Capitol Hill staffers gathered Monday to hear about the benefits of a plant-based diet also heard about the potential fallout of unhealthy eating.
“The average child is drinking over 50 gallons of soda pop a year… and every time you eat or you drink sugar it destroys B vitamins… which are for brain function,” vegan celebrity trainer John Pierre told staffers as they munched on a spread of kale chips, grape leaves and vegan cupcakes in the Capitol Visitor Center. “Now you couple that with violent video games, pornography, violent cartoons, violent music. And then is it any wonder that children are going berserk? And going into schools and shooting one another?”
In December, 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot 20 children and six adults at a school in Newtown, Conn.
“We’re breeding it into them. It’s impossible not to,” said Pierre.
Pierre, who trains talk show host Ellen DeGeneres, told staffers that certain laws needed to be changed but that they could start by looking at their own diets — and making plants a big part of them. Staffers from the offices of the House Democratic Caucus, Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., and Rep. Marcia Fudge, D-Ohio, were in attendance.
The lunch was hosted by a newly formed Congressional Vegetarian Caucus and the vegan nonprofit the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.