<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"   Photo: CBS Photo Archive  Everyone&amp;#039;s freaking out over this new study that basically says that multivitamins are ineffective, but the things is, we know this. This isn&amp;#039;t some country-wide tire recall or embarrassing &amp;quot;the yoga pants are see-through!&amp;quot; moment. Back in 2011, The Wall Street Journal mused &amp;quot;Is This The End of Popping Vitamins?&amp;quot; while The New York Times ran &amp;quot;News Keeps Getting Worse for Vitamins&amp;quot; as far back as 2008. It&amp;#039;s an old story. Related: What Vitamins Do You Really Need in Your Eye Cream? So maybe the better question is: Why, in 2013 (almost 2014) is everyone still buying vitamins? Or maybe not everyone, but at least half of the American population, according to CBS. That&amp;#039;s a whole lot of people, and certainly way more than the ones who are told by their doctors to take them for nutrient deficiencies. I blame it on marketing. There&amp;#039;s an aspirational element to popping a multivitamin, and a control one too, sort of like what New York mag argued about slugging down a green juice. Juice gets &amp;quot;its devotees jazzed up, under control, and certain they&amp;#039;re living right,&amp;quot; Vanessa Grigoriadis wrote. I&amp;#039;d bet that&amp;#039;s the mindset these companies rely on: Take this vitamin, and you will be the wizard of health, even if you&amp;#039;re on the Egg McMuffin and Skinny Margarita diet. I get that it&amp;#039;s propaganda, that it&amp;#039;s what everyone does to sell products, but I do think sometimes, it goes too far\u2014especially in the ads that are targeted towards women. Instead of promoting a &amp;quot;take charge of your day!&amp;quot; thing, they can get kinda heavy on the guilt and shame reverse psychology, like with this ad:      If you can&amp;#039;t watch it at work or in the Starbucks line or wherever you are, here&amp;#039;s a plot recap: Basically, if you&amp;#039;re a mother and you don&amp;#039;t take your multivitamin, your kid will fall off the jungle gym and it will be all your fault. It&amp;#039;s a cheap ploy to scare an anxious mother into adding one more thing to her shopping list, and it&amp;#039;s offensive. So too are the ads designed to make us feel like we&amp;#039;ll be more beautiful if we take our multivitamins. Health is beauty, yes, and Nicole Kidman is wonderful in all ways, but I&amp;#039;d like to see someone who emanates health on less of a superficial level hawk me vitamins instead. Like an Olympic athlete, perhaps.      Until the message changes, and maybe I could hear some scientific proof that these things work instead of watching Nicole Kidman spin around in pastel short shorts, I won&amp;#039;t be buying multivitamins. But you know what? Thanks to ads like these, I&amp;#039;m pretty sure other women will, no matter how many studies make waves like this week&amp;#039;s one. More power to those women if they really feel or have noticed it making them healthier, but shame on the vitamin companies if they made them feel like they&amp;#039;re somehow less adequate, less productive, less beautiful if they don&amp;#039;t buy their product. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/beauty/health-fitness/news/a16962/multi-vitamins-dont-work/>