Gluten-free - unless you have celiac disease - is definitely a case of social idiocy. The scientist who did the original study that suggested that eating gluten caused various minor ills like stomach upset redid his study, much more rigorously and methodically, and found that the "gluten" effect was nothing more than a placebo effect: people who thought they were eating a gluten-containing diet - whether they actually were or not - reported symptoms; those who believed they were eating a gluten-free diet - whether they were or not - did not report symptoms. He's a true scientist because he was honorable enough to publish the results and explicitly state that the apparent effects were not real.