Milk The Perfect Dog Whistle

By Cory Franklin | February 18, 2026

For nearly fifty years, Dr. Arthur Caplan has been the preeminent medical ethicist in the United States. A pioneer in the specialty, he helped popularize the field of medical ethics and has authored authoritative books and articles on diverse topics including organ transplantation, genetics, human experimentation and in vitro fertilization.

He has been honored as one of the 50 most influential people in American health care by Modern Health Care magazine and one of the 100 most influential people in biotechnology by Scientific American magazine.

During his career, especially during the COVID pandemic, he has not shied away from controversial opinions such as mandatory COVID vaccination, the physician’s right not to treat the unvaccinated and revoking the licenses of doctors who opposed vaccination. For patients who refused vaccination, he proposed charging them more for their hospital bills, life insurance and disability insurance.

Though unpopular with some, those opinions did not diminish his reputation. After retiring from his directorship of medical ethics at New York University, he continues to write and lecture as an eminence grise in medical ethics.

However, as his career winds down, Dr. Caplan may have gone off the rails. In a recently penned article in Bioethics Today, he comes down hard on the Federal government campaign to promote drinking whole milk: “Milk drinking is political. Drinking whole white milk has played a big role in racist and far-right thinking…Racism and eugenics, sadly, may be playing a role in the sudden drive to fetishize drinking whole milk. Drinking whole milk is a dog whistle to far right, white nationalists. The campaign to promote whole milk may have many factors behind it, but at a time when eugenics, racism, and white nationalism fuel too much of our political rhetoric, the whole milk campaign must be swallowed with care.”                                                                                                  

That’s right, drinking whole milk is now a dog whistle.

It’s hard to know where to begin. But let’s start with:  This is stupid.  As George Orwell said: “One has to belong to the intelligentsia to believe things like that: no ordinary man could be such a fool.” From the department of “Everything is Racist,” The London Daily Telegraph has catalogued some of the many things that have been branded racist: everything from ballet to geology to libraries to dogs to Jingle Bells to just being nice to other people. Welcome to the club, Milk.

It’s unnecessarily political: There was a time when medical ethics was supposed to be about medicine and ethics, not politics. No longer. This is making a mountain of bias out of a molehill of an eagerness to rally the woke. In fact, Dr. Caplan is sloppy in attempting to assert his progressive bona fides.

During the 1990s, there was a popular ad campaign, “Got Milk?” promoting whole milk. Notorious white supremacists featured in the ads included Michael Jordan, Shaquille O’Neal, Serena and Venus Williams, Rihanna, Demi Lovato and Sara Ramirez.

It’s trivial: Ethicists have many far more serious things to write about instead of a made-up crisis. This medical journal article is basically one step above clickbait. There is more than a whiff of social media and Tik-Tok videos here.

It’s anecdotal selection bias: Dr. Caplan all but admits in the article that he’s been on the lookout for this “trend.” He offers no evidence that most or even many racists/white supremacists truly care whether they’re drinking whole milk or lower-fat varieties.

Are they the only ones who have succumbed to the temptation of the taste of whole milk? Dr. Caplan himself has conceded that he has drunk whole milk because he enjoyed the taste. Have all the other progressives rejected that good taste?

It’s not even good science: For a scientist/ethicist to trash milk is especially puzzling, because whole milk is one of the healthiest foods there is, especially for children. The greater caloric and fat content of whole milk is generally acceptable when consumed in moderation.

Yes, a significant fraction of the populace, especially in minority populations, cannot tolerate whole milk because of lactose allergies (although some lactose intolerant individuals report being able to drink whole milk).  Really now, does that require invoking Mussolini and the Nazis as Dr. Caplan did in his article?

Many years ago, I attended several medical ethics conferences where Dr. Caplan was the keynote speaker. Invariably incisive and articulate, he offered some of the best insights in the field.  In the twilight of his professional life, has it really come to this?  Milk as racist? Of course, now that he has launched his fusillade at white whole milk, the question that demands asking is, “Does this mean we must give up chocolate milk, as well?”

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About the author:

Dr. Cory Franklin

Cory Franklin, physician and writer, is a frequent contributor to johnkassnews.com. Director of Medical Intensive Care at Cook County (Illinois) Hospital for 25 years, before retiring he wrote over 80 medical articles, chapters, abstracts, and correspondences in books and professional journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine and JAMA. In 1999, he was awarded the Shubin-Weil Award, one of only fifty people ever honored as a national role model for the practice and teaching of intensive care medicine. 

Since retirement, Dr. Franklin has been a contributor to the Chicago Tribune op-ed page. His work has been published in the New York Times, New York Post, Washington Post, Chicago Sun-Times and excerpted in the New York Review of Books. Internationally, his work has appeared internationally in Spiked, The Guardian and The Jerusalem Post. For nine years he hosted a weekly audio podcast, Rememberingthepassed, which discusses the obituaries of notable people who have died recently. His 2015 book “Cook County ICU: 30 Years Of Unforgettable Patients and Odd Cases” was a medical history best-seller. In 2024, he co-authored The COVID Diaries: Anatomy of a Contagion As it Happened.

In 1993, he worked as a technical advisor to Harrison Ford and was a role model for the physician character Ford played in the film, The Fugitive.

Comments 35

  1. Has always amazed me that these so called intellectuals are always out to literally destroy everything, other than their useless and baseless opinions.
    Thanks for the piece. Well done.

    Hey John!!!! Get well soon.

  2. Dr. Caplan is a woke idiot. His legacy is being self-trashed by his wokeness and total disregard of the facts of medical research. Only an idiot would write such drivel. Should we tell our friends over the pond to rename the White Cliffs of Dover (and repaint them in rainbow colors) because the cliffs are racist? What a jerk.

  6. As Michael Savage would quip, “Liberalism is a mental disorder.” I am pure Celtic white, I drink whole white milk, I am unvaccinated, and I love the smell of napalm in the morning.
    What is a woman and can men have babies?

  8. Dr Franklin, thanks for the morning laugh.
    As a veterinarian, there is nothing racist about milking cows or drinking milk. It is a much better alternative to high sugar drinks or those loaded with artificial sweeteners. It actually has nutritious value. Obesity was almost nonexistent when I was a kid and we all drank milk. That’s not the case now. The woke know no bounds.

  9. Great column doc. All I drank was whole milk or water as a kid until kool aid arrived. But that was a treat.

    I never knew how ugly my consumption was and I even learned how to squirt it fresh from the cow into my mouth at a local dairy farm up in Delavan. Yikes. Mainlining. Who knew.

  10. Damn.

    My cats are racist.

    They line up by the milk stand every day, waiting for the goat to hop on the stand, and for me to shoot milk into their open mouths.

    But… they can’t be racist. None of them are white.

  13. I’ll take milk any day over the processed vitamin waters, energy drinks, etc. marketed towards myself and my children. Also, don’t just call something “bad” without taking a position on better alternatives to the self-proclaimed “bad”. Embarking on an “anti-milk” crusade and calling milk racist is juvenile at best.

    Disclosure: I grew up spending Summers at my grandparents dairy farm.

  17. Internet search finds in the USA, “3.5% of dairy farmers are Black or African American.” Solid proof Blacks are racists. I’m so smart, I’m going to write a paper on this.

  18. It seems that there are clowns in every field. I think HHS is one of the few areas Trump has brought transparency to. I am heartened by the fact the Dr Bhatacharia is leading the CDC. I like the new food pyramid. I like how RFK JR. is promoting fruits and veggies and urging people to stay away from processed foods. Also, it is no secret the pharma and big Ag are undermining our national health.

    What I eat or drink, along with what medication I take or vaccine I take are my choice, not anyone else’s. Freedom. Holy shit, you’d think everyone has forgotten the USConstitution! We need a refresher on the Bill of Rights

  19. I’m old enough to remember the “Got Milk?” campaign.
    However, I do *not* remember any mention of *whole* milk. Nor of *skim* milk, or *2%* milk.
    Just plain old *milk*.
    I *do* vaguely remember an occasional “Got Chocolate Milk?” reference, but those were rare.
    Although, on further review of past ads, there are plenty of references to skim/2%/1%/fat free appearing in the (usually small) text of the ad, but you won’t see them (when they exist) unless you actually read it.
    And yes – as a kid in the 50’s-60’s, we grew up on whole milk – both at home, and at school. My siblings and I wouldn’t touch skim or powdered milk – it didn’t taste right then, and it doesn’t taste right now…

  20. Another thought: I wonder if the good Dr. Caplan may have meant *raw* (or unpasteurized) milk instead of *whole* milk? He’d at least be able to present an argument on the merits, but the “rayyyyycisssss” take is still way too hot to handle…

  21. Hello,
    Your cranky Democrat in Florida just made a small donation to Ted Dabrowski for Governor campaign via winred marketing site. You folks in Chicago or suburbs should be mad as heck and willing to take a look at Ted and his amazing doctor wife. I voted twice for Obama with few regrets except we later got old Joe Biden who lied to us about the one term only.So,change is needed and Dabrowski could be the start of it for Springfield and beyond. But,if you have someone better in mind,the primary is approaching and I doubt a superstar QB of DA BEARS wants to change professions just yet. I hope John is healing somewhat and will be back to stab the Supreme Court members who told the President he is wrong on tariffs.

  23. Awesome. I now have the perfect response when I get called a racist because I voted for the Bad Orange Man. I can’t be racist, because I’m lactose intolerant!

  25. Let’s be crystal clear, though…. Dr. Arthur Caplan was on the wrong side of history when it came to general mandatory COVID vaccination, the physician’s right not to treat the unvaccinated, revoking the licenses of doctors who opposed vaccination those vaccinations, and the authoritarian concept of charging those who refused covid vaccines more for their hospital bills, life insurance and disability insurance.

    His views on these were so myopic, so unscientific, and so authoritarian that the only reason they didn’t touch his reputation was that he was provided ample cover by the left and the media.

    His comments on drinking milk are themselves racist in nature. Perhaps he prefers chocolate milk? Strawberry milk?

    This guy is clearly off his rocker and his views and mind should immediately be pushed into the dustbin of history….. he, and people like him, are dividing our country and its people.

  26. Actually the only reason his (Caplan’s) reputation was not torched was that many of his views – particularly regarding Covid vaccination – were either implicitly or explicitly endorsed by the AMA or ACP. This was under the cover of “misinformation.” In fact spreading such “misinformation” regarding vaccines did elicit warnings from the ABIM (American Board of Internal Medicine), ABFM (American Board of Family Medicine), and the ABP (American Board of Pediatrics) threatening adverse consequences. And the Federation of State Medical Boards – states actually issue medical licenses – threatened that several member states (California being one) will revoke medical licensure for spreading “misinformation.” And in the beginning – I can personally attest – “misinformation” included the following: the virus was a lab creation, natural immunity was real and robust, there was significant asymptomatic infection, the mRNA vaccine did not prevent infection and transmission, young kids were at minimal risk of serious disease, pericarditis and myocarditis induced by vaccination is a concern in young adolescent males.

  29. Another idealogue sacrificing what integrity he has remaining isn’t news. Wokeness uber alles.

    It’s completely unsurprising this type of unfounded race baiting comes from a devout leftist.

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