oreos illegal?

I am sorry if my statement came out too either/or but I was speaking of a general attitude of people.



I think that what you are proposing would be an impossible task, even at its best. Food corporations mislead the public ALL THE TIME, as do drug and tobacco companies, all of which now fall under the supervision of one governmental agency or another.

Yeah, there are supposed to be agencies in government whose job is to protect the public's health. At the level that they do regulate, I would say that their track record is only fair, to be very generous.

My point is that some people would want MORE government regulation- costing more money in taxes, and probably being no more effective in keeping people healthy than the way the situation is now.

I say that it is up to the individual to look out for the health of his/her family, whether it be which cookies to buy, or whether to cook at burger at home, or go to MacDonald's.

I think we need to keep in mind that there is a large section of the population that doesn't have the resources or knowledge to determine what foods are safe/unsafe on their own. Those people get their information from free newspapers, from tabloids, from t.v. news. They are not in positions to be able to become better educated, not everyone is. Anything and everything that helps this part of our communities understand what may not be healthy for them is to the advantage of all of us in decreased health care costs, healthier children and adults.

We can say people need to be responsible for their own health, but we have to recognize that we need to help some people. That's part of the responsibility who have the resources and knowledge and ability to teach and share. If governments can't/won't do these things, then we have to do whatever we think will make a difference. It's our responsibility.

ehBeth- And that is exactly what WE are doing right here on A2K. Do you realize how many health related topics we have discussed on this Forum? I will bet that there are a lot of people here who have been made aware of a lot of health issues, just from surfing A2K!

Phoenix, Exactly! c.i.

Exactly what we are doing here? I think that we are definitely not the people who ehbeth is talking about. How many poor people do you know who have access to the www?

I have never met a poor person who did not have access to the web. It was simply a matter of wanting it or not. And I have met many people who live off less than 50 dollars a month.

I disagree with the notion that people need to be force fed education. Abject poverty is only an impediment to getting certified education. The knowledge is available to anyone with intellectual curiosity.

littlek- Maybe not the www, but what about the newspapers, radio & TV?

It should ideally be a partnership of sorts between the public, the government, and the businesses that supply us, whether it be food or anything else. The truth is, the government helps businesses mislead the public at least as often as it protects it. That is why being personally responsible is not always the only answer. I do not want to be a guinea pig for genetically altered food, but, the government has allowed it to be slipped into our food supply unannounced and unlabled. I do not have a way of knowing how much of it I have consumed. We need people to blow the whistle as often as possible, because often we don't have a chance of being personally responsible, for we are not given the chance.

Phoenix, that's what the law suit was intending to do, put the news in the paper.

Craven, you know as well as I that a poor city kid isn't likely to spend time to surf the web on his or her own. It happens, but not often.

I think that the government is definitely not helping matters. Another reason for the law suit. It forces the gov't to do something.

Here's the result of a Mercury News/Kaiser Family Foundation survey in Silicon Valley: 57% of kids say they don't have access, 49% say they see nothing of interest, and 36% say they never learned how. Here's the surprise of the survey: 18% of Hispanics go online once a month or less, 14% of whites, and 12% of Asians. By parent education of kids who log on once a month or less: 20% if head of household has high school diploma, 11% if head of household has some college, and 10% has a bachelor degree or higher. By age: 19% of 10 to 13 year olds, and 11% of 14 to 17 year olds. Another report in the Mercury News this past week: 64% of Silicon Valley kids ages 10 to 17 who say the Net has helped with their grades, and 44% of students with internet access at school who log on in the classroom. It makes me wonder why the other 56% does not log on in the classroom, because they have access, but don't bother. c.i.

The kids do have access but may not know it. Many libraries have barrels of kids doing homework there. One even helped me with a problem. Whether they seek it out is a different matter.

bob, It's like everything else in life; some people will seek out thinkgs out of curiosity, while others wait for the info to come to them. You can bring a horse to water...... c.i.

I love the library. Always have.

People who can't easily feed or cloth their children generally don't have internet access. There is very limited internet access through libraries here - library hours are generally decreasing, and i can tell you that many parents of limited resources cannot afford to take themselves and their children to libraries during the hours they are open. Subscriptions to newspapers are not affordable for the parts of the community that I worry about - they also don't get magazines and often don't have t.v.'s (there are people i work with who don't have t.v.'s - they can't afford the luxury). For these people to be aware of some things - they have to be on the radio or in free give-away papers - which means these things have to be eye/ear-catchers.

My first years were spent in a very poor neighbourhood. I was the only child in my kindergarten class who knew what a toothbrush was. 40 years later, I can recall trying to explain what it was. Given my limited English at the time, I came up with 'a broom for the mouth'. Guess how many of my classmates knew what a broom was. Today's equivalent of that classroom will have children whose families do not know about/can't afford to research nutrition and health issues. We need to help them. If part of that help is a 'silly' lawsuit that gets lots of publicity because of its 'silliness', so be it.

I'm not worried about the people at A2K - in the sense of this lawsuit, I don't care about them - they already have internet access and are curious enough to be in a community like this.

It's the larger, real, world I'm worried about.

ehBeth sorry to hear that. It's such a learning tool I almost wish I'd been born 50 years late. But I wasn't and in truth I wouldn't give up the memories I have for that. I wish the means could suddenly appear so that they could explore as far as their minds choose to wander. Books though are still a wonderful alternative. I devoured books when I was young and still read a lot.

I've been online now, for just 3 years. First of all I had to buy a laptop ( used one) and then I had to figure out how I was supposed to connect to the internet. All of this , I taught myself...through thick and thin. The average person, lower middle class in the US doesn't own a computer and doesn't have internet access.

They do have the library to go to where there are thousands of books to read, till the cows come home. Poor kids love two places, when growing up. The first is the library, 'cause it's clean and it's warm in the winter and cool in the summer. The second is the boy's/girl's club, where the sports fun is located.

Teachers in the poor urban/rural areas perform a major service in a kid's education , when they introduce the kid to books and the library. It provides not only an education for a kid, while growing up, it also provides an "escape mechanism" for a kid from the depression of poverty.


We need the libraries, more than we need internet access. I enjoy surfing the internet, but I'll never love the internet as much as I love books and the library.

bobsmyth - i agree. the library was a life saver for me. i loved being there so much, that my parents made going to the library into a treat for me. i recall that at one point i had to go to my swimming lessons to be 'allowed' to go to the library. i was definitely an odd child. i suspect we'd find a disproportionate representation of odd children here at a2k. many of us probably read more than other kids of our age.

I need to learn how to do that short link thing but until then

12 Ways

I love the Number 10 reason.

http://ala8.ala.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Products_and_Publications/Periodicals/American_Libraries/Selected_articles/12_Ways_Libraries_Are_Good_for_the_Country.htm

Make sure your city council gets a copy.

Joe

http://164.109.16.145/update/faq.html

Just in case that link doesn't work, this one should:

http://www.nabiscoworld.com/oreo/

then click the button in the lower left of the screen labeled "Trans Fat and Oreo Cookies."

If anybody wants to talk about "being poor as a child," I've got hundreds of stories - from our own family. Most of us do not come from "wealthy" backgrounds, but was able to overcome many handicaps to "arrive." Being poor is no excuse for not having motivation to succeed - especially in this country. I'm not going to feel guilty because my siblings and I have succeeded satisfactorily in this country. There was 'nobody' out there giving us extra handouts because we were poor. I now own three computers, and I've earned all of them (four, if you include my sons). c.i.