Mine was on the computer power cable. ::shrug::
who cares. by the time i’m 50 they will have a bunch of drugs that will combat the obesity & cardiovascular side effects of eating stuff like that.
Apparently these people have never heard of statins. Or the new 6 drug polypill.
Somewhat of an exaggeration but what about “bulk barn” purchases where the buyer scoops some into a plain plastic bag? What about soft candies bought in ones or twos. Basically anything you put in your mouth can choke you. Water, pudding, stewing beef, or candies are all potentially dangerous choking objects.
The idea that the public needs warnings for obvious things like “fattening food are fattening” and “small objects in your mouth could choke you” implies that people are completely unable to gauge the risks they inevitably engage in to actually live. I personally dislike that attitude.
Oh, okay. So you’re saying you’ll pay for it yourself, right? [sub]Didn’t think so.[/sub]
Never much fun to jump in on the losing side of an avalanche, but I was glad they released this report and glad that the media picked up on it.
I’m a pretty healthy eater, but my weakness has always been desserts. I allow myself a certain amount of pie and ice cream and what have you, and I balance it by getting enough exercise. And while I knew ice cream was fatty and should be eaten in moderation, I had no idea how much fat was in some of this stuff. 30 to 40 grams in a sundae? I can at an entire pie for less than that.
People should absolutely be responsible for their own diet, but as Kimstu pointed out, doesn’t having some accurate information about what you’re actually eating help you make good decisions?
And now it’s a little more widely available.
If I have to read and watch 14 news stories a week about drive by shootings and police pursuits, I don’t mind the occasional piece that has some relevance to my day-to-day life.
I appreciate the information. You don’t. Was this study even publicly funded? If so, I’ll send you 12 cents. That should more than cover your end of it.
Lib: * If you want to know, it ain’t hard to find.*
Oh bullshit, Lib. It would certainly be much easier to read item-specific calorie counts off a store menu board than to quiz the server about how many grams of whipped cream go into a particular item, how many grams of ice cream of what sort, how many walnuts, what size banana, etc. etc. etc., and then go compile the total fat and calorie amounts independently.
And as for “paying for it yourself”, the compilation and availability of the very information you linked to is partly funded by taxpayer money—some of the data comes from government agencies and studies, the university studies and websites are partly supported by government grants, and so forth.
There ain’t no such thing as a free ice-cream sundae, so it’s no use your trying to pretend that the information you can look up on the Web is something you “paid for yourself” while the CSPI-recommended nutritional labeling would be a completely different and execrably authoritarian kettle of fish. Pfui.
Grey: The idea that the public needs warnings for obvious things like “fattening food are fattening” and “small objects in your mouth could choke you” implies that people are completely unable to gauge the risks they inevitably engage in to actually live.
But this is a rhetorical oversimplification. CSPI isn’t just saying “fattening foods are fattening”, which I agree would be very duh-worthy; they’re saying, “This is exactly how fattening these particular foods are, which is quite a bit more fattening than most people apparently realize” and “These particular foods present more of a choking hazard to children than most people realize.”
Considering that rates of obesity and obesity-related diseases continue to rise, and that each year dozens of children are killed and over 10,000 treated in the ER as a result of choking on food*…
… I think it’s fair to say—not that “people are completely unable to gauge risks”, which is a silly exaggeration—but that many people are apparently inadequately informed about the extent of some common risks. I don’t see anything wrong with what the CSPI is doing to try to give them better information.
(And Dumbguy, no, as per my cite above, the CSPI receives no taxpayer money, although of course any legislative initiatives it recommends are, like all legislative activity, publicly funded.)
- Did you know that? I didn’t; those are much higher numbers than I would have naively expected.
This thread makes me hungry for Ben & Jerry’s.
Yeah, I had some B&J’s yesterday. It was delicious. And thanks to mandatory nutrition labeling, I knew how much it cost me fat- and calorie-wise.
But what’s thaqt got to do with these whiny twits?
The one exception I’d posit here is the “mouthful of death” gel candies that were killing all those tots. This is a specific instance where the public needs advisory warnings. The new trans-fat nutritional labeling is another good idea.
I still regard most of this stuff as a BGO (Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious).
ME: But what’s that got to do with these whiny twits?
You mean, the whiny twits in this thread fuming about the CSPI, or the whiny twits that they’re trying to paint the CSPI as being?
All the CSPI did was to compile some data on the nutritional content of some ice-cream parlor products and issue a press release—with a few eye-catching exaggerations, but perfectly factual and rational for the most part—pointing out that the calorie and fat figures are quite a bit higher than most people think they are, and recommending posted calorie counts on the parlors’ menu boards.
Several whiny twits have posted to complain about this as “over the top” and “hysterical outrage” and “thinking they know better than anybody else” and “trying to make other people lead the same life that they do” and “PETA tactics” and “trying to make people stop eating ice cream” and “not trusting other people to gauge the risks they engage in” and so on and so forth. A couple of us Lone Voices of Reason have been trying to point out that this reaction is rather silly and exaggerated, but apparently without making much of an impression so far.
I don’t see how they can do a study that says “ice cream is more fattening than people think”, and then only prove that ice cream is rather fattening, without ever providing information on what people think.
I believe there’s something called “a survey” that they might wish to look into.
Well this particular whiny twit still is agog at the idea that people don’t realize that a food generally classified as junk food is fattening in large servings; or the fact that small object placed in the mouth potentially could lead to choking.
I mean all those years without earnest do-gooders like these, how did we ever manage?
Kimstu
Bullshit? Pfui? 
I understand your reasoning. It goes something like this:
Poor Lib. If only he knew what was good for him. He needs to know how much fat is in the ice-cream even though he doesn’t eat it. And even though he doesn’t understand why, I believe that he has an obligation to pay for information that someone else wants to have. It’s just a few more cents, and when added to his present obligations amounts to almost nothing. Lib is a hopeless dolt who doesn’t deserve thoughtful answers. But I am a good soul with the absolute best of intentions, and I am going to make his life better even if it kills him.
bolding mine
And just how do they know that people don’t realize just how fattening or how much of a hazard things are?
These jagoffs are just screaming to get attention.
And don’t kid yourself. I don’t have time to search for it, but most here will recall the recent lawsuit that tried to get OREO’s pulled from the market until they could be made “healthier”
Rigel
If you eat ice cream, you will die. Right. If you eat ANYTHING, you will die eventually. If you eat nothing, you will die sooner.
Is life suppose to be about living long or living good? I get more pleasure out of eating the soft ice cream from the truck that comes to our office every day at 4:00 than I would from living an extra week!
The people at not-milk are hysterical on this subject. Milk causes every disease ever known, people who eat any milk (even a product that contains whey or cassien) are all going to die early, horrible deaths. I love it when they claim that we are eating more dairy, but the milk industry is doing lousy, and that people a century ago barely drank any milk. Yeah, and they died much early than we do, on the average.
We are talking life here, not statistics. You will have a heart attack/stroke/whatever or you won’t. If you’re going to die anyway, let’s live for pleasure.
Herein lies another problem with Libertarian philosophy: it means the end of disclosure-based regulation. I abhor the nanny-state as much as the next guy, which is why I think disclosure-based regulation is the best kind – it seeks not to tell consumers what they can or cannot do, but rather to provide consumers with enough data to make an informed purchasing decision. It is entirely appropriate to shift the cost of providing that information to the producer of the purchased item, because they are in the best position to provide that data efficiently. Government-mandated nutrition and ingredient information on the sides of cans and boxes are entirely appropriate. So are government-mandated prospectuses for investors when a company plans to issue securities to the investing public.
Having said all that, there is an issue of data overload, and you don’t want disclosure that makes things sound worse than they actually are. That’s the real problem with overzealous groups like the CSPI: they either want so much disclosure that it becomes difficult for the consumer to process it all, or they want disclosures designed to frighten people away from what are essentially meaningless risks.
that according to the EPA, beach sand is a carcinogen? Can I sue Cape Cod for my exposure?
Here’smy idea (for a warning label to be affixedto awhiskey bottle): WARNING:CONTINUED USE MAY LEAD TO CONTINUED USE!