Amazingly, I Didn't Need To Have Nancy Pelosi Come To My House And Tear A Doughnut Out Of My Hand
My friend, fellow alt weekly columnist and The Atlantic blogger Ari LeVaux emailed me about my post on Dr. Robert Lustig's petulant little tantrum calling for the government to start controlling sugar consumption.
Now, I'm right there with Lustig on how awful sugar is -- and I've posted his video and sent the link to it around to many. But, I'm very much not there right him on his thinking that government should tax or ban sugar. Ari writes:
Hi Amy,I saw your blog post about Lustig's sugar proposal. While I agree with your sentiment, I'm curious where you draw the line. Do you think there should be an age limit for legal sale of alcohol and tobacco? If so, what would you think of some kind of age limit for sugar?
The reason I'm asking is because while I agree that informed people should make their own decisions on what to eat, children don't have that choice, and they can be trapped into longtime habits and medical conditions based on what they're fed.
My fix would start with ending the US government's continued subsidies to sugar farmers.
Ari
My response:
Children's parents should be responsible for parenting them -- we should not be "parented" by the state because some choose to have children. We were not allowed to eat sugar growing up. Since I did not work a side-job as a bookie and did not have either a driver's license or a car, I had a hard time going up to the supermarket and loading up on Little Debbie's.19 viewsMy fix would start with ending all government subsidies. If you can't stay in business, you should do something else!
Also, government meddling in what people eat has largely caused the obesity crisis (per Gary Taubes, for example, writing about how an aide to George McGovern with zero science experience created the Food Pyramid. Of course, the current "Food Plate" is not based in dietary science, either, but "science."
