McD’s is about so much more than nutritional deficiency; they have exploitational practice right across the board.
There is so much sugar, fat, food colouring, and preservatives that I hesitate to call it food.
One of my children has reacted so badly to additives that he is banned from McDonalds, which has gradually been accepted by grandparents, aunts & uncles as it is very obvious that if they give him a “treat” he turns into a very difficult child to manage almost immediately.
His younger cousins (3 pre-schoolers) are all McD avoiders, due to a better understanding of the perils of this particular fast-food gained by their parents when watching my child spin out of control. No, I’ve never said “I told you so”,
but iit takes herculean effort sometimes!

My biggest reason for limiting my kids access to McD’s was the discovery that even here in NZ, McD’s require their suppliers to hormone-feed and routinely use prophylactic antibiotic feeding, so that the food-chain builds up a concentration of these medications. So many of my son’s schoolfriends have regular weekly doses of McD’s and pre-adolescent weight problems, that I can’t fail to make a link between the two issues. What the long-term effects of growth hormone ingestion will be for this generation of children I don’t want to guess; obesity I feel is a symptom, not an outcome. Stupidity of the parents, perhaps, but the effect is on the growing bodies of the children.

katie

What about the workers at McDonalds who set the (low) standard of pay and conditions that have become the norm in the fast food industry as a whole. Where is their choice? And do parents really choose to have children badger the life out of them? If adults really knew the consequences of their choice, would they have continued to choose McDonalds? I know anyone who does not already know about obesity and fast foods is pretty stupid, but stupidity is not a crime and should not be punished.

If you don’t like the taste, that’s fine, don’t go. Everyone should have that choice, of course. But don’t go around imposing your tastes on others. If they want to go to McD’s, then that’s their CHOICE. Again, it’s sheer dogma for you to ascribe their visits to “the power of advertising” rather than the autonomous choices of informed agents. Maybe they just plain like McD’s, didn’t you ever think of that?

The obvious answer would be that it’s cheap, tasty, and convenient — good value, in other words. There’s no need to ascribe magical manipulative powers to advertisers in this case. It’s not like Nike or something where the product is absurdly overpriced. It’s more like prostitution — moral puritans get their knickers in a twist when people start “selling sin” (what a revealing choice of phrase that was!). You disapprove of the choices made by the customers, and so try to explain their behaviour in terms of false consciousness. (It couldn’t be that these autonomous agents actually - *GASP* - want to “sin”!) But what if you’re just being prudish? What if the customers are fully informed already? Could it be that McDonalds is not so evil after all?

Further, I’m not sure why labelling is necessary, I mean, what kind of idiot doesn’t already know that fatty burgers and fries aren’t health foods?

“it would still be an inherently bad thing because it seeks to homogenise eating around the world”

You mean, only people who live in Western countries should be offered the convenience of Fast Foods. We must deprive all others of such choices, for the sake of retaining their “exotic” charm. (Mustn’t disappoint the tourists now!)

respectfully
BJ

A good discussion is at

http://www.bermudasun.org/issues/Sep20_96/re.html

Franchises cause a continual flow of money from one country to another fir very little, if any, gain. As the article referred to suggests, a very high price is paid for “know how” and brand loyalty.

What do others think?