What most readers of this blog don't know yet is that these stamps are just a preview.
Yes, Mark Martin and Marvel Comics have entered into an agreement to re-launch ALL the Marvel characters "reimagined" as only Mark can. The "Pumpie-verse" is coming soon!
if you highlight it and right click on go to addy it won't work b/c u r missing this 20_07.txt
anyway, to make it easier.....
Snack food makers sell healthier treats, face threats of regulation, obesity
By: VINNEE TONG - Associated Press NEW YORK -- America's snack food makers are marketing smaller portion packs, using healthier fats and reducing sugar in some of the nation's favorite potato chips and cookies.
While they're trying to make money off of greater demand for healthier grab-and-go food, they're also hoping the new products will help them avoid increased federal regulation and the threat of lawsuits that allege complicity for the nation's rising rate of obesity. Kellogg Co., maker of Pop-Tarts and Cheez-It crackers, said last week it will restrict use of licensed characters such as Shrek in its advertising, and either reduce the amount of calories, fat, sugar and sodium in products or stop marketing them to children under age 12 by the end of next year. Kellogg said the changes were the result of negotiations with two Massachusetts parents, the Boston-based Campaign For A Commercial-Free Childhood and the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a food lobby group. Together, they had threatened to sue the company and Nickelodeon, the children's cable network owned by Viacom Inc.
Kellogg's changes build on a move by Walt Disney Co. last fall to limit the use of its characters in marketing junk food to children, and an earlier one by Kraft Foods Inc., which in 2005 stopped advertising products high in fat and sugar to children under 11. Kraft has also expanded its organic and diet lineup.
Nutritionists note many of these products are far from health food, but some of the changes are an improvement. Smaller servings, such as 100-calorie packs of products such as Frito-Lay's Doritos and Kraft's Oreo thin crisps, can help people eat less, said Cornell University nutrition and psychology professor David Levitsky.
The challenge for the $10.39 billion-a-year snack foods industry is to balance healthier ingredients and consumer taste. And the numbers show it's struggling. Sales of reduced fat, low fat and fat-free snacks fell 2.6 percent in the past year, according to data from Nielsen LabelTrends. Total snack sales rose 3.4 percent.
"I think the low-calorie ones don't taste good," Lynn Somers-Davis of New York said, while shopping with her 3-year-old daughter. "We eat the full-fat version, just in smaller amounts. It's mainly a taste issue."
At the same time, federal regulators are scrutinizing food marketing more closely.
The Federal Trade Commission has set a public hearing for July 18 to discuss food advertising targeting children, where comments from critics could put pressure on food companies.
The FTC in coming months also is expected to survey 44 food and drink companies about their spending and methods used in advertising to children. The survey could provide more fodder for critics.
"They're trying to take enough steps so Congress won't pass laws and they won't get sued," said Margo Wootan, Nutrition Policy Director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. The Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group that focuses on nutrition and food safety has used the threat of litigation to get some food and drink makers to stop using misleading ads and labels, remove soft drinks from schools and eliminate trans-fats.
PepsiCo has come up with a Smart Spot designation that appears on nearly 300 products that meet certain nutrition standards set by the company. The products can get the label if they have 25 percent less calories, fat, sugar or sodium than the original product or have a "functional benefit," such as hydration. That allows the logo, a white check mark over a green dot, to appear on diet versions of its Pepsi Cola, Mountain Dew and Mug Root Beer, and on baked Cheetos, Doritos and Lay's.
PepsiCo plans to announce new guidelines for marketing to children within the next few weeks, spokeswoman Lynn Markley said Tuesday.
Markley said that while PepsiCo is willing to work with the FTC, the effort to add healthier products to its portfolio is not driven by fear of greater regulation.
"I don't believe that," she said, adding that the healthier products combine business interests with the public interest. "There's a committed effort to provide products that can contribute to healthier lifestyles."
Kraft, maker of Kool-Aid and Velveeta cheese, has started selling a Sensible Solution line of more than 500 products with a green flag to alert shoppers that it has a nutrient such as protein, calcium or fiber, or that it has lower levels of fat, sugar or sodium than the regular versions of the product. Kraft says the standards differ from category to category.
And that's part of the problem, Wootan said, arguing for more uniformity in the industry standards. Self-regulation so far has been inadequate, she added.
"How is a parent supposed to look into and do research on nutrition criteria for each one?" she said.
PepsiCo, Kraft, Kellogg and McDonald's are among 11 companies that have banded together to self-regulate their advertising to children and minimize government interference.
The others are Cadbury Schweppes USA; Campbell Soup Co.; The Coca-Cola Co.; General Mills Inc.; The Hershey Co.; Unilever, maker of SlimFast and Country Crock; and Masterfoods USA, maker of Snickers, M&Ms and Skittles. Announcements from several of those companies on ad policy changes are expected soon, said Linda Bean, a spokeswoman for the group.
"There's a major confrontation that's going to come up between the health industry and the food industry and that's what we're seeing," Cornell's Levitsky said.
Kraft spokeswoman Elisabeth Wenner said it is cooperating with the FTC process but believes that self-regulation is the best approach right now.
Regulators are focused on children, in part because they are particularly susceptible to marketing and are showing a marked rise in obesity, Wootan said.
Among American children between the ages of 6 and 11, 19 percent are overweight, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, and studies show overweight children are more likely to be obese as adults. The center reported that as of 2004, 66.3 percent of adults over the age of 20 in the U.S. were overweight or obese.
A separate report on TV ads released by the FTC June 1 showed that the percentage of ads for junk food, sugary cereals and soft drinks on children's programs is twice what it was 30 years ago, even as the total number of food ads has fallen.
Somers-Davis, the New York shopper, said products that use cartoon characters like Dora the Explorer, Hello Kitty or Shrek have a huge effect on her daughter.
"She's very taken with those," she said. "It's kind of annoying because real food loses its seductiveness."
Snack and fast food makers are now trying to seduce parents with promises that they're doing better. A McDonald's ad now shows a Happy Meal of chicken McNuggets, sliced apples and lowfat milk, instead of the usual french fries and soda.
Soft drink makers also have been adding lower-calorie offerings, as sales of carbonated soft drinks decline and sales of bottled water and teas rise. PepsiCo recently bought Izze and Naked Juice and entered a partnership with Ocean Spray while Coca-Cola bought Glaceau, maker of Vitaminwater, and announced a partnership with Campbell, which makes V8.
One of PepsiCo's biggest investors said the health initiatives are good for future profitability.
"It's a smart business strategy," said Walter McCormick, manager of the fundamental large-cap fund at Evergreen Investments in Boston. "Clearly the trend is to healthier foods."
Still, traditional snacks and cola are the more reliable source of revenue, as consumers gravitate to what they know.
"You certainly don't want to abandon your old-line customers," McCormick said. "Every now and then, even if you feel like fish and poultry, you do want to have a steak."
Oops. My window didn't stretch out to the end of the line all by itself.
Ok already, so they're trying to limit the kid directed advertising for cereal and make it a little healthier. That doesn't sound so bad to me.
I just remember those so-called "marshmallows" in sugar cereal that always had the consistency of tile groat, and that when I ate sugar cereal as a kid, it did get me wound up--it's not really food per se. I mean, actual nutritious food, and beyond the obesity issue, how about just getting kids properly fed and less sugared-up before teachers have to educate them? Kids don't just need to eat better so they won't get fat, but they need to eat better so that their brains work better, and we're talking about a time when brains need al the help they can get.
Yeah, yeah I know, more interference from the goo-vern-ment about how we're suposed to live our lives, but there's such a thing as corporate responsibility, and people buy what's available to them to buy. It's why you see more Sunny Delight in the grocery stores in poorer communities than orange juice. It's cheaper and it kind of LOOKS like orange juice. Just like when Nestle sold that baby formula that kind of looked like baby formula, baby formula that was also mostly sugar and water and ended up causing all that malnutrition in Africa. You could (if you were an asshole) make the argument that, buyer beware, it was up to those African families to take the bull by the horns and read those labels and find out what they were feeding their kids, but I happen to believe that the corporations that sell this stuff are responsible for the effects their products have on the health of their consumers, and I mean the products used as marketted.
And class IS an issue. This stuff is heavily marketted to the working class. As are cigarettes. I don't get coupons sent to me for Sunny Delight or Little Debbie Snack Cakes, but I did when I lived in a shittier part of town. And though "educated" may not mean "smarter", "educated" does mean greater access to information about health and healthy practices for your children.
I don't know that Captain Crunch or The Lucky Charms guy are a whole hell of a lot more innocent than Joe Camel. It's a blatant appeal to kids to eat stuff that isn't good for them, targetted directly at kids. It's behavior that they can pass on to THEIR kids. It's not the same as smoking a Marlboro, but it's in the same general category of ammoral behavior. And you can use the same kind of cartoon characters to get kids to eat stuff that IS good for them, it's just so much easier to get them hooked on stuff that isn't.
Anyway, this was supposed to be about a painting of ye ol' Captain America.
You need to find some newsgroups or something to join Eeteed.
i know i’m going to be sorry for doing this, but...
1) jed, look at the number of words this post inspired me to type (before this post), and look at how many you were inspired to write. now rethink carefully who “... need[s] to find some newsgroups or something to join...”
2) mark martin is a cartoonist/illustrator who created a character named BUDDY McNUTTY. the character promotes the sale and use of peanuts (peanuts are a type of food). mr. martin has also done work on cartoon character named SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS. the character has been used to promote the sales of many different types of food. considering the above two things, it is appropriate to bring to mr. martin’s attention (and to the attention of his fans) that the food industry has decided to restrict the use of cartoon characters to promote its products in hopes of avoiding control from the government.
seeing mr. martin has painted a parody of CAPTAIN CRUNCH jogged my memory that this recently happened, and i used the opportunity to share this information with him, and with his fans.
I am not cheering this regulation trend. Has regulation of the tobacco industry prevented people from smoking? Have lawsuits helped anybody but the select few who win outrageous awards and pay enormous percentages of that to their lawyers? Has taxing cigarettes prevented people from smoking, or has it created a lucrative sin titty for the government to suckle? Does demonizing an industry and them becoming dependent on it as a source of revenue make any sense at all?
Smoking will kill you. Junk food can make you unhealthy and kill you. Anybody who doesn't know that already is probably uneducatable.
Regulation just makes killing yourself more expensive and takes all the fun out of cereal boxes.
Oh, I don't know, Mark, regulation could spawn better cereal box comics. I'm looking forward to the inevitable crossovers, when I can read about lung cancer on the back of my HONEY BUNCH O'OATS box, with tumorous lungs as comics characters hacking it out with that damned little honeybee.
Hey Eeteed, maybe I need to join some newsgroups or something! Newsgroups for all!
Anyway, we're talking marketting to children vs. marketting to adults. As for adults, I think Nestle's baby formula is a case in point, where a corporation knowingly took advantage of the consumer to the obvious detriment of the consumer's health. I believe in regulation within reason since corporation's won't act responsibly on their own initiative. A public corporation is designed for the sole purpose of making money.
I'm no fan of nuisance lawsuits and the majority of class action suits, which only indicate to me that maybe the court system isn't the best way to take care of this problem. At the root of this problem is the corporate citizen--a corporation that is legally treated as an individual with the rights of an individual but without the responsibilities of an individual. I think the laws regarding corporate citizens need to be completely overhauled.
As for "smoking will kill you, junk food will kill you, if you don't know this you're stupid", this is an incredible oversimplification of the problem.
The object of the cigarette companies is to make cigarettes seem cool to teenagers and people in their very early 20s, and to make them feel rebellious by smoking them, and to hook them as young as possible. It doesn't take too long to get addicted, just one bad decision when you're young, and if you haven't made any bad decisions when you were young Mark, you've got one up on me and just everybody else on the planet.
Sugar cereals are marketted directly to young children, who then clamor to have their parents buy the stuff, and it seems harmless enough on the surface. A little Captain Crunch won't kill you. But they're indoctrinating buying habits in children at the youngest possible age, and when these kids have their own money to spend, they spend it on garbage. Kids who have their own money for lunch who are given the choice--and they are given many unhealthy choices--won't spend it on a salad.
We're talking about the kid consumer here. Kids are let loose with money in their pockets and not only do they buy junk but they establish the habit of buying junk--a habit that's hard to break--when they become adults. The fact that it's bad for you isn't enough to combat all those years of indoctrination.
I just don't believe that the corporation is in no way responsible whatsoever for this behavior.
Taxing cigarettes is definitely not the answer. It punishes the low income addicted consumer, and not the corporation. I don't know what the answer is, but that's definitely not it.
The fact is that low cost, unhealthy products--often some of the unhealthiest products on the market, ARE marketted specifically to low income people. I think Sunny Delight is an excellent example. It's marketted as a cheap alternative to orange juice, when it's about as healthy as Kool Aid. While you're not going to give your kids Kool Aid for breakfast, Sunny Delight is marketted as a breakfast drink, and when you can't afford orange juice, Sunny Delight sounds like a good idea. It's marketted as being "full of vitamin C" but so is Kool Aid. It's not just about education its about the practical reality of being poor, and the accessability of these products.
If you have never HEARD of Sunny Delight, it may just be because of where you live and where you shop, because if you live in the shitty part of town, you're very familiar with Sunny Delight.
It's not an even playing field. Everyone doesn't have the same advantages, it's not a common sense issue. You and I have had advantages that most people do not, and are in more of a position to make healthy decisions for ourselves.
I don't know what the answer is, and maybe this isn't it, but it's definitely broken.
I know kids are stupid, and poor people can't go to the next state to buy orange juice instead of Sunny D.
I also know the only people that get punished by these lawsuits and regulations are the children and poor people who have to pay $7 a pack for cigarettes. The fatcat CEO at Phillip-Morris is still raking in the dough, and to compound things, the government gets in on the action. They say the taxes on harmful products go to offset the costs of healthcare bla bla bla, but it all just goes into their big fat pile and the cost of healthcare just goes higher and on and on and on.
Seriously - kids don't buy Captain Crunch. Their parents do. And if regulation and lawsuits make Captain Crunch cost more, they'll just pay more. With their welfare money!
If cigarettes kill people and the gov't wants to get involved, outlaw cigarettes. It ain't that complicated.
The whole thing stinks!
I know corporations have responsibilities. I know kids aren't born knowing Captain Crunch is a bowl of sugar. You can assume I know the basics, and move on from there.
Actually, I think there's good evidence that regulating cigarettes has led to fewer people smoking. The gubmint stopped TV ads and made them put warning labels on the packs, and the number of smokers droppped. They also stopped putting free cigs in soldier's rations. (My dad-in-law said he was the only soldier who didn't smoke in his unit in the Korean war, and he traded all his free cigs for food.)
Cig tax, I'm not so sure about. I don't know how much evidence there is that it's helped anyone.
Cap'n Crunch should be removed from the market because it scrapes the hell out of the roof of your mouth! It promotes palate lesions!!!
Hey! Didn't I like, totally agree with you on the taxing cigarettes thing? And the nuisance lawsuits thing? What's going on here? Did you skim? I don't blame you for skimming, but if you're going to legitimately respond here, you're not allowed to skim.
I said I didn't have the answer, and obviously I don't think this is the answer, I'm just talking government regulation of SOME kind.
Hey, rather than ban cigarettes, how about all advertising of cigarettes? I'm just putting that out there. And that includes people smoking specific brands of cigarettes on TV and in movies.
I think people totally have a right to kill themselves in any way they prefer, I just don't think corporations have a right to encourage them to do it. Hell, I'm for the legalisation of Heroin, if no one could possibly make a buck from it.
If you can make these things LESS commercially viable, why not?
And yeah, the parents buy the Captain Crunch, and the toys, and so forth, but you raised a kid, you know how this stuff goes. My friend had totally planned to shelter her little girl from the evils of Barbie, but that kid wanted nothing but Barbies! She broke down and got the kid one. It wasn't going to kill her. Neither is Captain Crunch, but, the social pressure is huge to buy this stuff! You can't understimate the power of the cereal isle wine.
And most people on welfare can't afford breakfast cereal. Seriously. It's incredibly overpriced. It's white bread toast and sunny D for breakfast. But cereal isn't the only problem here.
Hey, we've got a Surgeon General. What about a government mandate to promote healthier cereal and food for kids--maybe you get advertising time--on PUBLIC airwaves--based on the nutritional value of your product during programming that's targetted at children. I'm just saying! There's got to be sollutions here that require these corporations to be more responsible that don't involve lawsuits.
And I'm not taking for granted anything, Mark. Sometimes your common sense doesn't make as much common sense as you'd like to imagine. Like your pound a week weight loss program. Just what exactly ARE "the basics"?
24 comments:
What most readers of this blog don't know yet is that these stamps are just a preview.
Yes, Mark Martin and Marvel Comics have entered into an agreement to re-launch ALL the Marvel characters "reimagined" as only Mark can. The "Pumpie-verse" is coming soon!
Sorry to let the news slip early...
I always knew Captain America was kin to Captain Crunch. KNEW it.
enjoy him while you can. soon, the good captain and all his cereal selling cartoon pals will be gone forever,
Is this a homicide threat? Should we alert the authorities?
You can't hide behind the curtain of anonymity forever Eeeteed.
(insert bad pun about serial/cereal killers here)
I've got your number.
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/06/21/health/13_13_166_20_07.txt
#%@%# trial lawyers!
The page to that link won't come up. Its been "removed" or "moved" or somesuch thing.
did you highlight/copy/paste it? i did so to check, and it still works.
Yes.
We're talking about this link here, right?
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/06/21/health/13_13_166_
if you highlight it and right click on go to addy it won't work b/c u r missing this 20_07.txt
anyway, to make it easier.....
Snack food makers sell healthier treats, face threats of regulation, obesity
By: VINNEE TONG - Associated Press
NEW YORK -- America's snack food makers are marketing smaller portion packs, using healthier fats and reducing sugar in some of the nation's favorite potato chips and cookies.
While they're trying to make money off of greater demand for healthier grab-and-go food, they're also hoping the new products will help them avoid increased federal regulation and the threat of lawsuits that allege complicity for the nation's rising rate of obesity.
Kellogg Co., maker of Pop-Tarts and Cheez-It crackers, said last week it will restrict use of licensed characters such as Shrek in its advertising, and either reduce the amount of calories, fat, sugar and sodium in products or stop marketing them to children under age 12 by the end of next year.
Kellogg said the changes were the result of negotiations with two Massachusetts parents, the Boston-based Campaign For A Commercial-Free Childhood and the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a food lobby group. Together, they had threatened to sue the company and Nickelodeon, the children's cable network owned by Viacom Inc.
Kellogg's changes build on a move by Walt Disney Co. last fall to limit the use of its characters in marketing junk food to children, and an earlier one by Kraft Foods Inc., which in 2005 stopped advertising products high in fat and sugar to children under 11. Kraft has also expanded its organic and diet lineup.
Nutritionists note many of these products are far from health food, but some of the changes are an improvement. Smaller servings, such as 100-calorie packs of products such as Frito-Lay's Doritos and Kraft's Oreo thin crisps, can help people eat less, said Cornell University nutrition and psychology professor David Levitsky.
The challenge for the $10.39 billion-a-year snack foods industry is to balance healthier ingredients and consumer taste. And the numbers show it's struggling. Sales of reduced fat, low fat and fat-free snacks fell 2.6 percent in the past year, according to data from Nielsen LabelTrends. Total snack sales rose 3.4 percent.
"I think the low-calorie ones don't taste good," Lynn Somers-Davis of New York said, while shopping with her 3-year-old daughter. "We eat the full-fat version, just in smaller amounts. It's mainly a taste issue."
At the same time, federal regulators are scrutinizing food marketing more closely.
The Federal Trade Commission has set a public hearing for July 18 to discuss food advertising targeting children, where comments from critics could put pressure on food companies.
The FTC in coming months also is expected to survey 44 food and drink companies about their spending and methods used in advertising to children. The survey could provide more fodder for critics.
"They're trying to take enough steps so Congress won't pass laws and they won't get sued," said Margo Wootan, Nutrition Policy Director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. The Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group that focuses on nutrition and food safety has used the threat of litigation to get some food and drink makers to stop using misleading ads and labels, remove soft drinks from schools and eliminate trans-fats.
PepsiCo has come up with a Smart Spot designation that appears on nearly 300 products that meet certain nutrition standards set by the company. The products can get the label if they have 25 percent less calories, fat, sugar or sodium than the original product or have a "functional benefit," such as hydration. That allows the logo, a white check mark over a green dot, to appear on diet versions of its Pepsi Cola, Mountain Dew and Mug Root Beer, and on baked Cheetos, Doritos and Lay's.
PepsiCo plans to announce new guidelines for marketing to children within the next few weeks, spokeswoman Lynn Markley said Tuesday.
Markley said that while PepsiCo is willing to work with the FTC, the effort to add healthier products to its portfolio is not driven by fear of greater regulation.
"I don't believe that," she said, adding that the healthier products combine business interests with the public interest. "There's a committed effort to provide products that can contribute to healthier lifestyles."
Kraft, maker of Kool-Aid and Velveeta cheese, has started selling a Sensible Solution line of more than 500 products with a green flag to alert shoppers that it has a nutrient such as protein, calcium or fiber, or that it has lower levels of fat, sugar or sodium than the regular versions of the product. Kraft says the standards differ from category to category.
And that's part of the problem, Wootan said, arguing for more uniformity in the industry standards. Self-regulation so far has been inadequate, she added.
"How is a parent supposed to look into and do research on nutrition criteria for each one?" she said.
PepsiCo, Kraft, Kellogg and McDonald's are among 11 companies that have banded together to self-regulate their advertising to children and minimize government interference.
The others are Cadbury Schweppes USA; Campbell Soup Co.; The Coca-Cola Co.; General Mills Inc.; The Hershey Co.; Unilever, maker of SlimFast and Country Crock; and Masterfoods USA, maker of Snickers, M&Ms and Skittles. Announcements from several of those companies on ad policy changes are expected soon, said Linda Bean, a spokeswoman for the group.
"There's a major confrontation that's going to come up between the health industry and the food industry and that's what we're seeing," Cornell's Levitsky said.
Kraft spokeswoman Elisabeth Wenner said it is cooperating with the FTC process but believes that self-regulation is the best approach right now.
Regulators are focused on children, in part because they are particularly susceptible to marketing and are showing a marked rise in obesity, Wootan said.
Among American children between the ages of 6 and 11, 19 percent are overweight, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, and studies show overweight children are more likely to be obese as adults. The center reported that as of 2004, 66.3 percent of adults over the age of 20 in the U.S. were overweight or obese.
A separate report on TV ads released by the FTC June 1 showed that the percentage of ads for junk food, sugary cereals and soft drinks on children's programs is twice what it was 30 years ago, even as the total number of food ads has fallen.
Somers-Davis, the New York shopper, said products that use cartoon characters like Dora the Explorer, Hello Kitty or Shrek have a huge effect on her daughter.
"She's very taken with those," she said. "It's kind of annoying because real food loses its seductiveness."
Snack and fast food makers are now trying to seduce parents with promises that they're doing better. A McDonald's ad now shows a Happy Meal of chicken McNuggets, sliced apples and lowfat milk, instead of the usual french fries and soda.
Soft drink makers also have been adding lower-calorie offerings, as sales of carbonated soft drinks decline and sales of bottled water and teas rise. PepsiCo recently bought Izze and Naked Juice and entered a partnership with Ocean Spray while Coca-Cola bought Glaceau, maker of Vitaminwater, and announced a partnership with Campbell, which makes V8.
One of PepsiCo's biggest investors said the health initiatives are good for future profitability.
"It's a smart business strategy," said Walter McCormick, manager of the fundamental large-cap fund at Evergreen Investments in Boston. "Clearly the trend is to healthier foods."
Still, traditional snacks and cola are the more reliable source of revenue, as consumers gravitate to what they know.
"You certainly don't want to abandon your old-line customers," McCormick said. "Every now and then, even if you feel like fish and poultry, you do want to have a steak."
You almost highlighted it all.
Here's the link.
Oops. My window didn't stretch out to the end of the line all by itself.
Ok already, so they're trying to limit the kid directed advertising for cereal and make it a little healthier. That doesn't sound so bad to me.
I just remember those so-called "marshmallows" in sugar cereal that always had the consistency of tile groat, and that when I ate sugar cereal as a kid, it did get me wound up--it's not really food per se. I mean, actual nutritious food, and beyond the obesity issue, how about just getting kids properly fed and less sugared-up before teachers have to educate them? Kids don't just need to eat better so they won't get fat, but they need to eat better so that their brains work better, and we're talking about a time when brains need al the help they can get.
Yeah, yeah I know, more interference from the goo-vern-ment about how we're suposed to live our lives, but there's such a thing as corporate responsibility, and people buy what's available to them to buy. It's why you see more Sunny Delight in the grocery stores in poorer communities than orange juice. It's cheaper and it kind of LOOKS like orange juice. Just like when Nestle sold that baby formula that kind of looked like baby formula, baby formula that was also mostly sugar and water and ended up causing all that malnutrition in Africa. You could (if you were an asshole) make the argument that, buyer beware, it was up to those African families to take the bull by the horns and read those labels and find out what they were feeding their kids, but I happen to believe that the corporations that sell this stuff are responsible for the effects their products have on the health of their consumers, and I mean the products used as marketted.
And class IS an issue. This stuff is heavily marketted to the working class. As are cigarettes. I don't get coupons sent to me for Sunny Delight or Little Debbie Snack Cakes, but I did when I lived in a shittier part of town. And though "educated" may not mean "smarter", "educated" does mean greater access to information about health and healthy practices for your children.
I don't know that Captain Crunch or The Lucky Charms guy are a whole hell of a lot more innocent than Joe Camel. It's a blatant appeal to kids to eat stuff that isn't good for them, targetted directly at kids. It's behavior that they can pass on to THEIR kids. It's not the same as smoking a Marlboro, but it's in the same general category of ammoral behavior. And you can use the same kind of cartoon characters to get kids to eat stuff that IS good for them, it's just so much easier to get them hooked on stuff that isn't.
Anyway, this was supposed to be about a painting of ye ol' Captain America.
You need to find some newsgroups or something to join Eeteed.
i know i’m going to be sorry for doing this, but...
1) jed, look at the number of words this post inspired me to type (before this post), and look at how many you were inspired to write. now rethink carefully who “... need[s] to find some newsgroups or something to join...”
2) mark martin is a cartoonist/illustrator who created a character named BUDDY McNUTTY. the character promotes the sale and use of peanuts (peanuts are a type of food).
mr. martin has also done work on cartoon character named SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS. the character has been used to promote the sales of many different types of food. considering the above two things, it is appropriate to bring to mr. martin’s attention (and to the attention of his fans) that the food industry has decided to restrict the use of cartoon characters to promote its products in hopes of avoiding control from the government.
seeing mr. martin has painted a parody of CAPTAIN CRUNCH jogged my memory that this recently happened, and i used the opportunity to share this information with him, and with his fans.
I am not cheering this regulation trend. Has regulation of the tobacco industry prevented people from smoking? Have lawsuits helped anybody but the select few who win outrageous awards and pay enormous percentages of that to their lawyers? Has taxing cigarettes prevented people from smoking, or has it created a lucrative sin titty for the government to suckle? Does demonizing an industry and them becoming dependent on it as a source of revenue make any sense at all?
Smoking will kill you. Junk food can make you unhealthy and kill you. Anybody who doesn't know that already is probably uneducatable.
Regulation just makes killing yourself more expensive and takes all the fun out of cereal boxes.
Oh, I don't know, Mark, regulation could spawn better cereal box comics. I'm looking forward to the inevitable crossovers, when I can read about lung cancer on the back of my HONEY BUNCH O'OATS box, with tumorous lungs as comics characters hacking it out with that damned little honeybee.
Hey Eeteed, maybe I need to join some newsgroups or something! Newsgroups for all!
Anyway, we're talking marketting to children vs. marketting to adults. As for adults, I think Nestle's baby formula is a case in point, where a corporation knowingly took advantage of the consumer to the obvious detriment of the consumer's health. I believe in regulation within reason since corporation's won't act responsibly on their own initiative. A public corporation is designed for the sole purpose of making money.
I'm no fan of nuisance lawsuits and the majority of class action suits, which only indicate to me that maybe the court system isn't the best way to take care of this problem. At the root of this problem is the corporate citizen--a corporation that is legally treated as an individual with the rights of an individual but without the responsibilities of an individual. I think the laws regarding corporate citizens need to be completely overhauled.
As for "smoking will kill you, junk food will kill you, if you don't know this you're stupid", this is an incredible oversimplification of the problem.
The object of the cigarette companies is to make cigarettes seem cool to teenagers and people in their very early 20s, and to make them feel rebellious by smoking them, and to hook them as young as possible. It doesn't take too long to get addicted, just one bad decision when you're young, and if you haven't made any bad decisions when you were young Mark, you've got one up on me and just everybody else on the planet.
Sugar cereals are marketted directly to young children, who then clamor to have their parents buy the stuff, and it seems harmless enough on the surface. A little Captain Crunch won't kill you. But they're indoctrinating buying habits in children at the youngest possible age, and when these kids have their own money to spend, they spend it on garbage. Kids who have their own money for lunch who are given the choice--and they are given many unhealthy choices--won't spend it on a salad.
We're talking about the kid consumer here. Kids are let loose with money in their pockets and not only do they buy junk but they establish the habit of buying junk--a habit that's hard to break--when they become adults. The fact that it's bad for you isn't enough to combat all those years of indoctrination.
I just don't believe that the corporation is in no way responsible whatsoever for this behavior.
Taxing cigarettes is definitely not the answer. It punishes the low income addicted consumer, and not the corporation. I don't know what the answer is, but that's definitely not it.
The fact is that low cost, unhealthy products--often some of the unhealthiest products on the market, ARE marketted specifically to low income people. I think Sunny Delight is an excellent example. It's marketted as a cheap alternative to orange juice, when it's about as healthy as Kool Aid. While you're not going to give your kids Kool Aid for breakfast, Sunny Delight is marketted as a breakfast drink, and when you can't afford orange juice, Sunny Delight sounds like a good idea. It's marketted as being "full of vitamin C" but so is Kool Aid. It's not just about education its about the practical reality of being poor, and the accessability of these products.
If you have never HEARD of Sunny Delight, it may just be because of where you live and where you shop, because if you live in the shitty part of town, you're very familiar with Sunny Delight.
It's not an even playing field. Everyone doesn't have the same advantages, it's not a common sense issue. You and I have had advantages that most people do not, and are in more of a position to make healthy decisions for ourselves.
I don't know what the answer is, and maybe this isn't it, but it's definitely broken.
Junk food can make you unhealthy and kill you. Anybody who doesn't know that already is probably uneducatable.
We're talking about very young children here, Mark. If we went on the assumption that kids already knew everything, we'd be sunk.
Dude, join a newsgroup or something!
I know kids are stupid, and poor people can't go to the next state to buy orange juice instead of Sunny D.
I also know the only people that get punished by these lawsuits and regulations are the children and poor people who have to pay $7 a pack for cigarettes. The fatcat CEO at Phillip-Morris is still raking in the dough, and to compound things, the government gets in on the action. They say the taxes on harmful products go to offset the costs of healthcare bla bla bla, but it all just goes into their big fat pile and the cost of healthcare just goes higher and on and on and on.
Seriously - kids don't buy Captain Crunch. Their parents do. And if regulation and lawsuits make Captain Crunch cost more, they'll just pay more. With their welfare money!
If cigarettes kill people and the gov't wants to get involved, outlaw cigarettes. It ain't that complicated.
The whole thing stinks!
I know corporations have responsibilities. I know kids aren't born knowing Captain Crunch is a bowl of sugar. You can assume I know the basics, and move on from there.
Actually, I think there's good evidence that regulating cigarettes has led to fewer people smoking. The gubmint stopped TV ads and made them put warning labels on the packs, and the number of smokers droppped. They also stopped putting free cigs in soldier's rations. (My dad-in-law said he was the only soldier who didn't smoke in his unit in the Korean war, and he traded all his free cigs for food.)
Cig tax, I'm not so sure about. I don't know how much evidence there is that it's helped anyone.
Cap'n Crunch should be removed from the market because it scrapes the hell out of the roof of your mouth! It promotes palate lesions!!!
Hey! Didn't I like, totally agree with you on the taxing cigarettes thing? And the nuisance lawsuits thing? What's going on here? Did you skim? I don't blame you for skimming, but if you're going to legitimately respond here, you're not allowed to skim.
I said I didn't have the answer, and obviously I don't think this is the answer, I'm just talking government regulation of SOME kind.
Hey, rather than ban cigarettes, how about all advertising of cigarettes? I'm just putting that out there. And that includes people smoking specific brands of cigarettes on TV and in movies.
I think people totally have a right to kill themselves in any way they prefer, I just don't think corporations have a right to encourage them to do it. Hell, I'm for the legalisation of Heroin, if no one could possibly make a buck from it.
If you can make these things LESS commercially viable, why not?
And yeah, the parents buy the Captain Crunch, and the toys, and so forth, but you raised a kid, you know how this stuff goes. My friend had totally planned to shelter her little girl from the evils of Barbie, but that kid wanted nothing but Barbies! She broke down and got the kid one. It wasn't going to kill her. Neither is Captain Crunch, but, the social pressure is huge to buy this stuff! You can't understimate the power of the cereal isle wine.
And most people on welfare can't afford breakfast cereal. Seriously. It's incredibly overpriced. It's white bread toast and sunny D for breakfast. But cereal isn't the only problem here.
Hey, we've got a Surgeon General. What about a government mandate to promote healthier cereal and food for kids--maybe you get advertising time--on PUBLIC airwaves--based on the nutritional value of your product during programming that's targetted at children. I'm just saying! There's got to be sollutions here that require these corporations to be more responsible that don't involve lawsuits.
And I'm not taking for granted anything, Mark. Sometimes your common sense doesn't make as much common sense as you'd like to imagine. Like your pound a week weight loss program. Just what exactly ARE "the basics"?
You know what they say about assuming. It makes an ass out of u and ming.
GOTT IN HIMMEL! Are we gonna go all the way back to the pound a week weight loss program (which is TOTALLY logical)?
UNCLE! I'm not skimming! Please watch for the next exciting issue of Buddy McNutty coming in November! (not a joke)
Interesting how a silly cartoon painting of Cap'n Crunch/Captain America can spark such a heated debate.
Damn! What is this?! MYRANT??!! I thought only Steve's blog took up this much vertical space!
CAP'N 'MERICA. I like it. Best one so far.
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