Please Explain Why is this expectable

[Lynne]

Do you know that there is no empirical evidence to prove that saturated fats and foods high in cholesterol cause heart disease? In fact, there is no scientific proof that high cholesterol causes heart disease.

I don't know what scientific proof there is regards transfats being harmful. Like most of you, I have often heard that transfats, high fructose corn syrup, and white flour are the bad guys (sometimes along with potatoes, carrots, etc).

People try to blame fast food for the obesity epidemic. They say, "it's something in the food." No doubt, refined carbs cause many people to overeat. The blood sugar rises, then drops, causing an insatiable appetite. They end up being overweight and undernourished. The end results if often Type II diabetes and heart disease. I'm not sure education is going to help much. People are going to overeat and not move if that's what they want to do. Also, it's not terribly difficult to overeat healthy food either.

If transfat is truly artery-clogging (and it probably is), then I applaud the government for banning restaurants from using it.

However, a moratorium on fast food restaurants is ridiculous. Nutrition is complex and there really is very little clinical nutritionists truly know about nutrition.

As an aside, our local grocery store banned welfare customers from purchasing fresh potatoes last year. Yet they allow them to buy bags of potato chips, Cheet-os
and cartons of ding-dongs. Figure that one out.

Oh, and a moratorium does sound rascist.

 

[jkembry]

As an aside, our local grocery store banned welfare customers from purchasing fresh potatoes last year. Yet they allow them to buy bags of potato chips, Cheet-os
and cartons of ding-dongs. Figure that one out.

Huh.....If they have money to pay for the chips....how can they be banned from buying potatoes?

 

[Lynne]

Huh.....If they have money to pay for the chips....how can they be banned from buying potatoes?

They'd put up a sign that said, "Food stamps cannot be used for fresh potatoes." I asked the clerk why. Come to find out, it was a local thing in our county. Someone at Social Services had determined that clients were becoming obese from their large potato consumption. This shows ignorance (I don't mean stupidity but lack of knowledge). Potatoes actually have fiber, protein, Vitamin C and a host of antioxidants.

I asked the clerk if food stamp clients were still allowed to buy junk food and she said yes.

I notice that many food stamp clients load their carts with nonnutritious crap. They might be better off eating a few too many potatoes.

 

[CuongNhuka]

I don't know what scientific proof there is regards transfats being harmful.

Geussing you've nevert seen Super Size Me?

 

[Lynne]

Geussing you've nevert seen Super Size Me?

Oh, yeah. I did see that movie a few years ago. I remember the guy gained some phenomenal amount of weight and really skewed his blood lipids, maybe his blood sugar, too. I remember the doctor was worried about irreversible damage. His liver enyzmes were off, etc., which probably indicated a fatty liver. Of course, he ate crap for all meals and he supersized. Just the overeating would do all of that damage. Overeat brown rice and beans and you will get fat; it's just not as calorically dense as a lot of fast food.

I don't eat McDonald's myself. One can make healthier decisions if they eat there. I do eat some fast food though - Taco Bell and Wendy's. So, no purist here.

Then there is the story of the guy who lost 82 pounds recently eating McDonald's. But he made healthy choices.

As far as the scientific proof regards transfats, I haven't done the research. They probably are harmful. But sometimes the media jumps on a single study and makes it sound like the holy grail of truth. Personally, I try to avoid transfats - I know that the oils have been oxidized and right therein is a problem.

 

[CuongNhuka]

Oh, yeah. I did see that movie a few years ago. I remember the guy gained some phenomenal amount of weight and really skewed his blood lipids, maybe his blood sugar, too. I remember the doctor was worried about irreversible damage. His liver enyzmes were off, etc., which probably indicated a fatty liver.

That in of itself sounds kinda like proof of the effects of the contents of fast food. it's far from the sceintific method, but it does work .

 

[shinbushi]

What is stupid is that South Central Ooops I mean South LA is one of the most Crime ridden piece of crap neighborhoods in L.A. There are many more important problems killing the residents than fast food. Typical Liberals rather than fixing real problems trying to control people like a mommy or daddy.

 

[Nolerama]

I see it as similar to a municipality prohibiting new businesses to use neon signs due to a building's "historic" factor. Or cities having ordinances against drinking beer out of cups (not bottles) on the street. Odd stuff... but for a reason.

It's not like it's a Congressional Act, it's a city-wide decision. It can be changed. Maybe people in that neighborhood are not just tired of being morbidly obese, but would like their property value to rise, attracting better businesses and eventually gentrifying that particular neighborhood in general to make the property owners a little more wealthy.... in a 15-20 year time frame.

I see it all the time. I've even seen communities protest the opening of a new McDonalds and successfully shut it down through a boycott.

 

[Cryozombie]

I see it all the time. I've even seen communities protest the opening of a new McDonalds and successfully shut it down through a boycott.

Now if only we could do that with Walmart.

 

[girlbug2]

Now if only we could do that with Walmart.

It has been done.

 

[punisher73]

You think it is their job to protect us, from trans fat and Taco Bell?
Don’t you think they have a few other more important things to protect us from?
Why should my personal choices be decided by the Government?
What happened to personal accountability? I know if I eat fast food every day I will not be healthy, there for I don’t.
And most of all do you want this government being in charge of something as simple as what you can eat in L.A?

What next no whole milk?
No brown eggs?
No sugar, salt.

I know a group of people who eat peanuts and die, who protects them?
Can I sue the government for not protecting me because I ate 4 lbs of ice cream and got sick?


This is not the Governments job. Just another freedom “rite” taken away for the “good of the people”

Sorry to burst your bubble, but they aren't BANNING fast food places, they just aren't allowing them to be built or opened in a one year window to try and encourage "healthier" places to open to give more options to people.

The gov't has been choosing what gets to open where for quite a long time now with zoning laws etc. This isn't anything new, just the media trying to stir up controversy.

How is this any different than the gov't banning smoking in many places?

 

[Kacey]

How is this any different than the gov't banning smoking in many places?

First, let me repeat that I think the government is turning way too far into a nanny state.

Second, as I said earlier, if you smoke, I have to breathe it - and tobacco smoke makes me nauseous and triggers my asthma in the short term, never mind any of the potential long-term problems. If you eat trans fat in my presence, however, that has no impact on my health, although it potentially could, in the long run, affect my insurance rates. That is why I agree with smoking bans, but not with laws about which foods can be sold where.

 

[CuongNhuka]

\That is why I agree with smoking bans, but not with laws about which foods can be sold where.

There are already all kinds of laws regulating food. Until the FDA was made it was common for butchers to take the meat that had fallen on the floor and selling it anyways. There was all kinds of horribly disgusting practices. This is just the government trying to do more of the same.

 

[Kacey]

There are already all kinds of laws regulating food. Until the FDA was made it was common for butchers to take the meat that had fallen on the floor and selling it anyways. There was all kinds of horribly disgusting practices. This is just the government trying to do more of the same.

Ah... so in your mind, laws about hygienic food handling (which are a public health concern) are the same as treating the population of various areas as being too stupid to choose their own food? I'm not saying that these people are choosing their food wisely - and that does lead to a health concern - but there's a reason there are so many fast food places in the area, and it has more to do with economics than anything else. Fast food is cheap - which is related to quality of the food and the service - and as you improve both food and service, you also increase cost. I know plenty of people who cannot afford anything more expensive, no matter how nearby it may be. The government is, in this case, attempting to legislate the law of supply and demand - and that's not going to work; laws that attempt to do so have always fallen flat... Prohibition having been the most spectacular example.

IMHO, the money spent to enforce this law would be better spent on programs that educate people about cheap ways to find good food, as many people don't understand how to buy or prepare good quality, healthy food - that would attack the root of the problem, instead of a symptom, which is what they are doing now.

 

[CuongNhuka]

Ah... so in your mind, laws about hygienic food handling (which are a public health concern) are the same as treating the population of various areas as being too stupid to choose their own food?

I never said that and you know it.

 

[Kacey]

There are already all kinds of laws regulating food. Until the FDA was made it was common for butchers to take the meat that had fallen on the floor and selling it anyways. There was all kinds of horribly disgusting practices. This is just the government trying to do more of the same.

Ah... so in your mind, laws about hygienic food handling (which are a public health concern) are the same as treating the population of various areas as being too stupid to choose their own food?

I never said that and you know it.

That may not be what you meant - but that is how the above reads to me. If you meant something else, please explain what it was.

 

[5-0 Kenpo]

That in of itself sounds kinda like proof of the effects of the contents of fast food. it's far from the sceintific method, but it does work .

Far from scientific is an understatement.

All the movie shows is that for one person, eating McDonalds may cause that one person to have health problems. And I say may because we do not know what other things that he did that may have cause or exaserbated these conditions.

This movie shows nothing about what effect one aspect of food, transfats, could have on the majority of the population.

 

[5-0 Kenpo]

That aside, if not to protect the people, then what is the purpose of government?

Oh, and the answer to this is: to protect peoples freedoms. And these laws are a direct contradiction to that.

Of course, thats what I believe is the purpose of government. Some have different ideas, which would include protecting people from themselves.

 

[Cryozombie]

That may not be what you meant - but that is how the above reads to me. If you meant something else, please explain what it was.

FWIW thats how it reads to me as well.

I disagree with them banning/delaying the opening of the places on principle. If they want Healthy places to go in instead... they should give incentives to the people who want to open a healthier food place instead of regulating who can open their business. Give a Loan/Grant/Tax Break to the guy who wants to open a place there that isn't fast food, so that it becomes affordable. After all, its much cheaper and easier to open an "add water" restaurant that you can Franchise out for 50k than it is to build something new from the ground up, and I think that makes it look far more lucrative to wanna-be business owners...

 

[punisher73]

First, let me repeat that I think the government is turning way too far into a nanny state.

Second, as I said earlier, if you smoke, I have to breathe it - and tobacco smoke makes me nauseous and triggers my asthma in the short term, never mind any of the potential long-term problems. If you eat trans fat in my presence, however, that has no impact on my health, although it potentially could, in the long run, affect my insurance rates. That is why I agree with smoking bans, but not with laws about which foods can be sold where.

Unhealthy people do affect us and what we pay in insurance rates. I do care about that.

Again, this isn't a law about what food can be sold where. Understand what you are arguing about. This is about a zoning ordinance that says that they will not approve any new fast food restuarants to be opened in a certain area. The existing places are fine and can operate as normal. Zoning laws exist all over the place in cities. Having a porn store by a school doesn't affect you, but many cities have a zoning ordinance about what can be opened by a school. Did you look at what the obesity rates are for the area in question? If I remember correctly it is almost double the national average, so that area probably does feel the financial effects of it.