Fake fats make you more unhealthy than you might realize, in my opinion. I’m sure that you have heard the electrifying news about how trans-fats are bad, blah blah blah, and quickly switched back to the weather channel to avoid the next depressing nutrition report. Hang with me. I promise that this will be more entertaining, and certainly more accurate.

Our recent 100-year bad-fat binge is delivering horrible side effects that go way beyond obesity. Three decades of the “low-fat sham” has contributed to our poor state of health by removing healthy fats and replacing them with cheap fat and sugar, all based on compromised research. Great job, experts!

We fall for the same gag time and time again. Here is how it goes: 1. A greedy “entrepreneur” needs to sell their junky byproduct. 2. They hire a bunch of fake TV doctors to say that the product is totally safe (low fat frankenfood, soda pop, diet soda pop, cigarettes — all recommended by fake TV doctors and real celebrities). 3. We believe it, for some reason. 4. We realize that we’ve been hosed and feel dumb. 5. We get mad and want them to pay. 6. They can afford better attorneys — you get the idea.

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It’s the same story with all of the food scams that we have fallen for. Here are only a few examples.

Eggs are bad. The whites are OK. Eggs are good.

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What the heck is cholesterol? Cholesterol is bad. Some cholesterol is OK. Cholesterol is essential for life.

Carbs were always OK. I’m not overeating, I’m carb-loading. Now carbs are bad.

Nuts are good. Nuts are bad. Peanuts are deadly. Peanuts aren’t nuts!

Milk is bad. Milk is good. Warning: This product may or may not have been manufactured in a facility that may or may not have had milk processed or not processed in the same facility, maybe. We can put a warning label on food for milk-contamination but not GMOs? Wow.

Fat makes you fat. Sugar makes you fat. Fat and sugar mixed together makes you fat, but happy.

No wonder people are confused. Stop listening to fake TV-model-celebrity-doctors who are just fronting for the man behind the curtain and listen to your grandma!

Fact: Quality animal fat is essential to human life and has been for a long time. Eliminating it for health reasons is about as health conscious as drinking fake orange juice from a petroleum based container.

Forget about phony research and focus on common sense for a minute.

Here is the fat breakdown:

The vegetable oil industry started in the early 1900s and has been demonizing animal fats to gain market share in the natural spirit of friendly competition. Never in human history have we eaten so much processed, concentrated vegetable oil. (Olive oil, flax seed oil, coconut oil, sesame oil and similar vegetable oils can be easily, minimally and not harmfully processed). Corn, canola, soybean, safflower, sunflower oils have never before in history been eaten in the mass quantities as they have recently thanks to really good marketing and the wonders of science.

Once again it’s the process of processing these oils that makes them particularly unhealthy. They are compressed, heated, solvents and chemicals are added to turn cheap GMO grains into oil so we can eat cheap, low fat, “heart-healthy” snacky-cakes.

This high dose of omega-6 polyunsaturated fats messes up that delicate balance of fatty acids within our cells and makes for a ratio of fats that we have not had to deal with ever in history. The adaptation to this poor ration is obvious as Americans demonstrate inarguably the most deplorable health in history.

We rank 26th for life expectancy — good thing we don’t keep score anymore. Knowing that I came in 26th would hurt my feelings.

Hydrogenated oils like margarine, Crisco and all of your fake butter “spreads” are just as bad. When margarine first came out, it created a major stink for people who had common sense at the time. Butter people protested. However, the companies that started hydrogenated oils just stuck to their guns, kept on marketing, kept paying white coats to say that the stuff was safe and voila, our current state of health.

Fact: Eating good fats does not cause high cholesterol. All human cells need cholesterol. Reducing healthy cholesterol impairs health. Ask anyone who takes statin drugs if they feel better after taking them, even if their bad cholesterol goes down a little. Atherosclerosis and arteriosclerosis are caused by another mechanism — calcium, chlorine and cholesterol imbalance — which for your sake I won’t get into in this article. The latest research, that was not paid for by companies that make billions treating heart disease, has repeatedly concluded that the main function for heart disease is stress.

Good fats:

Always go for the cleanest animal fat you can find. By “cleanest,” I mean naturally raised, naturally fed and properly butchered animals. If you think that it’s corny to be a free-range/organic feed nut, you just enjoy your statin drugs, blood pressure pills, type II diabetes and visits to the clinic and pharmacy. Quality tallow and rendered animal fat from healthy animals is very healthy, tastes great and is very satisfying for a reason. The empty, dissatisfying “fake feeling” from eating fat-free frankenfood exists for the same reason. High quality butter is a fermented health food. Olive oil, coconut oil and avocado oil are healthy, minimally processed vegetable oils that have good ratios of fatty acids. Many nuts offer the same benefits. Just remember not to overdo it on calories — you don’t need as much real food because it actually has energy in it. Don’t eat fat or meat from the diseased and sick animals from our patriotic feed lots from the heartland.

Eat clean, eat local, support your local farmers and drop out of the ‘corporate food games.”

Steve Wells is a personal trainer and co-owner of Midland Fitness. His column appears on Tuesdays.