Ever since I was little, my mom has tried every diet out there. Whole thirty, weight watchers.. 80/20…keto… The list goes on, and on, and on. However probably the worst of all her diets is the new idea of the “juice cleanse detox”. Yeah, because all I want to do is sip blended veggies all day. However, diet culture knows we will do anything-including sipping exotic green juices, to attain the perfect but unattainable body. Diet Culture purposely feeds off the media-made insecurity, as the dieting world is a multi-million dollar business. Hiring famous celebrities and influencers to express their dieting views for an expensive yet unreachable figure. One example of this is an episode of doctor Ozs, featuring the juice cleanse diet. Dr. Oz proceeds to show a man named Joe Cross, who previously weighed 310 pounds, claiming he lost over 80 pounds solely sipping blended fruits and veggies- no solid foods, for 2 months. Today we will be disproving Cross’s claims of how this “miracle diet”, cleansed his gut and intestines, transformed his health and wellness, and made him lose all his weight by fastening his metabolism.  

Claim 1: “Juice Cleansing Can Transform Your Health in One Weekend (1:02)”

In the video, Cross states this diet absolutely transformed his health and wellness, advertising it can do the same for you. This is not an uncommon phrase as many celebrities like actress Salma Hayek, in interviews like one with PopSugar states nearly the same phrase: “Cleansing is like my meditation, doing the detox helps me commit to my health and hit the reset button”. However, Hayek partnered with popular dieting brands and created her own Juice Cleanse company. This idea that your “health can be transformed” is what fuels the diet culture. Studies from  Harvard Health Publishing, showing how the “wales of juicers in the United States climbed 71%,  raising $215 million in 2012 from the previous year.” This is a very harmful statistic as juicing if not done correctly can have serious negative medical effects. Sharon Horesh Bergquist, a well-known dietitian, in her interview with Explore Health shares that juicing can create great harms on the body such as “diarrhea, fatigue, dehydration, and irritability (Bergquist.)” On top of that, Harvard Medical Journal shares that currently “No published research supports the safety or efficacy of juice cleanses or fasts”. So if dozens of doctors and medical professionals don’t advise this diet to the general public, what are the chances it truly is “healthy” for us?

Expert 1: Joe Cross; Film Maker/ Health Influencer

 But let’s take a step back, who is this Joe Cross anyway? Why is he advising the public to take on a liquid-only diet that doctors continuously disprove? Well, Joe Cross isn’t only featured on the infamous “Doctor Oz ” show but is known globally for his new “lifestyle” change. In 2010, Cross created and produced a documentary called “Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead”, featuring the transformation of his health throughout his 60-day liquid cleanse. This as you would imagine created a lot of traction within the media, and has reached over 30 million people worldwide. However, before Cross, this blending fruits and vegetable diet only was not well known, and barely existed. Some go as far as calling Joe Cross the “Juice Daddy”, saying he was the creator of this diet. Cross thoroughly enjoyed his newfound fame, and created a brand for himself, appealing to people’s emotions showing his journey and solely the success of those who have tried it. He used his brand instead of helping people escape the trap of the obesity crisis, but used his fame to gain money for himself. Cross now has a patent on his own books, films, programs and online courses consulting juicing… Cross even patented his very own juice processor called the “Nama Cold Press Juicer-extracting the natural flavors and nutrients”. Still today in 2021, he is selling a 15-day guide book for over $149 dollars, claiming that in only 15-days he can, “Increase your energy levels and overall health, Break the cycle of unhealthy eating, and lose and maintain weight.” These three phrases are constantly and consistently used, to manipulate and take people’s insecurities, for personal profit.  

Claim 2: “My Body and Organs Were Detoxed- My Cells Were Being Fed (5:02)”

Another claim made within this episode is how Joe Cross’s whole body was detoxed, including getting rid of the bad bacteria in his gut, stomach, and intestines.  Now throughout the course of my research, this statement has been proved wrong countless times. Joan Sale Blake- a world-renowned professor at Boston University, Nutritionist, and food chemistry experts in an article with USA Today News expresses how “[T]here is no science to suggest that you need to detox your body. While the idea of magically resetting the body with a juice cleanse is popular, our body can remove toxins and cleanse on its own” (Blake). However this ideology is a well-known fact in the medical field, our bodies can naturally clean up the waste that needs to leave the body. Andy Bellatti, a popular nutritionist from Los Angeles, backs up this idea in an interview with The Insider stating logistically the same thing: “People don’t understand that your body is constantly detoxing. The kidneys and liver are two organs that are in charge of detoxing the body. You don’t need to do anything else in terms of drinking any juice to help the body detox [which deprives] the body of essential nutrients” (Bellatti). Depriving the body of essential nutrients can put our bodies in a slow state of malnutrition. Johns Hopkins Hospital states that prolonged malnutrition “deprives[s] [the body] of vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients it needs to maintain healthy tissues and organ function.” This can cause health effects like organ failure, stunted growth, and diabetes. Ironic how a diet promoted to be “so healthy” for you, has a high possibility of seriously injuring or killing you.

Expert 2: Doctor Oz; Television Show Host With a Ph.D. in Doctors Medicine

However Joe Cross isn’t the only one advertising this diet,  Mehmet Cengiz Öz or better known as “Doctor Oz”, hosted Cross in an interview. Doctor Oz is a popular Turkish American doctor, author, educator, and television host. Throughout the course of his television career, Oz has hosted a variety of segments promoting popular (but unhealthy and unsustainable) diets. 

Author Kavin Senapathy founder at Forbess inc. quotes the “doctors” constant “promotion of evidence-scarce health and diet advice” (Senapathy). This can be so harmful as  “the television doctor still maintains a powerful grip on the nation”. However, Dr. Oz (and his production team) know what they’re doing and have a strategy. His target audience is one that is prayed on by the media and diet culture daily: Dr. Oz continues earning applause and charming millions of women in the age 25 to 54 demographic every day. Its strategy is building off young people’s insecurities- for a profit. This is shown in the juice cleanse operation as Dr. Oz shows a heart story of someone who lost a lot of weight and shows the positive aspects of their journey, influencing and engaging his audience. At the end of the segment, Dr. Oz reveals this is a paid adship with Joe Cross’s juice cleansing corporation and encourages his audience to buy Crosses’ 3-day life and weight transformation guide. Dr. Oz paired with (and continues to pair with) dieting and weight loss corporations (for a large personal profit) because he knows he has the target audience for those corporations to flourish. 

Claim 3: “Juice Cleansing was my saving grace- the reason I lost over 80 pounds” (3:24) 

Lastly, and one of the most eye-capturing claims made- was Cross’s claim of his extensive weight loss. Cross lost over 80 pounds and transformed the overall outwards appearance of his body. Cross also claims this process happened as his metabolism was fastened. Sharon Horesh Bergquist, MD, assistant professor of medicine at the Emory School of Medicine, In an interview with Spoon University shares the opposite of this logic: “ though juice cleanses limit your caloric intake by design, that doesn’t make them healthy or even weight loss-promoting. Without adequate protein and calorie intake, your body may switch to breaking down muscle for energy”(Bergquist). Of course, weight loss will occur, as you are drastically cutting your previous calories by simply eating no food. Over time, that can slow your metabolism.” However the weight loss is not actually the loss of fat, it would be an immediate loss of water weight. Athena Levi- a dietician in Exploring Health shares how “the main problem with “detoxes,” though, is the fact that they’re meant to be quick fixes, which usually means they’re unsustainable in the long term” (Levi). Ultimately, juice cleanses will promote a quick fix to weight loss, as you are simply going into a deep caloric deficit, but this action is often unsustainable and unhealthy for those who do it. 

Conclusion: 

In conclusion, though this diet did help Joe Cross’s life, dozens of dietitians and medical professionals advise against it.  Stating the same phrase- that this diet doesn’t have enough research to know the benefits or the lasting negative effects. This diet has created claims that are very misleading and false, which can ultimately cause serious long-term mental and physical harm. Diet culture is the one to blame, making people believe their insecurities aren’t valid, blindly leading millions of people to try weird and unusual diets (like juice cleansing). These diets can not only affect you physically, but mentally, as over creating a greater risk of eating disorders, depression, and even suicide. In the end, from personal experience, I can tell you, taking pride in who you are, and what you look like, is worth far more than constantly slaving your life away to attain the “perfect figure”. Save the green juice, and go smile in the mirror.

Featured image by Derrick Brutel via Flicker