Context was the idea of a government banning certain popular foods
Statement wise “I don’t want the government to tell me what to eat” or variations could mean basically anything. Most of the time it’s posturing on behalf of the idea that a lack of government regulation is a good thing which ignores a rather bloody history of food suppliers adulterating food with harmful substances in the name of preservation / cheapening production cost or using production practices that cause the likelihood of contamination of food.
Once you scratch the surface of the argument you can usually figure out more exactly what they mean and it often isn’t things like government subsidy programs publishing food pyramids based on shady science and economics rather than in the interest of health.
Often it’s based out of perceived personal inconvenience or the appearance of moral judgement such as when there’s some sort of health labelling initiative.
In Canada there are a lot of things that are not considered legal additives for food that are used in the US and the difference in strictness is in part because the Health care system in Canada is funded publicly. Producers of foodstuffs cost the government money directly if whatever they put in it has no nutritional value and causes known health problems. Rather than let companies create messes and tragedies which the government is on the hook to clean up when people’s health fails they remove the issue at it’s source. In the US there’s less incentive as these costs become scattered in the form of individual medical bills and oftentimes the savings are from food being shelf stable for longer. Shrugging one’s shoulders at the fallout or claiming its an exercise of “freedom” is in service to those who make money hand over fist.
I think it’s more like government can ban what can be sold as food and make advice. They can’t really stop you from drinking bleach or eating the grass in your yard or whatever. They can only prevent you from feeding it to someone else or selling it as food.
Meat isn’t a food that could be banned in the same way as, say, Red Dye #4 or force-hydrogenated fats or high fructose corn syrup. They could make farmers cull whole herds of cows if mad cow broke out i guess, but there are wild hogs, backyard chickens and goats, it’s just not a controllable food.
I come from a dynasty of educators. I cannot emphasize that enough. At Christmas I had to explain what a molecule was. Amongst them were several teachers and administrative individuals.
At some point, you need to revisit and refresh your understanding of the world. People can and do forget information they learned 30 or 40 years ago if they’re not making use of it on at least a semi-regular basis.
Bro, a molecule! I do Uber so I’m definitely not using chemistry on a day to day basis. But a fucking molecule‽ Come on man…
But a fucking molecule‽ Come on man…
Genuinely curious if you could pass Chem 101 exam from your Uber driver seat. Do you just know the word or could you actually speak on it.
I really don’t know where you’re going with this dumbass statement, but I can assure you that I know the meaning of one very common word.
So you just feel confident that you know the layman’s definition of “molecule”. Cool.
Omg, you’re trying to sound smart! It’s so cute!
So let me explain to you what the word “molecules” means. You have these individual building blocks of everything. They are called atoms. When one atom is bonded, whether covalently, ionically, metallic, or van der walls(to be fair I still don’t know what that means) it is considered a molecule.
Do you want me to dumb it down more for you?
No? Are you going to shut the fuck up now? Cause I actually have a degree in this shit.
Unregulated anarchy vs nanny state. There’s a wide spectrum in between we can argue about, but let’s not get too far toward either extreme.
As a (social) anarchist, yeah there’s a wide range. The government shouldn’t tell people what they’re allowed to eat, in my opinion, but they should protect them from dangers and exploitation. We don’t usually have the tools, or the time, to test all our food to ensure safety. We need government oversight for that. However, they shouldn’t go too far beyond that and force us to eat particular things.
Kinder eggs should NOT be banned, and Americans have an inferior product because of it.
…but also I agree with the banning of Red dye #3.
It’s banned in the US because we’re sue-crazy. Companies can’t rely on the common sense of their customers here. Even if the egg comes with a blinking neon sign that says there’s a non edible toy inside, someone would sue (and win!) claiming that it’s not enough and the toy shouldn’t be there in the first place.
Even if they don’t win the case, court cases in general can be extremely costly. So companies will try to avoid getting sued as much as they try to avoid doing things that would actually lose them a lawsuit.
I was about to protest, but grog calls for red dye #2, so we’re all good.
The ban is against putting inedible objects inside food. It’s a sensible ban imo.
Most fruit have inedible seeds inside, yet those aren’t really an issue. Yes, these are marketed specifically towards children, which could be part of the issue, but it’s a bit ridiculous.
I live in a place where kinder eggs arent banned and i dont often find rocks inside cheap brownies. Theres a way to have both lol
It’s a toy. A succulent little toy.
I see you know your judo well.
Without a warning, sure. But they aren’t trying to hide that there is something inedible in there. It’s not even a “hey, there is a prize inside one of the brownies in this box.” It’s, “there is something inside this thin chocolate shell. Break it to see what it is.”
In a right wing “anarchy”, dangerous foods will appear in the markets all the time.
In a left wing anarchist society, the community would consult their experts on food safety then band together and colletively stop making such foods, and stop importing those from other communities.
That’s anarchy? Wow, that’s dumb. They should not just collectively decide something. They should write down what they decided so that people who couldn’t attend or that later come from outside the community know what has been decided. Or, even better, if I know I can’t participate in the decision (or don’t want to) I should be able to pass my voice to somebody who’s there who I trust. Or, even better, just in case that person spontaneously gets sick or dies, to a group of people. Maybe, to get some consistency with people getting to know the details of the decision making process and the prior decisions, only redistribute these stand in votes every few years or so. Just to get the anarchy organised a bit.
That sounds great!
Wait a minute… That doesn’t sound like anarchy… That sounds like democracy!
That’s not anarchist at all…
I have to admit I never really understood how anarchist societies were supposed to work. Now that you’ve pointed out they are just people banding together to make collective decisions based on expert information, I can’t fathom why I ever thought they could go wrong.
Simple: they wouldn’t work that way.
Left anarchism, like everything left, only works on paper.
Here’s a few holes:
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Who decides who is and isn’t an expert? Jim Jones was considered an expert by the Jonestown people, RFK is considered one by maga.
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Assuming we find a way to establish an “expert” category of citizens, that’s already hierarchical. You now have a ruling class since these people get more of a say than the average person by virtue of their role, and don’t have a completely flat anarchist society anymore but instead a sort of representative technocracy.
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Moreover anarchist societies are supposed to not employ coercion, so even if you had experts whose opinion dictates norms, how are you going to enforce them?
Anarchists (left and right) reinvent the state, just shittier, less consistent, and without founding principles, every time they are put in front of the practical needs of a society where not everyone agrees with them.
Some go as far as inventing authoritarian oligarchies, just ones they happen to agree with and thus support.
Sorry, I thought my sarcasm was obvious.
Oh god you have no idea how many believe this in earnest (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
Some go as far as inventing authoritarian oligarchies
tankies are authoritarian, their “leftism” is just a disguise to obtain power
They are authoritarian and marxist leftists, they are not mutually exclusive, if anything they are more likely bedfellows than not, by necessity.
You can’t have a free economy without decentralised price controls (i.e. a market) and you can’t have a market without ownership, so you will eventually end up having a control economy if you remove private ownership from the equation, and control economies are fundamentally authoritarian.
The ultimate means of production is the person, and you don’t get to own it exclusively, even if it’s yourself.
I think some market-based leftists have proposed various solutions for this problem, like mandating that all companies be run as coops. But I’m still skeptical of these for a number of reasons.
That’s also a non-solution, all it does is make scaling a company a huge mess, and contractorship basically mandatory for any kind of expansion.
I.e. I don’t hire anyone cause they would need to buy into the co-op, or they’d have their surplus value taken and thus be exploited, so instead everyone makes self-employed ““co-ops”” and hires eachother as contracting businesses.
It’s literally just capitalism with really stupid centralist extra steps.
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Yes. People who oppose science-backed food regulations are dumb or selfish or both
There’s a big difference between food safety and not eating meat. One is about companies putting dangerous stuff in food that can potentially harm people, the other is about something which humans have been eating ever since they existed. I understand that there are some arguments to be given about why we shouldn’t eat meat, but those are definitely not as widely supported as disallowing the companies to inject “poison” into our food. In my opinion banning meat definitely would go way too far, the cost of banning meat far exceeds the benefits for public wellbeing.
Dictating what you eat and banning things you shouldn’t eat are very different things.
Moreover, most governments (unless it’s a religious thing) don’t ban what you can eat… they only regulate items sold and marketed to you as food. E.g. I don’t think we have any laws that ban you from guzzling bleach, but I’m pretty sure you can’t legally pick up a cuppa hot bleach at your local beverage shop. INAL.
Banning the ability to legally make a choice is effectively the same thing as banning the choice itself. It doesn’t matter if you’re legally allowed to consume something if it’s illegal to obtain it.
For example, I’m in VA. When Democrats last had power they legalized possession of Marijuana, and created a path towards establishing legal vendors. When Republicans took over, despite saying they wouldn’t do this, they removed the path to create vendors, so it’s illegal to purchase. It is technically still legal to grow it, but that’s the only legal option, and it isn’t an option for most people. In effect, it’s almost as illegal as it was before.
Yeah, they ban the sale of items which shouldn’t be eaten, so there’s none for the consumer to choose, even if they wanted to. I mean obviously I’m referring to somewhat edible things, and not saying that everything that isn’t edible is banned.
Depends on where you live, but yeah, I imagine drinking dangerous chemicals isn’t necessarily illegal in itself. However I know there is a law in Finland saying you can’t sell like methanol from gas stations to ppl “if you suspect it’s going to be consumed”, because some drunks mightve done that in the past.
Not really a problem, but just remember such a law existing.
Let’s ban marketing meat as food. You can sell dead animal tubes, but you can’t call them sausages.
You shouldn’t eat corpses
jagged_circle likes his meat live
Depends on the species, to be fair.
Love me a nice bit from a fresh deer corpse.
Hyperbole-loving drama queens.
You’re talking about two different things.
Context was the idea of a government banning certain popular foods
This would mean they’d be against food safety regulations, would it not?
It’s entirely possible to be in favor of food safety regulations and opposed to the government banning foods outright. In fact, I think one could safely presume that those are the positions most commonly held by most people.
Horse meat is illegal.
Having ate horse in the past - when it was legal I can assure you that the ban is entirely a perfect example of needless regulation. I never had it , but friends of mine said the best ‘buffalo wings’ they ever had was from a resteraunt that was shutdown for serving dog - they were catching local pets which is a good regulation, but the lack of legal ability to get dog is needless.
Americans are weird about dogs - a dog farm would be burned to the ground (with the farmers in it) if ever someone tried to set one up here. Any other social issue sure, it’ll be american pseudofascist insanity, but man don’t mess with the puppies. We care way more about them than other humans.
No. Americans are weird about cows and pigs. The dog regulations make sense.
No it isn’t. Not in Canada anyway.
And…?
Which is stupid.
Oddly enough, so is horse dick!
Now, anyways.
It wasn’t always the case. It took a porn star dying after porn makers in the 2000s forced a horse to rape a woman (yes, I typed that right), and film it. The practice had been going on since the 70s, but now a woman died. So lawmakers got together and said “Ya know what? No more sleeping with horses. I don’t think anyone will argue that proposed law, and I can use it on the campaign trail next election!”
And so it was. No more horse fucking porn.
And I guess the meat is also illegal. I’m sure there’s a story there too.
It took a porn star dying after porn makers in the 2000s forced a horse to rape a woman
Uh. You’re going to need to cite a source on that. I’m aware of a man that died after he was mounted by a horse, but AFAIK that was a case where the man was entirely willing because he some really fucked up fetishes.
i feel like there’s a lot of astroturfing in the comments here, how depressing
Anything besides just eating a little less meat.
I really don’t get it. There’s definitely a group of ideologues that are pushing anti-meat on here, and flood any post on the topic. Something like that either needs funding or volunteers coordinating. I’m guessing either extremist anti-meat groups, or big ag astroturfers trying to make them look bad.
It definitely does not require coordination.
You are on Lemmy, which attracts leftists. Hence all the communism memes. Leftists heavily overlap with vegans. Hence, there are a disproportionate amount of vegans on Lemmy, ready and willing to spread anti-meat talking points at any given moment. This is all quite straightforward.
Well when these things get posted, you’ll see an unnatural flood of downvotes & angry comments come in. Definitely seems like some kind of coordinated brigading. Or could just be one asshole with a bot farm.
What evidence do you have that it is unnatural? How can you tell the difference between brigading and simply lots of vegans showing up by chance? If we assume 2 out of 5 Lemmy users are vegans or think we should eat less meat to save the planet, and almost all lemmy users simply scroll the front page, then this seems like a completely expected phenomenon
Sure, I’m making some assumptions based on patterns I’ve seen.
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We’re in a climate catastrophe, and the meat industry is one of the major contributing polluters causing it.
So it makes sense to ban factory farming, because it’s killing us.
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It means that they’re not a nuanced thinker.
Most people who say that do so for dogmatic reasons, not because they arrived at this conclusion after careful analysis. It’s the political point of small government.
These are the same people who will probably be first in line shouting for government intervention when their drinking water is full of chemical waste.
You can try to reason with folks like that but you probably won’t change their mind. Just try not to shout at them.
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I don’t think they thought about it very much. It’s like that spongebob meme where patrick has the wallet. Or the Friends one that I don’t know the name of the template. You could go point by point building up a case for why there should be government regulations, but as soon as you say like “regulation” they go “Nope bad”
Though some people really do believe they as a rugged individual will be able to research and test all of their food without an FDA or whatever. If they buy bread that has sawdust in it, they’ll be able to tell, and somehow get a refund, or buy some other bread that doesn’t have sawdust. That seems like a lot of work and optimism compared to regulations and inspections by qualified professionals earlier in the process.
I’d like the government to suggest things, and point to the science on things, but to leave the informed choice ultimately up to me.
I want them to deny bad actors the ability to sell dangerous foods on the open market.
Informed choice should be between safe products.
Whats your stance on cigarettes and alcohol?
Theres no realistic reason cigarettes should be sold to anyone, ever - but the government (in Australia where I am at least) have put the warnings out there and if people choose to still smoke, despite the packets themselves graphically showing someone with gangrenous toes, then shouldn’t that be up to the individual?
Neither is healthy for you, but neither is going to kill you outright in small amounts. So heavily regulated and limited to adults is fine as long as the companies aren’t allowed to outright lie about their products like cigarette companies used to do. Those are basically on par with eating excessive amounts of unhealthy food when consumed in small quantities.
By safe I’m referring to things like food that isn’t going to kill you in the short term because it is spoiled, toxic, has harmful additives. You know, the things that lead to food regulation agencies that keep companies from selling rotten meat or food with lead intentionally added for flavor.
The original post context was the banning of meat
I’m not saying government shouldn’t regulate safety - but that if something is safe for consumption it shouldn’t be banned, like the original posts example of meat.
Orrrrrrrr, and hear me out…
We thin the herd. We sell products that if you spend any time paying attention, you know NOT to buy.
“Delicious home baked cyanide cookies! Just like grandma used to bake! That one time…”
And then? If you eat those cookies, that’s on you.
Although, this bakery would have an uphill battle maintaining a regular customer base.
That’s alright, when the 100% chalk contraceptive pill and the polyethylene ‘super sensitive’ condom hit the market I think they’ll do ok.
im not sure if this is satire or not?
I like the government to force companies to meet certain regulations for production of various food items so that they’re safe for everyone, but then let me pick at the grocery store from what’s then produced.
It’s a harsh quote, but it gets the point across: “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.” Carlin was right, and it applies here. Sure, half of us may be able to adequately identify what we should and shouldn’t eat, but there is another half that can’t. With proper education we can change that, but right now corporations educate better through commercials than schools do through lectures. We have to maintain oversight because the evil of capitalism will choose profit over people every time.
without relevant regulations, though, you won’t know what you shouldn’t eat because you won’t know that they’re putting sawdust in peanutbutter or borax and fermheldahyde in milk.
Maybe it’d be okay to have plaster of paris in flour, though. I mean, how else are you supposed to sculpt that Italian loaf like the french baguette?
Don’t be fooled. The people screaming about unpastureized milk and other things are being used so corporations can go back to poisoning you with shit. and that’s pretty much the most charitable I can be of that particular lot.
Problem is those people get a say in regulations - which is why covid vaccines are not recomended anymore.
That’s a whole other hydra head to deal with…
I feel a reply I made to someone else addresses my side of this:
“Context was the idea of a government banning meat” says the original post.
I agree that you can’t possibly be fully informed on every part of everything you buy or consume, there’s too much info and for a lot of it you need a good understanding of biology, science and food science to even grasp what some ingredients are for and how they work.
I am not against the governments telling people the dangers of certain foods (such as increased cardiovascular issues with overconsumption of red meat, or risk of stroke due to smoking) but as long as the consumer is informed of such, it should be up to them - not up to the government banning something like meat
And I’m against the abuse animals suffer and the whole meat industry, by the way. I hate what happens to the animals, but thats a whole other can of worms…
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“Context was the idea of a government banning meat” says the original post.
I agree that you can’t possibly be fully informed on every part of everything you buy or consume, there’s too much info and for a lot of it you need a good understanding of biology, science and food science to even grasp what some ingredients are for and how they work.
I am not against the governments telling people the dangers of certain foods (such as increased cardiovascular issues with overconsumption of red meat, or risk of stroke due to smoking) but as long as the consumer is informed of such, it should be up to them - not up to the government banning something like meat
And I’m against the abuse animals suffer and the whole meat industry, by the way. I hate what happens to the animals, but thats a whole other can of worms…
spoiler
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I feel those examples are less about eating the meat (well, aside from all the issues that come with eating humans) and more about preventing them becoming meat in the first place - but yes, with everything theres nuance and outliers, but as a general I’d say that if people know what they’re eating and know the risks, and what they do doesn’t pose risk to others then let them eat whatever it is they’re eating…
if people know what they’re eating
And therein lies the problem. People can’t know what they’re eating unless there is a lot of government regulation for businesses to list what they are putting in a clear, concise manner, readily available at the time of purchase and/or consumption. We also have to constantly check that they’re being honest. And what do you do if it’s a mistake? You think in the current regulatory environment that companies are going to subject themselves to a society where if they fuck that up, they’re gonna be held accountable? Give me a break.
The next step is that everybody has to understand everything they are looking at, and assess every single thing they ever put inside their bodies from top to bottom. This is not feasible. Yes we all need to understand better what we consume, but we often take for granted, even you, the many things that we just consume without thought.
Should you have to check the quality of the water literally every single time you drink it everywhere you go? How do you even get that info when you’re in a public space? Are there just going to be labels all over the world plastered on everything we engage with our five senses? Do we need to carry around something to test what we drink at all times? I mean really tease this stuff out, apply it to your daily life with every single thing you breathe in, put on your skin, eat, etc. It’s not reasonable.
I for one like that I can take for granted that the food I am eating at a restaurant is, generally speaking, safe to eat. I don’t want to get E. coli. I don’t want to get trichinosis. I don’t want lead poisoning or sawdust in my food. If you expect businesses to do what they want and consumers to live by “caveat emptor,” you’re going to be so sorely disappointed by the body count.
You see all of this as some sort of nanny state or whatever you want to call it, I see them as common sense, bare minimum guardrails.
I’m not arguing against anything you’ve said. In fact, I said most of what you just said 2 replies ago.
Aaaand now the town’s water supply has murcury in it, thanks.
Do you have a degree in chemistry? How do you know which 7 syllable words on the side of the box are dangerous and which ones aren’t?
In an unregulated market, who is there to say that the ingredients even need to be listed on the box?
Every purchase can be like its own little surprise!
I’m gonna paste in a reply I made to another comment which I think will answer my view on this
“Context was the idea of a government banning meat” says the original post.
I agree that you can’t possibly be fully informed on every part of everything you buy or consume, there’s too much info and for a lot of it you need a good understanding of biology, science and food science to even grasp what some ingredients are for and how they work.
I am not against the governments telling people the dangers of certain foods (such as increased cardiovascular issues with overconsumption of red meat, or risk of stroke due to smoking) but as long as the consumer is informed of such, it should be up to them - not up to the government banning something like meat
And I’m against the abuse animals suffer and the whole meat industry, by the way. I hate what happens to the animals, but thats a whole other can of worms…
Should the government simply suggest companies accurately label the contents of food products?
No. The government should absolutely enforce correct labelling on anything a person is to consume. Like cigarettes in Australia, if the consumable poses a health risk that too should be labelled clearly.
Leaving critical thinking up to the masses??? Oh…oh no.
Natural selection.
If the danger is clearly labelled, and all ingredients and potential hazards are clearly advised…
