Learn English – Using ‘lack thereof’ on a negative to refer to the lack of a positive

expressions

The sentence I'm writing is:

The fitness industry makes a lot of money from misinformation, or the lack thereof.

What I really want to say is:

The fitness industry makes a lot of money from misinformation, or the lack of correct information.

Is there a better way to phrase what I want to say? I feel that using lack thereof on misinformation (the negative) refers to the absence of misinformation (which I actually mean to be present), instead of the absence of correct information (the positive).

Best Answer

You could rephrase the sentence to include the consumer.

The fitness industry makes a lot of money from poorly informed and misinformed consumers.

As stated, your second option suggests that the correct information doesn't exist yet in the universe, which could well be true or what you mean, but it feels like you should pin it on the consumers instead of the state of knowledge about exercise and health. Alternately, if you point is that we just don't know much about exercise, I think you have a great option already.

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