Well.., I guess the thing here is to define "Safe to eat" because many of my family members and friends "DO NOT" find it safe to eat.
Including nausea, stomach cramping and diarrhea and sometimes vomiting.

1). Is MSG the same as salt?

No. MSG is made from water, sodium and glutamate. Table salt is made from sodium and chloride.

2). Is MSG safe to eat?

Yes. According to Health Canada, MSG is not a health hazard.

BUT some people may have a sensitivity to MSG. It is the glutamate part of MSG that can produce symptoms such as:

Blurred vision
Tingling and/or burning sensation
Chills and shakes
Feeling of pressure on the face
Headache
Increased heartbeat
Nausea and vomiting
Pain in the face, back, neck or chest

These common symptoms of MSG sensitivity are generally temporary and can appear about 20 minutes after eating MSG and last for about two hours. The symptoms seem to happen faster and are more severe if you eat MSG-containing foods on an empty stomach or drink alcohol at the same time.
http://www.eatrightontario.ca/en/Articles/Food-allergies-intolerances/The-Truth-about-MSG.aspx#.U_wvE4JFcqU

Hmmm, foods with MSG gives me head aches and makes me constipated. Foods without MSG doesn't make me sick. Go figure!

Anecdotal story is anecdotal

Weird how most people swear that they get sick from the MSG in Chinese food, and yet seem perfectly fine with chips, almost every fast food chain, store bought salad dressings, soups, and on and on. It's funny how MSG only seems to make you sick when you know it's there.

"perfectly safe for the vast majority of people" - What about the other people? Screw them, they're just the stupid minority, right? This video debunks NOTHING. I'd like to see this prick get the headaches I used to get after eating Chinese food from a particular place. I'm sure he'd be real gung-ho about MSG then.

Are you trying to be funny?

No, I didn't miss the sarcasm tag. Did you?

Ok, I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, but you seem to be serious, so...

You're wrong.

The video debunks exactly what it says it does, the myth that MSG is bad for you, when in fact, it's in all kinds of food.

You got headaches after eating Chinese food from one restaurant; do you know what that means? Absolutely nothing. Your anecdote is completely and utterly irrelevant, unless you've never eaten any other food with MSG in it (like any of the list @Sarzy mentioned).

And yeah, "perfectly safe for the vast majority of people" is a completely acceptable standard. You can pick pretty much any food on the planet and a small number of people will get sick or even die from eating it. But it's "perfectly safe for the vast majority of people". Otherwise, we'd have to ban peanuts, shellfish, gluten, dairy, eggs, soy, garlic, meat... need I go on?

If eating at one Chinese restaurant gives you headaches.... don't eat there.
But don't blame it on some mythical MSG boogie man that was basically drummed up out of xenophobia.

Right, so it must've been a total coincidence that when I asked them not to use MSG, I was fine? Time and time again. But if I ever forgot, I was screwed. I'm sure it was all in my head, though.

The fact is, MSG is harmful to some people. That is the scientific consensus according to this video description and content. The whole video is based on the false premise that people who are sensitive to MSG somehow claim that it's bad for everyone, and those deluded MSG haters need to be set straight. It's ridiculous.

Sorry, you're right. Your one anecdote outweighs the thousands of man hours of research put into this. Tell me, does this restaurant not use soy sauce?

Yes, MSG is harmful to a small number of people ... if taken in large doses on an empty stomach, i.e. like pretty much every foodstuff out there.

And I don't know where you got the idea that the video claims that "deluded MSG haters need to be set straight". It simply states that the prevailing myth about MSG has no basis in fact, much like the other current fad, the gluten free diet

*related=http://videosift.com/video/You-Probably-Dont-Need-to-Be-on-that-Gluten-free-Diet

And meh, you got a headache... so what? People actually die from peanut and shellfish allergies, but most people still eat them. I'm not really sure what your point is, other than to raise a meaningless anecdote about a restaurant that gives you headaches, but for some reason you still go back to.

You Probably Don't Need to Be on that Gluten-free Diet has been added as a related post - related requested by ChaosEngine.

How easy you must find it to criticize and dismiss when you're not the one who has suffered. Do you think people who are sensitive to MSG want to be like that? They want to hate on MSG just for the hell of it? Make stuff up? Revel in their ignorance?

I went to this particular restaurant because it was a family tradition and I had little choice in the matter. I went through years of suffering before I had ever heard of MSG. One day I read somewhere about Chinese restaurants and MSG and from that day on, my suffering was at an end. That may not mean anything to you, but it made a difference in my life. So dismiss it as an anecdote all you want. But you'll never convince me or anyone else who went through this experience. Be thankful you never had to.

True story: I once got tear gassed in Paris. I was in a taxi going down a narrow lane. The woman driving in front of us stopped to go into a bakery blocking traffic. When she came back out the taxi driver called her something unspeakable in French. She threw a canister at us and for the next 10 minutes I couldn't see and I could barely breathe.

Because of this, Paris is an awful place and I've never been back. That may not mean anything to you, but it made a difference in my life. So dismiss it as an anecdote all you want. But you'll never convince me or anyone else who went through this experience. Be thankful you never had to.

Wow, you have opened my eyes with this dead-on comparison of anecdotes. Well done sir, I salute your superior intellect and concede defeat. Please continue to set the record straight for all those poor fools out there like me.

No problem. Correcting fools is what I do.

Understanding why so much anecdotal evidence exists is certainly worthwhile! The following link cites many studies on double blind tests for MSG sensitivity.

http://www.businessinsider.com/msg-allergy-doesnt-exist-2013-8

Glutamatic acid (which is what MSG turns into after solubilizing in water, along with a sodium ion) is one of the 20 amino acids that is the basis for all proteins and life, since the beginning of life on earth. It is in relatively high concentration in every cell of your body. Consuming MSG would be akin to consuming 'protein' in your diet, and is commonly labeled as protein in food labeling: http://www.truthinlabeling.org/hiddensources.html

Consuming too much protein in your diet can cause problems, but you need to be eating it to a relatively obvious excess (a gallon of milk per day). Weightlifters who protein supplement far too much quickly experience heart problems.

The business insider link suggests that there are some people who could potentially be sensitive to Glutamate, and be activating the vagus nerve in the stomach...though it seems to be speculative in that article.

The idea that another ingredient is causing the problem is far more likely. Americanized chinese restaurants all taste the same, because all of their food comes from the same place. A group in China has monopolized the american chinese restaurant market, and provides food and resources at unbeatably low prices. To remain competitive, almost all american chinese restaurants invariably purchase from this group. Given China's track record of putting all kinds of crazy stuff in their produce, it seems entirely likely that some ingredient other than MSG is a much more likely culprit.

I know a couple of people in particular who have reacted extremely badly to chinese restaurants in america, and even went to the emergency room for it. Given the details of their story (a mystery glob of black sauce that they ate from the black sauce egg tray), I could only imagine what kind of horrible things they could have ingested other than MSG. 'Chinese restaurant syndrome' may indeed be a relatively accurate term for what people are experiencing.