Analysis Of Forks Over Knives

“Forks Over Knives” & How its Bias

Carlie J Niederkorn

Southeast Missouri State University

The documentary I was presented with was Forks over Knives. Its general premise is saying meat is bad, it causes cancer, and that all humans should be on a whole- food plant based diet. They took these people into a 12-week program to switch them over to this diet. My knowledge before watching this film was that meat is good for you, we get plenty of amino acids that we don’t make in our own body. It gives us lots of protein. I did know that red meat is not a good meat to eat all the time. But I never would have thought of cutting meat out of my diet. Lee Fulkerson was the director as well the writer of Forks Over Knives. I feel as though

The emotional feel or atmosphere created by the documentary was just trying to help. You could tell that they want to help people and make sure they are all healthy and can live the right lifestyle. While watching this film I encountered many things I found questionable. I found three claims to be bias/ controversial in this documentary: it uses correlation as causation, they claim someone having health issues can be solved by cutting meat out of their diet, and lastly they only use one study to prove their method, and it is the one that one of the main people in the movie made.

The documentary uses correlation as causation which isn’t true. It stated many times throughout the film that there is a correlation with protein consumption and tumor growth. They use many examples like that within this film. Forks Over Knives (2011), “During the same time the way American ate was changing, again, the number of fast food franchises was exploding as more and more over scheduled Americans began using them as a convenient way to feed themselves and their families. While the fast food revolution was sweeping the nation the rate of cancer deaths in America was continuing to rise.” They don’t state what types

The people they used for the big stories in this film had some sort of health issues already. They picked from ones that had high risks for heart disease or type two diabetes. They didn’t use people who aren’t at a high risk and don’t need to switch their diet. They failed at showing a direct link between how someone’s health is increased from eliminating meat. It only used people whose diets were full of junk food, not just meat. HB (1991), “Canadians are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of nutrition in their long-term health prospects. With this increased awareness, however, has come an abundance of misconceptions including the notion that meat is "bad" for you. In their haste to avoid saturated fat, physicians and the public alike have lost sight of the fact that lean meat in reasonable serving sizes poses no threat to health and is an extremely important source of many nutrients.” We heard plenty of stories of people who were on the verge of getting a heart disease, or had even had a heart attack or two. No one they used was on a normal diet who ate meat. Forks Over Knives (2011), “On my way over I drank these two red bulls, I also had a twelve-ounce coke and another half of a twelve-ounce coke. I haven’t always lived the healthiest life style, and I’ve eaten more than my share of fast food.” But one thing that stood out to me was the people they showed the results