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You are what (they let you) eat

24 comments on You are what (they let you) eat

You are what (they let you) eat
: Jackie is watching a sad British reality show — the debate by MPs trying to natter and nanny their citizens’ diets:

Before falling asleep, I’d been deeply engrossed in a BBC Parliament broadcast of a meeting of the House of Commons health committee. Representatives from Cadbury Schweppes and Pepsi were trying to explain to the MPs why TV advertising of junk food shouldn’t be banned. The MPs quite frankly didn’t seem to get it, with one (whose name I forget) saying with no small amount of awe in his voice, “The more effective your advertising, the more crisps and chocolate bars you’ll sell!” No sugar, Sherlock.

The concept of personal choice seems foreign to this lot, and the idea that the government should perhaps not be in the business of trying to save people from every possible bad choice they are now free to make — right down to an ill-advised packet of crisps, piece of shortbread or can of fizzy drink — seems not to have occurred to them. Or if it has, they’ve dismissed it and carried on with the desperate urge to nanny.

24 responses to “You are what (they let you) eat”

  1. anne.elk Avatar
    anne.elk

    Agreed. How ya feel about cigarettes and marijuana?

  2. Jeff Jarvis Avatar
    Jeff Jarvis

    Anne:
    Cigarettes are innately harmful and serve no possible healthful purpose.
    Potato chips are not innately harmful; they are harmful only if the consumer consumes too many, thus putting that risk in the consumer’s hands.
    I favor banning or over-regulating cigarettes (and ending all agricultural subsidies for them).
    I favor leaving us all to our own devices regarding what we eat.

  3. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    You forgot to mention the relative merits of hash brownies (innocent stare).

  4. anne.elk Avatar
    anne.elk

    If I understand the post though, no one is suggesting banning potato chips, just banning advertising for potato chips. And while I am not sure of this, I don’t believe the British have anything similar to a first amendment (please correct me…., but if not, w00t for US(a)!)
    I was at an Albertsons yesterday, and with no news or advertising of the event whatsoever, watched dozens of consumers fill their baskets with Christmas Candy on sale for $0.50 a box. One couple bought $45.00 worth of candy for less than $5.00. I doubt that banning potato chips ads would have much of an effect on potato chip sales.
    Regardless, too nice a day to spend indoors, as soon as the brownies finish, time to ingest them, then head to the liquor store for some chips.

  5. hugh macleod Avatar
    hugh macleod

    OK Yanks, for the last time: EUROPE IS MORE AUTOCRATIC THAN AMERICA. If the elite classes think potato chip ads are bad for common muck like you and me, well then, too bad, we’re just going to have to do without such wonderful infotainment.
    Thank you, New Labour, for knowing what’s best for me and my kin!

  6. Jeremy Avatar
    Jeremy

    No, everyone in Europe is just a marxist. So they feel that people have no personal choice in anything, everything is the result of society

  7. Leslie Avatar
    Leslie

    If the government is paying the costs (ie medical care bills) for the results of junk food, then the government will probably quite naturally feel a need to do whatever it can to control those costs.

  8. lk Avatar
    lk

    Leslie – good point, a person’s right to an unhealthy lifestyle ends at my wallet. Until there is a way for the fat f***s to pay for their sloth, it is fine if a few ads bite the dust. I am not ready to wave the Constitution around like this is the end of the US as we know it.

  9. hugh macleod Avatar
    hugh macleod

    The government is not paying for the health care. The taxpayer is. The government knows how to spend money, not to make it.

  10. Angie Schultz Avatar
    Angie Schultz

    Right on, lk! I say we ban anything that might possibly lead to someone, somewhere, being treated at taxpayer expense. That means:
    No sports. Ever. Anywhere.
    No alcohol.
    No OTC medications—everything has to have a prescription.
    No private transportation. The government can drive better than you can.
    But why think small? We should prohibit unlicensed breeding.
    That last is my favorite, and I can’t wait until it’s implemented. There’ll be means tests—no more childhood hunger. Psychological tests—no more child abuse. Genetic tests—so costly diseases will be removed from the gene pool. AND, since abuse and neglect and disease cause lifelong problems, removing them (because the government will know best, remember?) will eliminate all kinds of anti-social behavior. Just think! It may mean the end of crime and wars and frowny faces, forever!
    Oh, there’ll be carnage. But it’ll be worth it, you’ll see.

  11. John Anderson Avatar
    John Anderson

    Banning adverts for potato chips (crisps?) won’t do a thing except allow more profit for the makers: Hershey’s did quite well without any advertising until Nestl

  12. lk Avatar
    lk

    Angie – come on. My comment was about the fat f**ks that eat like there is no tomorrow. But then there is a tomorrow, and next year, etc., then they have type 2 diabetes and we/I/taxpayers pay for it. Let them pay for there own bad habits. Let the helmetless bikers also pay for their own. No, i do not know how it works, I just want someone on the national stage to take to task the lazy buttheads that exhibit this behavior. And that goes for everyone reading this crappy comment – where do you stand personally in the fitness scale. BMI’s going up, medical expense is correlated to it. So if you have a large BMI, pay more.

  13. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    I’d like to see you say this should you become a fat f**k with type 2 diabetes. Or — gee, I hope your metabolism never slows to a crawl due to genetics and/or old age.

  14. Angie Schultz Avatar
    Angie Schultz

    I’m sorry lk, I don’t see your point. People have children irresponsibly. In fact, my experience is that most children are born to parents who have not thought overhard about it beforehand. This causes no end of misery, from difficult pregnancies to babies born with AIDS and crack addictions, to the problems I outlined above.
    Compared to that, obesity is penny-ante stuff.
    Surely this is just the logical conclusion to what you suggest.

  15. lk Avatar
    lk

    Angie. Nope, I am stopping at obesity and behaviors that lead to health problems (smoking, drug use and alcohol). No slippery slope here. I am not smart enough to get to any logical conclusions. Leaping to conclusions can cause injuries.

  16. kate Avatar
    kate

    Angie,
    Don’t ban any of that stuff. Just stop using taxpayer money to finance the cleanup.
    lk said it: “a person’s right to an unhealthy lifestyle ends at my wallet.”

  17. Angie Schultz Avatar
    Angie Schultz

    Kate—yes, that would be a logical alternative, but I don’t think that’s what lk meant.
    I used to know a fellow who was very enthusiastic about Hillary Clinton’s health care plan. One of the major side benefits, as he saw it, is that then he could coerce (by proxy) people into healthy lifestyles. It just offended him that some people didn’t exercise; it offended him whether or not he had to pay for it. He was very excited that national health care would allow him to punish those sinners against the “health” god. I think this is lk’s view, as well.
    But seriously, I don’t think it’s realistic to believe that there will come a day when there is no—none, nada, bupkis—taxpayer-funded social net. If we do have one, we can either accept that there’ll be a certain amount of self-inflicted wounds, so to speak, or we can spend a huge chunk of the allotment trying to keep the “undeserving” out of the program.

  18. lk Avatar
    lk

    I do not want to punish sloth thru a health God. I resent that the US had developed the A number one health care system in the world, and too much of the resources are used on those that chose a lifestyle that created their health problems. I do not favor withholding services to them, but I want them to hurt at the pocketbook. If they happen to shape up, so be it, but I want them to really hurt financially (and quit bellyaching when medicine cannot cure them).

  19. lk Avatar
    lk

    The bigger question is how “they” pay for their life style. I have no answer. Tax on some items may be the way. I can’t see health insurance making a difference in payments based on a person’s life style.

  20. Andy Freeman Avatar
    Andy Freeman

    > I can’t see health insurance making a difference in payments based on a person’s life style.
    Life insurance does.
    No “universal” health program will make the distinctions that lk wants for the simple reason that he doesn’t have the votes.

  21. lk Avatar
    lk

    I know life insurance makes premium differences based on life style, but I am not sure if the health insurance industry could also do this. I don’t think they want to become the “healthy life style” police. Rather, the answer appears to be taxes. Someone smarter than me will have to figure that one out. I would pay a lot more for my alcohol and junk food.

  22. JorgXMcKie Avatar
    JorgXMcKie

    lk, first check out how much of the health care dollar is spent in last month of someone’s life. Last time I looked, it was around 80%. These are mostly the sick elderly, those who have been kept alive for years in the face of very debilitating diseases, and very young babies (mostly premies) with extreme health/genetic problems. Healthier lifestyles don’t figure much here. The amount of the 80% that is diet driven is much lower than you would apparently suspect.
    On the other hand, many lifestyle choices do, indeed, affect the price of health insurance. For instance, I would back a bill that would let insurers off the hook for people who don’t wear seatbelts (I do) or motorcycle helmets (I don’t) and require that they either buy specific coverage (that would be expensive) or carry proof of ability to pay before being transported to the hospital.

  23. Andy Freeman Avatar
    Andy Freeman

    > motorcycle helmets
    Folks who don’t wear helmets are actually a social good because hey supply a huge fraction of the organs and they’re usually young enough that said organs are in reasonable shape. The folks who wear helmets tend to live, but fixing them is expensive.

  24. Andy Freeman Avatar
    Andy Freeman

    > I don’t think they want to become the “healthy life style” police.
    Absent regulation, they’re going to price discriminate as accurately as possible.
    I note that lk hasn’t mentioned the other side of the coin. If he really thinks that certain habits are life-shortening, then he should be willing to let those folks opt out of certain programs that they’ll never use, such as social security.