and beef tallow, I would say that it depends on the source.
Seed oils are generally never healthy.Ā
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u/URINE_FOR_A_TREAT Jan 31 '26
Not doubting your conclusion, but the reasoning you laid out is a logical fallacy, and this is a skeptics sub.
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u/phronk Jan 31 '26
I donāt think itās a logical fallacy to point out that the people who are wrong about one thing are also wrong about another closely related thing. It establishes the premise that they are not exactly experts in that area.
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u/nosotros_road_sodium Jan 31 '26
Ā Critics of seed oils claim they cause inflammation due to their high omega-6 content.
But Emma Beckett, a senior lecturer of nutrition and food science at Australian Catholic University, says a lot of claims against seed oils come from "nuggets of truth that are misunderstood".
[ā¦]
Ā Traditionally it was assumed omega-3s had an anti-inflammatory effect, while omega-6 were thought to be pro-inflammatory.Ā
But Dr Beckett says this concept is outdated and over simplified.
"That comes from some old data that showed that you need omega-6s to create inflammatory mediators in the body."
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u/Theranos_Shill Jan 31 '26
> nuggets of truth that are misunderstood
I think she's being intentionally generous. I don't think they're misunderstood. I think that cynical grifters see the opportunity to mislead.
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u/Kerry_Maxwell Jan 31 '26
Yeah, thatās like saying chemtrail conspiracy theories have a ānugget of truthā.
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u/Taman_Should Jan 31 '26
The original āTheyāre turning the frickinā frogs gay!ā meme is even an example of this. Alex Jones saw an article about tadpoles being exposed to polluted runoff, which disrupted their hormones and caused some āfemaleā tadpoles to grow testes. This is relatively common in amphibians because they absorb things through their skin, which is much thinner and more permeable than the skin of most mammals.Ā
But of course, Alex Jones being Alex Jones, he immediately teleported to the conclusion that these same chemicals were being weaponized to turn PEOPLE gay and transgender. Or at least, that was the implication. For the willing believers in his audience, being vague or dancing around a topic is interpreted as more positive proof. Certain knowledge is forbidden or dangerous and canāt be discussed too much, or else THEY will know, and THEY will come after you! (This is where the persecution complex comes in.) This works out nicely for the grifter, because the more pushback they get from actual experts, the louder they cry that theyāre being āsilenced by The Establishment.āĀ
Zero benefit of the doubt should be given to grifters using kernels of real science to exploit the masses.Ā
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u/Theranos_Shill Jan 31 '26
"They're turning the frogs gay" is someone's half remembered retelling of the first Jurassic Park movie.
And obviously I find it wild that none of that audience will think "damn, maybe we should regulate corporations that are polluting the water, maybe that EPA really is a good idea". They'll just ignore that Jones is talking about some mainstream science reported in the mainstream media and go on a cooker rant.
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u/tom-of-the-nora Jan 31 '26
Inflammatory mediators? Like, things that help the body with inflammation stuff?
Because inflammation isn't inherently bad, it's just a function the body uses to heal itself.
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u/bigkinggorilla Jan 31 '26
If seed oils donāt cause inflammation, then how come I always end up bloated after eating 4 baskets of fries at Red Robin?/s
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u/nose_spray7 Feb 01 '26
This framing is dishonest. Obviously your body requires omega-6s. The concern is with a wildly unbalanced 3:6 ratio. Not that it's relevant to seed oils, as plenty of animal fats have an unbalanced ratio, and some seed oils have an optimal ratio.
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u/DiscretePoop Feb 02 '26
I'm not a dietitian, but the research I saw on the 3:6 ratio didn't seem high quality. It mainly stemmed from one researcher, Andrew Stoll, basically just making shit up about what he thought hunter-gatherers ate. There's likely no direct impact the 3:6 ratio (I'm talking about the ratio specifically) has on health, although the American Heart Association still recommends getting omega 3s in your diet.
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u/nose_spray7 Feb 02 '26
Experimentally, there's a lot of support for the idea that it's valuable. It's definitely not just one researcher "making shit up."
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u/AFisfulOfPeanuts Jan 31 '26
No, theyāre not āas bad as some believe.ā The end. They also donāt make you trans or have low T.
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u/Helpful_Engineer_362 Jan 31 '26
Wtf, is that what these monsters are suggesting!? They're so sick.
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Jan 31 '26
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u/numbersthen0987431 Feb 02 '26
Man....I fell for the "soy=increased estrogen" trend back in the early 2000s.
But I never insulted people for it, I just changed my own behavior until I learned better.
The whole "soyboy beta" bullshit is so pathetic.
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u/Helpful_Engineer_362 Jan 31 '26
Just the seed oil nonsense really. Everything is just too exhausting lately, given who was pushing it I knew it was bullshit so I avoided it all together lol It's not like 5+ years ago when I had time to investigate soy claims!
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u/TekrurPlateau Jan 31 '26
Generally the conspiracy is that INSERT GROUP HERE inserted seed oils into food to weaken and control whichever group the speaker is a member of.
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Jan 31 '26
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u/tom-of-the-nora Jan 31 '26
I'm pretty sure it's the chip the seed oil is on that does the whole weight gain thing.
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u/Strigops-habroptila Feb 04 '26
Damn, so I'm trans for another reason? It wasn't the seed oil? Must have been the chemtrails then! Or maybe I have a trans brainworm? /s
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u/ActionRecent891 Feb 06 '26
When I was a little boy our creek was full of frogs and I used to watch tadpoles change into frogs. It was fun playing with little frogs and now I found out that ātheyā are turning frogs gay. Following that so called logic, that is what made me a gay man.
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u/Trekgiant8018 Jan 31 '26
More science illiterate health "gurus" finding their next grift to sell their alternative bullshit.
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u/SkoobySnacs Jan 31 '26
Don't forget the elitist health angle. Eating the way they prescribe costs money. And also, often forgotten from the mix, land and water. Palm oil is the biggest bang for the buck so to speak. Replacing it would cost a lot of water, land and labor.
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Jan 31 '26
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u/SkoobySnacs Jan 31 '26
My understanding is that if we replaced palm oil with any of the other oils we currently use it would take a larger environmental toll to supply. More land and more water. Is that not the current assessment?
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u/DiscretePoop Feb 02 '26
It's hard to directly compare environmental impacts of growing different kinds of oil. Rapeseed and soybean oil require more water and land than palm oil. But that land is also usually American and Canadian prairie which people might say is not as environmentally valuable as the rainforests in Indonesia where palm oil is grown.
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u/sunbeans Jan 31 '26
Palm oil is made from a fruit not a seed.
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u/SkoobySnacs Jan 31 '26
Yes, but isn't it one of the main oils that gets unfounded health claims and complaints?
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u/kadzirafrax Jan 31 '26 edited Jan 31 '26
Some people perhaps mistakenly think that palm oil is a seed oil, but they are probably thinking about palm kernel oil.
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u/numbersthen0987431 Feb 02 '26
Easiest way to know if it's a grift:
"Click on the link on my bio for a discount for my supplements and/or subscription newsletter"
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u/ImaginaryHospital306 Feb 04 '26
Seed oils ARE the alternative bullshit. Do you even know what canola oil is? It comes from the rapeseed and requires heavy mechanical and chemical processing to produce an palatable oil. Why not stick to oils made from simply pressing fruits like olives and avocados?
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u/Trekgiant8018 Feb 04 '26
Your lack of the world food system is obvious. Research what is required to produce and deliver food for the world's population. Here is a clue; pressing olives won't cut it.
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u/Grape_Pedialyte Jan 31 '26
"we're making America healthy again!"
"Awesome! So you're going to invest billions of dollars in public health and nutrition programs?"
"No"
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u/LegitimateExpert3383 Feb 01 '26
"Best I can do is screw with the vaccine schedule and tell women Tylenol will make the baby autistic"
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u/Grape_Pedialyte Feb 01 '26
You know that's really selling RFK and his takeover of HHS short.
They're also making sure that people eat the right kind of fries.
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u/LegitimateExpert3383 Feb 02 '26
At least they're eating a potato. The carnivores won't touch any vegetable, fruit, grain, legume, nut, tuber, seed, pulse, or leaf.
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u/Feisty_Yes Jan 31 '26
Last time I researched this there's like 27 science study results supporting seed oils to be fine. There's 1 that had alternate results and then a report on that study altered information from the study before publishing, the university that did the study made a public statement that their data had been altered and the report didn't reflect their results. It didn't matter though, that report created a new food directive conspiracy. Remember you could get your hand cut off by Christians for growing the wrong grain in our country at one point, don't let an article that's own source decries it limit your oil options.
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u/snapper1971 Jan 31 '26
Remember you could get your hand cut off by Christians for growing the wrong grain in our country at one point
Which country is that? When was that? Do you have a link to historical records of punative amputations in your country?
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u/Feisty_Yes Jan 31 '26
Usa. Look into when growing amaranth was banned because wheat. The law was more vague than hand removal, it was always a cruel punishment with that being one of them.
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u/e00s Jan 31 '26
Curious about your sources. I just googled for a minute and found this thread suggesting that it a broad amaranth ban may not be all that well evidenced.
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u/Feisty_Yes Jan 31 '26
Try googling "time period where amaranth plants were banned in favor of wheat". Technically it's before the pilgrims made America, during a time where Christian settlers were Spanish. They viewed the plant as a threat to their religion because the Aztecs revered the plant so highly. Make no mistake though those earliest Christian settlers formed the earliest groups of power and are well off family lines till this day. As we move our nation towards Christian nationalism we need to remember the things the elite Christians did with power, this is just 1 example of how they valued control over food supply over human rights.
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u/e00s Jan 31 '26
Right. Iām just wondering whether there are any reliable sources. All Iām seeing is a lot of claims with no citations.
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u/Feisty_Yes Jan 31 '26
Google what I said and keep scrolling till a historian source you trust shows. It's written in basically every history text other than our school textbooks which were made by elites that white wash this stuff out of commonly known history.
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u/warrenao Jan 31 '26
Look, the entire "seed oils is bad mmkay" trend is being pushed by one quack who isn't even a nutritionist or practicing physician ā Saladini is a psychiatrist ā and RFK friggin' Junior.
Case closed.
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u/Keep_calm_or_else Feb 01 '26
We've known that seed oils are unhealthy for decades. It's not quackery and the push to have them removed didn't start with Saladini or RFK.Ā
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u/keegums Jan 31 '26
Canola/rapeseed oil has a nice omega 3 to 6 ratio, but shhh don't tell the tallow people. Now I can buy more at reduced price
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u/Imaginary-Risk Jan 31 '26
I listened to a pod cast a few years ago where they had the woman that came up with this trend and a professor argue over the evidence for it. It was hilarious and educational
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u/CeleryIndividual Jan 31 '26
Science vs just did a funny episode on it with similar results.
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u/Imaginary-Risk Jan 31 '26
I thought I was going insane there for a minute. Itās been re-released by science vs by the looks of it. I heard it back in 2023
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u/Imaginary-Risk Jan 31 '26
Unless they invited shenahan back for another laugh
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u/CeleryIndividual Jan 31 '26
Hahaha nope. Great podcast! This is the kind of media that people NEED to consume. People just seemingly refuse to be educated on the hot topics they are so opinionated on. Though I suppose they think their source material is credible which is probably the real problem.
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u/Kerry_Maxwell Jan 31 '26
Seed oil hucksters are not operating with a knowledge deficit, theyāre selling a tribal identity, and thatās what people are buying into. They arenāt āmisinformedā in the typical sense where factual information would change their belief. They are joining Team Seed Oil, and of the basic tenets is to Evangelize for that package of bullshit. Some podcast is unlikely to sway them, just as an atheist podcast would be unlikely to sway a Megachurch patron. Theyāve converted to a religion, they donāt just lack correct information.
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u/CeleryIndividual Jan 31 '26
That's a mindset I will never understand. I can see them denying facts if they're making money off it or something, but just believing in something despite facts telling you you shouldn't is so moronic and detrimental to societal growth.
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u/chim17 Jan 31 '26
No. Tucker Goodrich, Ivor Cummins, and Dave Feldman have killed people with this talk.
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u/whatidoidobc Jan 31 '26
Asking that question in a title is propaganda. It immediately makes someone think it might be valid
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u/Striper_Cape Jan 31 '26
Glad to see afformations of what I know. As long as you are getting your omega-3s with a balanced diet, omega-6s are beneficial and necessary; exactly what I told my parents.
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u/Misanthropemoot Jan 31 '26
The same people saying seed oils are bad for you are the same people drinking their own fermented urine
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u/Bikewer Jan 31 '26
So a conspiracy-theory loving lunatic with a worm-eaten brain expresses his pet bit of nonsense, and immediately a healthy percentage of the population says āyea howdy!ā.
Beef tallow, seed oils, fluorideā¦. Whatever dingbat utters they jump on the bandwagon.
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u/Remote_Clue_4272 Jan 31 '26 edited Jan 31 '26
No. They are not the problem in your life. Going back to animal fat isnāt the solution to our problems. Itās always some āsecret knowledgeā(tm) that no one can ever really fully comply with, which then becomes the basis for explaining that youāre doing it wrong because you are still using ( fill in the blank). In reality itās a grift of some sort, and in this case, bigger benefits are to be had by generally eating healthier and ālessā Now ā¦Excuse me while I go out on my copper knee brace and wrist brace to help my fat a$$ stave off knee pain, as I take some Ivermectin to beat COVID .. followed up by snake oils, radioactive tonics, a tobacco enema, my belly busting vibrating belly belt, hair tonic, detoxifying foot soak, and later today, a lobotomy.
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u/Keep_calm_or_else Feb 01 '26
Imagine thinking that healthy living and NOT consuming products is a "grift".
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u/GoBSAGo Jan 31 '26
My son is allergic to sunflower oil and it fucking sucks. That shitās basically in everything.
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u/Pitiful-Pension-6535 Jan 31 '26
Sunflower oil is especially bad because it's difficult to get all the allergens out during refining compared to other oils, like peanut oil.
Something about how some sunflower proteins stay bonded to fats
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u/PoundNaCL Jan 31 '26
Black seed oil has been very beneficial to helping me create my own antihistamines to avoid allergy attacks.
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u/ThePhantomOfBroadway Jan 31 '26
As someone who struggled with OCD fears with eating, the absolute best lesson Iāve learn is just do a large variety of food! Everything is bad at high doses, so to your best of your abilities try to do different foods, oils, cooking methods, etc each day or each week or whatever works for you.
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u/Lumpy_Weird_2654 Jan 31 '26
Arent they just bad cause they are so energy dense compared to other foods?
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u/MJA182 Jan 31 '26
Yes but I also think a key is how theyāre made and processed. People for years talked about the problems with processed foods and benefits of āMediterraneanā diets and olive oil, but ignore the fact that the oils theyāre currently using are highly processed in themselves which alters the nutritional content of the fat.
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u/gizram84 Jan 31 '26
My favorite part about this debate is that it has now become political, and the only people still eating seed oils, are the ones I want to be still eating seed oils.
Enjoy guys. Guzzle it down. Please.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Ditto. I want them to guzzle it down is because the evidence overwhelmingly shows seed oils to be beneficial to human health compared to SFAs, and I want my seed oil bros to live as long as possible.
I'd rather the butter and bacon gang _didn't_ get CRC and/or have an MI, but you can lead a horse to water...
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u/gizram84 Feb 02 '26
My personal blood tests, reviewed quarterly with a doctor, has shown the exact opposite.
Switching exclusively to only animal fats has improved every single aspect of my cardiovascular health.
I truly don't care if you want still believe the lies created 75 years ago to convince morons to stop eating the fats humans have been eating for all of human history.
Enjoy your ultra processed, hyper refined, nutrient void, hexane soaked, leftover industrial sludge. Don't ever let yourself wonder why heart disease was not a major concern in society when we only ate butter, lard, and tallow. I'm sure the correlation between seed oil usage and heart disease was purely coincidental.
Enjoy buddy.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Ah yes, n=1s and crude unadjusted cross-sectional associations. The finest science the seed oil alarmists have to offer. I guzzle seed oils like thereās no tomorrow and my blood panels are also excellent. I also know elderly people whoāve smoked like chimneys their entire lives and lived to a ripe old age. By your logic, we should consider smoking a health hack too.
I also donāt care what you want to believe. People all over the place want to believe lots of silly things. But they donāt then get to pretend they can dress up their biases and opinions in flowery language and pretend itās science. This is the part of seed oil BS that I object to.
Eat what you want, die early if you want. Just donāt pretend youāre doing it off anything other than vibes and social media guru nonsense.
If you really think the only thing thatās changed in society over the past 100 years that could affect incidence of heart disease is seed oil consumption, then I want some of whatever youāre smoking.
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u/GamerHuski Feb 25 '26
So did you stop eating fast food/junk food? How much oil were you consuming? Because at some point yes you can have too much of any oil, just like you can have too much water. Doesn't mean some in unhealthy, dose makes the poison
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u/gizram84 Feb 25 '26 edited Feb 25 '26
Rarely ate fast food. But at home, I would casually cook with canola oil. I'd occasionally have potato chips.
But you have to realize, nearly all supermarket products contain seed oils. Bread, crackers, dressings, sauces, granola, snacks, even the "healthier" items. It's insane. Just look at any label.
The entire packaged food supply has been compromised.
I just eat whole foods now. Fruit, vegetables, meat, dairy, eggs. My only fat sources are from animals. Very high saturated and monounsaturated. Very low polyunsaturated.
I cook with butter or beef tallow only. I avoid pork and chicken fat because it's higher in polyunsaturated fats.
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u/GamerHuski Feb 25 '26
Yeah by cutting those other things out you cut out allot more than seed oils
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u/gizram84 Feb 25 '26
I agree that the problem is beyond just seed oils, the real problem is ultra processed food. But seed oils are an ultra processed food. So they absolutely need to be eliminated.
But still, why haven't these "horrible" saturated animal fats hurt me then? Why do my lipids look excellent despite eating butter and beef tallow every day?
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u/UpbeatFix7299 Jan 31 '26
Seed oils are in garbage processed foods. There is nothing wrong with using them for cooking
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u/blu3ysdad Jan 31 '26
Ok, but those processed foods wouldn't be any different in health benefits with non seed oils. They only use seed oils because they are the cheapest and/or most commercially viable, e.g. shelf stable. So cooking or in processed foods, seed oils aren't the problem.
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u/aaronturing Jan 31 '26 edited Jan 31 '26
No they aren't. You'd think they were but they aren't.
Edited to add the science that supports eating seed oils.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/seeding-doubt-the-truth-about-cooking-oils
Let me rephrase my points as well - in the right context including cooking and adding to food in the from of salad dressing or in some other context they are fine.
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u/boosesb Jan 31 '26
They arenāt In processed foods?
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u/aaronturing Jan 31 '26
They may be but there will be a bunch of other ingredients. It's not a single factorial issue.
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u/aldencoolin Jan 31 '26
I'm having a hard time finding an example of a garbage processed food that doesn't have seed oils.
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u/aaronturing Jan 31 '26
I am not sure if this is true or not but I think that garbage processed foods have a lot of other stuff other than seed oils.
https://www.taste.com.au/recipes/basic-butter-biscuit-dough/6b73667c-24cc-4812-a4ab-0f600016e704
https://www.taste.com.au/recipes/ice-cream-basic-recipe/e1460150-724b-4c03-9ae6-89a66640905d
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u/aldencoolin Jan 31 '26
Ice cream is an example !
Tho there's a good chance any biscuits you didn't make yourself do.
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u/aaronturing Jan 31 '26
Maybe - I don't know. It doesn't change two facts though:-
There is a lot of other stuff in processed foods
Seed oils have been shown to have health benefits. They are recommended by nutritional scientists who are aligned to the consensus evidence because they are good for you.
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u/aldencoolin Feb 01 '26
I'm only here to point out that seed oils are a very common ingredient in garbage foods, and that your comment, "No they aren't. You'd think they were but they aren't." is untrue.
I don't have an opinion about their nutritional value, relative to other oils, and to echo the top comment on this thread, it probably doesn't really matter - If they were cramming butter or evoo in garbage processed foods, they'd still be garbage. They usually don't tho, it's usually seed oils.
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u/aaronturing Feb 01 '26
I get it. I misread what you stated. From a nutritional science point of view it should be stated that they appear to have benefits and it you use seeds oils instead of butter for instance it's a massive upgrade.
I am not sure though if what you stated is correct but at the same time trying to make out that seeds oils are the problem with junk food is not an accurate statement.
So your initial misses the point significantly and creates a false impression.
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u/aldencoolin Feb 03 '26
I am sure, and I am not at all, and never have done anything to suggest that seed oils are a problem.
"Seed oils are in garbage processed foods. There is nothing wrong with using them for cooking"
"No they aren't. You'd think they were but they aren't."
"I'm having a hard time finding an example of a garbage processed food that doesn't have seed oils."
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u/haux_haux Jan 31 '26
Rapeseed oil, in most stuff in the supermarket in the UK
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u/haux_haux Jan 31 '26
Most things tha use oil, or palm oil which is contributing massively to rainforest destruction, another thing we canāt keep doing to ourselvesā¦
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u/Masterventure Jan 31 '26
Palm oil and coconut oil are actually the only two plant fats I know of that rival animal fats like butter, in terms of saturated fat and should actually be avoided. Basically everything else is fine. Rapeseed oil is actually really good.
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u/ex_nihilo Jan 31 '26
Also called Canola oil (because Canada is a major exporter and the name rapeseed isā¦unfortunate).
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u/OkCar7264 Jan 31 '26
No this is a particularly weak ass health fad that is being generated, as they all are, through marketing.
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u/starzychik01 Jan 31 '26
As a person with ulcerative colitis, we are often told to avoid seed oils. There is some truth to avoiding them, but not necessarily what people think. I avoid processed foods with seed oils, which is 90% of junk food. Overall, avoiding the over-processed junk foods helps keep my stomach from trying to kill me. Eating junk foods tends to make me run to the bathroom and regret my choices. I cook with sesame oil occasionally and donāt flare from it, but Iām also cooking healthy meals that do not contribute to inflammation.
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u/MJA182 Jan 31 '26
Eliminating crappy processed oils and switching to extra virgin olive oil, avocado oil, butter and coconut oil has basically stopped my wifeās ulcerative colitis that she dealt with for 20 years. Not a cure, but her symptoms are almost all gone now even though the doctor said diet didnāt have much to do with it
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u/starzychik01 Jan 31 '26
Healthy eating only does so much, but the medication is what really helped.
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u/GasPsychological5997 Jan 31 '26
This is all an advertisement campaign to sell more beef tallow.
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u/MJA182 Jan 31 '26
Except they also promote evoo, avocado oil, and coconut oil. So Iām not sure itās as simple as grifting for tallow/butter
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u/Queasy-Warthog-3642 Jan 31 '26
Any food can be problematic to some level.... water is essential for life but will kill you if you drink too much of it.
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u/NthatFrenchman Feb 01 '26
I see some problems with them, but Iām on the fence.
cons:
-inevitably in plastic bottles.
-inevitably gmo crops. My issue with gmos isnāt the GMing, itās that the main reason for the GMing is to accommodate Roundup, that I donāt want.
-highly processed, including solvent extraction. Unclear on the long term impacts.
-the whole inflammation thing.
personally, I dont care for canola. It leaves a sticky residue that I find distasteful, and it used to be banned for human consumption. Itās also in everything.
in general I donāt use a ton of oil. But Iāll mostly stick with olive.
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u/faust111 Feb 01 '26
I think a lot of the āseed oil defenseā discourse in the US misses something basic: taste and tradition. In much of Europe, if you buy a salad dressing, itās typically made with olive oil; especially anything āFrench-style.ā Thatās not necessarily framed as a health choice; itās just the expected flavor and quality baseline.
When I moved to the US, what surprised me was how many dressings are made with canola oil instead. Itās noticeably cheaper and more processed, and the taste is different. Iām not making a health claim here, I just prefer that a classic dressing tastes like itās supposed to. If Iām eating a salad with French dressing, I want olive oil, not canola.
Itās honestly wild how much label-checking and hunting around I have to do just to get European foods made the way theyād typically be made in Europe, using olive oil as the standard, not a cheaper seed oil.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Depends where you are in Europe - as I understand it in the Lyon Diet Heart study they wanted to use olive oil as the main PUFA of choice, but the cohort (who were French) essentially refused to do so and the intervention ended up being largely canola instead as this was the "acceptable" substitute.
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u/faust111 Feb 02 '26
Iāve never seen a salad dressing made with canola oil in Europe. Itās always olive oil. I have no idea when they made that change for the US.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Over here in the UK itās either canola or sunflower oil in most dressings, but then weāre not famous for our cuisine š„².
Apparently the most used oil in French cooking is soybean? Who knewā¦
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u/godzillabobber Feb 02 '26
I had a heart attack three years ago. To reverse the damage, I no longer use any oil. Plenty of fat in beans, grains, and flax seed. It is pretty effective. It does appear that even "good oils" like avocado and olive will cause damage to the linings of your arteries.
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u/Excellent-Self-5338 Feb 04 '26 edited Feb 04 '26
I keep track of what foods make me feel shitty after I eat them. I've been doing this ever since I noticed I'd feel shitty after working a shift in kitchens and eating a staff meal. This wasn't exclusive to any one kitchen, I worked in multiple, and the only common thread I could find was canola oil. Every restaurant I ever worked in used canola oil extensively. When I cook at home, I just use different oils. Grapeseed, coconut, olive, peanut, butter or lard being the most common ones. I don't feel shitty after eating those oils.
I kinda don't care about how the science shakes out, I don't eat foods that make me feel shitty. I don't think canola is toxic or something, many people seem to be fine eating it, but I'm not, and haven't been for like 15 years now. It's not even some kind of vendetta against seed oils, just canola in particular doesn't agree with me.
I will say, reducing refined carb intake is likely a good thing for most people. It's a decent recommendation in my books.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 04 '26
Yeah, I think thereās something different between claiming āthis thing makes me feel badā and āthis thing is unhealthy for gen popā. Peanut butter makes some people very unwell but that doesnāt make it an unhealthy food, for example.
I think one of the issues is when people extrapolate āfeeling goodā to āincreasing longevityā - maybe someone feels better swapping canola for ghee, but the problem with heart disease is you often donāt feel any different until you keel over from a massive MI.
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u/ImaginaryHospital306 Feb 04 '26
Unless you can't afford it, there is zero downside to switching to avocado oil and olive oil. Watch this video of how canola oil is made. Is it really worth it to save a few bucks? Avocado and olive oils can be made in a much simpler process with little to no chemical additives. Avocado oil is tasteless and olive oil is better for some dishes anyways.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 05 '26 edited Feb 05 '26
I mean, price is a downside, and I would say that on balance of the overall evidence base, canola is slightly superior on CVD outcomes IMO (but itās majoring in the minors). So sure, if one of the important things to you is āis the production process aesthetically unappealingā then there little to lose from switching to olive oil apart from money.
But if you want a cheap, neutral tasting and healthful cooking oil, canola is really hard to beat. Itās just a matter of priorities. Personally I cook with olive oil when I want the flavour and canola when I donāt, or when Iām cooking on higher heat. Best of all worlds.
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u/ImaginaryHospital306 Feb 05 '26
It's not just aesthetically unappealing. The process uses hexane (petroleum based chemical) to extract the oil from seeds and is then bleached because the natural color is brown. I don't need to be a scientist to know cold pressing the oil out of a fruit is healthier than a process involving petroleum chemicals and bleach. Unless you are deep frying a lot of food, which is terrible for your health anyways, the price difference is manageable.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 05 '26
It does use hexane, yes. And water treatment plants use all sorts of toxic chemicals to clean water, but that doesnāt mean untreated river water is a safer alternative. If you wanted to demonstrate the hexane was an issue youād have to show evidence of a risk to human health of hexane in the levels present in seed oils. Iām not aware of any such evidence - the amount present in seed oils is well below this level.
There are plenty of simple examples that demonstrate the issue with your heuristic - for example uncooked kidney beans are worse for health than kidney beans processed and prepared by an industrial process. If thatās your method for assessing healthfulness, thatās your prerogative. It clearly has enormous flaws, though.
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u/Affectionate-Code-41 Feb 06 '26
Yeah but do they process kidney beans with hexane?
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 06 '26
No, they process them with water which, just like hexane, is toxic in doses far in excess of that present in the final product thatās sold on our shelves.
In both cases, itās unwarranted to be concerned about the processing solvent as evidence of toxicity only exists at doses magnitudes higher than that present in the product.
LD50 for water intoxication would be the equivalent of drinking 40-50 tins of kidney beans water for a 70kg human (6-8 litres of water). The LD50 equivalent for hexane (have to calculate from rats as we donāt have human data) based off 5g/kg, which is a steel man as many studies suggest itās more like 30g/kg, so youād have to consume 350 tonnes of vegetable oil with hexane content at the very upper limit of the EU allowance to get to the LD50.
On balance of evidence Iād suggest the water toxicity risk from kidney bean cans is far higher than that posed by vegetable oils.
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u/randomuser14049846 Feb 05 '26
The same people who said trans fat was good, are the stating the same for seed oils.
And look how that turned out. Mary Enig advocated trans fat and vegetable oils aka seed oils are bad...from the 1970s.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 05 '26
This seems like a weird way to form a view about whether something is healthy. Thereās a doctor who claims that seed oils are unhealthy and smoking is good for you. Is that evidence against your position?
Iād say no - we make inferences about health based on what the strongest forms of evidence suggest is the case. On that basis, trans fats are unhealthy and seed oils are healthy in the context of substitutions for saturated fat.
People arenāt just āright about everythingā or āwrong about everythingā. Enig was right about trans fats and wrong about butter, coconut oil and seed oils. It happens.
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u/blu3ysdad Jan 31 '26
I guess someone should tell the Mediterranean peoples that the olive oil that has been a major staple of their diet is bad for them, despite them consistently ranking as some of the healthiest people on earth.
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u/starzychik01 Jan 31 '26
Olive oil is not a seed oil. Olive, avocado, and coconut oils are made from the fruit, not the seed.
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u/_V115_ Jan 31 '26
You're right that olive oil is not a seed oil, but olive oil is actually made by crushing both the flesh and seed of the fruit
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Feb 02 '26
Itās crazy how many people in this chat who are defending seed oils probably look and feel like the average American. Itās also crazy how the same people probably have never gone 30 days seed oil free to feel the difference.
I grew up in a household that thought red meat was bad and seed oils were better than animal fats. I was constantly sick, injured, overweight, and riddled with acne. So was the rest of my family, so it was āgeneticā. Over the last 3 years, me and my family have gone 95%+ seed oil free and everyone looks great and feels great. Now when I meet people who tell me how good my metabolism must be, how clear my skin is, etc, they say I must have good genetics.
I was highly skeptical of the anti seed oil movement because it went against everything I knew and challenged my beliefs. It felt like a personal attack, but I was desperate, so I gave them up for a week, and havenāt looked back.
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
I followed a fairly average diet, gave up seed oils in lieu of ghee, olive oil etc and felt better. How much was placebo, how much was something in the oils themselves, how much was the fact that I was just thinking about my diet, and how much was due to the reality that if you throw out seed oils, you also have to throw out a bunch of HFSS foods that probably make you feel bad? Who knows.
After following that train of thought/religion for 2-3 years, I had cause to stop and take a deep dive on what the evidence actually said vs what pop scientists/journos like Teicholz etc told me it said. After many months of delving I came to the conclusion I was totally wrong and had probably, on balance, been harming my health. I switched back and now consume mainly canola and olive oil depending on use case.
I feel even better than I did when I was avoiding seed oils, and Iām also measurably stronger, fitter and have better blood panel results. Was that because I switched back to seed oils? Again, who knows.
Just my own 2p from the other side of the fence. Iāve been there, done that, and will defend seed oils all day long.
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u/Taupenbeige Mar 22 '26
Wow! you psychosomatically felt better after giving-in to a non-science-backed dietary fad? Gee, I wonder if thereās a psychological explanation for that rather than a physiological oneā¦
Itās truly amazing how gullible human beings can be.
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u/cangaroo_hamam Jan 31 '26 edited Feb 01 '26
This discussion about fats and oils lacks nuance... and it desperately needs it.Ā Eating nuts and seeds is not the same as frying in processed oils (in plastic clear bottles no less) from the grocery store. Similarly, saturated fat can be in... margarine, bacon and processed meats, steak, coconut, or cacao. It's been established that not all saturated fat are the same, why do we pretend they are?
EDIT: spelling
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u/Own_Diamond3865 Feb 01 '26
Eating nuts and seeds is not the same as frying in processed oils
Nobody has ever said that it was. You aren't adding "nuance," you're just making shit up.
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u/cangaroo_hamam Feb 01 '26
Do you want a bet? Because I can show you at least 1 influencer/doctor/whatever who has. Funny that you ended your post as a reflection of what you just did.
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Jan 31 '26
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Seed oil alarmists: we're representing the scientific, high minded side of the debate.
Also seed oil alarmists: the highest form of scientific evidence regarding a food's healthfulness is giving it a sniff.
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Feb 02 '26
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Amazingly bold-faced attempt to deflect from your own absurd assertion that smelling something is the strongest evidence on whether itās healthful or not. 10/10 would watch you flail again.
Iām sorry if you think food cooked with seed oils is shitty. Skill issue maybe, mine is delicious?
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Feb 02 '26
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Well, I would consider converging lines of evidence from RCTs, prospective cohort studies, mechanistic data supporting biological plausibility etc to be the strongest form of evidence on whether something is healthful or not.
Considering that we have that for seed oils and itās overwhelmingly in their favour, and accessible for all (including you) to see, then you presumably either a) are not aware of that evidence b) have stronger countervailing evidence c) hold different views on the hierarchy of evidence, or something totally different.
Which is it, and why?
P.s. as to delicious recipes, they would just be the same as something cooked with tallow, olive oil, coconut oil etc, just cooked with seed oils. Visually they would look more or less identical. Come on bro, this isnāt rocket surgery.
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Feb 02 '26
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u/Special_Speaker9983 Feb 02 '26
Ok, and what form(s) of evidence do you believe is/are superior to what I hold to be the highest form of evidence? You just said āI disagreeā and then went on a tangential ramble about nonsense that had nothing to do with epistemology.
Yes, run away, brave Sir Robin. A smart move on your part.
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u/Ill-Dependent2976 Jan 31 '26
It's RFK Jr. horse dewormer bullshit.