Guy sues fast food restaurants for making him fat and unhealthy

The BBQ Pit
21

I heard this on the radio today, and as soon as I got home I headed straight to the pit to see if this topic had been started yet. If it hadn’t been, I was gonna sound off. I should have figured you guys were on top of it.

I agree with those before me- it’s amazing, simply amazing. Where the fuck has personal responsibility gone in this country? Obviously nowhere, if people really think they have a case against a company making them fat, apparently against their will.

Amazing.

*My favorite line, omitted above- "Israel Bradley, 59, said his ritual of eating a pound of french fries a week gave him high blood pressure, diabetes, made him obese and forces him to walk with a cane. In 1993, he passed out and had to be rushed to the emergency room because of the medical problems caused by his diet.

Good God almighty, a pound of fries a week! He’s so fat he needs to use a cane to waddle himself up to the counter to get even more fries (Or, more precisely, I bet he uses his car, in which case he not only needs a cane, but also a shoe horn to squeeze his fat ass into the car).

And through all of this, the blood pressure, the diabetes, the fucking cane, it not only doesn’t occur to him to stop stuffing his face with a pound of fries a week, but that it’s someone else’s fault that he does?

Amazing.
But, as one of our local radio guys has rightfully pointed out, it’s only the beginning. Seeing as anti-smoking, anti-drinking, and anti-anything that people have problems with has been making the progress that it has in recent years, it was only a matter of time before the focus would turn to something else. Who better to nail than fast food.

22

As someone who has been fat since my day of birth, I just gotta say that I’m shedding no tears for these guys.

Yeah, most of my family is fat, but mostly I’m fat because I don’t exercise and eat too much sugar.

It’s not Wendy’s fault if I eat a Frosty.

23

So we can sue those that ruin our lives by making us unproductive? Boy, I have a pretty good case against all those dopers who post stuff I can’t stop reading, not to mention those who disagree with me and make me type for hours. Boy, I’m gonna be rich. You all just wait and see. :wink:

24

Whose fault is it when I eat a Wendy?

What?

25

Naw, that just means the pharmaceutical companies give better head.

Congress? Out best interests at heart? The idea makes me laugh so hard I think I just ruptured something. My lawyer will contact you tomorrow to discuss damages.

26

They don’t need Grimace, just look at the customers you’re lined up behind.

27

They have their nutritional information for all the food on the website… the only time their food has almost given me a heart attack is when I saw the amount of calories and fat in it. A whole day’s worth of calories for me, in one extra value meal! I lost my taste for fries pretty quick after that.

28

This is my prediction for the next big leap in frivolous lawsuits:

Criminal Sues GOD Because of Free Will

Papers were filed today against the Supreme Being on behalf of Mr Joe Blow, a convicted felon who is serving a life sentence for murder, rape, child molestation and assault with a deadly weapon.

“If God had never given me free will, I would not have turned out to be the slimey, worthless ass pumping mountain of greasy cock gristle that I am today.” he said in an interview on nbc.com. He is seeking an undisclosed sum for damages.

His lawyer agrees with him completely. “Mr Blow has had a hard life of killing, raping, and other serious crimes for which he should not be held accountable for. This is clearly all God’s fault.”

Reporters have tried to reach God several times for comment, but he could not be reached.

A jury selection begins next month.
That is my prediction
Sanscour

29

Can the secondary fat victims get in on this, too?

30

I think that ridiculous acronyms are a more pressing problem. I mean, seriously…“Help Efficient, Accessible, Low Cost, Timely Health Care” = HEALTH? My ass it does. Something needs to be done about this problem and now!!!

I’m not kidding, that is truly atrocious.

31

A couple of questions/points, in all sincerity and with no animosity:

1.) Is it safe to assume that all of you who are against this lawsuit also opposed the lawsuits against the tobacco companies? If not, why not? What’s the difference?

2.) Why is alcohol (apparently) getting a free ride? I say apparently because I’m not aware of any past or pending lawsuits of this sort against brewers/distillers. If there are no such lawsuits, why not? While some might still argue that cigarettes and their attending ‘secondhand smoke’ haven’t caused the amount of collateral damage commonly attributed to them, I’d think few would dispute the connection between DUI fatalities/spousal abuse and alcohol.

3.) The McDonalds down the street from me has the nutritional information for all their products posted quite plainly on the wall right next to the front counter. Is this commonplace? I don’t travel much, and I frequent McD’s even less; but if it is, it’d be hard to argue that they were concealing their products’ unhealthy nature.

TIA!

32

I believe that McDonalds did put out a lean burger, called McLean. It Mcsucked and did not sell.

Many fast food joints do sell grilled chicken sandwiches. Still not great, especially after adding cheese and bacon, but an option.

33

He shouldn’t sue fast food restuarants because they made him fat and unhealthy - he should sue all of the people who are about to beat his ass into a bloody pulp for being such a jackass.

34

I don’t know about McDonalds or Burger King, but I think the guy has a case against KFC. After all, they do put a secret additive in their chicken which makes you crave it fort-nightly.

[sub](Y’all remember the days when people who fucked up their lives would just blame it on their parents? <Sigh> Good times. Good times.)[/sub]

35

apotheosis:

  1. I am iffy on tobacco lawsuits. On one hand, outlaw them and you’re just going to have crazed nicotine freaks breaking into your house and robbing you so they can get money to take to their black market dealer. Nicotine is the most addictive substance on earth and there is no reason to think that some smokers wouldn’t turn into criminals if cigs suddenly became illegal. Nobody has ever been forced to smoke, though, and the excuse “I didn’t know it was bad for me” went out with my grandmother’s generation. On the other hand, tobacco companies are big liars, always have been, they know cigs cause cancer and still they load up the nicotine to keep people addicted. I don’t think a smoker in this day and age should sue because they were dumb enough to take that first drag, but I do have to admit it would be nice to see the tobacco companies REALLY get their just desserts. They make a product that kills people if you use it in the way it is intended, nuff said. Flip a coin.

  2. Alcohol: no alcohol company has ever announced that alcohol is not addictive and thus can be enjoyed freely. Plus when you drink you get an immediate feedback. It can be argued that drunk drivers who go out and kill people were not using alcohol responsibly and it isn’t the beer company’s fault if someone abuses their products. (As opposed to smoking, where even a measly 1/4 pack a day is going to cause damage.)

  3. Hi Opal!

  4. McDonald’s and their fast food colleagues have never, ever claimed to sell healthy food. With the exception of their salads and pansy little grilled chickens, everyone knows that the stuff they sell is loaded with carbs, calories, and grease. The only place I see claiming to sell healthy stuff is Subway, and even they are debatable if you are a low-carb loyalist. You’d have to be a total moron, like these people in the lawsuit, to believe that you can inhale a Big Mac several times a week and it NOT end up padding your butt.

With the exception of the few fat people out there who have actual metabolic disorders, people are fat because they eat too much and don’t exercise. Period.

I need to cut my weight in half, literally. When I do it, I would be extremely pissed if someone said “oh, you just got lucky.” I got to the weight I am myself, and dammit when I lose the weight, it will be ME who did it, with the help of God. Nobody but me gets the blame for me being fat, and nobody but me and God will get the credit when I lose it.

Caesar can kiss my ass. He’s making all fat people look like whiny babies.

Sorry this was so long.

36

Americans do not have the ability to choose unsafe products if they so desire.

Americans can’t haul their butts to the grocery store and buy carrot sticks instead of Quarter Pounders?

Americans have more options as far as what they eat than many countries combined! If you want to eat healthy, you can. If you want to eat nothing but junk, that’s certainly available.

Nobody forces anybody else to make bad choices.

37

I’ll chime in and answer from my point of view, apotheosis.

  1. I wasn’t for the tobacco lawsuits, at least from the standpoint that the government should be involved. If individuals had legitimate and real reasons to sue, i.e. that companies were lying about the effects of tobacco, spiking their products, or doing shady things like that, then it should be pursued by either and individual or a class action type thing. Even given that, however, I still thought people who sued under the guise that they never knew smoking was harmful were full of it.

Again, my biggest problem with the tobacco lawsuits has been the involvement of the government, in whatever form. From the beginning I thought it was a shady, almost unethical means for a strapped government afraid to raise taxes finding an outside, easy, source for revenue (At the time I had no idea it’d be as blatant, and completely out of control as it’s turned out to be today-- in my fine state of Minnesota, I think about five percent of the judgement against the tobacco companies went back into the areas that the government said were directly affected by smoking related illnesses, etc.).

Besides, I think it opened the floodgates for the frivolous lawsuits like these that are bound to continue and spread to other areas.

  1. I don’t think alcohol has been getting a free ride. I think what happened with tobacco will happen with alcohol too. First, advocates make it a public safety issue, then, when public opinion has changed, and the message has been pounded home, go for the jugular and attack full on. In the case of tobacco, this has been going on for awhile. Back in the seventies it was a made a public safety issue, what with the surgeon general coming out and criticizing it and the general trend to make it a bad thing, instead of the good thing it was portrayed as. Years… many years later, the lawsuits started and, well, kinda didn’t go anywhere, but they kept coming. Finally, after the years of lawsuits and the growing trend in the public that anything tobacco is bad, the government finally steps in and puts their full weight behind numerous lawsuits. Basically, the final blow.

Personally, I don’t see how this isn’t happening with alcohol right now. The only thing is, we’re only in the later, or maybe even the middle stages, of the campaign to make it ‘bad’. Give it a couple years, or maybe ten or so, and I bet the lawsuits start and eventually, sometime down the road (And IMHO, sooner rather than later), the government will step in and attack these companies as well.

The result, I presume, will be about the same- revenue generated from people who can least afford it. Essentially a regressive tax framed in the context that it’s a public health issue, when in reality it isn’t- it’s a tax.

Again, my humble opinion.

  1. I’ve seen those nutritional flies too, and not just at Mickey D’s. If you read them, and only have a cursory understanding of nutrition, those things are pretty frightening, especially if you make that your one and only source for food. Only an idiot would do that.

Those same kinds of warnings- different though they are- didn’t do a damn bit of good for the tobacco companies, did they?

38

They already did it to alcohol, we got an amendment, lots of crime, and then another amendment. The last thing i want to see is a McAmendment.

39

Resident doper sues Coke, a SDMB member, and keyboard manufacturers over damage to his keyboard

When asked about this he said “I just had so much luck with suing the other guy over the defamation of my screen name that I thought this just might work”

Tonight at 11

40

WV_Woman, CnoteChris, thanks for the responses.

Personally, I’m kinda conflicted over the whole mess…as both a teetotaler and a smoker (crazed nicotine freak :D), it’s difficult to take either side on the issue without feeling like a hypocrite, so I appreciate outside opinions on the matter.