No, I said *you* should be personally responsible
I’ve visited this area of thought before, but it bears frequent discussion: Corporate — and corporate shill — calls for “personal responsibility” are nothing less than gross insults against reasonable...
View ArticleBig Food's big lie: Rely on personal responsibility
Last time I wrote, I decried the stain of Big Food’s insistence that “personal responsibility” should be the only standard of conduct, when it works its ass off to ensure it won’t be held responsible...
View ArticleTax dollars underwrite junk-food marketing to kids
Ask anyone, and “protecting our kids” is one of our highest values — we have child endangerment laws, and even well into their teens, we ignore their “consent” for some behaviors because we don’t think...
View ArticleIt's enough to offend and anger; why doesn't it?
A persistent theme in my topics lately has been the hypocrisy and rank dishonesty of corporations and their spokesman, such as when they insist on the standard of personal responsibility, but refuse to...
View ArticleThe bears video you've heard about
If you haven't seen this, then you should. And then, you should share.
View ArticleAd insults, injuries, from D'Angelo's
Regular visitors will know that I think that write off the cost of advertising their crap on their taxes is absurd, and that all marketers are indeed liars, as Seth Godin coined it.read more
View ArticleBritish NGO makes case for taxes on some foods
The UK's British Heart Forum makes a reasoned, nuanced case for imposing taxes on unhealthy foods, but I'm not sure it moves the needle.
View ArticleWash. Monthly ag story illustrates the corruption of our politics
In Washington Monthly, reporter Lina Khan lays bare the scandalous treatment of the nation's farmers at the hands of Big Ag. The story shows that we've been here before, with a handful of meat...
View Article"Self regulation?" That's like "no regulation," right?
I’d been saving Jon Entine’s post in Forbes on a back screen for a while, motivated by the headline, “Is 2013 a Watershed Year for the Anti-Obesity Movement?”/ and I finally got to it.What a bunch of...
View ArticleSelf-regulation can work, if you want it to
I thought I’d discuss self-regulation in a different context than in my last post, which was titled, “‘Self-regulation?’ That’s like ‘no regulation,’ right?” Then I was referring to Big Food, which...
View ArticleA truer "Coming Together"
This is the Coke commercial you may have heard about, in which it "tackles" the obesity problem it helps to perpetuate with gauzy images and assertions that range from questionable to bullshit.Well,...
View ArticleAcademy's conflict of interest is all too apparent
In a recent post, I dropped in on the latest flaring of comment over the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics’ insistence on accepting financial support — about 10 percent of its budget — from Big...
View ArticleSupermarket chieftains bemoan the yoke of interference
Man, these people just don’t get it.At the FMI mid-winter executive conference, a panel of supermarket mucky-mucks traded pats on the back while complaining that the government’s regulation of their...
View ArticleReal-world experience on what reducing ads to kids does
The sale of Frosties, the Brit equivalent of Frosted Flakes, have dropped 18 percent in a year, which was attributed to a ban on advertising foods high in fat, sugar, and salt on children's...
View ArticleThe HFCS dodge: "Not worse" does not mean "not bad"
Under the headline, “Sweet News About Your Valentine’s Day Sweets,” a guest blogger at Corn Commentary discusses “misconceptions” about high fructose corn syrup while overlooking basic truth that ought...
View ArticleHFCS is "natural"; No, and so what if it was?
I started a trio of posts yesterday about a guest post at the maize-pimping website Corn Commentary that talks about "misconceptions" around high fructose corn syrup.read more
View ArticleHFCS threat wasn't its chemistry, it was its economy
This is the last in a trio of entries (Part 1, Part 2) about a guest blogger Sara Ross's post at the maize-pimping website Corn Commentary that talks about "misconceptions" around high fructose corn...
View ArticleFirst take on the Times's story on food industry manipulation
It isn't officially out until Sunday, but already, 5 people have sent me pointers to The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food, which leads the New York Times Magazine this Sunday. I'll have...
View ArticleThey knew they were making us fat, and put profits first
Michael Moss’s Sunday Times Magazine cover story offers the goods in several respects, but no more so than at the beginning, in which he describes a meeting in 1999 — that’s 14 years ago — in which the...
View ArticleHow to end marketing to children, by Alex Bogusky
So I was a guest last week at the annual two-day summit of the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood, and my acceptance of a press pass implied that I would write about my experiences. I guess I...
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