>> Hostess Twinkees, Hohos, Ring Dings, etc. are all very good examples of plant-based food.
>Sure, but that's not what people are talking about when they refer to plants in the context of health and nutrition.
Citation needed.
Specifically, this definition[0] disagrees with your opinion, allowing "higly processed foods" and "refined sweeteners" in a plant-based diet (necessittating a newly-invented acronym WFPB[1], meaning "whole-food plant-based"). They helpfully included a lollipop pictogram to get the point across.
"Plant-based" is a useless noise-word that should not be used at all, especially when you do have something concrete in mind. And if you don't, it's better not to speak, and figure out what you mean first.
We already have words like vegetarian and vegan that, while not scientifically precise, allow for a decent amount of understanding of what a person eats when they say they follow a vegetarian or a vegan diet.
Plant-based communicates no such thing. All "plant-based" diet definitions seem to generally involve eating less meat, without specifying less than what. The phrase "plant based" is as vapid as "more healthy" when provided without further elaboration.
This[2] defintion of "plant-based", for example, puts Mediterranean diet as an example; this effectively prescribes eating fish and poultry[3]. The same source[3] says the Japenese diet is similar (and is, therefore, also plant-based). The parent comment juxtaposed these two diets to "plant-based" ones, because their best guess as to what "plant-based" means did not include "heavy on poultry and fish".
Nobody seems to be able to say what exactly isn't a plant-based diet. Example [4]:
>Whole30, a popular diet and lifestyle plan, doesn’t usually qualify. “The Whole30 diet traditionally is heavier on animal proteins, though it is possible to follow this diet in a plant-based way,” Manaker says.
I'm guessing that subsisting exclusively on beef steak is not a plant-based diet, but perhaps, too, that can be followed in a plant-based way somehow.
When a diet described as plant-based requires you to "enjoy" fish and poultry weekly, we are firmly in the territory outlined in Orwell's brilliant essay "Politics and the English language"[5], which correctly observed (and predicted) the proliferation of meaningless buzz-words like "plant-based" (and corresponding acronyms), as well as the subsequent atrophy of thought.
"I am trying to less meat than I used to" has an unambiguous meaning.
"I am switching to a plant-based diet" has no meaning, because it communicates precisely zero information.
Please avoid using words and phrases that don't mean anything. For Orwell's sake, if not for ours.
[0] https://www.forksoverknives.com/how-tos/plant-based-primer-b...
[1] https://www.doctorsfornutrition.org/general-public/what-is-w...
[2] https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/what-is-a-plant-based-di...
[3] https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-h...
[4] https://www.everydayhealth.com/diet-nutrition/plant-based-di...
[5] https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...