I’ve long maintained that there is
no such thing as junk food. Today, Wendy McElroy provides
more ammo against the food fascists:
... food is .. one of the main forms of self-control you exercise over your own life. It means something different to everyone, and that's what makes attempts by the state to set one standard for all so offensive.
... The typical counter-argument is to say that since society pays for our health care, we owe it to society to lead healthy lives. In short, your neighbour has a vested financial interest in what goes into your body. If you won't take care of it, the government will make you.
This line of reasoning - rather than justifying a Nanny State or a nosy neighbour dictating your personal choices - constitutes a powerful argument against socialized medicine, but it doesn't do much to say that the government should control what you eat. If socialized medicine had been advertised decades ago as a government mandate to control the minutia of your daily life, then it would probably have never been implemented....
... We need to kick the government out of our kitchens.
Read
the whole column.
2 comments:
Of course, you are correct. Still, I am tempted to - just for the sake of 'balance' - pull out the multi-culti card...
By pulling out some of the most delicious and not too 'health-conscious' ethnic dishes, we could cry 'cultural insensitivity'...if for no other reason than to reveal the inherrent intolerance/racism of lowered expectations these government busybodies display towards the 'culturally-diverse-Canadians' (gosh - I hope I got the euphemysm right!).
I guess what I am saying is: if you are watching as the train is unavoidably bearing down on you, you might as well call its colour before it mows you down...or would that be insensitive?
True, to my knowledge, the only 'ethnic' dishes that anyone has suggested banning or restricting are poutine (banned by Quebecers), pizza (which is so ubiquitous that it's hardly even 'ethnic' anymore) and sharkfin (which was in consideration of shark health, not human).
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