As obesity and diabetes batter African-American and Latino communities, advocacy groups should be a fortress against the efforts by soda companies to defeat legislation to tax or place limits on their products. Instead, too many of them are allies of the soda industry.
The most recent example was this week, when a New York state judge struck down the 16-ounce limit on sugary drinks about to go into effect in New York City. Joining the beverage industry in opposing the law was the New York state chapter of the NAACP and the Hispanic Federation, a Northeast coalition of community service agencies.
Comments
Do you need the government to dictate by law how much soda you can buy? If so, you don't deserve your individual freedoms. If you invite the government to stick its nose so far under your skirt that it can tell you what you can and cannot drink, then you are giving it the power to regulate just about every choice in your life, on the theory that something is "good" or "not good" for you. Want to make a healthy choice? Make it. No one is stopping you. Want to influence others to make healthy choices? Speak out. March. Campaign. Persuade. But don't invite the government to become the manager of your mouth.
So you must also be against all the laws that prohibit drug use, or at least the ones that are ingested orally?
If we as a society have the ability (which it should) to prohibit the distribution of certain harmful drugs and to regulate the the distribution of others, then we have the right to regulate the distribution of other products. We do that extensively, from automobiles to toys to alcoholic beverages to food in the grocery...
The only question when it comes to regulating soft drinks is whether we should. Opinions can vary and it's certainly a legitimate subject for debate. Unfortunately, 6x6x6x, when you try to make some kind of general statement about the government as "manager of your mouth," your argument falls flat.
I agree with "6x" there is no need for this no need for govt. to tell women what medical proceedures are allowable. I thought the pharase, "government sticing its nose up your skirt" quite appropriate.
I'm not an expert on women's health issues, but I don't think the government tells women generally what medical procedures are allowable. It does regulate what the government will pay for though.
By the very act of paying for certain techniques for men to inhibit the ability to procreate but refusing to pay for certain techniques for women to procreate or the act of requiring women to have "special" tests by law for medical proceedures is in effect and in reality, "looking up their skirts." I'm not a woman by the way but I am married to one who likes to make her own medical choices. Whether or not they match up with someone else's political or religious beliefs.
So the same liberals that would fight for a woman's right to have control of her body in terms of abortion don't see an issue with not having control of what we put in the body. I'm in favor of allowing people to make their decisions on all their personal matters.
Inherent in you comment is the "generaliszation" all "liberals". It is why I don't like the labels at all. It leaps to a generalization regarding what people do and don't support. There are many issues I am liberal and many I am conservative on. I don't know where you stand generally speaking, but we agree on "allowing people to make their own decisions on personal matters." So who needs a label except for political drama.
attaboy (or attagirl) attaturk!
This situation is more complicated than whether or not the government is involved. Jackson is addressing the sell out of civic organizations, like NAACP and the Urban League, to large corporations whose profits are directly linked to public health epidemics of obesity and diabetes. We all may wish that it wasn't necessary to have governmental interference in anything. But following the money trail leads to the inescapable conclusion that everyone pays the cost of these public health epidemics, in the form of health care premiums and medicare costs. The way things stand now, we all chip in when someone is hospitalized, or visits the ER with a diabetic event, or has some medical intervention related to obesity. It makes sense to address the front end of the cycle, where there is behavior which is directly related to those epidemics. The behavior involved is drinking soda. People don't change behavior easily. If there's some other way to eliminate the original problem behaviors which didn't involve the government, let's hear it.
Personal responsibility. Responsible parenting. Personal accountability. Self-respect. A sense of self-preservation and a desire to live a long and healthy life.
When did we as a society walk away from the notion that the individual is responsible for his/her own choices and actions? If we can just get back to understanding that basic concept, we will realize that more government programs and government intervention and is not even close to the best answer.
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I like a nice cold cola and I have one four or five times a week. I like diet Coke. I haven't had one of those sugar bombs in decades. The idea that sales taxes on candy and soda are even a partial solution to obesity and diabetes is so breathtakingly stupid that only Deval Patrick and Derrick Jackson could support it. It has nothing to do with health and everything to do with revenues. This is obvious because there is no discussion of exempting diet sodas.
You're probably better off having a real coke a few times a week than diet coke which is full of more toxins than you perhaps realize.
Actually I seriously doubt that.
Obesity is killing our health care system. As our health care system gets killed, my costs for joining it go up and up and up. Sugary drinks and foods with added sugar are a leading cause of obesity. Therefore, it isn't as easy as telling government to mind their own business, folks. When what you do has a significant effect on my life, then someone has to intervene.
Stop playing the "You can make your own decision" card. A lot of kids are getting diabetes because of sodas and juices; Are they making their own decisions? We have a major problem here, and many of you want to stick your heand in the sand by using cliches about freedom of choice. God, it's such a tired response.
I also should have said that this issue is the same as taxing the sale of cigarettes. Put the collected taxes into healthcare to offset the true cost of sugary drinks. We're not arguing to ban all soda; we're arguing that awareness of the complete cost of these products should be strived for, and then the collection of payment for those costs. I walk around and see obese kids everywhere and it saddens me, and when I realize I'm paying for their healthcare (and that of many, many adults that have this so-called freedom of choice) it enrages me. Make me sad and then make me pay for The source of my sadness. Great. A complete system is made of all the components of said system. Have your soda, but pay for all of its costs.
<< Stop playing the "You can make your own decision" card>>
Why? It's sound, common sense advice. And it's especially important to play it when opposing the imposition of those who feel they are better at making decisions for me and my family than I am.
Interesting observation on minority organizations selling out to corporations......Who did our govenor work for assistindg same corporations...He is such a fraud but gets a pass from critisism from the minority community and the main stream press
Your are just wrong. I drink one or two sodas a day. My BMI is 23.7, which is perfectly normal, and I exercise regularly. Stop telling me what I can and cannot consume!
No one is telling you what you can or cannot drink. The entire topic comes down to the tax, which I see below that you are okay with.
By the way, if you want to tax soda, fine. I never understood why soda is exempt. But beyond that - NO!
Soda is exempt because food (not meals, just food) and beverages have never been subject to the sales tax in Massachusetts. In other states, yes, Massachusetts, no.
great column and right on about tobacco buy off influence for decades, and now soft drink industry does the same...we think we have freedome of choice but we really dont, the corporations make us feel we do but they rig the system -thats why high fructose corn syrup is in everything we consume making us lazy and fat and i guess stupid?
You don't have freedom of choice? You are not capable of reading labels? Newsflash for you, the stuff at the meat counter does not have corn syrup in it. Neither does the stuff in the vegetable section. No one makes you buy all the packaged junk, do they?
Or do you shop in a store where someone walks around with a gun pointed at your head making you buy Ho Ho's?
>>"Or do you shop in a store where someone walks around with a gun pointed at your head making you buy Ho Ho's?"
If you were in the store, that might be a worry.
Wouldn't life be so much richer if we all would just stop arguing and bend to the will of those know better?
Thank you for saying what needed to be said, Derrick. These pudgy dullards just don't know what's good for them (they're such children). If it's not asking too much, would you be so kind as to start authoring a "health directive for the week" column? Many thanks.
Nat is dripping with sarcasm like a soda is infused with sugar. Neither contribution is helpful to the overall situation. It is, in fact, true, that everyone has different areas of smarts. Think of Larry Bird and his ability to play basketball far better than most. It is also true that some folks truly lack the ability to know what's best for them in certain areas. To pretend that's not so is a flagrant denial of reality. When the everyone pays the price for poor judgment, it becomes a social issue.
@djm71
<<Nat is dripping with sarcasm like a soda is infused with sugar...It is also true that some folks truly lack the ability to know what's best for them in certain areas. To pretend that's not so is a flagrant denial of reality. When the everyone pays the price for poor judgment, it becomes a social issue.>>
Better to be dripping with sarcasm than arrogance, and that is what policies like the "big soda ban" are all about. If I wish to down a 32oz Mountain Dew, that's my choice, not yours. I am not harming you in the the process, and my beverage selection is no business of yours.
While you may seek help me by supporting nanny-state policies like this one, whether you realize it or not what you're really doing is trying to control me. No thank you, I'll live my own life.
Many of these comments by the right-wingers are hypocritical. The federal government subsidizes corn sweeteners to encourage people to eat more sugar. The state government waives the sales tax on soda to encourage people to drink more soda. Conservatives have no problem with the government taking steps that encourage people to eat unhealthy food. However, when the government takes steps to encourage people to eat healthy food, these same people claim that this is government interference in individual decisions.
<< Conservatives have no problem with the government taking steps that encourage people to eat unhealthy food.>>
Who told you that?
You're not only moronic you are factually wrong. The government doesn't "waive sales taxes to encourage people to drink soda." Food and beverages are not taxed under state law. There is no tax to waive.
"state can model a new morality"
What a quote! Pretty much says it all. Since when is the state in the business of modeling morality?
Gotta love Massachusetts though. . .Ban or tax, that is the credo here. Wait, I forgot, criminalize if at all possible.
Could we build a catwalk on Beacon Hill to model our new morality?
If you wish to fight obesity, invest in research, not silly and fruitless measures. Currently scientists do not have a way to take a fat person and make her into a thin one. In poor communities (of any racial or ethnic composition), this is made worse by issues of access to healthy food, safe streets and public exercise areas, and the necessity of working multiple jobs to pay for housing and transportation. Fixing those issues is going to take more work than a soda ban. Rather than focus on a relatively harmless indulgence that poor people can afford, how about making it possible for them to choose healthier lives for themselves?
This is just the current excuse to raise Deval some more tax money...if it was really about obesity, then why just soda? Bet they are downing a 12 oz bag of chips with that soda or maybe a box of Little Debbies....they still buy their booze with the taxes tied to it...the soda tax will bring in more money, but nobody is going to drink less soda or become miraculously thin because their soda cost an extra nickel.
Astonishing that no one sees that the bottling industry is playing its dominence in subtle and not so subtle ways over food and drink choices made by many Americans, controlling what you bring home from the market and what you injest in the products. Soda was introduced as a sometimes drink that has become an everyday drink because it is so readily available. Soda along with a diet of high fructose corn syrup that is found in all of the processed foods is making children "age out" due to poor diets causing an epidemic of the typical adult diseases by the time they are ten years old. Lacking a cultural shift by American citizens to wake up and see that we willingly hand over our money to the food and bottling industry, in exchange for empty calories in glossy wrappers and plastic bottles, becoming a society of fat lab mice in return. Not just powerless to help oursevles-but willing participants in our own plight, only to become a burden on others.
Government regulation may appear overbearing, but "we the people" fail to see that all citizens have the right to be heard in the processes of when a bill is proposed to become law. Industries take full advantage to pitch products that harm us, largley unopposed at the legislative table. So if you think that government is interfering, it is more the case that you are not.
"bottling industry is playing its dominence in subtle and not so subtle ways over food and drink choices made by many Americans, controlling what you bring home from the market and what you injest in the products"
Wow.
Sorry, respect1world, I've got some rather difficult news for you, so brace yourself. Here it comes: YOU control what you bring home from the market and what YOU ingest from that market.
And when government regulation appears "overbearing," well, it usually is because it's overbearing.
How about "we the people" exercising some self-control? One makes choices. One can choose NOT to consume "addictive" crap. Water is free.
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No one is FORCING anyone to buy this product , unlike the government that forces us to buy health insurance. So the answer is quite simple if you think its bad don't buy it - same for cigarettes,booze,fried foods, or pasta.. And parents/guardians should exercise the same control over minors, but Derrick would prefer if the government did it.
Thank you Mr. Jackson. The soda and fast food industries expend vast sums on research how their products can trigger addiction-like responses in our brains. They work hard to get us addicted to their soda, chips, burgers, candy bars and all the rest. David Satcher, our former Surgeon General, has written a book about this, reflecting his own struggle with addictive drinks and fast foods.
Anyone who knows the suffering of a diabetic - going blind, going on 3x/week dialysis, having a stroke that leaves you paralyzed and unable to talk - cannot believe that there are black and Hispanic organizations who would defend soda corporations in any way, shape or form. Diabetes is now rampant among children. These children are already condemned to early illness and early death.
This is a crisis caused by greed - greed of Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Burger King, McDonald's and all the others - who are as willing to make their money off people's suffering as the tobacco corporations. Governor Patrick is right to step in, and I hope he prevails.
Wow, I was wondering how long it would take someone to play the "suffering victim-oh my god-we have to save them" card.
But Citizen tosses in the trump card by villifying Coke, Pepsi, et al with the ultimate card GREED. Of course, it is all an evil plot.
I don't care what book a Surgeon General wrote, I used to eat and drink that stuff. Then I stopped. I did not have withdrawals, did not go into detox or anything else. I just stopped. Imagine that!
What a bunch of piffle.
So what I am reading between the lines is that hispanic and African America populations are unable to control themselves, and that they are immune to efforts at education. Because they are so lacking self-control, they--and everyone else--must be taxed and regulated. Hmmmm. This seems more than a little paternalistically racist. And really, the proof that this sort of regressive taxation works is where??
Maybe if those communities did not havesuch atrociousemployment numbers, obama
I don't think soda, candy, or other non-nutrional food should be exempt from the sales tax. But not sure any further restrictions should be placed on soda unless you recategorize it as a controlled substance.
Many commenters here seem to be opposed to regulation of soft drinks based on their freedom to make "personal decisions." That argument is seriously wanting.
Before such a position can have any weight, the meaning of "personal decisions" has to be defined. You can't make a coherent argument by using a term that is so general as to be meaningless.
Who-Cares must be the Head Whatsit In Charge of Nannies in this state. Thinks that freedom to make personal decisions is seriously wanting. Then states it has to be defined. WOW!
How about this concept Who-Cares: the government has no business regulating anything, contrary to liberals belief that they should be regulating everything, including your breathing.
"Who cares" You are correct "personal decisions" is indeed a large generalization that most of the commentors won't grapple with. Ranging from abortion to sacrificing animals, to pologamy all of these are "personal decisions". However, I will point out to you that most of these "libertarian" folks don't like to deal with the full implications of what they believe.
Oh look everyone! The NAACP will soon have two new opening for major positions to replace the two leaders that clearly don't know how the game is played. Sell out now or the NAACP will put you out.....
I am really wondering if I will live to see the day when a bunch of folks finally explain to the liberals in this country exactly what freedom and rights are all about the same way the british had it explained to them a couple hundred years ago.
If you had asked me that a few years ago, before moving to this state, I would have said there was no way. But when I see the arrogant thinking on the part of liberals in this state? Not so sure anymore.
Please! Not long ago you got done ranting on one poor fellow that it must be wonderful living in his bubble of perfection. I paraphrase there -
So how is it your wonderful bubble of knowledge knowing exactly what consititutes "freedom". god whispering in your on what's moral too. How come everyone who disagrees with you is a liberal. Does the labeling make it easier. Kind of like calling the Vietnamese "gooks". Just curious where all that perfection you're kicking out there comes from. Or is it as you say "baloney".
Now frankly I don't like the soda ban - but would all of you complaining about the "soda tax" and the ban on soda's please come to my defense regarding my smoking habit. My tax rate on smokes beats the heck out of any of you tax whiners. So come on let's get that libertarian support for smokers going.
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Well, to be honest, attaturk, I think taxing things that are luxuries is better than taxing things that are not. A soda ban is a little over the top, but I can't get all hot and bothered over it. I mean, people could always buy two bottles. haha.
Don't hate me, but it seems to me that cigarettes also fit that category. I don't want you to think I'm anti-tobacco. I smoked until about 5 or 6 years ago and I miss it still.
I think restrictions on "personal choices" should be limited to cases where they become more than personal. Even in those cases there's much room for disagreement. It could be claimed that failure to wear seat belts affects everyone's insurance rates, or adds to the cost of health care. It's a matter of degree and I think sincere people can disagree on what should or shouldn't be done.
I don't have easy answers and some seem to think everything should be based on some particular dogma that excludes the possibility of discussion.
I would like to propose a ban of my own. I think we need a ban on liberal journalists. Ask this group to get tough on teachers unions and they are mute.
Derrick, what you should be concerned about is that the group you want to protect can't read the labels of the products they are buying in the first place.
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"JL" If you come across this. I was being faceitious about the mice and smoking. I know smoking is bad for my health but hey I'm 65 and at this point not overly concerned about it. In interesting fact for you though, my mother smokes age 85 and there have been no known cases of cancer in my family line. Merely interesting, but does raise genetic questions.
Quite true, genetics makes a huge difference. My only advice to tobacco users (since tobacco chewers also get mouth and tongue cancer from it) is quit if you can, or cut down as much as you are able. While it is important to not start smoking in the first place, or to quit while you are still young and if you are able (nicotine is, hands down, the most addictive substance known for humans), there is still the matter that after a certain age it isn't worth making an issue of. As to the mice, an attempt was made in England to study effects of inhaled cigarette smoke in mice. The investigators constructed a rotating contraption to expose the mice to a constant level of smoke twenty-four hours a day. If anything it would have been a measure of second-hand smoke. The problem they ran into was that the animal caretakers kept stealing the cigs off the apparatus after hours so the results were uninterpretable.
I quit smoking when I retired. It wasn't easy, but the major changes in my life made it possible. I no longer needed the excuse of a cigarette break to get away from my job for a few minutes, and I no longer had to stand at the bus stop every morning and evening.
It's been 6 years since I quit, I guess, and there are benefits quite aside from lung cancer, although they say the cancer risk starts falling in a matter of months, and my blood pressure is lower. The thing I noticed within a few months, though, is that I was no long wheezing. All the little whistles and noises when I breathed, particularly at night, had gone away. I used to cough at least a few times every day. I hever cough any more; it;s a thing of the past.