Unhealthy Food
There are multiple issues at the heart of the idea that there should be bans on junk food. The surface-level issue is that there is a point at which our free will is being corrupted by external interests, and that government as another external interest can act to counter these influences. The other major underlying issue is actually public health. This paper will examine each of these major issues at the heart of the argument and then examine the strength of the arguments in favor and against such food bands.
The individual free will argument is used by both sides. Opponents of these bans have argued that individuals have the right to make their own determinations. Surowiecki (2012) counters that people do not have a fixed definition of what they want, but rather rely on contextual clues to determine optimal consumption. These cues are typically manipulated by those in the junk food industry to drive higher consumption, since the raison d'etre of those firms is to increase profits. Thus, we have only a veneer of individual free will; the reality is that our concept of free will is frequently manipulated. This leads to the nanny state argument -- that government has recognized this behavior on the part of business and believes it is in the unique position of changing this behavior. By limiting choices, it is protecting people from their own poor decision-making; rather, it is protecting people from having their free will manipulated. This line of reasoning can become quite complex the more philosophical it gets, which leads to a wide range of arguments about free will, the role of individual decision-making in American society and as a contrast to that the role that government should play in influencing individual decision-making. The argument essentially weighs the ethics of reducing one's individual freedom against the benefits of limiting one's fast food options (Mehta, 2007).
Ultimately, the debate...
Already, nearly 17% of American healthcare costs are linked to obesity (Bhasha, 2010). Under the new health care reform legislation of 2010, employers are not allowed to deny insurance based on a person's weight; however, there's a caveat in which employees in wellness programs can be charged up to 50% more if their weight exceeds specified levels based on age, gender, and height (Downey, 2010). Whether government should be
"For sets with a large number of options...a disorganized assortment can make it more difficult for consumers to recognize and appreciate the full extent of the variety," with arrangements of food and non-food objects (Kahn & Wansink 2004: 526). The more the appearance of variety, the higher the level of consumption of food and non-food items. In terms of taste, variety can influence consumption, even if color and 'packaging' is
I was expecting it to simply attack the way things are done today and make them sound horrible, without focusing on why they are truly bad or actually making people think about what they are eating. Those kinds of tactics are often used, but they rarely get results because people only see someone (or a group of people) being argumentative. Instead, people need to be presented with valid opinions
The section on animals was particularly heart-wrenching. In a society built on consumer excess, the meat industry has proliferated to the extent that it has become a disgusting parody of itself. We are no longer talking about families gathered around the table for a weekly pig roast. Now, Americans feel entitled to eating hamburgers twice a day, chicken every day, pork, beef, lamb, in various forms. The sense of entitlement
Food Menu and Nutrition Food Menu Overview The objective of this study is to create two food menus as follows: (1) one healthy food menu; and (2) one unhealthy food menu, from a local fast food restaurant. Following the creation of these menus, this work will write a nutritional analysis of the meal created, discuss the reaction of the writer to this information and describe how this will affect the food choices
Food Served in Public Schools The school nutrition environment, consisting of school meals and competitive meals, has actually properly gotten terrific attention due to the fact that kids eat, usually, one-third of their everyday calorie consumption at school (Briefel et al., 2009). Improving the dietary consumption of our country's kids is of crucial value given that one-third of school-age kids are obese or overweight (Ogden et al., 2010). Paper's Scope and significant areas:. This
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