Large food companies will be the first ones to preach personal responsibility, mostly because it directs the blame elsewhere. It’s easy to agree with them too. I mean McDonalds cannot force us to eat their hamburgers. They can however make their food so cheap, convenient and tasty that it becomes irresistible to a lot of people. Fast food is often the first thing people think of when they get hungry not only because of the factors mentioned above but also because they have been primed to think of certain foods by large corporations in a pavlovian sort of way.
Although I’m pretty sure it’s common knowledge that fast food is generally bad for you and what you unwrap rarely if ever looks like it does in the ads, the industry continues to grow (sell more food) and become more profitable year after year. I don’t doubt that a lot of the growth is coming from international expansion and I wouldn’t be surprised to hear 20 years from now that France has a per capita obesity rate similar to the US. I say this not because of any statistics I’ve seen but because of what I saw one day recently while using MSN France. It was so ridiculous I had to take a screenshot.
According to a study by Yale the fast food industry as a whole spent $4.9 billion dollars in 2009 on TV advertising, radio, magazines, outdoor advertising, and other media. “What’s the big deal?” You might ask. The big deal is that much of this advertising targets children (as young as 2 years old). The big deal is that when a company like McDonalds spends $800 million dollars a year on marketing, they are going to make it as hard as possible for you to say no to their food, or more appropriately, for you to say no to your child who wants a happy meal.
I don’t think that legislation is the answer, well maybe it is when it comes to marketing directed at children, but as a whole I think that business can be one of the best solutions. That is why I want to get into the restaurant business one day. I plan on one day making healthy food cool and as convenient as McDonalds.
Knowing that the government and large corporations do share some of the blame for obesity in America is nice but it does not solve the problem on a personal level. In that regard ultimate responsibility does lie with us. Yes it is hard to make healthy choices when eating but the pain is worth the gain loss. Maybe the most important lesson in this post is that you can’t always trust advertisements.
I can guarantee you that a Hardees thick burger is not really Padma Lakshmi’s “beauty secret”.. If you buy that, George Strait and I have got some ocean front property for sale in Arizona.
