Part one of essay: As you drive by your local fast food restaurant you smell the French fries, burgers, and nuggets and you immediately get an intense craving for the delicious greasy food. You dig into your pockets for spare change and start to salivate like one of Pavlov’s dogs. But is this your fault? Are you solely to blame for this intense craving? Or is it the fast food industry and their addictive ingredients, engaging commercials, and lack of healthy options? According to Radley Balko’s essay What You Eat is Your Business it is the individual’s responsibility to make healthy choices and that the government should not get involved in any way with the obesity epidemic or with the fast food industry. However, without healthier options at fast food restaurants, lower costs of healthy foods at supermarkets, and nutrition and wellness classes in schools the individual cannot be completely responsible for their actions because the option of living a healthy lifestyle is simply not available to everyone. The main arguments in What You Eat is Your Business are in great need of refuting. Balko argues that “Instead of manipulating or intervening in the array of food options available to American consumers, our government ought to be working to foster a sense of responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being.” (Balko 158). He also argues that obesity is not an issue of public health and it should be removed from the realm of public health. (159). Balko argues that the government should not intervene in the array of food options that are available to consumers. However, many families with low incomes can only afford fast food and at fast food restaurant there is a lack of healthy options. According to the nutrition information on the McDonald’s website a happy meal with milk, apple slices, and a cheeseburger (a so called healthy option) contains 415 calories. Furthermore one of the healthier salads on the menu, the ceaser salad with grilled chicken, contains 580 mg of sodium. The government needs to intervene and make fast food companies offer more healthy options especially because when many Americans cannot afford to buy anything but fast food. David Zinczenko furthers this argument in his essay Don’t Blame the Eater when he states, “My parents were split up, my dad trying to rebuild his life, my mom working long hours to make the monthly bills. Lunch and dinner, for me, was a daily choice between McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken, or Pizza Hut. Then as now, these were the only available options for an American kid to get an affordable meal” (Zinczenko 153). An individual cannot be held responsible for making healthy food choices when they can’t afford it and the government needs to intervene so that fast food companies have healthy options that are affordable.
part two of essay:Balko also argues that obesity is not an issue of public health, and therefore there is no need for government intervention. However, in the essay Obesity: Much of the Responsibility Lies with Corporations by Yves Engler in the United States nearly a third of the population is obese, and two thirds of the population is overweight. It is also stated that the annual costs of treating obesity-related conditions (heart disease, diabetes etc.) is at least 120 billion dollars. When over half of the population is overweight and numerous life-threatening diseases are associated with this epidemic it truly is an issue of public health. If a disease such as swine flu breaks out in the United States the government takes all actions possible to prevent its spread and protect other citizens from it, yet if people are dying everyday from obesity (a disease) and the health problems associated with it are we supposed to stand by and watch it happen? The government needs to be proactive and require nutrition and wellness classes in schools as well as lower the cost of healthy foods at supermarkets so that people have an education on what to eat and are able to afford it. Balko also disagrees with the summit on obesity where they will be “agitating for a panoply of government anti-obesity initiatives, including prohibiting junk food in school vending machines, federal funding for new bike trails and sidewalks, more demanding labels on foodstuffs, restrictive food marketing to children, and probing the food industry into more “responsible” behavior.” (Balko 157). In contrast, these are all actions that the government needs to take in order for Americans to have the option of living a healthy lifestyle. If the government doesn’t intervene and things continue the way we are what will the next generation look like? Will they all be overweight and die twenty years younger then this current generation will? As the economy continues to spiral downhill more and more Americans will not be able to afford healthy food and will continue to turn to fast food. Literally without government intervention there is no way that Americans will be able to turn their lifestyle around. Obesity, the fast food industry, the lack of education on nutrition, and the high cost of healthy food will cause society as a whole to suffer; the government must take action so that the citizens of this country do not succumb to the obesity epidemic.
The message in David Zinczenko’s essay, “Don’t Blame The Eater,” has a lot of validity. Zinczenko definitely seemed to know what he was writing about, he provided cogent reasons for his beliefs, and he supported those beliefs with ample statistics and facts about the current state of the fast-food industry. Throughout his essay, Zinczenko made good point after point about why the fast-food industry needs reform, and he made sense when predicting what will happen to the fast-food industry in the future. All in all, I thought Zinczenko’s argument against the fast-food industry was well-written, logical, and filled with ample evidence. In his essay, Zinczenko argues that our nation’s obesity and fast-food problem has developed into an epidemic because of several key reasons: It is an extremely cheap food alternative, its health hazards are not made clear to the consumers that purchase the product, and the advertising companies deviously appeal to children that can compel their parents to buy fast-food through whining. Zinczenko outlines his perspective that people in poor socioeconomic situations are most susceptible to the fast-food epidemic, followed by families with young children and people that do not read health labels closely. Perhaps Zinczenko’s best point in his essay was that fast-food is too cheap of a food alternative relative to other foods available to people of this country. The cheapness of fast-food causes a portion of our population to be extremely susceptible to heavy fast-food consumption and increased obesity rates, specifically, that portion is the socioeconomically poor. Many studies have shown a negative relationship between obesity rates and annual income, meaning obesity increases as annual income decreases. A UC-Davis study found that obesity rates begin to reach alarming rates starting with the lower middle class, when total household income falls below $60,000. Another study, published in USA Today, found that 23% of women with a college degree are obese, while 42% of women with less than a high school education are obese. Common sense and overwhelming evidence both point to the fact that fast-food companies prey on the poor. They set their prices at levels that are extremely convenient for the lower classes and they can afford to do so because of mass-production and a widely uneducated population that does not know about the hazards of fast food. While fast-food companies presently can afford to set their prices very low because of mass production, I believe they should be held to higher health standards by the government and should be compelled to make their prices more comparable to other food alternatives, thereby lessening the high and unhealthy demand for fast-food.
In “Don’t Blame The Eater,” Zinczenko argues that fast-food companies should be compelled to make the health hazards of fast-food more obvious to the general consumer, similar to the restrictions that the government placed on cigarettes and tobacco companies. He writes how the general public is very uneducated on the extremely harmful effects that fast-food has on the health of those that eat it. He is correct in saying this. Zinczenko writes “there are no calorie information charts on fast-food packaging…Advertisements don’t carry warning labels the way tobacco ads do. Prepared foods aren’t covered under FDA labeling laws.” There are widely proven health hazards about fast-food and the greedy companies withhold this information from consumers. The health of the entire country would benefit if these companies were compelled to make fast-food’s health hazards more obvious, and the government should place constraints on the fast-food industry similar to the ones that were placed on the tobacco industry. In his essay, Zinczenko also argues that fast-food companies are to blame for America’s obesity epidemic because of their advertising strategies. He writes how advertisers market towards the children of America, and that these children exert extreme influence on their parents’ food consumption patterns. A research team from Yale unearthed some very compelling statistics about this. They found that 40% of parents received requests from their child about a McDonald’s meal at least once per week. They also found that 15% of parents with pre-school aged children fielded such requests once per day. As much as 84% of parents caved in to these requests within the past week, the study found. It is evident that fast-food chains deliberately appeal to the children of America. They advertise with clowns like Ronald McDonald, complementary toys that kids like, and countless commercials on TV that the kids of America see every hour of every day. That being said, the strategy is effective, because the whims of kids affect their parents very much. If the obesity rates are to be reined in though, legal action must be taken against these advertising companies and they should be compelled to abide by stricter advertising regulations.
A popular controversial issue is who is to blame for America’s increase in obesity caused by increased consummation of fast food. Is it the consumer’s fault or is it the fault of the fast food companies themselves? In my opinion, it comes down to the fact that people have full control over what they eat. Workers of fast food restaurants do not force feed their food down customer’s mouths, the customers seek out their location and pay for their food. In his essay “Don’t Blame the Eater” David Zinczenko expresses a different opinion. David Zinczenko argues that consumers of fast food are not to blame for their increase in obesity. Zinczenko’s main argument is that fast food is much more available than healthy alternatives. His claims are that eating fast food is the only option for a meal when on a low budget and that there are many more locations to purchase fast food than there is to purchase fruit. He also argues that fast food companies do not put enough caloric-information charts or warning labels on their products. People are going to continue to eat fast food since they do not actually know what they are eating and that it could be a potential health hazard. Zinczenko’s main argument that for some families “lunch and dinner is a daily choice between McDonalds, Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and Pizza Hut” is an exaggerated statement. Families with low budgets have other options to provide a healthier meal than fast food. In a hypothetical situation, lets say that a family of four has only $10.00 to spend for both lunch and dinner each day, making their weekly budget for food $70.00. If eating fast food, each person basically gets one thing off of the dollar menu for each meal. If spent at a grocery store, the same $70.00 could provide a week’s worth of healthier meals. Two loafs of bread can almost always be found for $3.00 or less. Along with a pack of sixteen cheese slices for $2.00, container of lunch meat for $4.00, and $3.00 jar of peanut butter, they can have a weeks worth of sandwiches, alternating between peanut butter sandwiches and cheese and meat sandwiches. A box of macaroni and cheese costs $1.00. Buy seven of them and seven boxes of spaghetti noodles at $2.00. Then purchase a $2.00 stick of butter to have buttered noodles instead of paying for jars of spaghetti sauce. A bag of baby-cut carrots cost $1.50, purchase three bags. For beverages, an on-sale gallon of milk costs $2.50 and tap water is free. After spending $42.00, this hypothetical family has a week’s worth of lunch and dinners that include sandwiches with sides of pasta and vegetables and milk to drink. This is much more healthier than eating fast food everyday and there is still almost $30.00 to spend on more food.
One could argue that there is nowhere for people to buy these healthier alternatives. However, if one lives in an area with a McDonalds, Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut relatively close together, then the chances of that area being developed enough to include a grocery store are very high. Gas stations, dollar stores, and other types of convenient stores are also abundant and sell food, although it may be “off brand.” Zinczenko also argues that fast food stores do not put warning labels or enough caloric-content information on their packaging. McDonald’s, for example, puts the amount of fat, calories, protein, and carbohydrates on their wrappers. Even if someone has already purchased their meal, he or she will know for the next day how unhealthy it is. As for warning labels, they are unnecessary. You know how fatty the food is and it is the consumer’s decision to eat it. The food is only a health hazard if the consumer makes the decision to eat it everyday and is consuming too many calories, which is the consumer’s fault. Overall, Zinczenko lacks evidence in his arguments. The essay leaves us to assume that there is a distinct connection between people with low incomes and obesity. In reality, this is not the case. According to the Food Research and Action Center, “there is evidence that where there are gaps between high- and low-income groups, they have been closing with time as those with higher incomes become more obese.” The cause of this may be that those with higher incomes are willing to spend their money and feast on fast food. The spending of a low-income family may include a hamburger and small fry for each member, whereas a higher income family may purchase a hamburger, medium fry, and milkshake for each person and a 20-piece McNugget for the family to share. The higher income family consumed many more calories, which in turn, causes higher obesity.
We are now living in a society where obesity is slowly becoming the norm. If we continue on this path towards complete obesity, we will be faced with the difficult challenge of how to handle the negative effects that are guaranteed to follow. The fact that, as a society, we are becoming more obese can not be debated; what can be debated though is who is to blame for the increase of obesity. Radley Balko argues in his essay, “What you Eat is your own Business’, that to solve the national epidemic of obesity people need to be in control of their own health. I agree with this argument proposed by Balko, this point needs emphasizing since so many people believe that the majority of the blame should go to the companies making and selling the food. Balko, in his essay, argues that if people had more personal incentives to live a healthier lifestyle, they would be more inclined to care about their own health. If those living an unhealthy lifestyle were forced to pay their own health bills, Balko argues that they would indeed take greater care of what they put in their own bodies. He also argues that the state is holding private citizens back because the state is implementing rules that make it more advantageous to live a cheap unhealthy lifestyle and foot the bill on others. Balko tells us that in his opinion the government should not be telling us what we should eat, that instead it should be up to the individual what they choose to eat.
Agree People have more incentives if they are made to pay their own bills State is holding back health care Government should show/be a back up for health care incentives Disagree The companies are making the food, so they should be held responsible Those that are strapped for time and money have the only choice of cheap, fast food
Before leaving for the United States my father would tell me everyday, "whatever you do, do not get fat." I was constantly warned that whoever goes to America comes back fat or borderline obese. I was quite curious what it was in America that would prove so threatening as far as weight was concerned. It took me one trip to the convenient store to understand what the problem was: a lack of healthy food items and the excess of junk food. America's consumers cannot be blamed for what they are subject to, and hence I agree with "don't blame the eater" by david Z.
The essay “Don’t Blame the Eater” by David Zinczenko stresses that it is the conduct of fast food companies and the food industry that has lead to the high obesity rate in the United States. Food that is healthy, tasty, and affordable is very hard to come by. On the other hand, there are cheap and delicious fast food options all over. This circumstance has lead to consumers often just surviving of what is cheap and readily available. Then there also how fast food companies shy away from giving consumers the truth about their products and how calorie information is skewed to make it sound not as bad as it is.
One of the arguments in don’t blame the eater is how there is a lack of healthy, affordable alternatives and an excess of fast food options. Go to any convenient store, the cheapest and most satisfying options will most likely be bad for you. The few healthy alternatives that are available taste so bland and are even more costly that it does not make any sense at all to invest in healthy items. My first attempt at eating healthy ended up with me buying a whole wheat packet of bread and slices of turkey. I did not buy the mayonnaise or cheese to add to the sandwich because I wanted to avoid chemicals as much as possible. After the first time I ate ‘healthy’ I never tried again because that lead to me eating food that would make me unhappy. The truth is that food is one of the things that maintain our happiness. Food, other than sex, is one of the triggers of the neurotransmitter Dopamine that releases our happiness neurons. So here is my question, what are consumers supposed to do if whatever tastes good and is affordable happens to be greasy, unhealthy yet delicious fast food?
Another problem is the sneaky fashion in which the facts about the product are presented. Lot of the times information is skewed to look healthier than it really is. For example, the McDonalds salad dressing claims to be “280 calories per serving.” Who would have thought that the amount of serving is actually contains 2.5 servings. This leads me to tell you one of the main reasons why the eater is not to be blamed. The food industry has been adding MSGs (monosodium glutamate) to almost all their food items. MSGs are the secret ingredient that is making America obese. Corporations in the food industry have admitted to the claim that MSGs are what makes their food items addictive and that is exactly why they are added to foods. Furthermore, this is usually not declared in the back of a product and if it is you wouldn’t know that it is since it can also be called “hydrolyzed vegetable protein” which is just another name for MSGs.
Some say that health issues related obesity should not be matter the public sector is concerned about. Furthermore they argue that it is about personal ownership and responsibility. Yes, part of it is true but when two-thirds of a country is deemed obese there is definitely a problem in the system rather than of bad decisions by consumers. The public sector is the force that has the ability to set limits and barriers for the entities that are the source of the problem, food corporations. Hence, it is definitely the public sectors business to get involved between “you and your waistline.” I mainly blame it on the times, children spend more time in doors with televisions and the internet, walking has become uncommon and the amount of snack per day have increased. All the food industry mainly does is come up with more innovative ways to get your dollar for their snack. In my country, we have fruits for snacks, not Ranch flavored Doritos and cherry coke!
The public sector has a huge part to play. They need to give incentives for children to eat healthy and have more out door opportunities. They also need to regulate these companies who are putting its consumers at risk. Fast food is as bad a cigarettes if you think of the hazards it poses on children. For example problems related obesity are sleep apnea, type 2 diabetes, heart diseases and the biggest of them all, social discrimination. My biggest fear as a child was being a fat kid in middle school. The circumstances are to be blamed, not the eater. There are too many players in this game, and yes the consumer is one of them but the consumer cannot be blamed. There are too many sources of this problem that are influencing the consumers decision to buy that burger. The fact that it is become such a national problem leaves the public sector no choice but to intervene.
David Zinczenko the author of “Don’t Blame the Eater” correctly asserts that the fast food customer is not responsible for their poor eating habits because there are many more contributing factors that are out of their control. Unfortunately that means that fast food companies are to bear the burden as they feed people food that has led to the current childhood obesity rate of 16.9% for the 2009-2010. Zinczenko argues that the fast food industry is at fault for the growing obesity epidemic, and the individual should not be blamed. Zinczenko argues that the only inexpensive and available option to most kids is fast food. Furthermore, he argues that it is difficult to find healthy food and even seemingly healthy fast food is actually just as bad for you as other items on the menu. Lastly Zinczenko states that the fast food industry is marketing dangerously unhealthy foods to children which is just plain poor judgment and thus had led to the obesity epidemic. McDonald’s and many other companies advertise to children and spend huge sums of money, as Zinczenko says “McDonald’s and Burger Kind spend $1 billion each year on advertising,” that leads to the manipulation of children and creates bad eating habits. McDonald’s frequently advertises to young children and shows happy children often with Ronald McDonald eating fries and burgers. According to a study from Time.com children ages 3-5 were given McDonald’s food to eat out of labeled McDonald’s bags and unlabeled plain bags and children showed a preference for the labeled bag even though they cannot yet read the children can recognize the golden arches. The results were clear 48% said they preferred the labeled burger while only 37% preferred the unlabeled burger. And the French fries had even bigger success with 77% saying they preferred the branded fries. Thus, young children although they do not know it are being swayed by advertisements and according to Time are unable to make out the differences in true reality versus the advertisements until they are 8 years old. And so clearly it is unfair and manipulative to advertise to children because it sets them up for a potential lifetime of poor eating habits. Since by the time they understand what advertisements are they have already enjoyed many meals at McDonald’s and will likely continue. And the precious toy with the happy meal must not be forgotten as it is so powerful a draw for children, San Francisco has attempted to ban the toy from any fast food establishment that serves fatty foods. Even though McDonald’s was able to skirt the rule by charging 10 cents for the toy the fact is children often want the toy. And they want the trinket because it is relevant to their life featuring a product from a newly released movie or popular television show. Children see the movie and want to collect all the toys that McDonald’s is offering. But of course in order to get all the prized toys and not many repeats you will need to eat at McDonald’s far too much. The small trinkets are but one of the ways that young consumers are manipulated as their behavior to eat at McDonald’s is reinforced through the toys.
As some might argue kids especially the young and most impressionable are not able to go to McDonald’s without parental cooperation but the incessant whining to go to McDonald’s from a child is a strong pull on a tired parent who just wants a simple meal. And as such the parents are compliant with the child’s demands and everyone in the family ends up eating the unhealthy food. The advertisements lead kids to see and hear about McDonald’s all the time and thus parents driving home from work can just swing by a convenient drive-thru and pick up a cheap meal that keeps everyone happy. Another reason according to many people is that people do not need to eat poorly because they can stop at a grocery store and pick up some healthier alternatives to fast food. But healthy food at a grocery is expensive and takes time to cook that busy parents do not have available. And in some areas of the United States grocery stores are not nearby and if you do not have a car are nearly impossible to get to on a regular basis. For instance according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) 2.3 million U.S. Households live more than a mile from a grocery store and do not have access to a vehicle. But you can bet a McDonalds or unhealthy convenience store is right around the corner and thus some people have little choice but to eat unhealthily. Therefore, it is clear that people are not to blame for eating fast food.
When you choose a meal, do you cram as many calories as you can in a dollar and a minute? Compared to other countries, America spends the least amount of time eating but has the biggest BMI (Mass body index.) Therefore, it’s going to take more than sticking a warning on a wrapper to attract the attention of millions. I agree with author Radley Balko’s claim in “What You Eat is Your Business.” He insinuates how congress isn’t taking the right approach to resolve the obesity epidemic in America. Radley Balko makes the claim in “What You Eat is Your Business” that Americans need to “foster a sense of responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being.” Throughout the article, he suggests people of the obesity crisis, such as children and low to middle class, aren’t being responsible about healthy decisions. Not only can we blame those people for their unhealthy behavior, but congress also has been subordinate towards mitigating the problem. In retrospective, laws demanding healthy food on menus and warranted food labeling have been ineffective and digressed from an abiding solution. Consequently, the average obese person costs society $7,000 a year, and the will only be compounded unless congress contrives laws that will endure the public with their own health. The public’s reasons for being fat are refutable; specifically, those who contribute the most to the problem. The percentage of obese children in the United States has increased by 20% over the past years. Author Zinczenko claims in “What You Eat is Your Business” that he was an overweight child because he had no parents around, it was cheap, and that is what is happening today. However, that is a fallacy because a lot has changed since the 1980s. Zinczenko fails to recognize that parents have more control over their kids than before. Parents can monitor their child’s eating habits through cell phones, buying the right groceries, and even restricting time on the TV. Instead, about 60% of parents take their kids to fast food each week. Another predominate player of this epidemic lies at the hands of the low to middle class. Most of the class claims that healthier food is more expensive. Although, healthy food’s prices are somewhat higher, there is an array of other options, such as food stamps or choosing healthier foods on the fast food menu. The poor actions of the majority of the obese population could’ve been avoided.
On the other hand, many people might assume that it is actually the fast food industries that are making people fat. However, over the past decade, the food industries have been reprimanded and even changed their ways for the benefit of America’s health. For examples, in 2003 fast food restaurants added healthy side dishes and in 2005 they added nutrition information to packaging. People are too rushed to mind the wrapper and only 15% of sales were of healthy sides such as salads. Therefore, it becomes apparent that the government isn’t acting aggressive enough towards changing the problem by just regulating the food industries. If transforming the food outlets didn’t work, then changing laws that would affect the people would prove to be a more astute route. Specifically, a plan to further educate children about obesity in public schools could dramatically increase the way they look at nutrition. Health education is already in schools, so an addition of nutrition education would help the kids whose parents are bad models. And for the older generation, Balko urges congress to stop plans to further publicize healthcare. Moreover, it would be better if insurance companies reward or constrict opportunities for customers based on health. Such plans will be noticed by many because it weakens the financial safety net on obese. Accordingly, those who struggle with the losing weight can look towards dieting. Government should see these plans as the best and maybe only solutions for rectifying health in America. If nothing is done soon, it will surpass cigarettes to become biggest cause of preventable deaths in the world. In fact, the percentage of cigarette smokers in the United States is declining because of the insurance bias towards smokers. Analogously, campaigns against anti-smoking don’t reach out to the distributers but inform and plea to the public. Fast food works the same way because everyone is affected by the $200 billion spent on the problem each year.
In his essay, “What You Eat Is Your Own Business”, Radley Balko claims Americans are responsible for their own dietary intake, as well as personal health. He explains the need for the government to limit interference with the public’s choices. Although Balko makes a few valid points, the government should be partially involved in lowering the obesity rate in America. Balko tries to prove that obesity is not the government’s job to overcome. He believes that people are responsible for keeping themselves healthy and the correct weight. He makes an argument that states should not be involved in health insurance companies not insuring overweight customers. Congress should not focus their time on passing legislation regarding healthier eating habits that create no positive outcomes. He believes that to overcome the issue of obesity, Americans need to take control of their own daily habits. The government needs to be involved in ending the growing obesity rate in America. National Childhood Obesity Week was launched in early 2012 which is a social enterprise helping obese children to create a clear strategy to combat their obesity. Although this may seem to be a positive initiative, but currently, the government could not do anything without control the food and beverage aspect of obesity. According an article by Neville Rigby, there was no possibility of achieving even the meager target of reducing overweight and obesity to the levels reached at the start of the millennium, so the last government allowed their 2010 deadline to slide to 2020 with the connivance of some expert advisers participating in a self-defeating exercise in a numbers game that evades the real issues. Obesity in Americans has failed to be eradicated by the government because they are simply suggesting healthier habits, rather than making regulations. The American government should be attempting to produce healthy alternatives to fast food. Many Americans cannot afford and simply do not have time to make a healthy dinner for their large and busy families. Fast food seems to be the only option for these families. This causes horrible and lasting health issue for families. If there were healthy alternatives to these fast food restaurants, families could choose these and eliminate future health problems. Not only are there countless fast food restaurants on every block, but also they are extremely inexpensive. The government needs to step in and help develop an inexpensive and healthy alternative. Eating healthy in America can become very costly. Americans spend about $4,000 on food each year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Fruits are vegetables continue to climb in cost, causing Americans to buy less and less of them. The government needs to lower the cost of these healthier foods and add a tax to foods that are not healthy. Forcing Americans to choose healthier options will help America become healthier has a whole.
Different viewpoints on issues such as those will always exist. Instead of punishing both sides a middle-ground should be met. However, that “meeting in the middle” should entail a push on personal responsibility as well as incentives to eat healthily. If one becomes obese because of horrible eating habits, so be it. They should receive a bill for their “anti-cholesterol medication” rather than have the healthy pay for their detrimental habits. A bill for expensive medications should be incentive enough for most citizens, sparking new self-responsibility initiatives. The greatest influence in personal responsibility is not the risk of being obese, warning labels on products, “fat taxes,” or regulation, but money. The opportunity cost of purchasing something is the greatest influence that can be pushed upon consumers. Because fast-food connoisseurs know that their immediate satisfaction will be followed by negative results. They do not need government or social influence to make their decisions, because their decisions are already made. Only personal responsibility, incentives to eat healthy, or serious health threats will change the habits of heavy fast-food consumer. Until a great social or political movement occurs, little will change fast-food habits. Obesity is not an American problem, but a personal problem. As Balko put it, “We’ll all make better choices about diet, exercise, and personal health when someone else isn’t paying for the consequences of those choices,” and he is absolutely right. Give the choice of consumption back to the consumer, but provide them with the ability to make informed, responsible decisions.
In “Don’t Blame The Eater,” Zinczenko argues that fast-food companies are held completely responsible for Americans overweight epidemic, rather than the people actually purchasing the product. He states that the actual individual companies are to blame for a number of reasons. First, Zinczenko claims the fast food companies trick the consumers into eating meals that have more calories than the consumer intended. They do this by a false perception of serving size in drinks and sauces. He also states that the lack of information available to the consumer is hindering them from making the right diet choices. I, on the other hand, refute that. Americans In todays world should have enough knowledge and at least by know added up the facts and concluded that fast food is not a healthy diet choice and should be consumed at a moderate level. In Zincezenko’s essay “Don’t Blame The Eater,” he argues that our nations Epidemic on Obesity is related to the fast food industry for a number of reasons: It is readily available any time of the day, caloric Information is not clear to the consumer, and the advertisers are directly going for the youth of America. He states that if an individual is on a low budget diet that person will have a hard time eating anything other than fast food, simply because of the price and number of fast food locations. Not only is the caloric information absent from the packaging, it is almost impossible to obtain the Information. Zinczenko’s main argument is that fast food is a lot more readily available than say a healthy meal. With more than 13,000 McDonald’s and over 160,000 fast food restaurants through out the country that leaves one fast food restaurant for every twenty three square miles on American soil. Not only is their an abundance of restaurants but most of them stay open twenty four hours a day, making your greasy thousand calorie burger at any time of day. Not to mention, the food being sold at fast food joints would not be found at the St. Regis. With the average cost of an item at three dollars this makes the menu a lot more appealing
On almost every item at the grocery store there is a uniform caloric information table on the back of every item. However, this table will never be found on any fast food product. These large corporations make it very tricky for consumers to obtain something that should so simple and easy to get a hold of. I do not know about you, but why would a food manufacture be hiding what is in their product? the problem is not so much what is in the product, it is how much of it is in the product. The issue of what is in the food being served at these fast food restaurants is an entirely different argument but the amount of fat, sodium and number of calories is off the charts. For a typical U.S. male the number of calories I should be consuming per day for a healthy weight is 2,000. If I were to get lunch at Mcdonald’s and got a Big Mac combo with large fries and Coke the calories of that meal would be 1,514, that is more than seventy five percent of my daily calories that I just consumed in a single lunch. That only leaves me with 500 calories for the rest of the day and I did not even tally in my calories from breakfast. The children of America are the people of tomorrow and will be the people making all of the purchases in the future, so it is no surprise why the fast food corporations have aimed their sights on children. It may seam kind of stupid to aim advertising at individuals that do not even take home a pay check, but children are the driving force of the industry and the parents are not the only ones paying for it. By these kids consuming fast food at such an early age is becoming embedded into their brains that this food is okay for them. It becomes a norm in their life that becomes a psychological dependance. The food itself will not bring them happiness but the feelings associated with going to the play pen out in the back of McDonald’s, or the energy ruch from the fifty grams of sugar they just consumed in a matter of minutes. This dependence that kids acquire at a young age is what brings their parents through the drive through after school. Fast food companies are not going anywhere with advertising budgets in the billions it does not look like either side of this argument is going to back down. It is going to have to be the peoples choice and will ultimately come down to that split decision in ones mind telling them to pull through the drive-through. Im not asking someone to never eat McDonald’s again or even something remotely close to that but their needs to be moderation.
Fast food is something that every body craves at some point in their life. If you are walking or driving past, or even if you are at the business next to a fast food restaurant, the smell of the food can be very tempting. You may start running thoughts through your head like, “Am I hungry?” “Did I bring cash with me?” or “What will I get?” These thoughts just instantly come to mind when the greasy scent of quick and tasty food. Who is to blame for this reaction? The fast food industry, with a lack of healthy options, catchy commercials that make people smile, and ingredients that make people’s mouths water? Or is the consumer for giving into that pressure instead of eating something healthier? In “What You Eat Is Your Business,” Radley Balko states that it is the individual’s responsibility to make the healthy choices needed, and that the government should not be held accountable for the obesity epidemic or fast food in general. Conversely, the individual cannot take all of the responsibility. The healthy foods at supermarkets are more expensive and leave the low-income families no choice but to either go fast food or buy a lot of pop and chips, the unhealthy options at the grocery store. Balko argues that our government needs to be working towards giving the people “responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being” (Balko 158). Balko also claims that obesity should be taken away from the subject of public health because it is not an issue of public health. He disputes that the government should not deal with the types of food options available to consumers. Nonetheless, there are more and more low-income families that all they can afford for meals is fast food, and with a shortage in good tasting, healthy options, junk is what the consumer decides on. A “healthy happy meal” can have up to 415 calories, which is high for small children to be taking in. The government should be able to step in and require that fast food restaurants have more healthy options on their menus, keeping in mind those low income families that have a hard time affording the healthy fresh produce. David Zinczenko backs up this argument in his essay “Don’t Blame The Eater.” He grew up in a split home, with neither parent making a whole lot of money. He states that dinner was a constant decision of McDonald’s, Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut. He goes on to say “Then as now, these were the only available options for an American kid to get an affordable meal” (Zinczenko 153). The individual can’t take the responsibility of not making healthy choices when the unhealthy fast food options are all they can afford.
Another one of Balko’s arguments is that obesity is not an issue of public health and therefore needs no government intervention. However, Yves Engler states in his essay “Obesity: Much Of The Responsibility Lies With Corporations,” that in the United States almost one third of the population is obese, and another two thirds is overweight. Heart disease and diabetes are two diseases caused by being overweight and obese, and nearly $120 billion is spent annually for treating these diseases. When so much of the population overweight and these deadly diseases can come from being overweight, this problem becomes an issue of public health. The government needs to and should want to step in and help out. They should require nutrition classes in high school as a graduation requirement, and they should start working to lower the cost of healthier foods at the grocery stores. Balko disagrees with the summit on obesity that the government is working on. The summit states that the government will be “agitating for a panoply of government anti-obesity initiatives, including prohibiting junk food in school vending machines, federal funding for new bike trails and sidewalks, more demanding labels on foodstuffs, restrictive food marketing to children, and probing the food industry into more “responsible” behavior.” (Balko 157). These are actions that the government needs to take to provide Americans with the option of a healthy lifestyle. If these changes are made and there are still those that are obese, it becomes their fault because they are given the option but have chosen not to be healthy. Until then, however, the government needs to take the blame. What will future generations look like if America keeps going as we are now?
So You’re Fat So you’re fat. Or maybe you aren’t, but Have you ever looked in the mirror, and thought you needed to a lose a little weight? Sure who hasn’t? “according to a survey by the Calorie Control Council, 48 million-or 25 percent- of the U.S. adult population are currently on a diet”( Yves Engler 174) Now have you ever looked in the mirror, maybe seen you needed to lose weight and thought “damn those fast food companies to hell for doing this to me”? Hopefully not the case because if so your lacking a sense of personal responsibility. In “What You Eat is Your Business” Radley Balko argues for the seemingly lost idea of personal responsibility and its effects. He makes the claims that allowing our weight problems to become issues of public policy is alleviating us of the responsibility that is trying to keeping ourselves healthy. Balko argues that the issue of obesity needs to stay out of the public sector, and that people need to take responsibility for their own weight issues. He goes on to say that by bringing this issue into the public sector of health care would discourage people from losing weight because it isn’t costing them money anymore. Allowing weight loss to come into the sector of public health care would lead to government restrictions on consumer choices. This would open the door for the government to have a hand it what stores are selling, this wouldn’t just be limited to McDonalds or Burger King, but this would then extend to regular supermarkets. If people in our country continue to allow the blame to fall on anyone, but ourselves for our current situation, the rise of obesity will only continue. Peoples weight issues are their own business, and people need to realize that, because with each passing day obesity is becoming more of a public issue, and more money is being spent on peoples personal battles. The more money that is put into fighting obesity the harder it will be for people to stop gobbling whoppers, and become healthier. “And if the government is paying for my anti-cholesterol medication, what incentive is there for me to put down the cheeseburger?” (Balko 159)The sooner people have to start paying for their own medications, and cost becomes an incentive the sooner they will start losing weight. When the government decides that the American people aren’t fit to decide what they should eat because of their lack of person responsibility, they’re going to start putting restrictions on what we can and can’t eat. “A society where everyone is responsible for everyone else’s well-being is a society more apt to accept government restrictions, for example- on what McDonald’s can put on its menu..”(Balko 159). If we continue in our lackadaisical ways of not taking responsibility for our own weight problems, we won’t even have the choice to get fat, soon we may not even have the choice to enjoy that delicious grease, fat, sugar, and butter we so crave. This goes farther than just fighting obesity, and farther than coming into the public sector. . . think of the children, how are you going to get your pre-teen child to shut up when you don’t have the option of an unhealthy complaint suppressing treat?
Personal responsibility seems to be a lost cause at this point you have everyone looking for a magical pill that will solve their problems. We as a country spend “30 billion a year”(Engler 173) on diet products, we look to surgery, stimulants, and chemical products with so many syllables that it won’t even fit on the side of a bus. Instead of looking at ourselves and realizing that maybe the food choices we make aren’t the best or deciding to go on a work out plan we point a choice finger at the fast food companies as we sign our name to a legal document. We have created a culture in which looking more something on the menu than someone ordering on the menu has become acceptable. And it’s because of our lack of willingness to accept responsibility for our actions that things are only going to bet worse. “…60
million are obese” that’s not overweight, that’s obese a word that’s synonym is gross, and yet we try to blame others, and plea ignorant to the dangers of fast food. If life was a health class as a country we would have failed. And that’s why were fat.
Health is a Choice One great aspect of life, as expressed by many heroic scenes, is the humans always have choice. Take almost any hero and even in dire circumstances, that hero has the power of choice. The same power is available to all humans, so all humans can choose between healthy food and the succulent food of obesity. In contrast, David Zinczenko’s “Don’t Blame the Eater” asserts that people are the victims of obesity. He claims that “most of the teenagers who live . . . on a fast-food diet won’t turn their lives around.” The article states that obesity is because of a scarcity of healthy foods and a lack of nutrition information. However, these arguments are generalized and a more in depth analysis of these arguments provides many points of refutation. Specifically, the article does not take into account all the sources of healthy alternatives, the full extent of nutrition information available to people, and the other causes of obesity. “Don’t Blame the Eater” provides a defense to the overweight consumer. It states that the obesity “problem isn’t just [teenagers]—it’s all of ours.” Zinczenko uses relevant and significant facts to support this claim. One fact is about how Type 2 diabetes in children has rose from 5 percent to 30 percent since 1994. This is a significant fact that should concern Americans, especially when the article also states how “diabetes accounted for $2.6 billion in health care costs in 1969.” Another fact associates America’s “more than 13,000 McDonald’s restaurants” with the unavailability of healthy alternatives. That dominance of fast food companies is bolsters by yet another fact: “McDonald’s and Burger King spend [$1 billion] each year on advertising and their own swelling health care costs.” The author has clearly and factually developed a case of how obesity is not a rarity in today’s culture. Beneficial foods are available in more places than the article suggests. Wal-Mart, as well as other supermarkets, is a worldwide success that sells healthy groceries at low prices. In fact, there are over 3,000 Wal-Marts in the United States that are conveniently places in mainstream areas. Additionally, there are many local shops and grocery stores that provide many healthy choices. Unfortunately, the task of preparing one’s own food is a deterrent from healthy eating. Thankfully, there are fast-food options that are not part of an overweight lifestyle. A great example is Subway. Subway, a restaurant based on losing weight, makes flatbread and vegie sandwiches with healthy sides such as apples or baked chips. This food is certainly better than a burger and fries, and it still remains cheap and convenient. Nevertheless, healthy eating is still a choice for the consumer to make. Choosing to have Subway over McDonalds and choosing water over the “450-calorie super-size Coke” that Zinczenko suggests as a healthy alternatives is the ultimate factor in whether people fatten up or not.
Information about fast-foods and healthy eating is widely available. In elementary schools, students are taught the food pyramid, the proper balance of the different food groups. These elementary students have assignments that are designed to ensure they grasp the concepts of healthy eating. This education continues in higher levels in other ways. For instance, most junior high schools or high schools have a cooking class requirement. This class stresses the importance of healthy meal choices and even how to prepare healthy foods. Cooking classes also teach students how to read nutrition labels because serving size and nutritional information is valuable in cooking and eating in general. However, as the article points out, fast-food does not provide the luxury of nutritional labels or warnings. First of all, the nutritional label should be the warning to the consumer. Also, fast-food restaurant are required to have nutritional information about all there food, and it should be available upon request. Of course, this is a complication that many people are not willing to hassle with. Fortunately, there are nifty handbooks that provide organized nutritional facts for restaurants, such as “CalorieKing.” And even if the book is too much, the CalorieKing website can quickly educate any fast-food consumer. Perhaps the most important realization is that there are many factors that contribute to obesity besides fast-food consumption. Genes play a major role in obesity. An individual’s metabolism determines if a person digests and retains a majority or minority of their food intake. Age and certain medications can also affect a person’s metabolism, and their likelihood to become obese. A person’s metabolism generally slows down as they get older, and medications can slow metabolism as well. Although that fact is entirely out of a person’s control, the amount of exercise a person does is entirely in their control. Food and exercise should maintain a balance, that is, calorie intake should have an appropriate proportion to calories that are burned off by exercise. Exercise is not a simple, easy task like buying fast-food though. Each person must decide to put the extra effort into fighting the fat. Obesity is a problem that has become all too common in America. The culture can be blamed for this, or the people can take responsibility. People have the knowledge to fight this problem, and even to solve this problem. People can use their knowledge of healthy eating and healthy lifestyles to prevent obesity. They can help future generations fight obesity and put forth a good example. Each individual can do these things, but the real problem is, will they choose to.
Part one of essay: As you drive by your local fast food restaurant you smell the French fries, burgers, and nuggets and you immediately get an intense craving for the delicious greasy food. You dig into your pockets for spare change and start to salivate like one of Pavlov’s dogs. But is this your fault? Are you solely to blame for this intense craving? Or is it the fast food industry and their addictive ingredients, engaging commercials, and lack of healthy options? According to Radley Balko’s essay What You Eat is Your Business it is the individual’s responsibility to make healthy choices and that the government should not get involved in any way with the obesity epidemic or with the fast food industry. However, without healthier options at fast food restaurants, lower costs of healthy foods at supermarkets, and nutrition and wellness classes in schools the individual cannot be completely responsible for their actions because the option of living a healthy lifestyle is simply not available to everyone.
ReplyDeleteThe main arguments in What You Eat is Your Business are in great need of refuting. Balko argues that “Instead of manipulating or intervening in the array of food options available to American consumers, our government ought to be working to foster a sense of responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being.” (Balko 158). He also argues that obesity is not an issue of public health and it should be removed from the realm of public health. (159).
Balko argues that the government should not intervene in the array of food options that are available to consumers. However, many families with low incomes can only afford fast food and at fast food restaurant there is a lack of healthy options. According to the nutrition information on the McDonald’s website a happy meal with milk, apple slices, and a cheeseburger (a so called healthy option) contains 415 calories. Furthermore one of the healthier salads on the menu, the ceaser salad with grilled chicken, contains 580 mg of sodium. The government needs to intervene and make fast food companies offer more healthy options especially because when many Americans cannot afford to buy anything but fast food. David Zinczenko furthers this argument in his essay Don’t Blame the Eater when he states, “My parents were split up, my dad trying to rebuild his life, my mom working long hours to make the monthly bills. Lunch and dinner, for me, was a daily choice between McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken, or Pizza Hut. Then as now, these were the only available options for an American kid to get an affordable meal” (Zinczenko 153). An individual cannot be held responsible for making healthy food choices when they can’t afford it and the government needs to intervene so that fast food companies have healthy options that are affordable.
part two of essay:Balko also argues that obesity is not an issue of public health, and therefore there is no need for government intervention. However, in the essay Obesity: Much of the Responsibility Lies with Corporations by Yves Engler in the United States nearly a third of the population is obese, and two thirds of the population is overweight. It is also stated that the annual costs of treating obesity-related conditions (heart disease, diabetes etc.) is at least 120 billion dollars. When over half of the population is overweight and numerous life-threatening diseases are associated with this epidemic it truly is an issue of public health. If a disease such as swine flu breaks out in the United States the government takes all actions possible to prevent its spread and protect other citizens from it, yet if people are dying everyday from obesity (a disease) and the health problems associated with it are we supposed to stand by and watch it happen? The government needs to be proactive and require nutrition and wellness classes in schools as well as lower the cost of healthy foods at supermarkets so that people have an education on what to eat and are able to afford it. Balko also disagrees with the summit on obesity where they will be “agitating for a panoply of government anti-obesity initiatives, including prohibiting junk food in school vending machines, federal funding for new bike trails and sidewalks, more demanding labels on foodstuffs, restrictive food marketing to children, and probing the food industry into more “responsible” behavior.” (Balko 157). In contrast, these are all actions that the government needs to take in order for Americans to have the option of living a healthy lifestyle.
ReplyDeleteIf the government doesn’t intervene and things continue the way we are what will the next generation look like? Will they all be overweight and die twenty years younger then this current generation will? As the economy continues to spiral downhill more and more Americans will not be able to afford healthy food and will continue to turn to fast food. Literally without government intervention there is no way that Americans will be able to turn their lifestyle around. Obesity, the fast food industry, the lack of education on nutrition, and the high cost of healthy food will cause society as a whole to suffer; the government must take action so that the citizens of this country do not succumb to the obesity epidemic.
The message in David Zinczenko’s essay, “Don’t Blame The Eater,” has a lot of validity. Zinczenko definitely seemed to know what he was writing about, he provided cogent reasons for his beliefs, and he supported those beliefs with ample statistics and facts about the current state of the fast-food industry. Throughout his essay, Zinczenko made good point after point about why the fast-food industry needs reform, and he made sense when predicting what will happen to the fast-food industry in the future. All in all, I thought Zinczenko’s argument against the fast-food industry was well-written, logical, and filled with ample evidence.
ReplyDeleteIn his essay, Zinczenko argues that our nation’s obesity and fast-food problem has developed into an epidemic because of several key reasons: It is an extremely cheap food alternative, its health hazards are not made clear to the consumers that purchase the product, and the advertising companies deviously appeal to children that can compel their parents to buy fast-food through whining. Zinczenko outlines his perspective that people in poor socioeconomic situations are most susceptible to the fast-food epidemic, followed by families with young children and people that do not read health labels closely.
Perhaps Zinczenko’s best point in his essay was that fast-food is too cheap of a food alternative relative to other foods available to people of this country. The cheapness of fast-food causes a portion of our population to be extremely susceptible to heavy fast-food consumption and increased obesity rates, specifically, that portion is the socioeconomically poor. Many studies have shown a negative relationship between obesity rates and annual income, meaning obesity increases as annual income decreases. A UC-Davis study found that obesity rates begin to reach alarming rates starting with the lower middle class, when total household income falls below $60,000. Another study, published in USA Today, found that 23% of women with a college degree are obese, while 42% of women with less than a high school education are obese. Common sense and overwhelming evidence both point to the fact that fast-food companies prey on the poor. They set their prices at levels that are extremely convenient for the lower classes and they can afford to do so because of mass-production and a widely uneducated population that does not know about the hazards of fast food. While fast-food companies presently can afford to set their prices very low because of mass production, I believe they should be held to higher health standards by the government and should be compelled to make their prices more comparable to other food alternatives, thereby lessening the high and unhealthy demand for fast-food.
In “Don’t Blame The Eater,” Zinczenko argues that fast-food companies should be compelled to make the health hazards of fast-food more obvious to the general consumer, similar to the restrictions that the government placed on cigarettes and tobacco companies. He writes how the general public is very uneducated on the extremely harmful effects that fast-food has on the health of those that eat it. He is correct in saying this. Zinczenko writes “there are no calorie information charts on fast-food packaging…Advertisements don’t carry warning labels the way tobacco ads do. Prepared foods aren’t covered under FDA labeling laws.” There are widely proven health hazards about fast-food and the greedy companies withhold this information from consumers. The health of the entire country would benefit if these companies were compelled to make fast-food’s health hazards more obvious, and the government should place constraints on the fast-food industry similar to the ones that were placed on the tobacco industry.
ReplyDeleteIn his essay, Zinczenko also argues that fast-food companies are to blame for America’s obesity epidemic because of their advertising strategies. He writes how advertisers market towards the children of America, and that these children exert extreme influence on their parents’ food consumption patterns. A research team from Yale unearthed some very compelling statistics about this. They found that 40% of parents received requests from their child about a McDonald’s meal at least once per week. They also found that 15% of parents with pre-school aged children fielded such requests once per day. As much as 84% of parents caved in to these requests within the past week, the study found. It is evident that fast-food chains deliberately appeal to the children of America. They advertise with clowns like Ronald McDonald, complementary toys that kids like, and countless commercials on TV that the kids of America see every hour of every day. That being said, the strategy is effective, because the whims of kids affect their parents very much. If the obesity rates are to be reined in though, legal action must be taken against these advertising companies and they should be compelled to abide by stricter advertising regulations.
A popular controversial issue is who is to blame for America’s increase in obesity caused by increased consummation of fast food. Is it the consumer’s fault or is it the fault of the fast food companies themselves? In my opinion, it comes down to the fact that people have full control over what they eat. Workers of fast food restaurants do not force feed their food down customer’s mouths, the customers seek out their location and pay for their food. In his essay “Don’t Blame the Eater” David Zinczenko expresses a different opinion.
ReplyDeleteDavid Zinczenko argues that consumers of fast food are not to blame for their increase in obesity. Zinczenko’s main argument is that fast food is much more available than healthy alternatives. His claims are that eating fast food is the only option for a meal when on a low budget and that there are many more locations to purchase fast food than there is to purchase fruit. He also argues that fast food companies do not put enough caloric-information charts or warning labels on their products. People are going to continue to eat fast food since they do not actually know what they are eating and that it could be a potential health hazard.
Zinczenko’s main argument that for some families “lunch and dinner is a daily choice between McDonalds, Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and Pizza Hut” is an exaggerated statement. Families with low budgets have other options to provide a healthier meal than fast food. In a hypothetical situation, lets say that a family of four has only $10.00 to spend for both lunch and dinner each day, making their weekly budget for food $70.00. If eating fast food, each person basically gets one thing off of the dollar menu for each meal. If spent at a grocery store, the same $70.00 could provide a week’s worth of healthier meals. Two loafs of bread can almost always be found for $3.00 or less. Along with a pack of sixteen cheese slices for $2.00, container of lunch meat for $4.00, and $3.00 jar of peanut butter, they can have a weeks worth of sandwiches, alternating between peanut butter sandwiches and cheese and meat sandwiches. A box of macaroni and cheese costs $1.00. Buy seven of them and seven boxes of spaghetti noodles at $2.00. Then purchase a $2.00 stick of butter to have buttered noodles instead of paying for jars of spaghetti sauce. A bag of baby-cut carrots cost $1.50, purchase three bags. For beverages, an on-sale gallon of milk costs $2.50 and tap water is free. After spending $42.00, this hypothetical family has a week’s worth of lunch and dinners that include sandwiches with sides of pasta and vegetables and milk to drink. This is much more healthier than eating fast food everyday and there is still almost $30.00 to spend on more food.
One could argue that there is nowhere for people to buy these healthier alternatives. However, if one lives in an area with a McDonalds, Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut relatively close together, then the chances of that area being developed enough to include a grocery store are very high. Gas stations, dollar stores, and other types of convenient stores are also abundant and sell food, although it may be “off brand.”
ReplyDeleteZinczenko also argues that fast food stores do not put warning labels or enough caloric-content information on their packaging. McDonald’s, for example, puts the amount of fat, calories, protein, and carbohydrates on their wrappers. Even if someone has already purchased their meal, he or she will know for the next day how unhealthy it is. As for warning labels, they are unnecessary. You know how fatty the food is and it is the consumer’s decision to eat it. The food is only a health hazard if the consumer makes the decision to eat it everyday and is consuming too many calories, which is the consumer’s fault.
Overall, Zinczenko lacks evidence in his arguments. The essay leaves us to assume that there is a distinct connection between people with low incomes and obesity. In reality, this is not the case. According to the Food Research and Action Center, “there is evidence that where there are gaps between high- and low-income groups, they have been closing with time as those with higher incomes become more obese.” The cause of this may be that those with higher incomes are willing to spend their money and feast on fast food. The spending of a low-income family may include a hamburger and small fry for each member, whereas a higher income family may purchase a hamburger, medium fry, and milkshake for each person and a 20-piece McNugget for the family to share. The higher income family consumed many more calories, which in turn, causes higher obesity.
We are now living in a society where obesity is slowly becoming the norm. If we continue on this path towards complete obesity, we will be faced with the difficult challenge of how to handle the negative effects that are guaranteed to follow. The fact that, as a society, we are becoming more obese can not be debated; what can be debated though is who is to blame for the increase of obesity. Radley Balko argues in his essay, “What you Eat is your own Business’, that to solve the national epidemic of obesity people need to be in control of their own health. I agree with this argument proposed by Balko, this point needs emphasizing since so many people believe that the majority of the blame should go to the companies making and selling the food.
ReplyDeleteBalko, in his essay, argues that if people had more personal incentives to live a healthier lifestyle, they would be more inclined to care about their own health. If those living an unhealthy lifestyle were forced to pay their own health bills, Balko argues that they would indeed take greater care of what they put in their own bodies. He also argues that the state is holding private citizens back because the state is implementing rules that make it more advantageous to live a cheap unhealthy lifestyle and foot the bill on others. Balko tells us that in his opinion the government should not be telling us what we should eat, that instead it should be up to the individual what they choose to eat.
Agree
People have more incentives if they are made to pay their own bills
State is holding back health care
Government should show/be a back up for health care incentives
Disagree
The companies are making the food, so they should be held responsible
Those that are strapped for time and money have the only choice of cheap, fast food
Before leaving for the United States my father would tell me everyday, "whatever you do, do not get fat." I was constantly warned that whoever goes to America comes back fat or borderline obese. I was quite curious what it was in America that would prove so threatening as far as weight was concerned. It took me one trip to the convenient store to understand what the problem was: a lack of healthy food items and the excess of junk food. America's consumers cannot be blamed for what they are subject to, and hence I agree with "don't blame the eater" by david Z.
ReplyDeleteThe essay “Don’t Blame the Eater” by David Zinczenko stresses that it is the conduct of fast food companies and the food industry that has lead to the high obesity rate in the United States. Food that is healthy, tasty, and affordable is very hard to come by. On the other hand, there are cheap and delicious fast food options all over. This circumstance has lead to consumers often just surviving of what is cheap and readily available. Then there also how fast food companies shy away from giving consumers the truth about their products and how calorie information is skewed to make it sound not as bad as it is.
One of the arguments in don’t blame the eater is how there is a lack of healthy, affordable alternatives and an excess of fast food options. Go to any convenient store, the cheapest and most satisfying options will most likely be bad for you. The few healthy alternatives that are available taste so bland and are even more costly that it does not make any sense at all to invest in healthy items. My first attempt at eating healthy ended up with me buying a whole wheat packet of bread and slices of turkey. I did not buy the mayonnaise or cheese to add to the sandwich because I wanted to avoid chemicals as much as possible. After the first time I ate ‘healthy’ I never tried again because that lead to me eating food that would make me unhappy. The truth is that food is one of the things that maintain our happiness. Food, other than sex, is one of the triggers of the neurotransmitter Dopamine that releases our happiness neurons. So here is my question, what are consumers supposed to do if whatever tastes good and is affordable happens to be greasy, unhealthy yet delicious fast food?
Another problem is the sneaky fashion in which the facts about the product are presented. Lot of the times information is skewed to look healthier than it really is. For example, the McDonalds salad dressing claims to be “280 calories per serving.” Who would have thought that the amount of serving is actually contains 2.5 servings. This leads me to tell you one of the main reasons why the eater is not to be blamed. The food industry has been adding MSGs (monosodium glutamate) to almost all their food items. MSGs are the secret ingredient that is making America obese. Corporations in the food industry have admitted to the claim that MSGs are what makes their food items addictive and that is exactly why they are added to foods. Furthermore, this is usually not declared in the back of a product and if it is you wouldn’t know that it is since it can also be called “hydrolyzed vegetable protein” which is just another name for MSGs.
Some say that health issues related obesity should not be matter the public sector is concerned about. Furthermore they argue that it is about personal ownership and responsibility. Yes, part of it is true but when two-thirds of a country is deemed obese there is definitely a problem in the system rather than of bad decisions by consumers. The public sector is the force that has the ability to set limits and barriers for the entities that are the source of the problem, food corporations. Hence, it is definitely the public sectors business to get involved between “you and your waistline.” I mainly blame it on the times, children spend more time in doors with televisions and the internet, walking has become uncommon and the amount of snack per day have increased. All the food industry mainly does is come up with more innovative ways to get your dollar for their snack. In my country, we have fruits for snacks, not Ranch flavored Doritos and cherry coke!
ReplyDeleteThe public sector has a huge part to play. They need to give incentives for children to eat healthy and have more out door opportunities. They also need to regulate these companies who are putting its consumers at risk. Fast food is as bad a cigarettes if you think of the hazards it poses on children. For example problems related obesity are sleep apnea, type 2 diabetes, heart diseases and the biggest of them all, social discrimination. My biggest fear as a child was being a fat kid in middle school.
The circumstances are to be blamed, not the eater. There are too many players in this game, and yes the consumer is one of them but the consumer cannot be blamed. There are too many sources of this problem that are influencing the consumers decision to buy that burger. The fact that it is become such a national problem leaves the public sector no choice but to intervene.
David Zinczenko the author of “Don’t Blame the Eater” correctly asserts that the fast food customer is not responsible for their poor eating habits because there are many more contributing factors that are out of their control. Unfortunately that means that fast food companies are to bear the burden as they feed people food that has led to the current childhood obesity rate of 16.9% for the 2009-2010.
ReplyDeleteZinczenko argues that the fast food industry is at fault for the growing obesity epidemic, and the individual should not be blamed. Zinczenko argues that the only inexpensive and available option to most kids is fast food. Furthermore, he argues that it is difficult to find healthy food and even seemingly healthy fast food is actually just as bad for you as other items on the menu. Lastly Zinczenko states that the fast food industry is marketing dangerously unhealthy foods to children which is just plain poor judgment and thus had led to the obesity epidemic.
McDonald’s and many other companies advertise to children and spend huge sums of money, as Zinczenko says “McDonald’s and Burger Kind spend $1 billion each year on advertising,” that leads to the manipulation of children and creates bad eating habits. McDonald’s frequently advertises to young children and shows happy children often with Ronald McDonald eating fries and burgers. According to a study from Time.com children ages 3-5 were given McDonald’s food to eat out of labeled McDonald’s bags and unlabeled plain bags and children showed a preference for the labeled bag even though they cannot yet read the children can recognize the golden arches. The results were clear 48% said they preferred the labeled burger while only 37% preferred the unlabeled burger. And the French fries had even bigger success with 77% saying they preferred the branded fries. Thus, young children although they do not know it are being swayed by advertisements and according to Time are unable to make out the differences in true reality versus the advertisements until they are 8 years old. And so clearly it is unfair and manipulative to advertise to children because it sets them up for a potential lifetime of poor eating habits. Since by the time they understand what advertisements are they have already enjoyed many meals at McDonald’s and will likely continue.
And the precious toy with the happy meal must not be forgotten as it is so powerful a draw for children, San Francisco has attempted to ban the toy from any fast food establishment that serves fatty foods. Even though McDonald’s was able to skirt the rule by charging 10 cents for the toy the fact is children often want the toy. And they want the trinket because it is relevant to their life featuring a product from a newly released movie or popular television show. Children see the movie and want to collect all the toys that McDonald’s is offering. But of course in order to get all the prized toys and not many repeats you will need to eat at McDonald’s far too much. The small trinkets are but one of the ways that young consumers are manipulated as their behavior to eat at McDonald’s is reinforced through the toys.
As some might argue kids especially the young and most impressionable are not able to go to McDonald’s without parental cooperation but the incessant whining to go to McDonald’s from a child is a strong pull on a tired parent who just wants a simple meal. And as such the parents are compliant with the child’s demands and everyone in the family ends up eating the unhealthy food. The advertisements lead kids to see and hear about McDonald’s all the time and thus parents driving home from work can just swing by a convenient drive-thru and pick up a cheap meal that keeps everyone happy.
ReplyDeleteAnother reason according to many people is that people do not need to eat poorly because they can stop at a grocery store and pick up some healthier alternatives to fast food. But healthy food at a grocery is expensive and takes time to cook that busy parents do not have available. And in some areas of the United States grocery stores are not nearby and if you do not have a car are nearly impossible to get to on a regular basis. For instance according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) 2.3 million U.S. Households live more than a mile from a grocery store and do not have access to a vehicle. But you can bet a McDonalds or unhealthy convenience store is right around the corner and thus some people have little choice but to eat unhealthily. Therefore, it is clear that people are not to blame for eating fast food.
When you choose a meal, do you cram as many calories as you can in a dollar and a minute? Compared to other countries, America spends the least amount of time eating but has the biggest BMI (Mass body index.) Therefore, it’s going to take more than sticking a warning on a wrapper to attract the attention of millions. I agree with author Radley Balko’s claim in “What You Eat is Your Business.” He insinuates how congress isn’t taking the right approach to resolve the obesity epidemic in America.
ReplyDeleteRadley Balko makes the claim in “What You Eat is Your Business” that Americans need to “foster a sense of responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being.” Throughout the article, he suggests people of the obesity crisis, such as children and low to middle class, aren’t being responsible about healthy decisions. Not only can we blame those people for their unhealthy behavior, but congress also has been subordinate towards mitigating the problem. In retrospective, laws demanding healthy food on menus and warranted food labeling have been ineffective and digressed from an abiding solution. Consequently, the average obese person costs society $7,000 a year, and the will only be compounded unless congress contrives laws that will endure the public with their own health.
The public’s reasons for being fat are refutable; specifically, those who contribute the most to the problem. The percentage of obese children in the United States has increased by 20% over the past years. Author Zinczenko claims in “What You Eat is Your Business” that he was an overweight child because he had no parents around, it was cheap, and that is what is happening today. However, that is a fallacy because a lot has changed since the 1980s. Zinczenko fails to recognize that parents have more control over their kids than before. Parents can monitor their child’s eating habits through cell phones, buying the right groceries, and even restricting time on the TV. Instead, about 60% of parents take their kids to fast food each week. Another predominate player of this epidemic lies at the hands of the low to middle class. Most of the class claims that healthier food is more expensive. Although, healthy food’s prices are somewhat higher, there is an array of other options, such as food stamps or choosing healthier foods on the fast food menu. The poor actions of the majority of the obese population could’ve been avoided.
On the other hand, many people might assume that it is actually the fast food industries that are making people fat. However, over the past decade, the food industries have been reprimanded and even changed their ways for the benefit of America’s health. For examples, in 2003 fast food restaurants added healthy side dishes and in 2005 they added nutrition information to packaging. People are too rushed to mind the wrapper and only 15% of sales were of healthy sides such as salads. Therefore, it becomes apparent that the government isn’t acting aggressive enough towards changing the problem by just regulating the food industries.
ReplyDeleteIf transforming the food outlets didn’t work, then changing laws that would affect the people would prove to be a more astute route. Specifically, a plan to further educate children about obesity in public schools could dramatically increase the way they look at nutrition. Health education is already in schools, so an addition of nutrition education would help the kids whose parents are bad models. And for the older generation, Balko urges congress to stop plans to further publicize healthcare. Moreover, it would be better if insurance companies reward or constrict opportunities for customers based on health. Such plans will be noticed by many because it weakens the financial safety net on obese. Accordingly, those who struggle with the losing weight can look towards dieting.
Government should see these plans as the best and maybe only solutions for rectifying health in America. If nothing is done soon, it will surpass cigarettes to become biggest cause of preventable deaths in the world. In fact, the percentage of cigarette smokers in the United States is declining because of the insurance bias towards smokers. Analogously, campaigns against anti-smoking don’t reach out to the distributers but inform and plea to the public. Fast food works the same way because everyone is affected by the $200 billion spent on the problem each year.
In his essay, “What You Eat Is Your Own Business”, Radley Balko claims Americans are responsible for their own dietary intake, as well as personal health. He explains the need for the government to limit interference with the public’s choices. Although Balko makes a few valid points, the government should be partially involved in lowering the obesity rate in America.
ReplyDeleteBalko tries to prove that obesity is not the government’s job to overcome. He believes that people are responsible for keeping themselves healthy and the correct weight. He makes an argument that states should not be involved in health insurance companies not insuring overweight customers. Congress should not focus their time on passing legislation regarding healthier eating habits that create no positive outcomes. He believes that to overcome the issue of obesity, Americans need to take control of their own daily habits.
The government needs to be involved in ending the growing obesity rate in America. National Childhood Obesity Week was launched in early 2012 which is a social enterprise helping obese children to create a clear strategy to combat their obesity. Although this may seem to be a positive initiative, but currently, the government could not do anything without control the food and beverage aspect of obesity. According an article by Neville Rigby, there was no possibility of achieving even the meager target of reducing overweight and obesity to the levels reached at the start of the millennium, so the last government allowed their 2010 deadline to slide to 2020 with the connivance of some expert advisers participating in a self-defeating exercise in a numbers game that evades the real issues. Obesity in Americans has failed to be eradicated by the government because they are simply suggesting healthier habits, rather than making regulations.
The American government should be attempting to produce healthy alternatives to fast food. Many Americans cannot afford and simply do not have time to make a healthy dinner for their large and busy families. Fast food seems to be the only option for these families. This causes horrible and lasting health issue for families. If there were healthy alternatives to these fast food restaurants, families could choose these and eliminate future health problems. Not only are there countless fast food restaurants on every block, but also they are extremely inexpensive. The government needs to step in and help develop an inexpensive and healthy alternative.
Eating healthy in America can become very costly. Americans spend about $4,000 on food each year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Fruits are vegetables continue to climb in cost, causing Americans to buy less and less of them. The government needs to lower the cost of these healthier foods and add a tax to foods that are not healthy. Forcing Americans to choose healthier options will help America become healthier has a whole.
Part two:
ReplyDeleteDifferent viewpoints on issues such as those will always exist. Instead of punishing both sides a middle-ground should be met. However, that “meeting in the middle” should entail a push on personal responsibility as well as incentives to eat healthily. If one becomes obese because of horrible eating habits, so be it. They should receive a bill for their “anti-cholesterol medication” rather than have the healthy pay for their detrimental habits. A bill for expensive medications should be incentive enough for most citizens, sparking new self-responsibility initiatives. The greatest influence in personal responsibility is not the risk of being obese, warning labels on products, “fat taxes,” or regulation, but money. The opportunity cost of purchasing something is the greatest influence that can be pushed upon consumers. Because fast-food connoisseurs know that their immediate satisfaction will be followed by negative results. They do not need government or social influence to make their decisions, because their decisions are already made. Only personal responsibility, incentives to eat healthy, or serious health threats will change the habits of heavy fast-food consumer.
Until a great social or political movement occurs, little will change fast-food habits. Obesity is not an American problem, but a personal problem. As Balko put it, “We’ll all make better choices about diet, exercise, and personal health when someone else isn’t paying for the consequences of those choices,” and he is absolutely right. Give the choice of consumption back to the consumer, but provide them with the ability to make informed, responsible decisions.
In “Don’t Blame The Eater,” Zinczenko argues that fast-food companies are held completely responsible for Americans overweight epidemic, rather than the people actually purchasing the product. He states that the actual individual companies are to blame for a number of reasons. First, Zinczenko claims the fast food companies trick the consumers into eating meals that have more calories than the consumer intended. They do this by a false perception of serving size in drinks and sauces. He also states that the lack of information available to the consumer is hindering them from making the right diet choices. I, on the other hand, refute that. Americans In todays world should have enough knowledge and at least by know added up the facts and concluded that fast food is not a healthy diet choice and should be consumed at a moderate level.
ReplyDeleteIn Zincezenko’s essay “Don’t Blame The Eater,” he argues that our nations Epidemic on Obesity is related to the fast food industry for a number of reasons: It is readily available any time of the day, caloric Information is not clear to the consumer, and the advertisers are directly going for the youth of America. He states that if an individual is on a low budget diet that person will have a hard time eating anything other than fast food, simply because of the price and number of fast food locations. Not only is the caloric information absent from the packaging, it is almost impossible to obtain the Information.
Zinczenko’s main argument is that fast food is a lot more readily available than say a healthy meal. With more than 13,000 McDonald’s and over 160,000 fast food restaurants through out the country that leaves one fast food restaurant for every twenty three square miles on American soil. Not only is their an abundance of restaurants but most of them stay open twenty four hours a day, making your greasy thousand calorie burger at any time of day. Not to mention, the food being sold at fast food joints would not be found at the St. Regis. With the average cost of an item at three dollars this makes the menu a lot more appealing
On almost every item at the grocery store there is a uniform caloric information table on the back of every item. However, this table will never be found on any fast food product. These large corporations make it very tricky for consumers to obtain something that should so simple and easy to get a hold of. I do not know about you, but why would a food manufacture be hiding what is in their product? the problem is not so much what is in the product, it is how much of it is in the product. The issue of what is in the food being served at these fast food restaurants is an entirely different argument but the amount of fat, sodium and number of calories is off the charts. For a typical U.S. male the number of calories I should be consuming per day for a healthy weight is 2,000. If I were to get lunch at Mcdonald’s and got a Big Mac combo with large fries and Coke the calories of that meal would be 1,514, that is more than seventy five percent of my daily calories that I just consumed in a single lunch. That only leaves me with 500 calories for the rest of the day and I did not even tally in my calories from breakfast.
ReplyDeleteThe children of America are the people of tomorrow and will be the people making all of the purchases in the future, so it is no surprise why the fast food corporations have aimed their sights on children. It may seam kind of stupid to aim advertising at individuals that do not even take home a pay check, but children are the driving force of the industry and the parents are not the only ones paying for it. By these kids consuming fast food at such an early age is becoming embedded into their brains that this food is okay for them. It becomes a norm in their life that becomes a psychological dependance. The food itself will not bring them happiness but the feelings associated with going to the play pen out in the back of McDonald’s, or the energy ruch from the fifty grams of sugar they just consumed in a matter of minutes. This dependence that kids acquire at a young age is what brings their parents through the drive through after school.
Fast food companies are not going anywhere with advertising budgets in the billions it does not look like either side of this argument is going to back down. It is going to have to be the peoples choice and will ultimately come down to that split decision in ones mind telling them to pull through the drive-through. Im not asking someone to never eat McDonald’s again or even something remotely close to that but their needs to be moderation.
Fast food is something that every body craves at some point in their life. If you are walking or driving past, or even if you are at the business next to a fast food restaurant, the smell of the food can be very tempting. You may start running thoughts through your head like, “Am I hungry?” “Did I bring cash with me?” or “What will I get?” These thoughts just instantly come to mind when the greasy scent of quick and tasty food. Who is to blame for this reaction? The fast food industry, with a lack of healthy options, catchy commercials that make people smile, and ingredients that make people’s mouths water? Or is the consumer for giving into that pressure instead of eating something healthier? In “What You Eat Is Your Business,” Radley Balko states that it is the individual’s responsibility to make the healthy choices needed, and that the government should not be held accountable for the obesity epidemic or fast food in general. Conversely, the individual cannot take all of the responsibility. The healthy foods at supermarkets are more expensive and leave the low-income families no choice but to either go fast food or buy a lot of pop and chips, the unhealthy options at the grocery store. Balko argues that our government needs to be working towards giving the people “responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being” (Balko 158). Balko also claims that obesity should be taken away from the subject of public health because it is not an issue of public health. He disputes that the government should not deal with the types of food options available to consumers. Nonetheless, there are more and more low-income families that all they can afford for meals is fast food, and with a shortage in good tasting, healthy options, junk is what the consumer decides on. A “healthy happy meal” can have up to 415 calories, which is high for small children to be taking in. The government should be able to step in and require that fast food restaurants have more healthy options on their menus, keeping in mind those low income families that have a hard time affording the healthy fresh produce. David Zinczenko backs up this argument in his essay “Don’t Blame The Eater.” He grew up in a split home, with neither parent making a whole lot of money. He states that dinner was a constant decision of McDonald’s, Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut. He goes on to say “Then as now, these were the only available options for an American kid to get an affordable meal” (Zinczenko 153). The individual can’t take the responsibility of not making healthy choices when the unhealthy fast food options are all they can afford.
ReplyDeleteAnother one of Balko’s arguments is that obesity is not an issue of public health and therefore needs no government intervention. However, Yves Engler states in his essay “Obesity: Much Of The Responsibility Lies With Corporations,” that in the United States almost one third of the population is obese, and another two thirds is overweight. Heart disease and diabetes are two diseases caused by being overweight and obese, and nearly $120 billion is spent annually for treating these diseases. When so much of the population overweight and these deadly diseases can come from being overweight, this problem becomes an issue of public health. The government needs to and should want to step in and help out. They should require nutrition classes in high school as a graduation requirement, and they should start working to lower the cost of healthier foods at the grocery stores. Balko disagrees with the summit on obesity that the government is working on. The summit states that the government will be “agitating for a panoply of government anti-obesity initiatives, including prohibiting junk food in school vending machines, federal funding for new bike trails and sidewalks, more demanding labels on foodstuffs, restrictive food marketing to children, and probing the food industry into more “responsible” behavior.” (Balko 157). These are actions that the government needs to take to provide Americans with the option of a healthy lifestyle. If these changes are made and there are still those that are obese, it becomes their fault because they are given the option but have chosen not to be healthy. Until then, however, the government needs to take the blame. What will future generations look like if America keeps going as we are now?
ReplyDeleteSo You’re Fat
ReplyDeleteSo you’re fat. Or maybe you aren’t, but Have you ever looked in the mirror, and thought you needed to a lose a little weight? Sure who hasn’t? “according to a survey by the Calorie Control Council, 48 million-or 25 percent- of the U.S. adult population are currently on a diet”( Yves Engler 174) Now have you ever looked in the mirror, maybe seen you needed to lose weight and thought “damn those fast food companies to hell for doing this to me”? Hopefully not the case because if so your lacking a sense of personal responsibility. In “What You Eat is Your Business” Radley Balko argues for the seemingly lost idea of personal responsibility and its effects. He makes the claims that allowing our weight problems to become issues of public policy is alleviating us of the responsibility that is trying to keeping ourselves healthy.
Balko argues that the issue of obesity needs to stay out of the public sector, and that people need to take responsibility for their own weight issues. He goes on to say that by bringing this issue into the public sector of health care would discourage people from losing weight because it isn’t costing them money anymore. Allowing weight loss to come into the sector of public health care would lead to government restrictions on consumer choices. This would open the door for the government to have a hand it what stores are selling, this wouldn’t just be limited to McDonalds or Burger King, but this would then extend to regular supermarkets. If people in our country continue to allow the blame to fall on anyone, but ourselves for our current situation, the rise of obesity will only continue.
Peoples weight issues are their own business, and people need to realize that, because with each passing day obesity is becoming more of a public issue, and more money is being spent on peoples personal battles. The more money that is put into fighting obesity the harder it will be for people to stop gobbling whoppers, and become healthier. “And if the government is paying for my anti-cholesterol medication, what incentive is there for me to put down the cheeseburger?” (Balko 159)The sooner people have to start paying for their own medications, and cost becomes an incentive the sooner they will start losing weight.
When the government decides that the American people aren’t fit to decide what they should eat because of their lack of person responsibility, they’re going to start putting restrictions on what we can and can’t eat. “A society where everyone is responsible for everyone else’s well-being is a society more apt to accept government restrictions, for example- on what McDonald’s can put on its menu..”(Balko 159). If we continue in our lackadaisical ways of not taking responsibility for our own weight problems, we won’t even have the choice to get fat, soon we may not even have the choice to enjoy that delicious grease, fat, sugar, and butter we so crave. This goes farther than just fighting obesity, and farther than coming into the public sector. . . think of the children, how are you going to get your pre-teen child to shut up when you don’t have the option of an unhealthy complaint suppressing treat?
Personal responsibility seems to be a lost cause at this point you have everyone looking for a magical pill that will solve their problems. We as a country spend “30 billion a year”(Engler 173) on diet products, we look to surgery, stimulants, and chemical products with so many syllables that it won’t even fit on the side of a bus. Instead of looking at ourselves and realizing that maybe the food choices we make aren’t the best or deciding to go on a work out plan we point a choice finger at the fast food companies as we sign our name to a legal document. We have created a culture in which looking more something on the menu than someone ordering on the menu has become acceptable. And it’s because of our lack of willingness to accept responsibility for our actions that things are only going to bet worse. “…60
ReplyDeletemillion are obese” that’s not overweight, that’s obese a word that’s synonym is gross, and yet we try to blame others, and plea ignorant to the dangers of fast food. If life was a health class as a country we would have failed. And that’s why were fat.
Health is a Choice
ReplyDeleteOne great aspect of life, as expressed by many heroic scenes, is the humans always have choice. Take almost any hero and even in dire circumstances, that hero has the power of choice. The same power is available to all humans, so all humans can choose between healthy food and the succulent food of obesity. In contrast, David Zinczenko’s “Don’t Blame the Eater” asserts that people are the victims of obesity. He claims that “most of the teenagers who live . . . on a fast-food diet won’t turn their lives around.” The article states that obesity is because of a scarcity of healthy foods and a lack of nutrition information. However, these arguments are generalized and a more in depth analysis of these arguments provides many points of refutation. Specifically, the article does not take into account all the sources of healthy alternatives, the full extent of nutrition information available to people, and the other causes of obesity.
“Don’t Blame the Eater” provides a defense to the overweight consumer. It states that the obesity “problem isn’t just [teenagers]—it’s all of ours.” Zinczenko uses relevant and significant facts to support this claim. One fact is about how Type 2 diabetes in children has rose from 5 percent to 30 percent since 1994. This is a significant fact that should concern Americans, especially when the article also states how “diabetes accounted for $2.6 billion in health care costs in 1969.” Another fact associates America’s “more than 13,000 McDonald’s restaurants” with the unavailability of healthy alternatives. That dominance of fast food companies is bolsters by yet another fact: “McDonald’s and Burger King spend [$1 billion] each year on advertising and their own swelling health care costs.” The author has clearly and factually developed a case of how obesity is not a rarity in today’s culture.
Beneficial foods are available in more places than the article suggests. Wal-Mart, as well as other supermarkets, is a worldwide success that sells healthy groceries at low prices. In fact, there are over 3,000 Wal-Marts in the United States that are conveniently places in mainstream areas. Additionally, there are many local shops and grocery stores that provide many healthy choices. Unfortunately, the task of preparing one’s own food is a deterrent from healthy eating. Thankfully, there are fast-food options that are not part of an overweight lifestyle. A great example is Subway. Subway, a restaurant based on losing weight, makes flatbread and vegie sandwiches with healthy sides such as apples or baked chips. This food is certainly better than a burger and fries, and it still remains cheap and convenient. Nevertheless, healthy eating is still a choice for the consumer to make. Choosing to have Subway over McDonalds and choosing water over the “450-calorie super-size Coke” that Zinczenko suggests as a healthy alternatives is the ultimate factor in whether people fatten up or not.
Information about fast-foods and healthy eating is widely available. In elementary schools, students are taught the food pyramid, the proper balance of the different food groups. These elementary students have assignments that are designed to ensure they grasp the concepts of healthy eating. This education continues in higher levels in other ways. For instance, most junior high schools or high schools have a cooking class requirement. This class stresses the importance of healthy meal choices and even how to prepare healthy foods. Cooking classes also teach students how to read nutrition labels because serving size and nutritional information is valuable in cooking and eating in general. However, as the article points out, fast-food does not provide the luxury of nutritional labels or warnings. First of all, the nutritional label should be the warning to the consumer. Also, fast-food restaurant are required to have nutritional information about all there food, and it should be available upon request. Of course, this is a complication that many people are not willing to hassle with. Fortunately, there are nifty handbooks that provide organized nutritional facts for restaurants, such as “CalorieKing.” And even if the book is too much, the CalorieKing website can quickly educate any fast-food consumer.
ReplyDeletePerhaps the most important realization is that there are many factors that contribute to obesity besides fast-food consumption. Genes play a major role in obesity. An individual’s metabolism determines if a person digests and retains a majority or minority of their food intake. Age and certain medications can also affect a person’s metabolism, and their likelihood to become obese. A person’s metabolism generally slows down as they get older, and medications can slow metabolism as well. Although that fact is entirely out of a person’s control, the amount of exercise a person does is entirely in their control. Food and exercise should maintain a balance, that is, calorie intake should have an appropriate proportion to calories that are burned off by exercise. Exercise is not a simple, easy task like buying fast-food though. Each person must decide to put the extra effort into fighting the fat.
Obesity is a problem that has become all too common in America. The culture can be blamed for this, or the people can take responsibility. People have the knowledge to fight this problem, and even to solve this problem. People can use their knowledge of healthy eating and healthy lifestyles to prevent obesity. They can help future generations fight obesity and put forth a good example. Each individual can do these things, but the real problem is, will they choose to.