The Raw Tom Outrage

Tom Watkins is a 15 year old kid from Amsterdam who’s raised on a Raw food vegan diet. Raw foodies eat uncooked, unprocessed organic foods as a large percentage of the diet. The idea is that raw food is healthier than cooked food because it doesn’t destroy nutrients and doesn’t contain as many carcinogens as cooked food. The interest for The Incredible Shrinking Man is also what makes Tom the protagonist in a story of national outrage: because of his diet he might end up 6 to 12 centimeters shorter as an adult than he could be if he would eat dairy and meat like other children.

Considering our obsession with being tall and growth it’s not surprising that most people are appalled by Tom’s modest growth curve. The boy’s mother has been accused of experimenting with the boy’s health. However, she’s probably right in claiming that not she but most other parents are experimenting with allowing their children to eat historically unprecedented large quantities of fat, sugars, and proteins. We’ve long passed the point where tall means healthy. In fact statistically Tom’s 12 cm loss in height translates into a longer average lifespan of 6 years. Short people live longer. And because of Tom’s decreased height during this longer life he will consume considerably less food, need less energy and create less waste. Tom is a pioneer.