Fox News headline: "Should candy companies stop advertising to children?"
F%&$ you.
This is undeserving of reasoned counter-argument. I didn't stick around for the whole story, but anything that can be boiled down to that question is, on its face, utterly without merit. Candy is a luxury food item. Children have little to no disposable income. If children are eating too much candy, it is their parents' fault. Be better parents. End of discussion.
This sounds like the next step in the movement of some people telling the rest of us what we can and cannot do. It's like, first tobacco, then candy, then fatty foods, then red meat, alcohol, porn, and guns. It's like there's this huge vegetarian puritan conspiracy at work in modern society.
The insidious part is how, if you speak up against whatever lamebrained cause they've come up with, they can counter with, "Oh, so you're in favor of children eating too much candy, getting fat and diabetic, and dying? You monster!" "What, are you a Communist?" "That sounds like witch talk to me, verily."
So, before this next phase in the crusade of non-responsibilty begins, please, I beg everyone out there, take a moment. Find your stand and make it. Put the kibosh on someone's attempt to stir up the fervor. Yes, they're idiots. But they're screwing things up for the rest of us.
I dunno. We talked my daycare bus driver into stopping at a 7-11 at least once a week, so we could buy candy. My parents knew nothing about it, I would have lied to them about it if asked, and I wasn't allowed to have candy - or any sugar, really - at home. (That's what people did with hyperactive kids before ritalin, apparently.)
I agree that it's the parents' responsibility to make sure their kids eat right. But when the parents only see the kids for maybe 4 hours a day, they don't have much control during the other 20 hours.
(But does that make it the government's responsibility? Um. No. There's a happy medium here somewhere.)
Posted by: Tanya at February 6, 2007 09:02 AMThe "parents seeing their kids four hours a day" thing is a whole 'nother part of the problem. I'm pretty sure that younger-than-teen children are supposed to be better supervised than that. Your bus driver also had a responsibilty that he failed to uphold.
I know, pressures of society, drive to succeed, all that. I don't care. No one gets to have everything. Do what you must before what you want.
I put a lot of stock in personal responsibilty. That's why I avoid so much of it. I don't want the bother. If people aren't willing to take on that responsibility and make the sacrifices necessary to do a good job, they shouldn't knock each other up.
Come on, people! You're raising the people who will decide which nursing home you live in someday. Put forth a little effort.
Posted by: David at February 6, 2007 03:08 PMI'm pretty sure that younger-than-teen children are supposed to be better supervised than that.
Well, yeah, that's why I had a daycare bus driver.
I'm with you on the personal responsibility thing - and on the not wanting much of it - but many people think they're responsibly marrying and procreating with someone who's going to stick around. If that someone opts out, then paying the mortgage and feeding the offspring on one income suddenly involves very long hours. *shrug*
Posted by: Tanya at February 7, 2007 08:52 AM