Gluten is a protein; to most people this will come as a letter of good news. Proteins are the building blocks of life, sent through the Golgi apparatus and the endoplasmic reticulum to become nutrients or cells or whatever they need to be.

Though not all proteins are created equally, some are going to be much more pure. Whey protein for example is a very pure form extracted from milk and dairy products, not to be confused with wheat protein.

Wheat protein would contain a lot of gluten. Now that is not a bad thing, unless you are among the slight percentage of people with gluten intolerance.

This is like being lactose intolerant, but with gluten. Your body will just lack the enzymes necessary to properly break down the gooey gluten as it passes through your intestinal tracts.

Sounds awful because it is, this is going to cause the stomach to bloat, indigestion, and even abdominal pains, so if you experience these symptoms after eating pizza, bread, bread sticks on the side of pizza, sandwiches, doughnuts, bagels, cereal, basically anything with flour then you can probably assume that you may have a gluten intolerance. Most the time people with gluten intolerance also have lactose intolerance, so if you have one check yourself for the other.

People have been eating gluten for years, so why is it only recently that people have become so gung-ho to get rid of this stuff? Well according to Dr. MDK from answers, it is a powerful autoantibody which causes the body's autoimmune system to react.

Now if you are not a PhD in health and nutrition or biology then you probably won't understand all the autoantibody and autoimmune jargon, but Dr. MDK goes on to talk about the close correlation between this and celiac, a disease that is leads to diabetes. He speculates that gluten may be a contributing factor to the excessive number of diabetics in today's society.

Many diabetics have to be extremely careful about what they eat because their insulin is constantly on the fritz and could at any time be too low or too high. These people were either born with a bad pancreas or they shot it to death through autoimmune functions, like the kind that are activated by eating gluten.

Grains are the base of the food pyramid so there has got to be something good about them. Well they are essential for energy and proteins, but you have got to get your other nutrients as well to counteract and reinforce the body from the inside out.

Anything in excess is going to be harmful. Cereal every day for breakfast may not be the healthiest choice, try opting it for some eggs and yogurt instead.