San Francisco bans Happy Meals

My 6 year old had probably had 5 Happy Meals in her life and gets a shit-ton of exercise.

SF is making McDonald's out to be the bad guys, when it is entirely the parents' fault.

Make Mickey D's a special treat once in awhile and there is no problem. I hate the idea of punishment for other peoples' dumb choices.

I question this idea that poor people are fatter because it is supposedly cheaper to eat fattening foods. Maybe that's a piece of it, but they're also making bad choices because there are plenty of healthy cheap foods you can buy for as much or less than unhealthy foods.

You can also look at smoking rates. Basically, the poorer you are, the more likely you are to smoke---

http://www.gallup.com/poll/105550/among-americans-smoking-decreases-income-increases.aspx

The poor can least afford to buy cigarettes, but they smoke at a much higher rate than people who can easily afford it. This clearly is a matter of behavior, not economics. Unlike food, smoking is not a necessity, and a higher percentage of the poor make the unwise choice to smoke.

Holy moley did you miss my point(s)! Wow! Where to begin?

1. It is NOT cheaper to eat unhealthy. The absolute fact is that it is WAY cheaper to scratch cook. People are just not taking the time to learn that skill anymore, even though you can make REALLY healthy meals for a family in under 30 minutes, so the real issue here is laziness and I am not too PC to state it as such.

2. The idea of parental punishment was thrown out there as something that might exist in the theatre of the absurd, or a Johnathan Swift novel, and even though the government has really been reaching into our lives a little more than most would like these days, I don't think it would get as bad as them telling us how to feed our children, and penalizing us if we stray, but why is a fast food company more culpable than a parent? Does the parent not have any will or control? If not, maybe the state DOES need to intervene and take those kids away.

3. I never said that corprations are evil, I implied-(others on this thread have actually stated the belief), that there are those out there that believe that the corporations in the fast food business are evil/bad because of a product they offer, while neglecting the fact that we do not currently have a forced feeding program instituted in this country. Accountability is the key idea here for those parents who feed their kids this crap on a regular basis. Either the state deals with the whole problem, i.e. the producers AND the consumers, or it stays out, that is ethical & fair.

4. Your vaccination analogy doesn't quite fit. It gets into the area of ends justifying means. There are NUMEROUS areas that the government can claim to "have our best interests at heart," yet we do not just let them come in and stomp all over our daily free will to "keep us safe from ourselves." Vaccination is to protect a child against something that they would have have no way to protect against, short of living in a bubble from birth. Somehow, cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets, and fries don't seem to make it into the same danger category as say, polio, chicken pox, or measles, except in your world.

San Francisco. What a screwed up city. They try to legalize pot because they don't want their rights infringed upon. But they vote to outlaw toys in fast food meals. What a screwed up city.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Primordial Ooze wrote:

If you passed a law forcing people to run 20 miles a week, would that be "exercise justice"?

Primordial Ooze, do you live in San Francisco by any chance? Because I would move there just to vote for you. It is forward thinking like you are displaying here that will have us competing with the Africans in no time.

You can vote for me for President in a few years. I'm going to get a law passed requiring 20 miles a week. For you lawyers out there, it will be passed under Congress's authority to raise and maintain an Army and Navy - as Lloyd George said, "You can't maintain an A-1 empire with a C-3 population."

Media watcher wrote:

They are mad because "happy" is too close a term to gay.

If they renamed it a "Gay Meal" could they put toys in them again?

Simpleton wrote:

My 6 year old had probably had 5 Happy Meals in her life and gets a shit-ton of exercise.

SF is making McDonald's out to be the bad guys, when it is entirely the parents' fault.

Make Mickey D's a special treat once in awhile and there is no problem. I hate the idea of punishment for other peoples' dumb choices.

I don't buy my children Happy meals, or any other fast food meals. I got food poisoning from a McDonald's in 1997 and have not eaten at one since then.

I still value McDonald's freedom to sell and market Happy Meals as they see fit and individuals' freedom to buy or not buy Happy Meals as they see fit.

If it were a gay meal, they would only offer weiners for homos and muffins for lezbos.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Media watcher wrote:

They are mad because "happy" is too close a term to gay.

If they renamed it a "Gay Meal" could they put toys in them again?

candy wrapper wrote:

San Francisco. What a screwed up city. They try to legalize pot because they don't want their rights infringed upon. But they vote to outlaw toys in fast food meals. What a screwed up city.

While SF may be a screwed up city, it isn't specifically for the reasons you provide.

Prop 19 was state-wide. Let's wait until the breakdown by county is available and see if SF voted for or against. Map currently isn't loading.

The toys in food wasn't on the voters ballot. It was voted on by the SF Board of Supervisors. They voted 8-3 in favor of the banning. This wouldn't have passed if it was presented to the voting public.

1.

. If you disagree, there is more data from the CDC and WHO. Also, there is an substantial lack of availability of supermarket in lower-socioeconomic areas.

2. I do not believe that fast food companies are more culpable. I believe that corporations have a better ability to effectuate change. Also, I believe that the requirements have the ability to give parents more valid options by introducing "healthy meal" option.

3. My bad. I never meant say that you believed that corporation are evil. Corporations are meant to adapt situations and profit. It is what it is. But corporations have the ability to adapt to the regulation

4. All the law says is that if you sell a toy with a meal (if you advertise to a child), then your meal should have certain nutritional requirements. The interest of the state is the well being of its children. If you don't think that childhood obesity and communicable diseases are epidemics, then I think you should a strong letter to the CDC for wasting your tax money.

Primordial Ooze wrote:

"We're part of a movement that is moving forward an agenda of food justice," said Supervisor Eric Mar, who sponsored the measure.

Because forcing good nutrition on people is "food justice"? What a concept.

If you passed a law forcing people to run 20 miles a week, would that be "exercise justice"?

Basically anytime you see "justice" with another word in front of it (think "social," "economic," or in this case "food"), you can safely assume it's a euphemism for communistic policies or at best (as in this case) irritating and vaguely repressive dogooderism.

Simpleton wrote:

My 6 year old had probably had 5 Happy Meals in her life and gets a shit-ton of exercise.

SF is making McDonald's out to be the bad guys, when it is entirely the parents' fault.

Make Mickey D's a special treat once in awhile and there is no problem. I hate the idea of punishment for other peoples' dumb choices.

"bad guys" "fault" "punishment"

These concepts have absolutely nothing to do with this. It is sad and terribly counterproductive that people view so much through such absurdly irrelevant lenses.

Independent thinker wrote:

elibad wrote:

I don't think you should think of it as parental negligence. It is a fact that it is cheaper to eat unhealthy. For example, soda is cheaper than milk.

This has to do with a lack of nutritional education. I tend to drink tap water as it is healthier and cheaper than both milk and soda. Also, my per meal cost is far less than that of a happy meal, and I eat healthy. Rice, beans, tuna, wheat bread, and vegetables/herbs from my windowsill garden are very cheap per meal. I consider McDonalds and other junk food to be a luxury, in both a financial and health sense.

Thank you for doing a little bit to kill this false meme that "junk food is the cheapest food."

I'm just glad it means there is a small chance that it will even slightly reduce the amount of cheap plastic crap we are buying from China.

Exactly, this kind of repressive government just wants to run peoples' lives for them, of course under the idea that "it's good for you". Next thing you know, they'll want cameras in your house to make sure you aren't giving your kids potato chips for lunch.

Hey, I think McDonald's is being punished because stupid parents let their kids eat too much. That opinion is absurdly irrelevant? How so? I simply don't like the idea of a government telling businesses how or how not to package legal, discretionary products together.

I do not buy the argument that it is the food companies fault that kids are getting fat. Parents of fat kids are usually doing a shitty job of parenting, in my opinion.

I hope Brian Wilson got one before they were banned.

1. That study and similar ones like it have been discredited when it was proven that the data was skewed. It was found that they used food pricing from all natural and organic products in the studies, i.e. of course it will cost more for fruits an vegetables, and other staple items if you buy all organic, certified free range, and all natural products. Don't get me wrong, it's nice to be able to shop organic etc., but sometimes, as is the case for most americans who eat pretty healthy, that is not realistic, so you buy some "regular" Granny Smith apples at .79 cents a pound instead of the organics a $2.19 a pound, or you buy standard old chicken breast at $1.99 a pound instead of free range at $3.99a pound, etc. As for the supermarket availability issue, what can I say, we both know what the issue REALLY is in those communities, and it doesn't have to do with economic feasabilty, either way, through out our country's history people have done a lot more to put food on the table, so if someone has to hop on a bus, so be it.

2. What? The corporations have a better ability to effecuate change? How about the word NO! There is your change. Change your behaviour. Chance your choices. Change your belief that you are a victim of the big bad companies that produce any given product- it's not limited to just fast food. Why won't you address parental accountability in this specific situation? 5 year old kids are not digging into their own wallet to buy this stuff, parents are, you must concede that point, or you are doomed to look at everyone as just the NEXT victim in their own life!

3. Accepted. Once again, parents ALSO have the abilty to adapt, regulated or not. Change starts at the bottom when it comes to individual behaviour, otherwise you will artificially create a market that has no place existing.

4. There is no doubt or arguement that the state should look out for the well being of it's children, but I think you missed my point again with regard to the vaccines. I have no problem with vaccinating children against the horrible threat of disease and the epidemics that come from them because there is no other way to protect oneself from exposure. My problem is with a law like this that seeks to try a form of social immunization to overcome childhood obesity, which I agree is an epidemic, without looking at the true cause of the problem. That problem I belive, is a behavioural choice by those who supply the food, i. e. the parent. Once again, the topic of parental accountabilty must be addressed before any progress can be made on even a small issue like this.

mcdonalds is a danger to public health. so are cigarettes. the government, as the entity responsible for the national well-being, should act accordingly. you could even argue it's a matter of national security, if the addictive quality of fast food was further established. it's not like these aren't hard facts: millions die from obesity and lung cancer every year, so don't try to make some absurd analogy about "big brother". we elect the government, it is beholden to US THE PEOPLE. who are corporations beholden to? their shareholders. they don't care who suffers, so long as it isn't their income. ruthless by definition.