McDonald's Happy Meals

[makattak]

First, San Francisco has banned Happy Meals:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20101103/hl_nm/us_mcdonalds_toys

Ok, ok, it's California, and specifically, San Francisco. They're nuts, I'm not concerned.

However, NOW we have lawyers coming after McDonald's for the Happy Meals:

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/san-francisco-s-ban-happy-meals-won-t-af

It's cigarettes part II.

Here's the money quote:

“It is also unfair to their parents because it makes a parent’s job very hard and it inculcates a lifetime of Big Mac Attacks."

Wow. Just wow.

Nope, nothing wrong with our legal system, nothing to see here, move along.

[TommyGunn]

It is also unfair to their parents because it makes a parent’s job very hard .....

Boo-hoo....boo - hoo......

   Good Grief!

[tyme]

Good.  I hope more places ban them.  If the not-very-healthy food weren't bad enough, they are taking advantage of psychological tricks to sell that food to kids.  That's not good.

I'm all for marijuana being legalized, but that doesn't mean head shops should offer toys with marijuana in order to appeal to children.

[Perd Hapley]

I didn't know that toys and pretty boxes were psychological tricks.    I suppose next, we'll ban the mazes on the backs of paper place-mats, and the crayons that go with them.

[dogmush]

McDonalds is probably doing us a favor.

Parents that are so weak that their children whine/bully/manipulate them in to excessive Happy Meals are very likely to fail at other basic parenting tasks and turn out non-useful members of society.  The Happy Meal toys mark them for the rest of us.

[makattak]

Good.  I hope more places ban them.  If the not-very-healthy food weren't bad enough, they are taking advantage of psychological tricks to sell that food to kids.  That's not good.

I'm all for marijuana being legalized, but that doesn't mean head shops should offer toys with marijuana in order to appeal to children.

Wow.

I guess we should start outlawing candy, too. It's not healthy.

Sweet cereals as well. Some of those have TOYS in them!

We can't trust parents to do the right thing. Thus we must outlaw guns junk food. IT'S FOR THE CHILDREN!!!

[tyme]

I would be quite happy to return to a belief in absolute personal responsibility, along with a belief that islands, and princesses, and God exist, but I can't get there from here.  It's magicians all the way down.

[MillCreek]

You left out the unicorns.

[makattak]

I would be quite happy to return to a belief in absolute personal responsibility, along with a belief that islands, and princesses, and God exist, but I can't get there from here.  It's magicians all the way down.

Yep. Time to outlaw guns, then. Can't trust people to be responsible.

We really ought to start on cars, too. Don't get me started on those dangerous hazards.

[Ned Hamford]

When they outlaw Happy Meals, only outlaws will have Happy Meals.
 

[Boomhauer]

Good.  I hope more places ban them.  If the not-very-healthy food weren't bad enough, they are taking advantage of psychological tricks to sell that food to kids.  That's not good.

You realize that the motives of politicians banning fast food, cigarettes, etc isn't even related one bit to public health, right?

For the Children! is such a nice cover and opposition breaker, though...

[tyme]

Since when does anything that can be presented as "for the children" automatically become unethical?

Yep. Time to outlaw guns, then. Can't trust people to be responsible.

We really ought to start on cars, too. Don't get me started on those dangerous hazards.

Right, because unhealthy food is very similar to guns and cars.

We don't allow restaurants to lace food with certain toxins even if they'd improve the taste of the food.  Why not?  Why aren't you all campaigning to allow this?

You realize that the motives of politicians...

Even corrupt, vote-grubbing politicians and mindless tree-hugging liberal groupies are right on occasion.  I happen to think this is one of them.

[makattak]

Since when does anything that can be presented as "for the children" automatically become unethical?

Right, because unhealthy food is very similar to guns and cars.

We don't allow restaurants to lace food with certain toxins even if they'd improve the taste of the food.  Why not?  Why aren't you all campaigning to allow this?

Why do you hate the poor?

[dogmush]

.

We don't allow restaurants to lace food with certain toxins even if they'd improve the taste of the food.  Why not?  Why aren't you all campaigning to allow this?

McDonald's food, despite what many think, is not actually toxic.  It's unhealthy in large quanities.  Which falls squarely in my "No *expletive deleted*it." catagory.

If people want to be fat, and raise fat children, who enjoy McRib's that's their buisness. And neither you, nor I , nor the Gov. of San Fran has any buisness getting involved.

I *might* have a little sympathy for this if anyone was trying to say that Happy Meals were a healthy, balanced meal.  But that's not happening.

[dm1333]

Good.  I hope more places ban them.  If the not-very-healthy food weren't bad enough, they are taking advantage of psychological tricks to sell that food to kids.  That's not good.

I'm all for marijuana being legalized, but that doesn't mean head shops should offer toys with marijuana in order to appeal to children.

Plenty of people here in northern California feel the exact same way.  Which is exactly what is wrong with this state. 

[Perd Hapley]

Maybe I give tyme too much credit, but I can't help suspecting he doesn't really mean it. He's just stringing us along until he can compare Happy Meals to, for example, marijuana. And at the end, he points out that banning one is just as stupid and evil as banning the other.

Please?

[TommyGunn]

I would be quite happy to return to a belief in absolute personal responsibility, along with a belief that islands, and princesses, and God exist, but I can't get there from here.  It's magicians all the way down.

Where are you, and why do you claim you can't get there from here?  have you tried earth google?  Have you stopped at a gas station to get a cheap roadmap?  Are you afraid to stop and ask directions? 



BTW -- you also left out mermaids.   

[Perd Hapley]

If the not-very-healthy food weren't bad enough, they are taking advantage of psychological tricks to sell that food to kids.

I'm still wondering about this. I presume it refers to the enticing name, the toy, and the kid-friendly packaging (which I think is just a paper bag now). Those are very straight-forward, so I'm trying to figure out how they're a "psychological trick." If some breathless Christian denounced Halloween candy as a psychological trick to interest young people in witchcraft and slutty costumes, I think we would all enjoy laughing at such a person.

[Scout26]

Less then 100 years ago the biggest killer of children was hunger and malnutrition.   

Being fat at any time before say 1940 was a sign of wealth and prosperity.

Let the farking parents, parent.  And if they do it poorly then the kids can either fail or rise above their parents.  Their future is what they make of it.   It's not the gorram .gov's job to tell you what can or cannot eat.

   

[seeker_two]

McDonalds is the last refuge for Darwinism.....no wonder the liberals want to outlaw it...

[BridgeRunner]

Happy Meals are a great way to feed and entertain kids from time to time for very little money.  
PlayPlaces are, in addition to being magnificent monuments to the concept of minimal-liability play structures, great places for kids to blow off some steam indoors.  I've love to have kiddo the older pay outside, but the fifteen month old invariably gets soggy and frozen.  Indoor cheap options are good.

Free wi-fi is not bad either, nor is the latest re-design to make the places somewhat attractive and less plastic-y and uncomfortable.  

I can out-liberal your "fast food is evil" position with my "Why do you hate poor people?" position any day, no contest.  

If making unhealthy food fun for kids is evil and should be banned, why isn't there a plan to ban Chuck E. Cheese?  Oh, right, it costs $30 for a family to go there and get something to eat and play for a while.  Social engineering, of course, is something we (and by we, I mean not me, seein' as how I'm one of the faceless poor people these guys are trying to engineer) do to poor people.  

Hm, Whole Foods et al sell organic free-trade chocolates with little bug-themed trading cards.  Better outlaw those.  Wouldn't want little Hayden, Kayden, and Kennedy getting their hands on that stuff and getting the idea that junk food is fun.  Oh, right, the legislators will sure their kids get properly shuttled by their nannies to their tennis lessons, so it's ok.  It's just The Poor that we (again, we meaning not me) need to protect from themselves.  

Stop oppressing the proletariat.

/raving liberal BW alter-ego

[Perd Hapley]

And that's thread win. The lady can't even afford an avatar anymore. And you want to give her a Sad Meal.   

[BridgeRunner]

And that's thread win. The lady can't even afford an avatar anymore. And you want to give her a Sad Meal.   

Doubleyew-tee-eff.  I didn't even realize it was gone until you said something.  I think it was saved to the stbx's photobucket, so not unexpected.  It was time.  Off to find a new avi.

[MicroBalrog]

Right, because unhealthy food is very similar to guns and cars.

There's nothing unhealthy about McDonalds food.

By which I mean, unlike the stereotype, it contains nothing very diffrent from what you would expect, chmeically, about a hamburger packed between two loaves of bread. It's a piece of meat between two loaves of bread.

There's nothing wrong about eating at McDonalds unless you eat there too often and maintain a sedentary lifestyle. If you take meat home, cook it, place it between two slabs of bread and wolf-down the entire thing ever day and then refuse to move, guess what? You're going to get fat. And eventually sick.

[MicroBalrog]

I would be quite happy to return to a belief in absolute personal responsibility, along with a belief that islands, and princesses, and God exist, but I can't get there from here. 

Let's try this one.