No Happy Meals for SanFran

[JSt0rm]

It's kind of interesting to see how ShawnD1's noecon rotten mind connects the dots, eh?

 

[DominionSeraph]

no idiot, any form of government deciding to ban happy meals with toys in them from mcdonalds through regulation is an action of big government.

By your definition.
Rather the point. You have set yourself up as the even bigger government determining what is and is not "big government."

 

[ShawnD1]

Umm. I think that change was implemented so police wouldn't gun down kids with toy guns.

Yep. Overall that was a good change and I fully support it. My point was that exposing kids to things that looked like real guns didn't make them careless with real guns. Kids are not stupid. They know the difference.
I wouldn't say adults are stupid either. If you see something that looks like a real gun, it's fair to assume that it might really be a gun.

Parents who feed kids at McDs are poor. They'll just get the apple one with a toy.

???
I grew up poor, and McDonalds was a luxury item. When we didn't have the luxury of fast food, we stayed home and made our own food. I seem to recall only the fairly well off families going to McDicks and Taco Bell every 2 days or whenever the hell they felt like going.

 

[OutHouse]

By your definition.
Rather the point. You have set yourself up as the even bigger government determining what is and is not "big government."

tool. crap like this law is big government period.

 

[DominionSeraph]

Take some time to wander through the old healthcare debate threads if you get some time. I seem to recall that most right-wingers were advocating that fat unhealthy people who made bad decisions should be allowed to suffer the consequences of those decisions and that we as a nation should not feel obligated to save them. No one said we should shoot em, but several seemed to believe we should let them die in the street of a heart attack. (I would agree with letting people suffer the consequences of their own decisions and helping those who made better decisions, but were just unlucky, except we have no good method of determining who is who.)

Hey, finally someone who makes some sense!

 

[DominionSeraph]

tool. crap like this law is big government period.

If there was only one law, and this was it, that would be "big government"? If the only government was one man whose only job was to go around and spot check restaurants to see if they were packaging toys with unhealthy meals?

 

[Craig234]

There's a lack of common sense by a lot on the right here on this.

As I said before, clearly this is a marketing effort to increase demand among children for a product - that happens to be not too healthy of food.

Just as cigarette companies knew more than the public that almost all smokers start in their teens or never start, and marketed directly to teens until pressured to stop, or how sugary breakfast cereals increase their already fun taste appeal to kids with all the cartoon characters and bright colors (the Happy Meal was a direct result of a marketing person seeing how his son was fascinated by the cereal boxes), it's similar marketing.

But we have here the argument 'other countries have these', as if that's proof San Francisco isn't doing something useful. Funny how the same people complain whenever 'other countries' are used for arguments they don't like, but are fine if it helps them. Different countries also have different cultures on how often they eat less healthy things, different rates of health issues, etc. And guess what (Wikipedia for quotes):

"In most countries, McDonald's introduced a "healthy option" to the Happy Meal- children have always been able to choose milk with their Happy Meal and the chain added fruit juice drink instead of a soft drink, and bags of dried fruit (or a whole piece of fruit such as an apple, or carrot sticks) in place of fries."

So, San Francisco is requiring something not completely unlike what "most other countries" already have as options with these products, healthier food, that the culture here hasn't made McDonalds offer as much, and these people who posted as fact how other countries have 'the same thing' just made up that fact, and it's wrong - and other countries actually are closer to what San Francisco is pushing for children.

And guess what else, after Disney was the regular partner with Happy Meals for years:

"However, on January 1, 2007, Disney did not renew the contract, wishing to use their characters to promote healthier foods."

Now, these people will say it's just fine for Disney to recognize this issue and walk away, but if THE GOVERNMENT reaches the same position, it's tyranny. If Disney reaches the view that the issue with the food is enough that even this major corporation who is driven by profit takes action against it, that's fine, but if the government concludes there's a problem with the food, they're just being wrong-headed and ignoring parental perogative.

Another chain took some steps on the same issue voluntarily:

"On 12 September 2007, Burger King announced that it was joining the The Council of Better Business Bureaus Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative. The program, a voluntary self-regulation program designed to shift advertising messages aimed at children so that they encourage healthier eating habits and lifestyles.[65] As part of this new initiative, BKC has stated that it will restrict advertising to children under 12 that uses third-party licensed characters to Kids Meals that meet its Nutrition Guidelines, refrain from advertising in elementary schools and from product placement in media primarily aimed at children under 12, promote Kids Meals that meet its Nutrition Guidelines as set forth on its web site and promote healthy lifestyles and healthy dietary choices in its advertising.[66][67] In response several groups, including the CSPI, lauded the move as guarded good news."

Oh, that's fine, it was 'voluntary', but let the elected government protect children... you got it, "TYRANNY!!!!!!"

Now there is one funny bit to the story of this marketing. Hard to believe this happened:

"In the summer of 2005, Burger King introduced BK Chicken Fries to its menu. The advertising campaign featured a faux metal band named Coq Roq in a commercial called Bob Your Head, members of whom wore chicken masks parodying the style of masks of nu metal band Slipknot. The website included music videos, downloadable cellular ring tones, and a store selling band merchandise. In addition, there is a MySpace page for the "band" that features bios, pictures, and their songs.[40] While successful, the campaign drew scorn for sexual double entendres..."

Coq Roq, really...

 

[JD50]

Parents who feed kids at McDs are poor. They'll just get the apple one with a toy.

Even fast food places are expensive compared to a home cooked meal. You have no idea what you're talking about.

 

[zsdersw]

Oh, that's fine, it was 'voluntary', but let the elected government protect children... you got it, "TYRANNY!!!!!!"

Glad to see you get it. "Voluntary or compulsory?" is the only important question.

 

[DominionSeraph]

Where were you 60 years ago? Companies would sell toy guns that actually looked like guns; they did not have the colored plastic tips on the barrel. Guess what. Kids didn't go around shooting up schools.

Uhhh... you do realize that the problem with realistic toy guns was that kids were being shot by cops, right? And this wasn't 60 years ago, it was the 1980's.

Silly conservatives don't even know what went on under Reagan.

http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/1738/Firearm-Laws-Regulations-Ordinances-TOY-GUNS.html

The actions by Kay-bee, Toys R Us, and Bradlees happened six years after the regulation after MORE kids were shot.
That wasn't mandated.

 

[Craig234]

Glad to see you get it. "Voluntary or compulsory?" is the only important question.

Oh, I do. That's why compulsary drug safety is tyranny while voluntary drug safety isn't; compulsary stopping at red lights, tyranny, voluntary fine; compulsary pollution limits, etc.

If this seems hyperbolic, it hardly is - a serious mechanism of bad governemnt by the right has been to use the 'voluntary' approach on things like pollution that does not work.

For example:

This just in, from the Department of Near-Tautologies: Mandatory emissions caps rein in power-plant pollution more effectively than voluntary programs.

That's the conclusion being drawn from a report on the environmental records of the 100 largest electricity companies in the U.S., released last week by an alliance of bottom-liners and tree-huggers, including the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES), the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Public Service Enterprise Group, Inc., New Jersey's largest utility.

Some folks might regard that conclusion as a no-brainer, but those folks don't work for the Bush administration -- it's made "voluntary compliance" the central plank of its environmental platform.

Recall the words of Assistant Interior Secretary Lynn Scarlett in a recent Grist interview in which she argued the virtues of voluntary programs: "[R]egulations tend to curtail creativity and innovation. Just think of the way, by analogy, most of us raise our families. Sure, you hold out some discipline for your children, but for the most part we try to inspire them to be flourishing young people through being role models, through encouragement, through exciting them about opportunities in the world before them."

Most parents, however, still put the cookie jar out of reach -- a "command-and-control" parenting strategy that Bush backers seem to favor when it comes to social issues.

President Bush's down-with-command-and-control philosophy on the environment is perhaps most conspicuous in his widely criticized proposal for a voluntary cap-and-trade program to curb the growth of carbon-dioxide emissions. It's also evident in his administration's repeated efforts to scale back enforcement and gut mandatory emission-reduction programs such as new source review and the Clinton-era plan for cutting mercury emissions.

The new report contends that this strategy might demonstrate more trust in the kids than they deserve.

The study analyzed utility-industry emissions of four pollutants -- nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur dioxide (SO2), carbon dioxide (CO2), and mercury -- using data collected by the U.S. EPA and the Energy Information Administration from 1991 to 2002.

The data revealed a marked overall decrease in emissions of pollutants subject to mandatory federal regulations: NOx fell by 28 percent over the period studied, and SO2 fell by 35 percent. Both pollutants, targeted by the Clean Air Act amendments of 1990, contribute to acid rain and haze, and NOx is also a key ingredient in smog.

In sharp contrast, CO2, a greenhouse gas and major contributor to climate change, has been the subject of a range of hopeful government initiatives and pleas, none mandatory, and -- surprise, surprise -- emissions of the pollutant rose by 25 percent between 1991 and 2002.

The report shows that "this notion that voluntary programs alone will work to address global warming in the utility sector is a farce," said Dan Lashof, science director of NRDC's Climate Center.

But, said Lashof, even more important conclusions can be drawn from the study, which found little correlation between the rate of emissions from utilities and the amount of electricity they produced.

Take this statistic: Fewer than one-fifth of the companies studied account for half of the utility sector's total emissions output -- including SO2, NOx, CO2, and mercury. And it's not proportional to the amount of electricity those companies generate. For example, explained CERES spokesperson Nicole St. Clair, though Southern Company generated just four times more electricity than its smaller competitor Calpine, the former belched a shocking 6,300 times more SO2 than the latter. Likewise, American Electric Power generated 28 times more juice than Panda Energy, but pumped out 436 times more NOx emissions along the way.

What does this tell us?

"Good news and bad news," David Gardiner, senior advisor to CERES and former assistant administrator of the EPA under Clinton, told Muckraker. "The bad news is that the regulations aren't working uniformly: There's a major discrepancy between the way our federal regulations are being implemented among different companies and in different states," said Gardiner. "The good news is that companies like Calpine are making great strides in economically viable ways, and that if we implement stronger regulations uniformly nationwide, we will see deep cuts in these emissions."

It's no small issue: The EPA itself has estimated that NOx and SO2 emissions from power plants still cause some 30,000 premature deaths each year. This -- combined with the EPA's troubling announcement last week that more than 474 counties do not meet updated health standards for ground-level ozone, directly linked to NOx emissions -- demonstrates, one might think, a need for some firm discipline.

Thankfully, there's more good news, according to Gardiner: "More and more, polluting companies -- and their shareholders, especially -- are beginning to realize that dirtier power plants face disproportionate financial and legal risks compared to their cleaner competitors." In the case of CO2, investors are starting to accept that caps are inevitable down the line, and they don't like the uncertainty of wondering when it will happen and how much time they will have to prepare, he added.

This unease is prompting a growing number of shareholders to push corporations for more disclosure of environment-related data and a lowering of emissions, and even to call for more uniform federal enforcement of emission standards for a full spectrum of pollutants.

In other words, children can learn to behave, but sometimes it takes a little more than asking nicely.

 

[dank69]

That's the insurance I speak of. I don't pay the insurance, and I have yet to be treated.

I don't expect everyone to be as strong as I, it's just important for them to know that as soon as they pay insurance, or are treated, that they lose control to people that don't want them to smoke, ride motorcycles without helmets, or eat at McDonald's.

-John

You haven't figured out that we all pay for uninsured people with our taxes?

 

[DominionSeraph]

Your egotistical rants are funny. I sure hope this is just your online persona, and not what you really think of yourself. You do realize you're not nearly as smart as you think you are, don't you?

And why would the hopes or judgments of Bober be meaningful? You do realize that you're pretty damned close to the bottom of the barrel, right? And I don't mean just on this board -- I mean out of anyone I've ever spoken with.

You are mentally defective. I rate you as having no ability whatsoever to properly engage in even the most basic of logical debates. So of what relevance would anything be that came out of your broken little head?

Look, if I have interest in tracing out your brokenness, I'll initiate engagement. Outside of that occurrence you can bank that I have no interest whatsoever in anything you have to say. You are a pseudo random number generator just spewing to no end, and unless I'm curious as to the underlying algorithm, the numbers you spew have no meaning and are instantly rejected as noise.

I will deign to speak at you because it amuses me. But don't try to insert yourself -- you do not belong.

 

[daishi5]

Hey, finally someone who makes some sense!

Well, I don't like the government regulating peoples freedom's when they don't impact other people. I don't like the government saying gays can't be married. I don't like the government making drugs illegal. I don't like them removing toys from happy meals. The healthcare reform stuff scares me a bit because of this, as the government pays for more services I receive it has more basis to restrict my freedoms because of the "cost."

I also think it will be interesting to follow up on the results of this ban. I suspect it will be like the war on drugs, years from now, the kids will still be fat, there will be no evidence it worked, but the ban will never be repealed, because we must protect the children.

 

[JD50]

And why would the hopes or judgments of Bober be meaningful? You do realize that you're pretty damned close to the bottom of the barrel, right? And I don't mean just on this board -- I mean out of anyone I've ever spoken with.

You are mentally defective. I rate you as having no ability whatsoever to properly engage in even the most basic of logical debates. So of what relevance would anything be that came out of your broken little head?

Look, if I have interest in tracing out your brokenness, I'll initiate engagement. Outside of that occurrence you can bank that I have no interest whatsoever in anything you have to say. You are a pseudo random number generator just spewing to no end, and unless I'm curious as to the underlying algorithm, the numbers you spew have no meaning and are instantly rejected as noise.

I will deign to speak at you because it amuses me. But don't try to insert yourself -- you do not belong.

lol, someone hit a nerve.

 

[dali71]

Parents who feed kids at McDs are poor parents. They'll just buy whatever their children demand, and no amount of legislation will change this..

fixed

 

[Capt Caveman]

The only question to answer is why Government or Society have any say at all into how a person lives there life. A person riding his motor-cycle without a helmet, is not hurting you. A person eating at McDonald's is not hurting you.

The only time it hurts you is when you say that you must pay for their medical care.

Well guess what, if you don't buy insurance, you don't have to pay for their medical care. Just your medical care.

Now, here comes Hillary II, President Obama, and he wants to make everyone pay insurance... so that we care about fat people, smokers, etc. No one is free from Government or Societal scrutiny. We are all linked at the chest.

It's all of our business... your business.

-John

Yet, you have a mental problem with a fire dept not willing to put out a fire b/c the owners decided not to pay for fire protection.

 

[bfdd]

lol @ craig comparing red lights to pollution. Government investing and building infrastructure is vastly different than controlling what can and cannot be sold. dominionseraph, i didn't come up with the definition of big government, someone else did. It just APPLIES to this situation.

 

[BoberFett]

And why would the hopes or judgments of Bober be meaningful? You do realize that you're pretty damned close to the bottom of the barrel, right? And I don't mean just on this board -- I mean out of anyone I've ever spoken with.

You are mentally defective. I rate you as having no ability whatsoever to properly engage in even the most basic of logical debates. So of what relevance would anything be that came out of your broken little head?

Look, if I have interest in tracing out your brokenness, I'll initiate engagement. Outside of that occurrence you can bank that I have no interest whatsoever in anything you have to say. You are a pseudo random number generator just spewing to no end, and unless I'm curious as to the underlying algorithm, the numbers you spew have no meaning and are instantly rejected as noise.

I will deign to speak at you because it amuses me. But don't try to insert yourself -- you do not belong.

Hahahahaha! Please, keep it up. You're a laugh riot!

 

[Amused]

And why would the hopes or judgments of Bober be meaningful? You do realize that you're pretty damned close to the bottom of the barrel, right? And I don't mean just on this board -- I mean out of anyone I've ever spoken with.

You are mentally defective. I rate you as having no ability whatsoever to properly engage in even the most basic of logical debates. So of what relevance would anything be that came out of your broken little head?

Look, if I have interest in tracing out your brokenness, I'll initiate engagement. Outside of that occurrence you can bank that I have no interest whatsoever in anything you have to say. You are a pseudo random number generator just spewing to no end, and unless I'm curious as to the underlying algorithm, the numbers you spew have no meaning and are instantly rejected as noise.

I will deign to speak at you because it amuses me. But don't try to insert yourself -- you do not belong.

 

[ShawnD1]

As I said before, clearly this is a marketing effort to increase demand among children for a product - that happens to be not too healthy of food.

Yeah! When parents want to quickly feed their kids with minimal effort, they should eat healthy foods like Doritos, canned soda instead of fountain soda, and microwave pizzas! Hmmm hold on a second. Let me think about this :hmm:

Just as cigarette companies knew more than the public that almost all smokers start in their teens or never start

And how did we deal with that? We directly attacked the problem by making cigarettes illegal for people younger than 18. That's how laws are supposed to work - directly attack the problem. If you think McDonalds is bad for kids, then you should make it illegal. No I'm not joking. Either make it illegal or just back off and let people eat whatever they want. As long as it's legal, kids will keep ordering it.

And guess what (Wikipedia for quotes):

"In most countries, McDonald's introduced a "healthy option" to the Happy Meal- children have always been able to choose milk with their Happy Meal and the chain added fruit juice drink instead of a soft drink, and bags of dried fruit (or a whole piece of fruit such as an apple, or carrot sticks) in place of fries."

I'm genuinely curious which country you live in. I'm pretty sure one can order milk and an apple in the US. American McDonalds locations also offer a wide variety of salads. The salad dressing comes in a separate package so it's up to you how much dressing goes on your salad. The reason nobody orders this is because nobody wants this. People want fries they can eat with one hand while driving. They don't want to dick around with a salad, spilling oil on their car seats, and trying to eat with a fork. Texting while I'm driving is difficult enough; I don't need to add a fork to this.


I don't feel like responding to the other 30 paragraphs

 

[Corn]

And why would the hopes or judgments of Bober be meaningful? You do realize that you're pretty damned close to the bottom of the barrel, right? And I don't mean just on this board -- I mean out of anyone I've ever spoken with.

You are mentally defective. I rate you as having no ability whatsoever to properly engage in even the most basic of logical debates. So of what relevance would anything be that came out of your broken little head?

Look, if I have interest in tracing out your brokenness, I'll initiate engagement. Outside of that occurrence you can bank that I have no interest whatsoever in anything you have to say. You are a pseudo random number generator just spewing to no end, and unless I'm curious as to the underlying algorithm, the numbers you spew have no meaning and are instantly rejected as noise.

I will deign to speak at you because it amuses me. But don't try to insert yourself -- you do not belong.

LOL, yer a pretty fart smeller alright. Bober pulled your strings like a master puppeteer and you were all too happy to be played.

*snicker*

 

[Red Dawn]

Hahahahaha! Please, keep it up. You're a laugh riot!

Well you have to admit, you are a real douchebag..just sayin

 

[MrX8503]

Oh yeah, that'll work. 🙄 Kids know what they like at McDonalds; they'll keep getting it with or without the toy, and their parents... since they're willing to let their kids eat at McDonalds in the first place... won't care if the kid gets the unhealthier stuff.

Yes it is a serious problem. Stuff like this isn't going to help, though.

I would wager that the internet has caused more of an increase in obesity than Happy Meal toys.

Perhaps SF should ban Facebook... since it entices children to use the internet instead of play outside with their friends. You agree, I assume.

It's worth noting that happy meals are also sold in Canada, France, Britain, Australia, Germany, Sweden, etc. All of those countries have wildly different obesity rates.

Nah let's forget all of those other factors and just say it's the toys. Parents aren't going to McDonalds because it's convenient; they go because kids put guns to their parents heads (because evil corporations make kids think guns are toys) and demand to get a happy meal with a toy. Oh and kids don't want the happy meal because they like the taste of burgers or french fries or coca cola, but because they like shitty toys that break in 2 seconds. It was the toys this whole time!!! :ninja:

I'm not saying fastfood is the sole cause of obesity, nor am I saying taking toys away would solve it or result in kids choosing healthier options. As far as I can tell they chose to single out the toys because its a more passive action than say....no meals on the menu can be 500+ calories.

Internet, lifestyles, HFCS, TV, laziness, being poor, video games, etc, there's probably thousands of things that creates a fat America. Saying "this" wont work or "that" won't work doesn't solve anything, nor does it change the fact that America is a fatass. Look for solutions to the problem instead.

 

[zsdersw]

I'm not saying fastfood is the sole cause of obesity, nor am I saying taking toys away would solve it or result in kids choosing healthier options. As far as I can tell they chose to single out the toys because its a more passive action than say....no meals on the menu can be 500+ calories.

Of course this is more passive than other more draconian measures, but that's not really the point. Rights and freedoms are almost always taken away a little bit at a time. Given that rules and laws are antithetical to freedom, we must ensure that only the smallest amount of freedom is relinquished and that laws and rules exist only when they offer the biggest "bang for the buck"; that they accomplish the biggest improvement in the general welfare for the least cost to freedom. This measure may seem small and have a very small cost, but its benefits are even smaller, making it frivolous and not something worth doing.

Internet, lifestyles, HFCS, TV, laziness, being poor, video games, etc, there's probably thousands of things that creates a fat America. Saying "this" wont work or "that" won't work doesn't solve anything, nor does it change the fact that America is a fatass. Look for solutions to the problem instead.

The solution to this problem is already known: eat right, exercise more. There is no top-down way to force this in a free society, though, so we must focus our efforts on persuading each other to make better choices, not try to mandate them via government. Mandating personal choices via government has never worked well... and the cost to freedom that it imposes is too high for the benefit it yields.