6
   

A can of Coke is the new cigarette.....REALLY??!!

 
 
Reply Thu 18 Dec, 2008 07:44 pm
Quote:

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These days, sugary drinks are to American health roughly what tobacco was a generation ago. A tax would shift some consumers, especially kids, to diet drinks or water.

“Soft drinks are linked to diabetes and obesity in the way that tobacco is to lung cancer,” says Barry Popkin, a nutrition specialist at the University of North Carolina and author of the excellent new book, “The World Is Fat.” He warns that the cola industry will spend vast sums fighting the proposed tax.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/18/opinion/18kristof.html?hp

I so love being protected from myself. Is this were we draw the line in the sand in opposition to the authoritarian do-gooders? We let them win the tobacco war out of guilt and shame for what the industry did, but what did Coke Corp ever do wrong to deserve this thrashing? These boobs have no willingness to moderate their crusades....it is time to end them.
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Type: Discussion • Score: 6 • Views: 3,989 • Replies: 33
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shewolfnm
 
  1  
Reply Thu 18 Dec, 2008 07:48 pm
Can i say that I see this as a survival of the fittest and people wont thrash me.. ?


if you choose to drink soda, gain hundreds of pounds and otherwise do things that you know will end your life sooner then it should... uh.. so be it.

The planet is over populated anyway.


but i say that with a grain of salt.

I dont think we should be so regulated personally..
maporsche
 
  2  
Reply Thu 18 Dec, 2008 08:30 pm
@shewolfnm,
Yeah, but they likely won't die before the reach reproductive age...so survival of the fittest wouldn't really apply.
hawkeye10
 
  1  
Reply Thu 18 Dec, 2008 08:56 pm
@maporsche,
if being fit is so great wouldn't the fit be role models for the rest? I don't see where cohesion should be needed to reach to desired goal if the do gooders are right. Also, I want to know where it it was decided that we should have no choice but to lust after a long life, to do everything possible to live long. I am more than happy to trade drinking for a few years of life....for instance. Why should I be punished for doing with my life what the majority does not approve of? Is free will only applicable for societal approved choices?

we are entering a new age of tyranny, only now it is not imposed by a class or a church or by those in power but rather a mass slavishness to an ideology. I swear that it is beginning to feel like I am in some zombie world, only this does not seem to be a nightmare but rather the real thing. Why oh why do so few object to being ordered about by nits?
maporsche
 
  2  
Reply Thu 18 Dec, 2008 09:10 pm
@hawkeye10,
Aren't the fit role models for the rest of us? Isn't this why beautiful people adorn the magazine covers and TV sets of the world?

And I was wondering what cohesion had to do with anything, then I realized you meant coercion and the sentence made a lot more sense.

As far as being punished....I don't think you really are. You're being forced to pay for your bad habits in order to offset the burdens you place on society. Obesity is one of the leading causes of illness in our society. You do not bear the full brunt of your healthcare costs, it is shared by society. This is true weather you're on medicare, welfare, or private health insurance.
hawkeye10
 
  1  
Reply Thu 18 Dec, 2008 09:31 pm
@maporsche,
no, the anti tobacco activists make no secret anymore about what they want...they want tobacco to be illegal and they think that they can get there. They are half way home already, we have laws that make it illegal to smoke in a car, in buildings even if the smoker owns he building, we have never ending lawsuits against the companies...Smokers should pay for the health costs that smoking imposes upon the society, but we are far beyond that.

But tobacco is not food, sugar is food and it is what the zealots are complaining about. We now also have calls for a fat tax on fast food, for instance a Big Mac should be taxed on its 29 grams of fat to make the price higher. But the money will not go to health programs, it will go into a general fund. The aim is to get people to buy fewer of them or to pressure Mcdonalds into making a lower fat product. Hey, we need fat in our diet, and sugar is always going to be in our diet even if we got rid of sugar because our bodies convert carbs into sugar. Sugar is not poison, we should not regulate and tax it is if it were a toxic substance. ditto for fat.
0 Replies
 
hawkeye10
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 12:07 am
Quote:
ALBANY, New York (CNN) -- Like many New Yorkers, I remember a time when nearly everyone smoked. In 1950, Collier's reported that more than three-quarters of adult men smoked. This epidemic had a devastating and long-lasting impact on public health.

Today, we find ourselves in the midst of a new public health epidemic: childhood obesity.

What smoking was to my parents' generation, obesity is to my children's generation. Nearly one out of every four New Yorkers under the age of 18 is obese. In many high-poverty areas, the rate is closer to one out of three.

That is why, in the state budget I presented last Tuesday, I proposed a tax on sugared beverages like soda. Research has demonstrated that soft-drink consumption is one of the main drivers of childhood obesity.

For example, a study by Harvard researchers found that each additional 12-ounce soft drink consumed per day increases the risk of a child becoming obese by 60 percent. For adults, the association is similar.

If we are to succeed in reducing childhood obesity, we must reduce consumption of sugared beverages. That is the purpose of our proposed tax. We estimate that an 18 percent tax will reduce consumption by five percent.

Our tax would apply only to sugared drinks -- including fruit drinks that are less than 70 percent juice -- that are nondiet. The $404 million this tax would raise next year will go toward funding public health programs, including obesity prevention programs, across New York state.

The surgeon general estimates that obesity was associated with 112,000 deaths in the United States every year. Here in New York state, we spend almost $6.1 billion on health care related to adult obesity -- the second-highest level of spending in the nation.

Last year, legitimate concerns about links between consumption of fast food and the prevalence of heart disease prompted New York City to ban the use of trans fats in restaurant food.

No one can deny the urgency of reducing the rate of obesity, including childhood obesity. Obesity causes serious health problems like type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. It puts children at much greater risk for life-threatening conditions such as cardiovascular disease and cancer.

We must never stigmatize children who are overweight or obese. Yet, for the sake of our children's health, we have an obligation to address this crisis. I believe we can ultimately curb the obesity epidemic the same way we curbed smoking: through smart public policy.

In recent decades, anti-smoking campaigns have raised awareness. Smoking bans have been enacted and enforced. And, perhaps most importantly, we have raised the price of cigarettes.

In June, New York state raised the state cigarette tax an additional $1.25. According to the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, this increase alone will prevent more than 243,000 kids from smoking, save more than 37,000 lives and produce more than $5 billion in health care savings.

These taxes may be unpopular, but their benefits are undeniable. Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that, for the first time in generations, fewer than 20 percent of Americans smoked. Lung cancer rates have finally begun to decline. As a result, we are all healthier.

Just as the cigarette tax has helped reduce the number of smokers and smoking-related deaths, a tax on highly caloric, non-nutritional beverages can help reduce the prevalence of obesity.

To address the obesity crisis, we need more than just a surcharge on soda. We need to take junk food out of our schools. We need to encourage our children to exercise more. And we need to increase the availability of healthy food in underserved communities.

But to make serious progress in this effort, we need to reduce the consumption of high-calorie drinks like nondiet soda among children and adults.

I understand that New Yorkers may not like paying a surcharge for their favorite drinks. But surely it's a small price to pay for our children's health.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of David Paterson.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/12/18/paterson.obesity/index.html

next up:
candy tax
fat tax
tax on each restaurant meal over the calorie limit
Fast food tax
regulation of product placement of high sugar high fat foods on menu boards
regulation of product placement of high sugar high fat food in grocery stores
"Caution!" warning on all packaging of high sugar high fat food
ban on advertisement of all high sugar high fat food
ban on all specials involving high sugar high fat food

More rules, laws and taxes to come a soon as the authoritarian do gooders can dream them up.
0 Replies
 
NickFun
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 12:45 am
Bullshit! Most people are fat because they eat too much and don't get enough exercise. And they eat the wrong things. I was at a McDonald's for breakfast a couple of months ago. It actually cost LESS to get hash browns with my coffee and sandwich. I fed the hash browns to the seagulls in the parking lot.
0 Replies
 
aidan
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 02:53 am
Yeah - that's why poor people eat more often at McDonalds (or buy the equivalent processed food products in the supermarket which are filled with salt and sugar and chemicals). These are the same people who might buy 2 liter bottles of soda to fill their baby's bottles with because it's cheaper than milk or even real fruit juice (which isn't good for a child in excess either - but at least it's got some nutritional value when taken in moderation).

I know of a family in which every single one of the four children is morbidly obese and all of them have had all of their front four baby teeth rotted out because they were given this stuff to drink in their bottles- and when I asked the mom why she chose coke - she said- they're always thirsty and it's cheap.

Yeah, you and I know water from the tap is even cheaper and much healthier - but she doesn't drink water so she doesn't figure her kids will like it and once a child gets a taste for sugary drinks - that's pretty much the end of the story as far as water goes.

I care more about the health of our nation's children than I do about being unregulated. I honestly do think they put some addictive **** in these drinks - I know myself, when I get on a roll of a diet coke a day - the next day I want two and the day after that three - the only way I can control my habit (which is caffeine) is to go cold turkey on it...think about how some kid who's been having coke three or four times a day since the age of twelve or eighteen months must feel.

I don't know what the answer is - but I think good, nutritional food should be made more affordable than this other crap...and if that means taxing this junk, I'm all for it.
I know when I was teaching, for treats I'd bring the kids apples - because they never got them at home because fruit was more expensive than pork rinds...and they wouldn't say, 'Next time can you bring me a cookie instead?' They'd say things like, ' Tomorrow can you bring in bananas?' (and I know these things are available in the lunch line - but a)have you ever looked at the quality of the fruit they serve in the lunchline - either not ripe at all or over ripe and bruised - and b) these kids have to uphold their cool status by eating junk like everyone else in line - only the nerds (their words) eat fruit and salad,' (they actually told me this).
0 Replies
 
shewolfnm
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 05:33 am
I agree with you.

I too think it should be almost mandatory for -children- to be given fresh good food. When they are an adult, let them choose what they want.
But.. on the flip side I also see that as a form of control as well.
I mean, just because a person is only 8 or 9 does not mean that they can not make informed consent about food.

I know of the types of parents you speak of. I live in a lower income neighborhood and the vast majority of the kids who live here are fat. And that is because you can feed an entire family on 40 dollars for a week if you choose. But that 40 dollars buys you junk and since that is what they can afford, they have to stretch that 40 as far as they can.

Not but a couple of months ago, we had to do that for a few weeks ourselves and I have not felt that bad in a loooong time. It was disgusting.. to eat that stuff.. and for maybe 15 bucks more, I was able to add fresh food frozen veggies and other good stuff to my bill.

Unfortunately, most people I dont think , are really educated in what is actually GOOD for them.
They see lables on foods like " healthy choice" brands.. and think that is good for them. They see " low fat" and think.. wow.. thats good for me too. Yet these low fat, so called healthy mainstream foods are probably as dangerous and addicting as McShit.
healthy choice for example as a brand, has high fructose corn syrup, red dye, and sometimes MSG. 3 things that are terrible on the human body.. yet they are advertised, packaged and accepted as healthy foods.

I dont know that I would totally agree with taxes on junk, and rules against bullshit foods.. I think a better thing to do is to make what is really in these things more public and raise awareness of what people are eating.
Make your own decision with out the punishment of taxes.... just make sure that people can 'easily' make an informed decision..
I think the contents of these kinds off foods is so easily hidden , renamed and ignored that people really DONT know what they are consuming.
That I think is where the laws and rules should change.
0 Replies
 
shewolfnm
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 05:35 am
@maporsche,
maporsche wrote:

Yeah, but they likely won't die before the reach reproductive age...so survival of the fittest wouldn't really apply.


good point.
I had not thought about that..
0 Replies
 
Mame
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 06:12 am
Before we had such a proliferation of junk food, poor families were able to subsist on regular food. I don't see why it's any different today. It was cheaper to buy cheddar than processed cheese. We drank powdered milk. We ate a lot of stew. Apples, bananas and oranges were 8 lbs for a buck and you could get 5 loaves of brown bread at the bakery for a dollar.

People aren't eating at McD's just because it's cheaper. I think it's because it's available.

When you have soft drink makers lobbying school boards to allow only their vending machines in the schools, you have a problem. We were only able to buy those little milk containers and juices.

I am totally against this kind of regulation. What you need is more education - of the kids - if you want to effect change in a global way. Teach nutrition and health in schools, starting in kindergarten. Kids are more powerful than we give them credit for. If you give your kids a choice between a tasty homemade burger or a McD's, I'd bet they'd choose the homemade one. McD's burgers are tasteless - it's the condiments that make them edible, in my opinion.
dagmaraka
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 06:35 am
well, food is already mass produced and thus regulated - by the producing conglomerates. ...it is NOT an open and free market. therefore, i agree that health of children comes first. just my opinion.
0 Replies
 
maporsche
 
  2  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 07:28 am
@Mame,
Mame, this tax will hopefully go into funding the very education programs that you're referencing. How else would you propose funding them?

And believe it, people eat at McD's because it's cheaper. That tasteless McD's burger is $0.99....a homemade burger would easily cost $3-4 each, but you also can't just buy the quantities for 1 burger, the packaging gives you enough for 3-4 burgers minimum and you walk out of the grocery store spending $20.
OGIONIK
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 07:39 am
@hawkeye10,
soda is ******* horrible, decalcifys your bones, i think, and inhibits absorbtion of nutrients..


look at the ingredients, then measure out the amount of sugar listed with table sugar, horrifying, as i sit here drinking a 2 litrer of coca cola..

i can quit ciggarettes, but i damn sure cant quit coke (the soda! durr!!) seriously, its semi-disturbing
0 Replies
 
OGIONIK
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 07:41 am
@maporsche,
maprshce, are those organic burgers? IMO 1 burger at home is CHEAPER

its like 4 bucks for a good size portion of ground beef, bunslike 3 dollars, cheese yeah ok it gets expensive right there


damnit i think ur right nevermind...

well, i shall go shopping tomorrow and post the results of the ultimate burger creation courtesy of ionik the amazing
aidan
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 09:32 am
@OGIONIK,
Ogionik's right - if you have four kids and need to make four burgers - then it makes sense and is cheaper to buy a pound of mince (or ground beef) and a pack of hamburger rolls. But then if you want mayonaise on your burger - you got to shell out 2 bucks for that - 2 bucks for the ketchup - and on and on for the pickles, onions, cheese (which is EXPENSIVE- unless you buy it in a big block and then you have to have a place to store it or freeze it...- and how many of these women have the intial 10 or 20 bucks to shell out on the huge economy size block of cheese - or the money to run a freezer and/or the space to store food they get cheaper in the huge bulk sizes - I don't even have room to store stuff in bulk -so yeah - when you're looking at that or going to Wendy's and getting 4/ 99 cent burgers that already come with all the ketchup and mayo and pickles, etc...it becomes a no brainer.

These kids ARE being educated about healthy food in school - I know they are - I've done it and I've watched other teachers do it. Children have no power in terms of what is bought and put in the cupboards of their homes. They have to eat what's put in front of them...until they can get a job and make their own money and buy their own food.

Honestly - I think one of the best and most useful and practical steps that could be implemented in the schools is to go back to the old home-ec classes as requirements for boys and girls. Part of the problem with a lot of parents today is that they have no idea how to cook. They have no idea what food to buy - how to store it and cook it safely, and on and on. I think if people were taught to cook their own food - they might actually do it.
NickFun
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 09:53 am
When I was a kid we would have fast food once in a very great while. Everyone (excpet for me, I don't like carbonated beverages) drank Coke and Pepsi but we stayed trim because we exercised! e didn't have Game Boys and Wii and all that crap. Let's blame American culture before we blame a soft drink company.
aidan
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 10:47 am
@NickFun,
yes, definitely - me too - we played jumprope for hours, rode our bikes- spent far more time inside than outside -although in my family we almost never had soda - but we did drink kool-aid (even cheaper than soda) but the fact remains that these drinks, in and of themselves, are a huge health issue for children today.

If you walk into any public school and look in the recycling bins inside and outside- you'd be amazed and really dismayed when you look at the number of plastic bottles and realized that that's how many sodas and gatoraides and stuff these kids are drinking.

And they don't want to eat decent food because they're not hungry because their bellies are full of soda- so they don't have any energy so they're zoned out in front of a screen all night (and I mean into the wee small hours) - and then they wake up and face the day tired. These kids are drinking soda and caffeine fortified drinks at 8:00 in the morning - and I'm talking twelve year olds. First they get the sugar rush - then the low..it's a vicious cycle.
And I agree, it's definitely cultural - yes- and some of that is because their parents can't afford to buy milk. Compare sometime how much a gallon of milk costs as compared to a gallon of no name soda from Wal-Mart.

I have to buy six liters of milk every two days and that's for my two kids - I spend at least fifteen pounds a week on milk. That'd be a lot of money for someone who doesn't have a big food budget. Now imagine if someone had three or four kids..I think people buy what they can afford and what they're raised on. Unfortunately a whole generation of parents and now children have been raised on junk.
I think nutritious food should be made more readily affordable.
0 Replies
 
OGIONIK
 
  1  
Reply Fri 19 Dec, 2008 10:49 am
@aidan,
aidan wrote:

Ogionik's right - if you have four kids and need to make four burgers - then it makes sense and is cheaper to buy a pound of mince (or ground beef) and a pack of hamburger rolls. But then if you want mayonaise on your burger - you got to shell out 2 bucks for that - 2 bucks for the ketchup - and on and on for the pickles, onions, cheese (which is EXPENSIVE- unless you buy it in a big block and then you have to have a place to store it or freeze it...- and how many of these women have the intial 10 or 20 bucks to shell out on the huge economy size block of cheese - or the money to run a freezer and/or the space to store food they get cheaper in the huge bulk sizes - I don't even have room to store stuff in bulk -so yeah - when you're looking at that or going to Wendy's and getting 4/ 99 cent burgers that already come with all the ketchup and mayo and pickles, etc...it becomes a no brainer.

These kids ARE being educated about healthy food in school - I know they are - I've done it and I've watched other teachers do it. Children have no power in terms of what is bought and put in the cupboards of their homes. They have to eat what's put in front of them...until they can get a job and make their own money and buy their own food.

Honestly - I think one of the best and most useful and practical steps that could be implemented in the schools is to go back to the old home-ec classes as requirements for boys and girls. Part of the problem with a lot of parents today is that they have no idea how to cook. They have no idea what food to buy - how to store it and cook it safely, and on and on. I think if people were taught to cook their own food - they might actually do it.


you knwo what, i am right, the mayoanise doesnt just go to the burgers, it goes to the sandwiches too, and whatever else!

as does the cheese, u dont use a whole stack of cheese for one round of burgers...
 

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