system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5 Why do we bleach our grains and wheat if we know its bad for us?
gpt
Well, we do a ton of things with our food that is bad for us. If it makes it look good, and improves sales, there is an incentive to do it. All neon-colored foods - any candies and many snacks like Cheetos, too - contain artificial colors, and many of those are the same ones used in cosmetics (not all however). Strictly speaking, carcinogenic materials to ingest, but used in a quantity that is deemed safe. (Now we could have a separate conversation about if it is ACTUALLY safe... But that's another story.)

As for bread specifically, bleaching also has a practical purpose. When making bread dough there is a process of gluten-formation that forms proteins that help give bread its distinct, sticky insides. Bleaching assists the formation of gluten compounds (not sure why personally) and, combined with the market's preference for 'white' bread, makes sense to do.