The Concentration Camp Diet

I have a few thoughts about the good old low-calorie diet for weight loss if you haven’t noticed. In fact, I’ve gotten plenty of heat (no pun intended) for making allusions between what is recommended as a typical “healthy diet,” and the fare that was provided to residents at Nazi concentration camps (please don’t be offended, it is just simply a fact).


This came to a head on the New York Times Health Well blog recently as they released an article about “main course salads,” each of which contained about 200 calories. I went off, saying that a person would have to eat about 7 of those salads per day to get the number of calories fed to concentration camp victims. I even plugged the recipe for one salad into my nutrition software and created a profile under the name: Anne Orexia, based on Ms. Orexia eating that “main course salad” and nothing else 3 times per day (CLICK HERE to see her nutrition numbers).

This was immediately and hotly contested, probably by a bunch of anorexic New York wannabe-models that believe that their diet of organic salad greens from Whole Foods and an occasional radish is healthy. Unfortunately, when taken on the “whole,” one can comprise a much healthier diet without ever having to eat anything besides burgers and pizza assuming it meets the basic energy requirements. There is no diet with insufficient calories that’s less harmful than fast food as far as I know. Still, they believed that concentration camps were a place where people did not receive much food. By today’s Weight Watcher’s standards, they were creeping up to the top of their Points range, and yes, such diets are capable of creating starvation and metabolic ruin. Concentration camps proved that.

So here I highlight the fact that health authors – nearly all of them, from Barry Sears to Dr. Oz and even Sally Fallon (in her weight loss book she dips below 2,000 calories – although very nutritious and NOT as metabolically destructive due to its high-fat and protein content), recommend caloric guidelines very similar to Auschwitz rations. Many health authorities actually recommend eating far less than Auschwitz prisoners were purported to receive. As offended as you might be that I say that, know that it is the truth. We modern, educated humans of the world, in the name of health, are eating concentration camp rations. And it is sick. And when I say sick, I don’t mean sick like a dude doing a 720 on a snowboard. I mean sick like you know, sick. Ill. Twisted. F’ed up.

Here is a report on the diet of Auschwitz prisoners compared to what a normal hardworking person’s diet should consist of calorie-wise (read more at http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/genocide/gcpol10.htm):

“Whereas according to the standards of the Physiological Committee of the Section of Hygiene of the League of Nations a hardworking man ought to receive in 24 hours about 4,800 calories and an average working man more than 3,600 calories, the prisoners at Auschwitz were getting at most from 1302 up to 1744 calories for 24 hours! 1744 calories daily represent a little less than the basic conversion of food into energy of a grown man, or in other words a little less than the amount needed by a man resting in a lying position, covered and motionless. A man who works, nourished in such a way is burning up his own tissues in order to cover the amount of energy expended. This inevitably results in the wasting away of his organism in a manner dangerous to life.


The diet of the prisoners working very hard outside the camp possessed such a calorific value. The prisoners who were working in the camp and whose work was also undoubtedly hard were getting at most 1302 calories for 24 hours, which was much below the amount necessary for the preservation of life when lying in bed.


The above given data explains in full why the prisoners of the Auschwitz concentration camp were dying in masses after a short period of time, and only those who had the chance of getting stolen food, or were getting parcels of food from their families at home, could preserve their life. All the other prisoners were doomed to destruction”.

Exercise more! Eat less! And you too can die in three months if that food is low in animal protein and key vitamins and minerals found in animal foods!

No wonder there are so many health problems, an epidemic of low body temperature, and so many people gravitating to this site to recover from their attempts to be healthy. The modern ideas about health are absurd and destructive, handed out for one reason and one reason alone – the mainstream thinks that eating the appropriate amount of food to satisfy appetite and the requirements of lean tissues causes obesity followed by type 2 diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and more. The mainstream is totally wrong about that scenario. Their logic is wrong, the sequence is wrong, and the guidelines for avoiding it are all wrong.

And to think that people are going on calorie-restricted diets, falling off of them, and blaming themselves for lack of willpower! The thought of it could raise my body temperature to 103 F! (we know the diet can’t do it, but could thoughts of Jenny Craig really stimulate metabolic activity I wonder? Nah, probably just a rush of cortisol and norepinephrine).

I’ve always hated the diet idea and the physical and mental demise that accompanies it, but recently seeing that my blood sugar was dramatically shot downwards eating the “worst diet imaginable” in the presumed opinion of every major public health entity in the world, I have no restraint when it comes to unleashing upon it (my pet dander allergies/asthma has shown remarkable improvement within the last 2 months as well).

Nourishing our bodies is one of the most basic, fundamental, satisfying, and uplifting things that humans do. Overweight people have even more of a desperate hunger within that needs satisfaction, and often a lot of self-loathing for eating that holds potential within it for an avalanche of psychological and emotional liberation. The diet, health, nutrition, and medical authorities have tried to take it away with their good intentions, but 180 is gonna continue to bring it back in a big way with intelligence.

We’re going to once again take the advice of a 7-year old:

To read the original NYTimes post that got me all fired up and make fun of my comments, CLICK HERE.

And in other news, 180 Kitchen is going to see a lot of action this week. I recently did a post and video on Tom Ka Gai – Thai coconut soup, and I’ve got posts coming later on Massaman curry and Baby Back Ribs. So heads up!