Hasta La Vista, Fatty...aka Schwarzenegger bans trans fats in restaurants

[FoolKiller]

No and no. Of course that would be the ideal way, but education campaigns are very long term and usually don't reach those who need education the most. Do you think people in trailer parks etc change their way of life because there is a campaign ? No. But if the potato chips, french fries, burgers and any kind of junk food has less transfat acids there is an immediate effect on anybody - willing to improve their health or not.

So, regulate against stupidity (assuming they are no longer ignorant)? If it is their personal choice why does it matter?

Burgers will be unaffected. As I said before, in a burger and fries meal only the fries are affected, and they are still very, very far from actually causing a significant reduction in heart disease in a lifestyle that east them regularly.

Butter is not as bad as the food industry wants you to think. Of course it's all a matter of balance. Trans fat acids are really a problem regarding ateriosclerosis. Which leads to all sorts of cardivasular diaseases like strokes, heart attacks and other thromboembolic consequences.

The question has to be asked why you would pick on one cause of arteriosclerosis but not another? Trans fats and saturated fats are both major contributors. Why only attack one if your goal is heart health? Why not go after all foods that raise LDL cholesterol and lower HDL cholesterol levels? Or is it less about caring about citizens health and more about politicians appearing to care, while actually achieving nothing but monetary waste.

You ( still ) have a different health care system.

Considering the discussion was in regard to California I didn't know I had to tackle it for all health care systems, but if you want to...

In Germany community pays for all this. We are basically talking about an open end sum of money. If our health insurence companies run out of money, as they do every year, the government pumps in several billion dollars.

So, you and others (because that is where government actually gets its money) pay for this but you see no problem in allowing what may increase its costs to be dictated? So again, why stop here? If the goal is health why not eliminate or tax all foods that can cause health cost increases, like sugary foods or fatty meats? If the goal is health changes this is just one very tiny thing. Any fried product still increases bad cholesterol levels and the risk for heart disease. True healthy lifestyle changes dictated by government require much larger changes. Changing what kind of fat you boil your crap in has a minimal change, because it is still a fat of some form and people with unhealthy eating habits are still eating a ton more of it than can ever be considered an improvement.

This is one stepp in reducing morbidity and therefor one step in reducing costs...

How many steps are you willing to take in that direction?

Also, where is the problem ? trans fat acids are cheaper to produce and easier to conservate over a long period of time. So all this will only cause a minimal increase in food prices and some products will have to be consumed within 6 months inseats of 12. So what.

Cost increases will be seen by the individual consumers. Poor eating habits are shown to be more prevalent in poorer communities, meaning you are raising costs on those who can afford it the least.

The benefit for general health is worth it. My opinion.

The question still stands as to how much of benefit it is. Saturated fats aren't healthy either and an unhealthy lifestyle doesn't just stop at eating some chips and fries, but a lot. I am not convinced any of this is actually about politicians helping anyone but themselves.

It depends. Too much regulation is just as bad as not enough regulation.

But if it makes everyone live a healthy lifestyle and saves everyone money in the long run when does it become too much? How far can that argument be taken?

Health care is something that can only be regulated properly by a government.

I disagree.

Markets concentrate on prices and shortterm effects. Saving the health of people in 40 years is on no agenda.

Because dead customers pay so much more. As you pointed out a long life expectancy means higher rates of things like Alzheimer's and other geriatric diseases, meaning it is better business to have people live long lives, because they will make money off of them for longer.

And it is not prices they focus on but profits. Prices mean nothing without profit. The drive for profit with competition means increased technology at cheaper prices. Government does not have competition, thus no desire to do better than anyone, just to do enough to keep their jobs/power.

Again. Why are so many people afraid of a little regulation. Not every little act ends in a George Orwell big brother style dystopia.

Why are so many people afraid of a little free market capitalism? Not every company ends in a Hollywood-style evil corporation.

I agree, in the end I can't stop large parts of the society ruining their health by extensive smoking, drinking, eating and lack of physical activity.

But this is one way to do something, and it doesn't hurt anybody ( well maybe some people in the food industry ).

If you mean people in the food industry are hurt by costs do you really think they won't make you pay that?

The general public simply is not smart enough to decide everything on its own

You may be joking, but I guarantee you that some government officials believe that, judging by their comments.

 

[Mark T]

By carefully detailing just what kinds of fat were being consumed, the researchers identified this hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated vegetable oil as the queen of fast food. It was more of a killer than saturated fats. They discovered that you would need to increase your intake of saturates by about 900 per cent to have the same harmful impact that you would have from the same amount of trans fat. Just small amounts of trans fat - say two grammes a day - increases your risk of heart disease by 23 per cent.

Apparently, it gives great “mouth feel” - what you get with a nice sticky doughnut or a moist Danish pastry. It lengthens shelf life too. One man lobbying against trans fats in America appears on television with a cup cake made more than 20 years ago. It still looks perfect and has retained the soft springiness associated with such confections

Source- Truth About Trans Fats

 

[Northstar]

Is there a video of that cupcake? Because I find that highly unlikely considering the ones I buy/make get stale and dry after a week.

 

[Mark T]

Is there a video of that cupcake? Because I find that highly unlikely considering the ones I buy/make get stale and dry after a week.

Did you put any forms of hydrogenated/trans fat in it?

Do people oppose the trans fat ban because they feel it is taking away some of there rights? If so, do they also oppose the ban on lead addition to products and the compulsory installation of seat belts? Do they feel that toxic food colourings should also be allowed to be used as long as the customer is "aware" of what they're buying?

 

[Northstar]

Did you put any forms of hydrogenated/trans fat in it?

Normally there is some trans-fat in them. I still would like to see a video, or even a picture of this 20 year old cupcake. If it truly was made 20 years ago, it was probably frozen, which would invalidate the argument.

Edit: I'm starting to question the validity of that article as I can't even find mention of it on Google.

Do people oppose the trans fat ban because they feel it is taking away some of there rights? If so, do they also oppose the ban on lead addition to products and the compulsory installation of seat belts? Do they feel that toxic food colourings should also be allowed to be used as long as the customer is "aware" of what they're buying?

There is a difference between something that can kill you no matter what, and something that can lead to something that might kill you if you don't exercise.

 

[nk4e]

Great...another thing on the rebel list to do.

 

[Max_DC]

Such a statement implies that the government knows more about what is best for them than the people that elect them. That isn't how it works.

Well, our government, and I guess that is pretty much the same in most countries, mainly consists of well educated people with university degrees in economics, law etc
The administraion has tons of experts, people that have been working in their fields for decades.
On the other hand - everybody can vote, even if his / her biggest achievement within the last 10 years was buying a sixpack at the local gas station.
That is how it works, and that's why I wrote what you quoted above.

The thing is if you take the ability to decide away, you have a Dictatorship.

And if everybody decides what is best for him/her alone you have prehistorical chaos.
It's - as usual - a balance thing. I don't see personal freedom of mankind in danger because some food companies use a different kind of fat - you won't taste any difference, you won't see any difference unless you own a private laboratory...

So, regulate against stupidity (assuming they are no longer ignorant)? If it is their personal choice why does it matter?

Puh, lengthy post . Personal choice is important, but not here. There is no difference, just that one is healthier ( or not harming your health as much ) and the other is not.

Burgers will be unaffected. As I said before, in a burger and fries meal only the fries are affected, and they are still very, very far from actually causing a significant reduction in heart disease in a lifestyle that east them regularly.

As I said above, I would take this to another level and force everybody who sells food to reduce these trans fat acids to a minimum. There might be products which need this kind of fat, and others might work with 0%. But reducing them is a good thing.

The question has to be asked why you would pick on one cause of arteriosclerosis but not another? Trans fats and saturated fats are both major contributors. Why only attack one if your goal is heart health? Why not go after all foods that raise LDL cholesterol and lower HDL cholesterol levels? Or is it less about caring about citizens health and more about politicians appearing to care, while actually achieving nothing but monetary waste.

LDL and HDL. Difficult one. It is not yet that clear what is the truth here. Talking about genetics. Some people have high LDL and low HDL and don't face ateriosclerosis at all. some people don't respond to diets or medication, their LDL levels keep high and HDL levels low.
From what I understand the negative effects of trans fat acids are a lot more evident. And it is so easy to avoid them, whereas those lipoproteines are the transport systems for fat. You can't elimiate them or change their quanities at will without killing the person. Also, high trans fat acids result in higher LDL. So this is connected anayway.
In general, yes, low LDL, high HDL, that's what you want to have. And statines ( Simvastatin etc ) work for many people, I'd prescribe them, yet it is a difficult topic. Statistics are one thing, interpretation the other.
As for your last sentence - politicians will always do this, but in this case, I can see the idea behind it. Also, if I remember correctly, the idea came from a medical institution.

So, you and others (because that is where government actually gets its money) pay for this but you see no problem in allowing what may increase its costs to be dictated? So again, why stop here? If the goal is health why not eliminate or tax all foods that can cause health cost increases, like sugary foods or fatty meats? If the goal is health changes this is just one very tiny thing. Any fried product still increases bad cholesterol levels and the risk for heart disease. True healthy lifestyle changes dictated by government require much larger changes. Changing what kind of fat you boil your crap in has a minimal change, because it is still a fat of some form and people with unhealthy eating habits are still eating a ton more of it than can ever be considered an improvement.

Ok. on the one one hand there are easy, practicable and cheap solutions for some problems and on the other hand there is the ideal solution for all our problems.
Trans fat acids are more like poison, it is not so much about keeping balance. That's the difference. Saturated fat acids are no problem, as long as you eat enough healthy food and keep your body in movement.
Again I agree - this is no solution to all problems. But what speaks against it ? I don't see a reason not to do sth against trans fat acids.
It's not that anybody tries to take away all your civil rights, it's just an ingredient you arn't even aware of.

How many steps are you willing to take in that direction?

Many more. Any ideas ?

Cost increases will be seen by the individual consumers. Poor eating habits are shown to be more prevalent in poorer communities, meaning you are raising costs on those who can afford it the least.

That's true, but to what degree ? Fat is cheap, of course you can't put in fresh pressed first class olive oil in everything. I'd say ( wild guess ) we are talking about a few cents for a gallon fat. Who cares.

But if it makes everyone live a healthy lifestyle and saves everyone money in the long run when does it become too much? How far can that argument be taken?

We'll see. We have to begin somewhere and then rule out further steps.

Because dead customers pay so much more. As you pointed out a long life expectancy means higher rates of things like Alzheimer's and other geriatric diseases, meaning it is better business to have people live long lives, because they will make money off of them for longer.

Difficult topic. Very difficult. If you consider economical and social / humanitarian aspects , then it is almost impossible to come to a satisfying solution.
Just a few key points :

What is best for the economy:
work hard and long ( without being sick too much ). Die the day after you retire.
Preventing diseases before the age of 65 is good, because you can work hard without interuption. But this also increases chances that you'll be in retirement for 40+ years and die slowly ( = expensive ) because your health is stable enough to fight gereatric diseases for a long time.
Next point : Many sick people mean a lot of work in the health care system. Which is not that bad for the economy aswell.
I could go on for hours. Very interesting.

And it is not prices they focus on but profits. Prices mean nothing without profit. The drive for profit with competition means increased technology at cheaper prices. Government does not have competition, thus no desire to do better than anyone, just to do enough to keep their jobs/power.

I meant profits yes. You know, the problem is, that there is no competion for delivering food, that might increase your health in 40 years.

Why are so many people afraid of a little free market capitalism? Not every company ends in a Hollywood-style evil corporation.

True, but not in this case. Trans fat acids are bad, no reason to protect them. No reason for a free market. It's pretty much poison, why should I trust profit oriented companies in sorting it out ? Ban them, reduce them to the max and end of story.
I do not want to establish communism. A free market that is not regulated to death is great and important in many cases. Not here if you ask me.

If you mean people in the food industry are hurt by costs do you really think they won't make you pay that?

Of course they will, but we are talking about peanuts.

You may be joking, but I guarantee you that some government officials believe that, judging by their comments.

I'm not joking, I just don't want to sound too harsh.
It is ok, it is human, that many people don't consider these kind of things. some don't care, some don't know and most of the time it's a mixture. That's life.
Luckily we have governments

Oh, and just for the record. My father is a general practitioner, I study medicine ( and although my M.D. grade is still about 20 months away, I only have another six months of actual medicine courses, the rest is 12 months of working in hospitals and and 2 months of learning for the final exams ).
I'm no endocrinologist but I know my fair share of medicine, enough to know that the idea behind this law is a good one. And to know that you can't let people decide everything on their own.

There is a difference between something that can kill you no matter what, and something that can lead to something that might kill you if you don't exercise.

It's pretty close to being toxic. Working out doesn't help a bit. If you are talking about the amount of total fat you consume, yes. But without going too much into biochemistry - these trans fat acids just can't be handled very good by our organism.
So, why not reducing them ? Doesn't hurt anybody.

 

[Joel]

My issue with it is where do you draw the line? Like Foolkiller said, what if they banned all but dark chocolate?

 

[niky]

Did you put any forms of hydrogenated/trans fat in it?

Do people oppose the trans fat ban because they feel it is taking away some of there rights? If so, do they also oppose the ban on lead addition to products and the compulsory installation of seat belts? Do they feel that toxic food colourings should also be allowed to be used as long as the customer is "aware" of what they're buying?

Lead kills you, period.

Eliminating poisons and carcinogens is one thing... but eliminating foods that can cause disease due to poor dietary planning? Rubbish.

Trans-saturated fats can be harmful, if you eat too much of it.

Saturated fats can be harmful, if you eat too much of it. Besides the part where it makes you fat and more prone to heart disease in the first place...

Softdrinks are bad for you... the high sodium levels and the sugar... diet softdrinks are bad for phenylketoneurics. (really, REALLY bad... it causes brain damage)

Peanuts can kill you, if you're that small percentage of the population who's allergic.

Milk is bad for the lactose intolerant. And many non-caucasians are lactose intolerant.

Refined sugar and corn syrup is bad for you. Which is why they're trying to ban it. Which is pointless. There are so many products right now using sugar substitutes.

Carbs are terrible for you. Too many carbs in your diet can lead to diabetes just as easily as too much sugar.

And what about salt? Sodium again. Is all-natural sea salt actually good for you? No. But you do need some salt in your diet.

-

Any type of landborne animal meat will contain fat of some kind.

Fish fats are very good for you, in terms of cholesterol, but you can't eat too much fish. Mercury levels and all that.

You can't eat too much tofu, either. Uric acid. And there goes our soy milk substitute for fat-laden milk, too.

The only things that won't kill you in your diet are green veggies. Bread? No thanks. Gluten causes any number of problems in the gut.

Would you like your government to regulate your food to you down to the point where this is all you can eat? I've been there, and no, you can't live on an all-green diet for very long. You don't have a lot of energy to spare or to work. If I didn't live so close to my office, I wouldn't have made it those three months.

-

Force restaurants to label each menu item with a proper calorie count, fat count and glycemic index score and let people decide. Make them label items that use trans-saturated fats.

Once these have been labelled, and people can see it, consumer pressure will force restaurants to adopt trans-fat free cooking practices. They can proclaim this on their menus to gain more market share.

They did this with caffeine, by marketing decaf for the health conscious... though there's no caffeine-free chocolate... which sucks for you if you have a pre-existing heart condition. Let's ban chocolate!

-

Nutrition education is of the utmost importance. If you can't be bothered to learn how to eat right, and you need the government to ban everything that's potentially harmful for you, yes... all you'll be eating is cabbage. Expensive, organically grown cabbage, at that.

 

[Tornado]

If so, do they also oppose the ban on lead addition to products and the compulsory installation of seat belts? Do they feel that toxic food colourings should also be allowed to be used as long as the customer is "aware" of what they're buying?

Lead and toxic food coloring can also very easily become a danger to others. Trans fat is only a potential danger to the person ingesting it.

 

[Stevisiov]

Lead kills you, period.

Eliminating poisons and carcinogens is one thing... but eliminating foods that can cause disease due to poor dietary planning? Rubbish.

Trans-saturated fats can be harmful, if you eat too much of it.

Saturated fats can be harmful, if you eat too much of it. Besides the part where it makes you fat and more prone to heart disease in the first place...

Softdrinks are bad for you... the high sodium levels and the sugar... diet softdrinks are bad for phenylketoneurics. (really, REALLY bad... it causes brain damage)

Peanuts can kill you, if you're that small percentage of the population who's allergic.

Milk is bad for the lactose intolerant. And many non-caucasians are lactose intolerant.

Refined sugar and corn syrup is bad for you. Which is why they're trying to ban it. Which is pointless. There are so many products right now using sugar substitutes.

Carbs are terrible for you. Too many carbs in your diet can lead to diabetes just as easily as too much sugar.

And what about salt? Sodium again. Is all-natural sea salt actually good for you? No. But you do need some salt in your diet.

-

Any type of landborne animal meat will contain fat of some kind.

Fish fats are very good for you, in terms of cholesterol, but you can't eat too much fish. Mercury levels and all that.

You can't eat too much tofu, either. Uric acid. And there goes our soy milk substitute for fat-laden milk, too.

The only things that won't kill you in your diet are green veggies. Bread? No thanks. Gluten causes any number of problems in the gut.

Would you like your government to regulate your food to you down to the point where this is all you can eat? I've been there, and no, you can't live on an all-green diet for very long. You don't have a lot of energy to spare or to work. If I didn't live so close to my office, I wouldn't have made it those three months.

-

Force restaurants to label each menu item with a proper calorie count, fat count and glycemic index score and let people decide. Make them label items that use trans-saturated fats.

Once these have been labelled, and people can see it, consumer pressure will force restaurants to adopt trans-fat free cooking practices. They can proclaim this on their menus to gain more market share.

They did this with caffeine, by marketing decaf for the health conscious... though there's no caffeine-free chocolate... which sucks for you if you have a pre-existing heart condition. Let's ban chocolate!

-

Nutrition education is of the utmost importance. If you can't be bothered to learn how to eat right, and you need the government to ban everything that's potentially harmful for you, yes... all you'll be eating is cabbage. Expensive, organically grown cabbage, at that.

This is such a great post, I wish the plus rep system was still around, in fact, didn't you used to have a quality posts badge? Suffice to say it doesn't surprise me that you know a lot about dietary requirements being diabetic but there is some good info there, I didn't realise lots of carbs would be bad for you.

 

[Mark T]

I understand that people are worried about there freedom to choice being taken away. However if restaurants gave you the choice of eating a meal which contained trans fats or an alternative healthier fat option which one would you choose?

 

[ExigeEvan]

I understand that people are worried about there freedom to choice being taken away. However if restaurants gave you the choice of eating a meal which contained trans fats or an alternative healthier fat option which one would you choose?

Whichever was tastier. I'm in a restaurant, I'm paying over the price for something that should taste good.

 

[Mark T]

Whichever was tastier. I'm in a restaurant, I'm paying over the price for something that should taste good.

Do you think that Trans Fat is going to be tastier than a natural animal or vegetable fat? Surely if it tasted better then all the top chefs would be using it rather than natural fat. Sureboss might be able to shed some light on what fats are commonly used in food preparation and what the real benefits are to using a trans fat.

Trans fat is a really bad product and in a year or so will most likely not be missed.

 

[niky]

@Stevevisio: I miss it, yes, but I'll take a premium instead, thank you!

I understand that people are worried about there freedom to choice being taken away. However if restaurants gave you the choice of eating a meal which contained trans fats or an alternative healthier fat option which one would you choose?

I would buy the fish and vegetables. Steamed, preferably. I hate fried foods, though I will sometimes eat fried chicken or fish.

I personally would not miss trans-fats. And if they banned high-fructose corn syrup, without banning refined sugar, I wouldn't miss it, either. I wouldn't mind them banning coffee due to the negative effects caffeine has on your heart, since I hate coffee.

But, in principle, I think it's a terrible idea. You're going down a road where you're banning anything even remotely harmful to people. Carcinogens are one thing... as they can be harmful, yes, to other people besides yourself, as they stay in the environment. Which is why a public smoking ban works for me... as long as you give people the right to smoke at home or in private establishments that allow it. (by the way, I hate the smell of cigarettes). But banning food products because they can make you sick if you eat too much? Hope you all like cabbage.

Again, education is the key. And moderation. By banning things and using selective warning labels (0g trans fats! Never mind all the sodium and saturated fats we still have!... it's almost as bad as "sugar free!" labels on snack foods that are loaded with fats and calories...), you're fooling people into thinking that the simple absence of one substance automatically makes it healthy to eat something that's bad for them... as others have previously mentioned.

I personally wouldn't eat Soylent Green. Too much cholesterol in those crackers. Do you know what's in them?

 

[Mark T]

Does anyone know if California ever made it compulsory to advise of foods that contained trans fats?

@ Sam48 - Smoking carries an age restriction and in the UK the packets tell the consumer of potential health problems. People have far more information before they actually buy the cigarettes. If you go to a fried chicken shop many don't display the nutritional information on the product your buying.

You have to remember that this is a productive additive and can easily be replaced with something far healthier which does not affect the product and price. The customer remains unaffected and the only person losing out is the company which produces the product.

Many companies are also voluntarily removing trans fats from there products so it seems that it was probably only used in the first place becuase it was either very cheap to buy compared to other fats or it cut the cost of production. I doubt they chose to use trans fats because of it's benefit to the product.

 

[Sam48]

If their gonna band unhealthy things in California, why not band smoking. It's like banning ice cream because it's "unhealthy". It's a part of our daily lives and should be left up to the people to decide. It's not like I wake up every morning and think hmmm, I think I'll have some trans fat for breakfast. It just happens that some of the food I eat has trans fat in it. It's my choice whether to pick the healthy food or the trans fat food, not the governments.

 

[FoolKiller]

Do people oppose the trans fat ban because they feel it is taking away some of there rights?

In this instance, not mine, but that of certain businesses, yes. Similar to my being opposed to smoking bans in privately owned businesses, while I am a non-smoker so I am unaffected. Violating rights, any rights, is wrong. It is an issue I have regarding the erosion of rights. Every small thing everyone says it is just a little thing and it will do some good, so no big deal. But this same public health argument is obviously getting rehashed for every little thing now. First tobacco, now trans fats and sugars. If it was truly about public health and about politicians caring about more than looking important they would ban these products outright, not just prevent businesses from using them. But all they do is attack businesses who use or allow products that are completely legal otherwise, making the effect of these bans minimal at most.

If so, do they also oppose the ban on lead addition to products and the compulsory installation of seat belts?

It depends on the products and how they are used. If I want lead based paint inside my home why shouldn't I be allowed to take that risk myself?

As for compulsory seat belt laws, they are laws purely to raise revenue by punishing people for only putting themselves at risk. It is my choice to not wear a set belt, not some politicians.

Do they feel that toxic food colourings should also be allowed to be used as long as the customer is "aware" of what they're buying?

Since you put it in quotes, define aware. As in it is known to me that the food I am buying might contain red dye number whatever and I am making a voluntary choice to buy it anyway, then yes.

Well, our government, and I guess that is pretty much the same in most countries, mainly consists of well educated people with university degrees in economics, law etc
The administraion has tons of experts, people that have been working in their fields for decades.
On the other hand - everybody can vote, even if his / her biggest achievement within the last 10 years was buying a sixpack at the local gas station.
That is how it works, and that's why I wrote what you quoted above.

A degree means nothing. Just ask any IT person how smart an executive with an MBA really is. My brother is a Pharmacist (doctorate) and has an MBA, but his answer to a really messy diaper is to let his daughter run around the house nude. He is intelligent but has no common sense, and no concept on how to relate in certain situations.

And then well educated people in the same field can disagree. Just look at President Obama's Economic advisers vs the hundreds that put out a full page add with a signed letter saying he/they are wrong. Look at an economist writing for one paper vs an economist writing for another. Look at politicians with similar backgrounds in different political parties arguing.

At the end of the day my health is my health to worry about, not my governor's or my president's (see my sig).

And if everybody decides what is best for him/her alone you have prehistorical chaos.

Not if we all recognize the rights of others. I choose to eat what I eat and I deal with my own consequences, without asking for anyone else to pay for my otherwise preventative health conditions. Hell, I have a congenital heart condition and I don't ask anyone else to pay for it.

It's - as usual - a balance thing. I don't see personal freedom of mankind in danger because some food companies use a different kind of fat - you won't taste any difference, you won't see any difference unless you own a private laboratory...

I don;t see freedom as a whole in danger because of this one thing, but I do see this one thing as part of a trend of eroding rights.

Personal choice is important, but not here.

How so? How is anything more important than your personal choice to live your life how you see fit?

There is no difference, just that one is healthier ( or not harming your health as much ) and the other is not.

But that is still my choice to make. No one else gets a say.

As I said above, I would take this to another level and force everybody who sells food to reduce these trans fat acids to a minimum. There might be products which need this kind of fat, and others might work with 0%. But reducing them is a good thing.

It might be a good thing, but it is not your right to force that on others. Not eating red meat is a good thing, or better thing, but should we regulate that? Just because you can regulate away someone's choice and remove bad decisions does not mean you should.

LDL and HDL. Difficult one. It is not yet that clear what is the truth here. Talking about genetics. Some people have high LDL and low HDL and don't face ateriosclerosis at all. some people don't respond to diets or medication, their LDL levels keep high and HDL levels low.

I am not trying to confuse the conversation here, but just throwing out examples of stuff known to affect heart health, as my point is that trans fats are not the sole culprit.

As for your last sentence - politicians will always do this, but in this case, I can see the idea behind it.

I could also see the idea behind banning dihydrogen monoxide, but that doesn't make it the right thing to do if you look at a bigger picture, something which a politician rarely will do.

Also, if I remember correctly, the idea came from a medical institution.

A medical institute has no place in determining policy. They can make recommendations that we should all consider in our daily health, but any suggestions they make regarding legal policy should be seen as nothing more than their opinion. Their recommendations should then be looked at in conjunction with legal and economic implications.

Ok. on the one one hand there are easy, practicable and cheap solutions for some problems and on the other hand there is the ideal solution for all our problems.

Righst aren't cheap.

Trans fat acids are more like poison, it is not so much about keeping balance. That's the difference. Saturated fat acids are no problem, as long as you eat enough healthy food and keep your body in movement.

But very many people don't do the things to maintain that balance. Your argument is for health. If you use a health argument then you can't stop at one thing (or its use in certain places but not others) and allow non-stop unhealthy stuff in other areas without looking like a hypocrite. Nor can you expect a government body to not recognize that same argument can work in all kinds of other areas where they previously couldn't do things. In the US the public health argument allowed the government to prevent the otherwise legal activity of smoking tobacco from occurring in privately owned businesses. Now that very same argument is being used again to again prevent an otherwise perfectly legal product from being used in privately owned businesses.

That is why these things aren't banned in the home yet, because they can't find an excuse they can get away with in the media. If health were truly the concern and the affect on rights was nothing then these things would be banned 100% in general. The simple fact that they are nit picking when and where they are banning them points out that it is pure BS that health is anything more than an excuse.

But what speaks against it ? I don't see a reason not to do sth against trans fat acids.

Rights speaks against it. It affects how businesses work, and some recipes take time to find a useful replacement for. Prices do get affected, even if just a little. When you deal in thousands or millions of products daily a penny here and there adds up very fast.

It's not that anybody tries to take away all your civil rights, it's just an ingredient you arn't even aware of.

Taking away one civil right is bad. Taking them away in an ongoing series of nanny state regulations is a disturbing trend.

And as someone who likes to cook, I am very aware of the ingredient. When I am making a pie I am not thinking about how unhealthy that crust is going to be with all of those trans fats in it. I am more concerned with how flaky the crust will be, and I have mistakenly bought the wrong thing and found out just how big of a difference small details can make.

Many more. Any ideas ?

Since your government is paying for health care and food is more of a necessity than health care why not give everyone healthy food cubes and require them to walk one mile a day to get them? Your goal is to reduce morbidity and since it government controls health care, considering that prevention is the best possible health care, your government should have full legal control over diet an exercise.

That's true, but to what degree ? Fat is cheap, of course you can't put in fresh pressed first class olive oil in everything. I'd say ( wild guess ) we are talking about a few cents for a gallon fat. Who cares.

I could have swore I linked an article and quoted a restaurant owner that said he was looking at $5-$15 a fryer load (which works out to more than a few cents a gallon), depending on how much more often he had to clean out his fryer. See, there is more to the costs than just supply. A $5 a gallon increase in a 1 gallon fryer that used to need cleaning once every six months but now needs to be cleaned out every 2 months is actually a $15 increase. And that does not include extra labor costs. Nor does it take into account the costs of research in labs (yes fast food chains have labs, my cousin did food science for KFC) to find a replacement that doesn't alter the taste too much. If nothing readily available on the market can be found then they have to create their own, and either open their own production facility or pay a company to custom produce it for them.

This is not as simple or cheap as ordering a new oil from your supplier. And for small, locally owned businesses it is not easy at all. These oils affect the taste of food and not just any old oil can be used. For frying you submerge the entire food into the oil. The oil plays a huge roll in the flavor. It is why respectable food places don't fry fish in the same bin as french fries and chicken. If you do, everything tastes a little like fish.

We'll see. We have to begin somewhere and then rule out further steps.

Governments, when allowed to go unchecked have a long history of not stopping when they should. I would rather check them early, particularly since mine was placed in check by our founders. Unfortunately that stuff has been ignored.

Difficult topic. Very difficult. If you consider economical and social / humanitarian aspects , then it is almost impossible to come to a satisfying solution.
Just a few key points :

What is best for the economy:
work hard and long ( without being sick too much ). Die the day after you retire.
Preventing diseases before the age of 65 is good, because you can work hard without interuption. But this also increases chances that you'll be in retirement for 40+ years and die slowly ( = expensive ) because your health is stable enough to fight gereatric diseases for a long time.
Next point : Many sick people mean a lot of work in the health care system. Which is not that bad for the economy aswell.
I could go on for hours. Very interesting.

You tried to make it out that private health care industry in a free market has no desire to actually help log term as long as they make profits. I pointed out that dead patients/customers are bad for profits. And for someone who is studying medicine to suggest that others who have devoted their lives to medicine would do such a thing is a bit shocking, personally. Moreso if you are, as it appears, suggesting that it is better to keep them sick long term.

I meant profits yes. You know, the problem is, that there is no competion for delivering food, that might increase your health in 40 years.

Then I do wish you would explain the booming business of Whole Foods Stores and similar chains in the US and the ever growing Organic foods trend. Because that seems to be a booming business of multiple competitors all trying to sell me stuff without all these nasty additives.

Or explain why once the negative consequences of trans fat uses came out many food producers and fast food chains scrambled to be the first to switch (Wendy's had them all beat because they switched years before) and throw up all their marketing that they no longer used trans fats.
^This would be where I come back to the question of why we need this ban since many businesses are getting away from it anyway because the free market has already pushed them in that direction, far quicker than all but a few knee-jerk reaction government bans could be fully implemented. In other words, the free market works faster when the customer demands it after they learn from an education campaign. But you said education campaigns don't work, right?

True, but not in this case. Trans fat acids are bad, no reason to protect them.

Rights are a reason. The most important one.

No reason for a free market.

Freedom. The best reason.

It's pretty much poison, why should I trust profit oriented companies in sorting it out ?

Because most did before California even considered a ban. I am really tempted to take a picture of the "0 Trans Fats" label on the Oreos my wife bought the other day.

Ban them, reduce them to the max and end of story.

Why when the market has already responded and you can now freely choose between places with them and places without them?

I do not want to establish communism. A free market that is not regulated to death is great and important in many cases. Not here if you ask me.

It is either a free market or not. You might not want communism, but you are not looking for a free market. You are looking for a market you can call free after it conforms to your standards.

Of course they will, but we are talking about peanuts.

Peanuts times millions. Some people barely scrape by and just a few cents more at every single meal can get very expensive over time.

And in a tough economy peanuts can be all that it takes to break a company, particularly small, locally owned businesses that have to go through the expense of researching an alternative and then the possible long-term expense of the replacement. Of course, peanuts to KFC is not peanuts to Sally's Homemade Pie Kitchen.

I'm not joking, I just don't want to sound too harsh.
It is ok, it is human, that many people don't consider these kind of things. some don't care, some don't know and most of the time it's a mixture. That's life.
Luckily we have governments

So, you seriously believe that governments are better at making life altering decisions for people than themselves, and that they should because people might make bad decisions for themselves? Why not just suggest we all live with our parents until they die? Making mistakes is part of life. That is how we learn. I am 30-years-old, married, and have a daughter on the way. I do not need a nanny government to tell me how to live my life. It is my responsibility and my choices. It is not the roll of government to tell me how healthy I should be. If I want to eat 50 pounds of shortening right now while swimming nude in a pool of it (get that image out of your minds eye), then the government has no say in it. My life. My health. My choice. When these nanny regulations try getting enforced in my kitchen I will also quickly point out my 1st and 2nd Amendments.

Oh, and just for the record. My father is a general practitioner, I study medicine ( and although my M.D. grade is still about 20 months away, I only have another six months of actual medicine courses, the rest is 12 months of working in hospitals and and 2 months of learning for the final exams ).
I'm no endocrinologist but I know my fair share of medicine, enough to know that the idea behind this law is a good one. And to know that you can't let people decide everything on their own.

Wow, I haven't heard such an elitist attitude outside of Congress like this ever. You study medicine, so your opinion should carry more weight in how I am allowed to choose to live my own life? No offense, but screw that. My body, not yours. You eat your food and I will eat mine. You cook with your choice of ingredients and I will cook with mine. I won't bother you in your home, so don't try to bother me in mine.

I understand that people are worried about there freedom to choice being taken away. However if restaurants gave you the choice of eating a meal which contained trans fats or an alternative healthier fat option which one would you choose?

I need more information in order to make an informed decision. Things like price and flavor can go into this. And even, if I am feeling like I have been eating unhealthy a lot lately that might alter my decisions.

Assuming flavor and costs are absolutely even: I will chose the healthier option. But at least then I got to chose. No pompous bureaucrat took that choice away from me.

EDIT:

Does anyone know if California ever made it compulsory to advise of foods that contained trans fats?

It has to be labeled on all packaged foods, but not in restaurants.

You have to remember that this is a productive additive and can easily be replaced with something far healthier which does not affect the product and price. The customer remains unaffected and the only person losing out is the company which produces the product.

You are contradicting yourself here. If there is no affect on product or price (which I have shown business owners saying there is) then the company that produces it won't lose out. But the simple act of switching affects the price.

Many companies are also voluntarily removing trans fats from there products so it seems that it was probably only used in the first place becuase it was either very cheap to buy compared to other fats or it cut the cost of production. I doubt they chose to use trans fats because of it's benefit to the product.

Voluntarily? As in government intervention is wasteful and pointless because it is late to the game? And again you contradict yourself by mentioning costs. Pick one. It either does affect costs or it doesn't.

 

[Max_DC]

A degree means nothing. Just ask any IT person how smart an executive with an MBA really is. My brother is a Pharmacist (doctorate) and has an MBA, but his answer to a really messy diaper is to let his daughter run around the house nude. He is intelligent but has no common sense, and no concept on how to relate in certain situations.

Well, of course you are right, but in general education helps. It creates knowledge. Add experience and you end up with some good people. Yes, maybe 3 out of 10 people with a degree still can't get the job done, but together they still can do a better job than the average joe.

And then well educated people in the same field can disagree. Just look at President Obama's Economic advisers vs the hundreds that put out a full page add with a signed letter saying he/they are wrong. Look at an economist writing for one paper vs an economist writing for another. Look at politicians with similar backgrounds in different political parties arguing.

Again, true, but I prefer two experts discussing topics over the opinion of one moron who thinks he is right.

I never said that only a university degree makes you a valuable person in society. But you also can't ignore that millions over millions in our countries are not capable of functioning in this society as they should. It's not always their fault, but is this way. They profit the most from these regulations.
I wouldn't need it. You wouldn't need it. They do.

At the end of the day my health is my health to worry about, not my governor's or my president's (see my sig).

Correct. But I'm looking for a practicable solution, wheras you seem to focus on basic principles. That's honorable and we all should consider these aspects.
But sometimes you have to bring it down to a simple level :

Action X.
Benefits ? Check
Negative aspects : Some, but insignificant imo
Draw a line
Black numbers on my bill. Red on yours.

Not if we all recognize the rights of others. I choose to eat what I eat and I deal with my own consequences, without asking for anyone else to pay for my otherwise preventative health conditions. Hell, I have a congenital heart condition and I don't ask anyone else to pay for it.

Ok see, I agree. But I don't want to take any life quality away from anybody.
If government decides that gasoline has to be colored in purple you would still argue that it is your decision what color the gasoline is. I'd say : As long as it is burning in my car I'm fine with it.
If this process of turning gasoline purple would cost sth, yes, then I'd protest.
But only if I didn't understand the resoning behind it. Coming back to trans fat acids, there is benefit for general health. Think about it, there is a 5 year old girl with her uneducated drop out of highschool mom and they pass a little restaurant that sells frenchfries to go. The owner of that shop uses the cheapest fat he gets in order to maximize profits. There is no sign that tells this mother that there are trans fat acids in these fries. And even if there was one, she probably wouldn't see it, understand it or care.
Same situation, regulated by government , french fries cost 2 cents more and taste the same. One problem solved. Nobody is hurt.
20 years later that might prevent thousands of heart attacks and strokes.

I don;t see freedom as a whole in danger because of this one thing, but I do see this one thing as part of a trend of eroding rights.

I understand, but not all regulations are bad. Look at every single one and the decide if protesting is worth it.
Example : In the Netherlands they introduced a new system for highway tax. Every car has to get a trackable GPS system.
That is too much in my book - that's big brother and I'd fear the following steps.
But trans fat acids ? Who cares ? I don't. And you shouldn't.

How so? How is anything more important than your personal choice to live your life how you see fit?

Because the benefit for general health outweights your personal rights here. Why ? Because most negative consequences for you are only psychiological ( bad government rules over you ), not real ( fat tastes the same, costs almost the same etc )

But that is still my choice to make. No one else gets a say.

Well, then let's legalize heroine, drugs for everybody. Personal choice, right ?

It might be a good thing, but it is not your right to force that on others. Not eating red meat is a good thing, or better thing, but should we regulate that? Just because you can regulate away someone's choice and remove bad decisions does not mean you should.

First of all, you can't regulate it, as you said. So let's forget it. But we can reduce the industrial use of trans fat acids. We can force small restaurants not to use them excessivly.

A medical institute has no place in determining policy. They can make recommendations that we should all consider in our daily health, but any suggestions they make regarding legal policy should be seen as nothing more than their opinion. Their recommendations should then be looked at in conjunction with legal and economic implications.

They made a recommendation and the government agreed.

Righst aren't cheap.

You know what I meant

But very many people don't do the things to maintain that balance. Your argument is for health. If you use a health argument then you can't stop at one thing (or its use in certain places but not others) and allow non-stop unhealthy stuff in other areas without looking like a hypocrite. Nor can you expect a government body to not recognize that same argument can work in all kinds of other areas where they previously couldn't do things. In the US the public health argument allowed the government to prevent the otherwise legal activity of smoking tobacco from occurring in privately owned businesses. Now that very same argument is being used again to again prevent an otherwise perfectly legal product from being used in privately owned businesses.

I don't agree. You say : if you can't do it perfectly and consequently in every aspect, then leave it be. This will get you nowhere.
You have to do what is practicable and what you actually can do. I can't make everbody live a perfectly healthly life, but I can try to terminate some harms. Especially if nobody is hurt. wheich is basicall the case here.
Totally banning tobacco would increase population health a lot, but there is no way of realizing it. So let it be. Instead, do what you can do. Better than nothing

That is why these things aren't banned in the home yet, because they can't find an excuse they can get away with in the media. If health were truly the concern and the affect on rights was nothing then these things would be banned 100% in general. The simple fact that they are nit picking when and where they are banning them points out that it is pure BS that health is anything more than an excuse.

As I said, I would force all food producing companies to reduce the usage of trans fat acids to a minimum. That would include home use.
There are trans fat acids in natural products. That's not healthy, but you can't change it. so it's fine. But you can reduce massive usage in artificial products

Rights speaks against it. It affects how businesses work, and some recipes take time to find a useful replacement for. Prices do get affected, even if just a little. When you deal in thousands or millions of products daily a penny here and there adds up very fast.

Individual health is - in my opinion - a greater right than to decide every little very little important nuance in your life.
And what is with the right of individual health for people that are not aware of the danger, because they are too young, not smart enought, don't care etc ?
You protect business interests of huge companies or maybe also small restaurants ( that won't get broke because of paying a few dollars more for fat ) and sacrifice the health status of the weakest in our society ( who are in my opinion not capable of deciding for themselves )

Taking away one civil right is bad. Taking them away in an ongoing series of nanny state regulations is a disturbing trend.

True but again : we are talking about trans fat acids ... believe me, you won't miss them. You wouldnÄt even notice if nobody told you.

And as someone who likes to cook, I am very aware of the ingredient. When I am making a pie I am not thinking about how unhealthy that crust is going to be with all of those trans fats in it. I am more concerned with how flaky the crust will be, and I have mistakenly bought the wrong thing and found out just how big of a difference small details can make.

And you should. Quality of life. with this regulation you'd buy the same ingredients and you won't taste a difference.

Since your government is paying for health care and food is more of a necessity than health care why not give everyone healthy food cubes and require them to walk one mile a day to get them? Your goal is to reduce morbidity and since it government controls health care, considering that prevention is the best possible health care, your government should have full legal control over diet an exercise.

Not possible to realize I'm afraid

I could have swore I linked an article and quoted a restaurant owner that said he was looking at $5-$15 a fryer load (which works out to more than a few cents a gallon), depending on how much more often he had to clean out his fryer. See, there is more to the costs than just supply. A $5 a gallon increase in a 1 gallon fryer that used to need cleaning once every six months but now needs to be cleaned out every 2 months is actually a $15 increase. And that does not include extra labor costs. Nor does it take into account the costs of research in labs (yes fast food chains have labs, my cousin did food science for KFC) to find a replacement that doesn't alter the taste too much. If nothing readily available on the market can be found then they have to create their own, and either open their own production facility or pay a company to custom produce it for them.

Well I don't know a lot about prices in food industry, but the market will solve the problem. Actually trans fat acids have to be produced out of cis fat acids. So theoretically they should be cheaper. They can't be conservated for the same amount of time, but modern logistics should be able to handle that.

This is not as simple or cheap as ordering a new oil from your supplier. And for small, locally owned businesses it is not easy at all. These oils affect the taste of food and not just any old oil can be used. For frying you submerge the entire food into the oil. The oil plays a huge roll in the flavor. It is why respectable food places don't fry fish in the same bin as french fries and chicken. If you do, everything tastes a little like fish.

I guess then those small businesses wil have to deal with these new regulations. If some get broke, so be it. I don't think so, but, if it was the case, so what. That's captialism, right ? If a few dollars more for fat ruin your business you're doing it wrong anyway.

Governments, when allowed to go unchecked have a long history of not stopping when they should. I would rather check them early, particularly since mine was placed in check by our founders. Unfortunately that stuff has been ignored.

Nobody said that they should be unchecked. You can vote. But in my opinion, it's the job of the government to deal with such topics.

You tried to make it out that private health care industry in a free market has no desire to actually help log term as long as they make profits. I pointed out that dead patients/customers are bad for profits. And for someone who is studying medicine to suggest that others who have devoted their lives to medicine would do such a thing is a bit shocking, personally. Moreso if you are, as it appears, suggesting that it is better to keep them sick long term.

You got me wrong here. I just wanted to point out that financial aspects in health care are extremly complex and hard to predict. I just presented a few aspects, each worth a discussion of its own. Too complex for this thread.
Dead customers are bad for profits. But not if they die 40 years later and nobody can actually proof that your product has anything to with it.

Then I do wish you would explain the booming business of Whole Foods Stores and similar chains in the US and the ever growing Organic foods trend. Because that seems to be a booming business of multiple competitors all trying to sell me stuff without all these nasty additives.

Well, yeah, you are right. But, why waiting ? If the free market will kill trans fat acids anyway someday, then nobody is hurt if the government speeds up the process a little. Might save thousands of lifes.

Or explain why once the negative consequences of trans fat uses came out many food producers and fast food chains scrambled to be the first to switch (Wendy's had them all beat because they switched years before) and throw up all their marketing that they no longer used trans fats.
^This would be where I come back to the question of why we need this ban since many businesses are getting away from it anyway because the free market has already pushed them in that direction, far quicker than all but a few knee-jerk reaction government bans could be fully implemented. In other words, the free market works faster when the customer demands it after they learn from an education campaign. But you said education campaigns don't work, right?

You know, tiny neighborhood restaurant doesn't seem to care that much about public relations, because nobody knows or asks what kind of fat they use. And while you named some positive examples, I'm sure that you can find dozens of products in a supermarket near you with massive amounts of trans fat acids.
If - as you say - they are going to dissapear anyway, why not right now ?

Rights are a reason. The most important one.

But not every right has equal value. Drastic example, I know, but still :
I could say killing my neighbor is my personal choice. Yett I think we agree that the right of not getting killed of cyour neighbor is a little more important.

Freedom. The best reason.

End of free usage of trans fat acids are the end of freedom, if not even of mankind. Come on...

It is either a free market or not. You might not want communism, but you are not looking for a free market. You are looking for a market you can call free after it conforms to your standards.

Not necessarily my standards, but some standards. A completely free market is a violent one. Only the strong survive. That's not my idea for a society I'd like to live in. Is it yours ?

Peanuts times millions. Some people barely scrape by and just a few cents more at every single meal can get very expensive over time.

Consequences of ateriosclerosis - billions of dollars. In the end, also paid by community. I think I know what's cheaper in the end.

So, you seriously believe that governments are better at making life altering decisions for people than themselves, and that they should because people might make bad decisions for themselves? Why not just suggest we all live with our parents until they die? Making mistakes is part of life. That is how we learn. I am 30-years-old, married, and have a daughter on the way. I do not need a nanny government to tell me how to live my life. It is my responsibility and my choices. It is not the roll of government to tell me how healthy I should be. If I want to eat 50 pounds of shortening right now while swimming nude in a pool of it (get that image out of your minds eye), then the government has no say in it. My life. My health. My choice. When these nanny regulations try getting enforced in my kitchen I will also quickly point out my 1st and 2nd Amendments.

We are still talking about trans fat acids here, right ? You always seem to think that one regulation leads to countless other regulations that ultimatly kill you right of living your own life. But that's not how it works.
But telling me to get that picture out of my mind you made things worse

Wow, I haven't heard such an elitist attitude outside of Congress like this ever. You study medicine, so your opinion should carry more weight in how I am allowed to choose to live my own life? No offense, but screw that. My body, not yours. You eat your food and I will eat mine. You cook with your choice of ingredients and I will cook with mine. I won't bother you in your home, so don't try to bother me in mine.

Again, you got m wrong here. Ultimately it is you decision. All I'll do in my future job, is to tell my patients what I think is best for their overall situation. It's ( almost ) never my decision, but his / hers ( exception is an emergency case etc ).
What I wanted to say is, that the average joe doesn't give a damn about trans fat acids. Maybe they would if they knew the consequences. But even then, most simply don't care. That's one reason why they smoke, drink, get fat etc
So why not helping them by talking this decision from them ? Since it doesn't hurt them or affect their quality of life in any way, I donÄt see a problem with it. Nobody would even notice if they'd force a massive reduction of trans fat acids secretly.

 

[FoolKiller]

Well, of course you are right, but in general education helps. It creates knowledge. Add experience and you end up with some good people. Yes, maybe 3 out of 10 people with a degree still can't get the job done, but together they still can do a better job than the average joe.

Again, true, but I prefer two experts discussing topics over the opinion of one moron who thinks he is right.

Every expert in the world working together cannot determine my individual circumstance, thoughts, wants, needs, and cares better than I can. Nor do they have that right, as that is mine and mine alone. Is it better for someones health to force them to eat or not eat certain things? Yes. Is it just? No.

I never said that only a university degree makes you a valuable person in society. But you also can't ignore that millions over millions in our countries are not capable of functioning in this society as they should. It's not always their fault, but is this way. They profit the most from these regulations.
I wouldn't need it. You wouldn't need it. They do.

You must be talking about people who are, or should be, wards of the state, because anyone that is considered able to function without being an immediate danger to themselves or others are, and should be, free to make their own mistakes. Not making healthy diet decisions does not mean someone is incapable of functioning in society. If it did an extremely large chunk of very successful and respected people would fall into that category.

Correct. But I'm looking for a practicable solution, wheras you seem to focus on basic principles. That's honorable and we all should consider these aspects.
But sometimes you have to bring it down to a simple level :

Action X.
Benefits ? Check
Negative aspects : Some, but insignificant imo
Draw a line
Black numbers on my bill. Red on yours.

It is a principle because it is the thing I hold most valuable. So, in your math they are extremely significant for me. If you are willing to turn away from principles in order to make sure that someone, you think is just a moron, can't make a bad decision regarding their health then I don't know how you can call it a principle. If you can sacrifice a principle for anything then it is not a principle, it is just a noble idea that can be ignored whenever it best suits you.

Ok see, I agree. But I don't want to take any life quality away from anybody.

How is anything we are discussing from my side taking life quality away from anyone? I am not forcing them to eat trans fats, or doing anything else to damage their health. I don't want their money, I don't want them to have to perform certain behaviors, buy certain products, or eat something they don't. I am allowing them the free will to make those choices for themselves, because I don't think that any consenting adults should be treated like children by a nanny government.

If government decides that gasoline has to be colored in purple you would still argue that it is your decision what color the gasoline is. I'd say : As long as it is burning in my car I'm fine with it.
If this process of turning gasoline purple would cost sth, yes, then I'd protest.

Yes, I would argue that it is, yet again, an example of government acting like they can dictate whatever regulations they want. The simple fact that the government spent time discussing it means it costs something to you, and that's not considering what must be done in a refinery to change the color with something that doesn't damage your engine over time.

But only if I didn't understand the resoning behind it. Coming back to trans fat acids, there is benefit for general health. Think about it, there is a 5 year old girl with her uneducated drop out of highschool mom and they pass a little restaurant that sells frenchfries to go. The owner of that shop uses the cheapest fat he gets in order to maximize profits. There is no sign that tells this mother that there are trans fat acids in these fries. And even if there was one, she probably wouldn't see it, understand it or care.

So, why not just require having nutritional information readily available in restaurants? That creates informed consent, and is where this should end without creating a rights issue. Then if you want to consider her a legally inept mother for providing her child a bad diet that becomes a whole new debate. Because it isn't as if healthy children's meals don't exist now. I can get fruit and milk at McDonald's in a kids meal.

Same situation, regulated by government , french fries cost 2 cents more and taste the same. One problem solved. Nobody is hurt.
20 years later that might prevent thousands of heart attacks and strokes.

The mother makes her own choices knowing the risks involved in her chosen diet. You saved her, against her will. If the daughter is your concern, then again there is a bad parenting legal debate to be had there. But I will not jump on the "BUT THE CHILDREN!!!!" straw man.

I understand, but not all regulations are bad.

I never said that.

Look at every single one and the decide if protesting is worth it.

I am protesting the nanny state in general. You don't treat a cough when it is a sign of pneumonia. You see the cough, and then attack the pneumonia. By your own descriptions of why this is good to take away people's choices in this case you describe a nanny state action.

But trans fat acids ? Who cares ? I don't. And you shouldn't.

Why shouldn't I care when government feels they can tell me what to do on a level of what legal food products I can eat? If I can stop the argument used for trans fats from becoming a legal precedent then that same argument cannot be used to attack things like sugars in sodas and artificially sweetened fruit juices. It is a slippery slope when the nanny state gets started and you have to stop it at the top, not when it has slid into something you care about. At that point the momentum is so strong that it cannot be stopped. That is why they start on small things like this. If something no one really cares about gets through it sets a legal precedent that can be used as justification when people do care.

Because the benefit for general health outweights your personal rights here.

Then by definition it is not a right, and I do not live in a society that recognizes individual liberty.

Because most negative consequences for you are only psychiological ( bad government rules over you ), not real ( fat tastes the same, costs almost the same etc )

If you think that is my main negative consequence then either I am not getting something across to you, or you do not respect individual liberty enough to understand what it actually means.

Well, then let's legalize heroine, drugs for everybody. Personal choice, right ?

I see now. You do not understand my personal philosophy at all, otherwise you wouldn't have stumbled into this. Regulars to the Opinions forums know that my answer to this is: Yes, we should legalize ALL drugs. I do not condone drug use, but my personal morals should not dictate the life of anyone else.

First of all, you can't regulate it, as you said. So let's forget it. But we can reduce the industrial use of trans fat acids. We can force small restaurants not to use them excessivly.

You can't ban commercially produced red meat? Seriously? It seems easier than trans fats as it is much easier to just look at it and tell. I mean, sure there will be a black market fed by hunters, but it can't be much worse than any other illegal product that I can still go out and buy on the right street corner. You seriously think it is easier to ban the use of a chemical found in products than just banning a product in general?

They made a recommendation and the government agreed.

Great, they can ban trans fats in the Capitol cafeteria and any restaurants the government owns. They do not own private businesses any more than they own my kitchen. Nor do they own my health.
And to repeat myself:

Their recommendations should then be looked at in conjunction with legal and economic implications.

I am raising the legal implications here, which you seem to be brushing aside, as below.

You know what I meant

Which is why I pointed out that fact that you seem to be ignoring there is more at stake than dollars and cents.

I don't agree. You say : if you can't do it perfectly and consequently in every aspect, then leave it be.

Actually, I am just saying leave it be. I am questioning why your philosophy appears to pick and choose, and why you think that a legal precedent won't wander its way toward too much intervention one small eroded right at a time.

You have to do what is practicable and what you actually can do. I can't make everbody live a perfectly healthly life, but I can try to terminate some harms. Especially if nobody is hurt. wheich is basicall the case here.

How many harms are you willing to try to terminate? San Francisco wants to go after sugar next to fight obesity and diabetes. Is that too far? Could they go that far if a legal precedent for terminating "some harms" wasn't already set? They are already comparing it to tobacco to clearly point out their legal precedent.

It is a partly a question of where you individually will stop, but it is also a question of where you individually will want to stop government. Government's ability to regulate only ends when its citizens tell it to stop.

Totally banning tobacco would increase population health a lot, but there is no way of realizing it. So let it be. Instead, do what you can do. Better than nothing

You realize it the same way you realize marijuana. You act like banning products out right is impossible, when government has been doing it since the beginning of time.

As I said, I would force all food producing companies to reduce the usage of trans fat acids to a minimum. That would include home use.
There are trans fat acids in natural products. That's not healthy, but you can't change it. so it's fine. But you can reduce massive usage in artificial products

You're missing my point though. If this legislation is about health then why don't they do it your way? The answer is that right now they can blame evil capitalism, and the people all say it is no big deal because it will only affect the companies. It has been said in this very thread. But if they did try to tell Holly Homemaker that she herself can't use shortening in her pie crusts because she is murdering her children Holly won't sit at home all prim and proper any longer voting for whoever promises to help her children the most.

Individual health is - in my opinion - a greater right than to decide every little very little important nuance in your life.

If you think individual health is a great right, then why do you think government should decide little important nuances of my life in regard to my individual health? My health is my right, and my individual health is directly tied to my ability to decide every little very little important nuance in my life.

And what is with the right of individual health for people that are not aware of the danger, because they are too young, not smart enought, don't care etc ?

Too young - parenting issue
Not smart enough - If they are smart enough to not require custodial care they are smart enough. Healthy eating is taught at the earliest stages of school.
Don't care - Um, they don't care, so what does it matter? They die and you go on unaffected. It was their right to risk their individual health on bad food choices that are public knowledge.

You protect business interests of huge companies or maybe also small restaurants ( that won't get broke because of paying a few dollars more for fat ) and sacrifice the health status of the weakest in our society ( who are in my opinion not capable of deciding for themselves )

You are serious about that bolded part, aren't you? You need to define that, because I really do think you look down on way too many people if you think that just because they willingly make bad choices you should make it for them.

I ate McDonald's on Tuesday, a McChicken sandwhich: reconstituted chicken patty deep fried in trans fats (I assume) and smothered in mayo. Am I not capable of deciding for myself? Should my government have intervened, swooped in, bopped me on the head, called me a moron, and taken it away and replaced it with an equally priced Fruit and Yogurt Parfait (which I also enjoy, btw)?

True but again : we are talking about trans fat acids ... believe me, you won't miss them. You wouldn't even notice if nobody told you.

That is wonderful, but my issue is with the government acting on this, not the fact that it is trans fats in particular.

And you should. Quality of life. with this regulation you'd buy the same ingredients and you won't taste a difference.

Quality of life and a crappy pie. I can see me at the next family dinner: "Sorry the pie's crust is not nearly as good, but I am giving you quality of life instead." My 95-year-old grandmother fusses if the meringue sweats. I am sure if I ruin her pie crust recipe she will focus more on how I have preserved her quality of life. I tried switching out the butter in my dad's peanut butter balls recipe once and all Christmas long I heard, "What did you do?" The taste was fine, but they were oily and nasty. No one thanked me for preserving their quality of life. If they cared about quality of life they wouldn't be eating these desserts at all.

Well I don't know a lot about prices in food industry, but the market will solve the problem.

The market will solve the problem without the regulation, but at a more natural and stable rate, only having those that can bear the intermediate costs or affects switching as the market adapts. Not a forced change all at once, leaving those that can't logistically do it at that moment to suffer.

Actually trans fat acids have to be produced out of cis fat acids. So theoretically they should be cheaper. They can't be conservated for the same amount of time, but modern logistics should be able to handle that.

But no one wants to go into a bakery and see the sign that says, "Now made with lard." If they did we wouldn't use shortening. No, Crisco had to find a massive conglomeration of various oil extracts to create something similar without trans fats, and some still say it isn't the same.

Let me clarify this again: Not all fat based oils used in cooking work the same.

I guess then those small businesses wil have to deal with these new regulations. If some get broke, so be it. I don't think so, but, if it was the case, so what. That's captialism, right ? If a few dollars more for fat ruin your business you're doing it wrong anyway.

No, that's not capitalism when government interference is the cause.

Nobody said that they should be unchecked. You can vote. But in my opinion, it's the job of the government to deal with such topics.

And I am arguing that they are beginning a trend and we should stop them now, before they have created the legal precedent to go after many other things.

You got me wrong here. I just wanted to point out that financial aspects in health care are extremly complex and hard to predict. I just presented a few aspects, each worth a discussion of its own. Too complex for this thread.
Dead customers are bad for profits. But not if they die 40 years later and nobody can actually proof that your product has anything to with it.

Private industry must care about its customers if it wishes to continue. It is simple economics. Sure, unethical acts happen in business, but that is human nature and it should be dealt with. But your initial statement regarding private health care is flat out wrong. That is my point.

Well, yeah, you are right. But, why waiting ? If the free market will kill trans fat acids anyway someday, then nobody is hurt if the government speeds up the process a little. Might save thousands of lifes.

Doing it via a ban is doing it unnaturally, and removing the fact that some people and businesses will still prefer trans fats. The market will never remove it 100%, allowing people to make that choice on their own.

You know, tiny neighborhood restaurant doesn't seem to care that much about public relations

Find a dead rat in their soup and see if you don't notice how much they care. Their PR is word of mouth, but it is still PR.

And while you named some positive examples, I'm sure that you can find dozens of products in a supermarket near you with massive amounts of trans fat acids.
If - as you say - they are going to dissapear anyway, why not right now ?

Yep, plenty still exist, and I have a choice because of it. That freedom to chose still exists in a free market..
If they did truly disappear completely on their own, doing it right now, all at once, upsets the market by causing unnatural changes. You can't just remove a major food ingredient at once and expect the food industry to be unaffected.

But not every right has equal value. Drastic example, I know, but still :
I could say killing my neighbor is my personal choice. Yett I think we agree that the right of not getting killed of cyour neighbor is a little more important.

This can't even be serious. If you honestly don't understand rights to the degree that this is a serious argument from you then I cannot make you understand my point of view. When you violate the rights of another it is no longer a right to perform your action. Choosing things that can kill yourself and not directly affect others is your right. Blatantly affecting others in such drastic ways is obviously not a right, and I challenge you to find anywhere I am promoting forcing something on anyone, as murder is the most extreme form of force.

End of free usage of trans fat acids are the end of freedom, if not even of mankind. Come on...

Freedom in general, no. A solitary freedom, yes. Part of a trend of free choices being taken away, yes. And that is a trend I wish to stop.

Not necessarily my standards, but some standards. A completely free market is a violent one. Only the strong survive. That's not my idea for a society I'd like to live in. Is it yours ?

A completely free market is not a violent one. Allowing free choice between businesses and customers, voluntary exchange of goods determined purely by supply and demand is not violent. Not only the strong survive (I assume you mean businesses), but many do fail, and they should. A business that cannot satisfy their customers is a failure, intervening is nothing but socialism.

Consequences of ateriosclerosis - billions of dollars. In the end, also paid by community. I think I know what's cheaper in the end.

You are the one that thinks government using your money to pay for health care of others is fine. Perhaps they should provide life necessities, like food and shelter, first (imagine the lives saved then) and that can take care of all the preventative diet needs and leave only catastrophic health care coverage needing to be covered.

But since I do not live under a government provided health care system, this argument holds no water. I pay for my health care, so if I choose to eat trans fats I pay the consequences, right? So, why do you care if I give myself arteriosclerosis? Even if it is in a single payer system, the rich are actually paying for the health care for everyone. Let them eat what they want.

We are still talking about trans fat acids here, right ? You always seem to think that one regulation leads to countless other regulations that ultimatly kill you right of living your own life. But that's not how it works.

But that is how we got here. The public health argument wasn't used to regulate legal activities and products in private businesses until they managed to get it to work for smoking after years of trying. That is how governments work.

But telling me to get that picture out of my mind you made things worse

It felt too serious, so I added some levity.

Again, you got m wrong here. Ultimately it is you decision.

But you are supporting regulating what I can choose to eat, saying you would prefer it even regulated my options for home? If you had it your way how is it my choice?

What I wanted to say is, that the average joe doesn't give a damn about trans fat acids. Maybe they would if they knew the consequences.

It is public knowledge, and the importance of healthy diets are taught at teh youngest levels of school.

But even then, most simply don't care. That's one reason why they smoke, drink, get fat etc

So? It is their body. It is their choice.

So why not helping them by talking this decision from them ?[/quality]
Because they are consenting adults and don't need a babysitter.

Since it doesn't hurt them or affect their quality of life in any way, I donÄt see a problem with it.

Quality of life is subjective. Some people find they prefer the joy of an unhealthy lifestyle more than the prospect of living to be old. That should be their choice, not the government's.

Nobody would even notice if they'd force a massive reduction of trans fat acids secretly.

That is obviously not true, as each company had to find a different alterantive that would properly work with their recipes.

But even if it were, that still doesn't make it right.

 

[Max_DC]

Before adressing the individual parts I'll write a few words after briefly reading what you stated above.

It's not that I don't get your point. After these last few posts you made your postion quite clear. I guess we simply have a different opinion here.

I was born and raised in one of the most regulated places on earth, Germany. We have rules and detailled regulations for everything, to a ridiculous degree. But I tell you something : All in all it works. This has a long lasting tradion, going back to Prussian times. Maybe sometimes Germans trust their leaders a little too much ( Hitler, anyone ? ), well they don't actually trust them, but they follow their orders anyway .
As an American it is probably unbelievable how massive these regulations are. Not long ago I read that over half of this planets tax literature is in German, because we have regulations,r ules and exceptions for everything. If you own a business, how small it might be, you need professional help. You can't do it yourself. You need those tax advisers ( probably helps saving money in every country, but without one you are screwed here - if he/she is good, you might end up paying nothing at all ).
Or take cars. If I want to replace the turn signal lights on my car ( for example from orange to white ), not only does this little thing of plastic have to be government proved, it hast to be actually be aproved for your specific car. Legal on VW golf ? Maybe illegal on your 3 series BMW.
That also goes for 5000 dollars carbon high quality hoods from Japan's best manufacturers : If not crashtested ( how does the carbon split exactly ) 5 times - not allowed in Germany. Put it on and you lose insurence.
If Mr. Prof. XY and Mrs Prof. XY want to homeschool their kid police will take their kid to school.
But is goes down to the kind of screws allowed to use in specific machinery etc. And the material they are made of.

It might sound like hell, but it is not.

I don't agree with everything, but in general it works. Because there are rules for everything you can rely on them ( most of the time ).

Also there is a areason why a small country like Germany was export world champion most of time for the last decades.

Engineering, precision, rules and regulations always seemed to work for us.


It's not that I think that this is the way it should be, that this is the ideal way to live. I think some things should be a lot more liberal, but trans fat acids are not really owning a top postion in my priority list.

What seems to be a little disaster for you and an imminent danger for the land of the free is a piece of nothing in our world of rules and regulations.

Did all that solve our problems ? No. Maybe some, but it created others. A perfect society is a vision that will probably never be reality.

All I can tell you, no need to be afraid . You can still live a perfectly free life in Germany, hell, if you own a car that is capable of doing 200 mph, you can legally do it.

A strong and powerful government doesn't have to be threat to personal freedom.

Smart people will always find a way to push boundaries and live their life.

There always be a fight between rules&regulations VS personal freedom.
You know what is best for you. Or at least you think you do.
I've seen patients die in my hands, I have seen the panic in their eyes as they gasped for breath. And some of them really helped to dig their own graves by smoking and eating too much of the wrong food etc.
Dying at the age of forty is not as funny as it seems to be when you are 20 and eat junk food.
Basically it's their life, their decision. Still - unless you are living alone without children in wildlife - every decision somehow effects other people.

Parents with any kind of bad habits, for example eating unhealthy food, will ultimately determine what their kids like. When many people buy bad food ( you might ask, what is bad food, where to draw the line. And I agree, it is difficult. Luckily we have trans fat acids - pretty bad and at the same time pretty useless, because its effects on the taste of most food products are not existant or minimal ), companies will make profits and produce more.
And on it goes, the never ending circle.

You say : I want to live my life with my rules at almost any costs.
I say : I am willing to sacrifice some personal choices of YOU and ME in order to do something important. in this case protect health of people who are either too young, too stupid or too careless. Against their will, for their best.
As you do with your wars

Yes, you can raise health campaigns, and I didn't say that they don't work at all, but it is far more effective to simply ban it. Bam, problem ( almost ) solved. Many more problems to come. Adress them with health campaigns. You can't ban sugar, in that case, only campaigns help.

Every expert in the world working together cannot determine my individual circumstance, thoughts, wants, needs, and cares better than I can. Nor do they have that right, as that is mine and mine alone. Is it better for someones health to force them to eat or not eat certain things? Yes. Is it just? No.

You must be talking about people who are, or should be, wards of the state, because anyone that is considered able to function without being an immediate danger to themselves or others are, and should be, free to make their own mistakes. Not making healthy diet decisions does not mean someone is incapable of functioning in society. If it did an extremely large chunk of very successful and respected people would fall into that category.

It is a principle because it is the thing I hold most valuable. So, in your math they are extremely significant for me. If you are willing to turn away from principles in order to make sure that someone, you think is just a moron, can't make a bad decision regarding their health then I don't know how you can call it a principle. If you can sacrifice a principle for anything then it is not a principle, it is just a noble idea that can be ignored whenever it best suits you.

I don't sacrifice them for anything. I adapt to the situation. The same rule/ regulation / principle might be perfect in one second, useless in the next second. The skill is to adapt - that requires a certain flexibility.
Medicine for example requires that a lot. What is right now, might kill the patient in the next moment.

How is anything we are discussing from my side taking life quality away from anyone? I am not forcing them to eat trans fats, or doing anything else to damage their health. I don't want their money, I don't want them to have to perform certain behaviors, buy certain products, or eat something they don't. I am allowing them the free will to make those choices for themselves, because I don't think that any consenting adults should be treated like children by a nanny government.

You are talking a lot about yourself being able to handle everything. And I don't doubt that. Others don't. It's them I talk about.
And I think you can survive with a little less rights, even if you don't like it at first. You'll get used to it

So, why not just require having nutritional information readily available in restaurants? That creates informed consent, and is where this should end without creating a rights issue. Then if you want to consider her a legally inept mother for providing her child a bad diet that becomes a whole new debate. Because it isn't as if healthy children's meals don't exist now. I can get fruit and milk at McDonald's in a kids meal.

Yes, that kind of nutritional information would be a great idea. Yet, I think we agree, a forced massive reduction is doing a more effective job at a shorter time. At the cost of some of your rights. Which, as I said, I am willing to sacrifice

Personally, I give a damn about what any government does with tran fat acids. I know enough to avoid them if I want to, and I'd still be able to get them if I wanted to, even with strict regulations.

The mother makes her own choices knowing the risks involved in her chosen diet. You saved her, against her will. If the daughter is your concern, then again there is a bad parenting legal debate to be had there. But I will not jump on the "BUT THE CHILDREN!!!!" straw man.

Maybe I just don't respect her will as much as you do . Also, bad parenting will always exists. And I can't punish every mother who buys fries for her kid in some small restaurant. Not possible. Not needed. Why ? Because I can ban trans fat acids just like Famine some 12 year old spam kid. Government ban hammer. Bam, problem solved.

I am protesting the nanny state in general.

I got this. If anything, then I understood this

You don't treat a cough when it is a sign of pneumonia. You see the cough, and then attack the pneumonia. By your own descriptions of why this is good to take away people's choices in this case you describe a nanny state action.

I don't know if I fully understand your analogy here, but I suppose ... no please elaborate.

Why shouldn't I care when government feels they can tell me what to do on a level of what legal food products I can eat? If I can stop the argument used for trans fats from becoming a legal precedent then that same argument cannot be used to attack things like sugars in sodas and artificially sweetened fruit juices. It is a slippery slope when the nanny state gets started and you have to stop it at the top, not when it has slid into something you care about. At that point the momentum is so strong that it cannot be stopped. That is why they start on small things like this. If something no one really cares about gets through it sets a legal precedent that can be used as justification when people do care.

I adressed this in my introduction of my post. I see where you are coming from, but I think you are too afraid, especially in this case.

Then by definition it is not a right, and I do not live in a society that recognizes individual liberty.

Not every right is of equal value. Not in general, and not in special circumstances.
On the one hand there are thousands of people who might die because they are too yound, to stupid etc as I said before. On the other hand there is foolkiller who cries over having lost the right to have free 24h access to trans fat acids in restaurants, supermarkets and his own kitchen.
Sorry, you lose.

If you think that is my main negative consequence then either I am not getting something across to you, or you do not respect individual liberty enough to understand what it actually means.

I understand it, and I think it is of extreme value most of the time. But not here. Because in my opinion ( and we are both basically expressing our opinions here, right ? ) having free access to trans fat acids is something I'd sell for 1 dollar. Know what I mean ? You can have it, I don't need it.

I see now. You do not understand my personal philosophy at all, otherwise you wouldn't have stumbled into this. Regulars to the Opinions forums know that my answer to this is: Yes, we should legalize ALL drugs. I do not condone drug use, but my personal morals should not dictate the life of anyone else.

I understand it very well, but I don't share it at all. Nah, "at all" is too drastic. Not in this case and not in the drug example.
Oh and don't get me wrong, I respects eating habits of all kind. Unhealthy or not. But that doesn't mean that I support free and easy access to them.

You can't ban commercially produced red meat? Seriously? It seems easier than trans fats as it is much easier to just look at it and tell. I mean, sure there will be a black market fed by hunters, but it can't be much worse than any other illegal product that I can still go out and buy on the right street corner. You seriously think it is easier to ban the use of a chemical found in products than just banning a product in general?

We are talking about the same "red meat" here, right ? Meat of pigs, cattle etc ? How on earth do you want to ban them ? Not possible, not needed and a massive attack on personal freedom to eat what you want. Because it actually is a huge differnce to eat chicken or to eat a beef steak. Whereas some industrial podouced doghnut still tastes the same.


Ok I have to face it at this point : It's 11.30 pm here, tomorrow I have another nice day of learning clinical pharmacology and pediatrics and your quotes just don't end

So that's it for today , our lengthy conversations are killing me, if I'd only be able to construct sentences as quickly and precisely as in my mother language

 

[FoolKiller]

I get the concept that you are in Germany where regulations are much higher and in comparison a trans fat ban is no big deal. But my desire to not live under a government that has such strict regulations as Germany, or just buys up companies that they decide they should own, like France, is why I am making my stand on something you see as very inconsequential.

My principles and philosophy on freedom and liberty would be severely strained if I had to live under the kinds of regulations you do now. Look at my comments in threads dedicated purely to American politics: I think the US has too many regulations now to actually consider what we have to be a free market or capitalism. To make it worse, our founding documents forbid a large portion of the things that we do today because the idea and principles behind the US originally were to remove government from the lives of men as much as possible, that government should answer to the people, not the other way around. Unfortunately, that experiment never got tested because the government did precisely what they were trying to prevent.

All that said, I understand you wanting to protect those who are too young to decide for themselves. As long as we have public schools I support them regulating what they serve to maintain a healthy and balanced diet. But as I said before, that becomes a parenting issue on a much larger scale than checking for trans fats on the label, and there are issues there that have a much stronger argument for regulation. In any instance you can't bring up protecting children from parents without a much larger discussion.

I do need you to explain the people you consider too stupid. If they are of legal consenting age and determined to be legally capable of making their own decisions in life, then I cannot see how an issue like their diet can be regulated based on their mental capacity. They are driving, getting married, having kids, but you discuss regulating food to protect them from themselves. I cannot fathom these are the people you are talking about without seeing it as being very elitist to think that the government can determine any health choice, no matter how small and insignificant, while allowing them to make decisions daily that have potential to result in the deaths of others (like drive).


And just to clarify an issue: When I see the word principles I think of what Stephen R Covey said in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Principles are unwavering and never change. Values adapt from situation to situation. That is paraphrasing, but may explain why when I say I consider something a principle I will not be convinced by any situational conditions.

As for the cough and pneumonia analogy: Cough = trans fats ban pneumonia = nanny state, over regulatory government.

When I see a cough (trans fat) I see a symptom of a disease like pneumonia (nanny state) and know that to ignore the cough allows the pneumonia to get worse. I can treat the cough (fight the ban), which will help the patient rest, but unless I stop the pneumonia (nanny state) as a whole from progressing there will be more and more symptoms (regulations) until the patient (liberty) suffers much more than just a cough.

I hope that made sense.


Comedic off topic twist on all this and my big individualism stance: I drive (and love) a Volkswagen, and speak enough German to know what that translates to.

 

[niky]

A couple of incredibly long posts here...

Would simply like to react to this:

Again, true, but I prefer two experts discussing topics over the opinion of one moron who thinks he is right.

I never said that only a university degree makes you a valuable person in society. But you also can't ignore that millions over millions in our countries are not capable of functioning in this society as they should. It's not always their fault, but is this way. They profit the most from these regulations.
I wouldn't need it. You wouldn't need it. They do.

I'm personally not a doctor, but I come from a medical family. My grandfather and grandmother were doctors. Half my aunts and uncles are doctors. My mother is a doctor. Several of my cousins are doctors. And I have a couple of friends who are doctors. Comes of being a stakeholder in a medical school. Saves me a ton of money when I need to go see one.

And here's something that I've observed, that has been pointed out to me by various doctors over the years...

Doctors make the worst patients.

Some younger ones may do drugs due to the stress. A lot of doctors drink, and a surprising number of doctors and even respiratory therapists smoke. (quirky, possibly unprovable observation... a higher percentage of respiratory therapy students seem to take up smoking than for other allied medical professions)

They lead an unhealthy lifestyle. If they work in a hospital, they're under a lot of stress, and heart problems are common.

They're stubborn. Sometimes refuse to listen to their own doctors... or to strictly follow their medication or therapy routines.

This would seem to me that your so-called "experts" are amongst the "millions upon millions" who are "not capable of functioning in society as they should."

These people do not lead an unhealthy lifestyle due to lack of information. They simply choose to ignore the consequences of their actions.

For these people, I'd have to ban trans-saturated fats, ban red meat, ban caffeine and tobacco, ban carbonated sodas, ban alcoholic beverages (strange... your German nannies don't seem to care about that!) and ban doctors from working more than 8 hours a day. Oh... and give them a mandatory 30 minute workout each morning.

Why?

Because doctors are obviously too stupid to do these things for themselves. And enforcing these bans will extend the lifespans of our valuable doctors by quite a lot.

-

By itself, a trans-fat ban is relatively innocuous. Hardly anybody notices it. Nobody will really care.

But it's a strange law.

It's akin to banning high-fructose corn syrup while not banning refined sugar... or... strangely... rice and bread... which have a higher glycemic index than corn-syrup laced softdrinks.

They're only banning trans-fats, again, because: 1. It's the buzz and 2. People will protest if you ban beef or pork.

Hypocrisy upon hypocrisy. I know a lot of doctors who are of the opinion that pork should be illegal, because there are a lot of patients who develop health complications due to it.

Of course... since pork itself is something the general public can: 1. recognize and 2. like to eat... such a ban is never going to happen.

Or is it? California can simply point out: "hey, we banned trans-fats... and this stuff's worse... so why not?"

 

[FoolKiller]

I know a lot of doctors who are of the opinion that pork should be illegal, because there are a lot of patients who develop health complications due to it.

Of course... since pork itself is something the general public can: 1. recognize and 2. like to eat... such a ban is never going to happen.

The pork industry had a brilliant marketing campaign in the 90's where they called it "the other white meat." I know people that bought into that concept fully, because a cooked pork chop turns white, just like chicken.

Or is it? California can simply point out: "hey, we banned trans-fats... and this stuff's worse... so why not?"

All they need is one concerned celebrity to be a spokesperson, and California has plenty of those.

 

[Max_DC]

I get the concept that you are in Germany where regulations are much higher and in comparison a trans fat ban is no big deal. But my desire to not live under a government that has such strict regulations as Germany, or just buys up companies that they decide they should own, like France, is why I am making my stand on something you see as very inconsequential.

Yeah I thought so and I understand it. I guess it depends on the way you were solcialized and your individual personality - since obviously not everybody in the States think as you do aswell as I don't represent Germany.
I think this really is a very intersting topic on its own.
Every person who uses the word x, for example freedom, has a different defintion for it. Depending on how he was socialized and what experiences he had in life regarding word x.
I mean look at your level of freedom, mine and the one of somebody who is living in Iran, maybe a woman living in Iran or in a low cast in India.
You know, I actually think that while some limits to freedom ultimately bother every human being ( like living in a cell of a prison, or in a country without the possibility to travel like East Germany before 1990 ) to a certain degree, other things might be totally different. Look you complain about this possible reduction of - and I think we basically agree - not massivly import subright, and people in Iran risk their life and health by criticizing their government.

Yet I don't see most people cry over their limited rights all day, as humans we tend to compare our situation with the one of people we kknow, live together etc.
That's why a person earing 100.000 $ a year feels rich in some rundown suburb and poor in Malibu living between millionairs.

My principles and philosophy on freedom and liberty would be severely strained if I had to live under the kinds of regulations you do now. Look at my comments in threads dedicated purely to American politics: I think the US has too many regulations now to actually consider what we have to be a free market or capitalism. To make it worse, our founding documents forbid a large portion of the things that we do today because the idea and principles behind the US originally were to remove government from the lives of men as much as possible, that government should answer to the people, not the other way around. Unfortunately, that experiment never got tested because the government did precisely what they were trying to prevent.

Hm I highly doubt that it would work in a way you'd like it.
I think that the risks of such a system are by far greater than its possible advantages. It's a question of balance, too few regulations and some strong individuals take over all the power. That would destabilize the system to a degree that the result could onyl mean - more regulations or civil war.
Third world countries tested this to some degrees.

For me personally or my family in generalliving in the States would certainly mean increased wealth. In my opinion the USA is a country for winners. I'd prefer to be a loser in Germany.

In your system the benefits for accomplishments are higher, but so are punishments. It's a harder system. I think it is a little closer to human nature than ours, whichis a little too artificial, constructed and not always thought to end properly.
But - you might not notice that as much as I do, you pay a price for that. I don't know if I would be willing to pay it.
Different example : Japan. I know quite a lot about its culture and society. I've been there several times and it really is a very unique society. One people,public safety that has to be experienced to be believed.
Japan is not perfect, as any country it has its flaws that result from its inividual structure. And there is a huge change at the moment. But in general I think that the Japanese are a very fortunate people, and being Japanese is pretty aewsome, like being part of a huge family.

I guess that's a little offtopic. I guess waht I was trying to say is, that one the one hand I understand you and that on ther other hand you probably wouldn't suffer from more regulations as much as you think now. At leats in longterm. Rules and regulations also create safety, predictability and stability. Which can result in a crtain comfort that even you like.

And I know that you don't share my opnion here, but have a look at results from research. I recently read an article about "happiness". Several studies tried to categorize this planet : The results are lists, a ranking of happiness. I can tell you - the country with the happiest people is neither Germany nor the States.
Although I'd say that the level of freedom in your country is pretty high, probably one of the highest overall, maybe along with Canada.
So a maximum of personal freedom doesn't seem to be the key to happiness.

You know who is pretty damn high in that list, I even think first ? Denmark. We share a border, but I didn't know too much about this country untill I read about it in that article regarding luck.
They are free, but yet their system has a lot of aspects that look a lot like socialism to me.
If I remember correctly, they can't really lose their jobs. They get paid like 80% of their last income, and the government helps them to find new jobs.
The difference in incomes is relativly small compared to the USA for example.

Too bad I can't fin dthe article right now, it was quite lenghty and described in detail why most people in Denmark are so damn happy.
It's no paradise, but I can tell you - there are reasons why they are so happy.
If I had to summarize it : They focus on "we" instead of you against me. Who owns more, who works harder, who can make more money etc. Obviously not the way to achieve happiness.
Ahving read the article I admire what they achieved, yet personally I think that this system is too "communist" for me to like it.

All that said, I understand you wanting to protect those who are too young to decide for themselves. As long as we have public schools I support them regulating what they serve to maintain a healthy and balanced diet. But as I said before, that becomes a parenting issue on a much larger scale than checking for trans fats on the label, and there are issues there that have a much stronger argument for regulation. In any instance you can't bring up protecting children from parents without a much larger discussion.

The more rules and regulations by the government you have, the less you depend on the uncontrolable, unpredictable and often questionable quality of parenting.
The "nanny" state functions as a wise nanny and - if done correctly - improves the situation for the majority of people.

You let every parent decide if they want their kids to eat a lot of trans fat acids. Great for those kids with smart and rsponsible parents, bad for those without.

My method guarantees low levels of trans fat acids in all people at the cost of a piece of liberty.

I know why you don't like that and I agree that the basic principle behind it is a danger to a free society.
That's why I say : Have a look at the individual case.
You say : it's a risk, because the government could make this the first step in many. Maybe it is. But what's live without risks ?
As you said before - without taking risks you could still live at home with your parents.

I do need you to explain the people you consider too stupid. If they are of legal consenting age and determined to be legally capable of making their own decisions in life, then I cannot see how an issue like their diet can be regulated based on their mental capacity. They are driving, getting married, having kids, but you discuss regulating food to protect them from themselves. I cannot fathom these are the people you are talking about without seeing it as being very elitist to think that the government can determine any health choice, no matter how small and insignificant, while allowing them to make decisions daily that have potential to result in the deaths of others (like drive).

Well being able to drive a car and function in traffic is not the same as being able to construct and build a car from scratch.
Playing videogames is not as difficult as programming one.
Having sex is not as difficult as being a responsible parent.

All I do all day long for several years is learning how the human body is working, what can go wrong and how we can fix certain things. And I can tell you - you could study medicine for 100 years and still learn new things every day. It is hopless to try to understand everything.

In Germany, med school is lasting 6 years minimum. Then you are M.D. . Then it takes anonther 5-8 years to become a specialist for whatever you want to do ( for example thorcic surgent ). And after 20 years of countless hours of studying and working you are finally somewhat competent in your specific field of medicine. And you will need all your power to keep up with science in that specific field.

You say you know best waht is best for you. How do you come to that conclusion ? You take everything into consideration and draw a line.
But what is everything in that regard ? It's what you know. And as I described before, that knowledge is pretty limited. So you are in fact coming to a conclusion without knowing all the facts.

And how else should it be, that's life.

You could now say that you don't need to know every biochemical or physiological detail, because you can simply just focus on your individual value of health compared to other things that matter in your life.
But again - I could argue that you may be degrading the importance of your health too much in your calue system, because you don't know what can happen and what the results exactly are.
For example many people think : ok, then I don't become 90 years old, but hey, I enjoyed it. Dying at 75 is fine for me. That harming your health means not only dying earlier but maybe also suffering 10 years before dying is often forgotten.
I at least partly know what seemingly unimportant small lifestyle aspects can do to several of your organs and what consequences that has. What level of morbidity that means. What side effects the medication has, that is needed to treat these consequences. And what deseases result from treating the first desease.

So, if medical experts in their fields come together and come to a result, that is convincing enough to create such a law, then I say : it's worth a try.
And I say that the average joe is not capable of truly understanding all this.
Even he thinks he can. He doesn't know or understand all the facts. So - philosophical question - to what degree can he know what's best for him ?
I don't know.

And just to clarify an issue: When I see the word principles I think of what Stephen R Covey said in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Principles are unwavering and never change. Values adapt from situation to situation. That is paraphrasing, but may explain why when I say I consider something a principle I will not be convinced by any situational conditions.

That's pretty strict. Almost too strict. Sticking to a principle is not that smart then, is it ? If circumstances change, then the statment , that was labeled as "principle" changes.
What is that constant apart from maybe some mathematical phenomena ?
Is a blue blossom blue ? Not if you are an insect with sight in ultraviolet spectrum. Take 10 kg of metal. Always the same ? In outer space ? On a planet twice the mass of earth ? At 1000 degrees ?
Sticking to a principle no matter what doesn't seem to be that reasoned.

As for the cough and pneumonia analogy: Cough = trans fats ban pneumonia = nanny state, over regulatory government.

When I see a cough (trans fat) I see a symptom of a disease like pneumonia (nanny state) and know that to ignore the cough allows the pneumonia to get worse. I can treat the cough (fight the ban), which will help the patient rest, but unless I stop the pneumonia (nanny state) as a whole from progressing there will be more and more symptoms (regulations) until the patient (liberty) suffers much more than just a cough. I hope that made sense.

Hahaha, ok now I understand and yes, it makes sense. You don't trust your government ha ? Yet you support Rand Paul, the next bacteria in town, that is waiting to take over your lung No, no I got you. Because Rand Paul probably is against a regulating nanny state and therefor not a pneumonia but part of your immune system, because he fights pneumonia from within.

Comedic off topic twist on all this and my big individualism stance: I drive (and love) a Volkswagen, and speak enough German to know what that translates to.

I guess then our secret cheimcal , planted inside every exported good, that makes you beg for more regulations and government power has not yet done its job. Beware, every time you enter that Volkswagen that chemical will influence you a little more untill one day you'll even ask your government for permisson to pee Then we have won

 

[Max_DC]

A couple of incredibly long posts here...

Would simply like to react to this:



I'm personally not a doctor, but I come from a medical family. My grandfather and grandmother were doctors. Half my aunts and uncles are doctors. My mother is a doctor. Several of my cousins are doctors. And I have a couple of friends who are doctors. Comes of being a stakeholder in a medical school. Saves me a ton of money when I need to go see one.

And here's something that I've observed, that has been pointed out to me by various doctors over the years...

Doctors make the worst patients.

Some younger ones may do drugs due to the stress. A lot of doctors drink, and a surprising number of doctors and even respiratory therapists smoke. (quirky, possibly unprovable observation... a higher percentage of respiratory therapy students seem to take up smoking than for other allied medical professions)

They lead an unhealthy lifestyle. If they work in a hospital, they're under a lot of stress, and heart problems are common.

They're stubborn. Sometimes refuse to listen to their own doctors... or to strictly follow their medication or therapy routines.

This would seem to me that your so-called "experts" are amongst the "millions upon millions" who are "not capable of functioning in society as they should."

These people do not lead an unhealthy lifestyle due to lack of information. They simply choose to ignore the consequences of their actions.

For these people, I'd have to ban trans-saturated fats, ban red meat, ban caffeine and tobacco, ban carbonated sodas, ban alcoholic beverages (strange... your German nannies don't seem to care about that!) and ban doctors from working more than 8 hours a day. Oh... and give them a mandatory 30 minute workout each morning.

Why?

Because doctors are obviously too stupid to do these things for themselves. And enforcing these bans will extend the lifespans of our valuable doctors by quite a lot.

-

By itself, a trans-fat ban is relatively innocuous. Hardly anybody notices it. Nobody will really care.

But it's a strange law.

It's akin to banning high-fructose corn syrup while not banning refined sugar... or... strangely... rice and bread... which have a higher glycemic index than corn-syrup laced softdrinks.

They're only banning trans-fats, again, because: 1. It's the buzz and 2. People will protest if you ban beef or pork.

Hypocrisy upon hypocrisy. I know a lot of doctors who are of the opinion that pork should be illegal, because there are a lot of patients who develop health complications due to it.

Of course... since pork itself is something the general public can: 1. recognize and 2. like to eat... such a ban is never going to happen.

Or is it? California can simply point out: "hey, we banned trans-fats... and this stuff's worse... so why not?"

Thank you. If even we, who should know best, are not capable of reaöizing all dangers to our health out there, how should anybody else ?

That is the argument for such a law.

No, honestly. That's human I guess. Some ignore it, some don't care and soem don't know !
If you get your M.D. degree on January 1st 2010, your level of knowlege in general medicine ( not the one you specialise in ) basically remains at 2010.
As sad as it is, but that's what statistics say. It is impossible to keep up with science. Even in your field, you couldn't keep up with every detail, even if you read publications 24 hours a day.

Do you know what i was tought about the danger of trans fat acids ? 3 sentences at most. One reader mentioned it once in one lecture. Future internists will learn it, but not future surgeons. Why ? Because it takes some years before all new scientific knowledge reaches our classes and books.

Another aspect is arrogance. Many M.D.'s think they know best. Medicine is a rather competetive course of studies. Here in Germany you have to be among the best if you want to get a place in med school right after highschool. There are other ways to get in, like waiting lists, connections, etc but there are certainly a lot of naturally selfconfident people in here. That doesn't help.
And even if they are not arrogant, they still often think that they know best or at least better than the doctor treating them.

I'm sure there are many lawyers in prison. Same paradoxon. You'll find that everywhere.

The fact that they often work so hard ( and by that put their health at risk ) also has other reasons : They either want to make a career and a lot of money, or they are obsessed with helping people.
It is after all an important job. You can't just go home, if there are still many patients in need of your help and doctors just don't grow on trees. Too few for too many sick people.

It's akin to banning high-fructose corn syrup while not banning refined sugar... or... strangely... rice and bread... which have a higher glycemic index than corn-syrup laced softdrinks.

They're only banning trans-fats, again, because: 1. It's the buzz and 2. People will protest if you ban beef or pork.

Well I agree. But is it that negative ? They try to do what they can do ( baning sth that is not healthy, but nobody cares because it is an ingrediant you can pretty much replace with sth a little healthier without noticing ) and don't do what is useless anyway ( because it would end in protests ).
I think that's smarter than doing nothing...

 

[FoolKiller]

Yeah I thought so and I understand it. I guess it depends on the way you were solcialized and your individual personality - since obviously not everybody in the States think as you do aswell as I don't represent Germany.

My very own brother believes we should be socialized to a degree more than the system you described in Denmark as being too communist for you. He literally thinks equal distribution of wealth is the only fair economic system. We have fun discussions.

Yet I don't see most people cry over their limited rights all day, as humans we tend to compare our situation with the one of people we know, live together etc.

Yes, many people consider rights as some sort of subjective thing. That is a problem in my eyes. I consider myself to be an objectivist, or very close to it. If you do not know what that is look at the works of Ayn Rand.

Hm I highly doubt that it would work in a way you'd like it.
I think that the risks of such a system are by far greater than its possible advantages. It's a question of balance, too few regulations and some strong individuals take over all the power. That would destabilize the system to a degree that the result could onyl mean - more regulations or civil war.
Third world countries tested this to some degrees.

I am not talking about anarchy and removing government as a whole. Government does have a role in protecting its citizens, and our Constitution laid out a very strict list of powers that our government has, without allowing it any room outside of that list. But through reinterpretations of certain wordings our government has managed to, over time, step vastly outside of those bounds. It has been doing it more and more in the last 100 years. It ranges from everything to assigning monetary policy to an un-checked Central Bank printing paper money with no physical value (the Constitution declares that as Congress' job, and even specifically says gold and silver coins) to war powers being handed to the President (Only Congress is supposed to declare war), and so on.

Third world countries in turmoil are doing is allowing every tough guy with a gun and money fight it out to see who gets to lead. I still think we require a democratic Republic to maintain the freedoms of all. No one is held back from attempting to achieve their goals in life, but no one is guaranteed them.

For me personally or my family in generalliving in the States would certainly mean increased wealth. In my opinion the USA is a country for winners. I'd prefer to be a loser in Germany.

Do not look at the USA now as my ideal. There are many instances where it does look like it is only for winners (ideally everyone should have an opportunity to be a winner), but that perception could not exist if government did not interfere. Monopolies (AT&T) have been created with government aid. Large companies that were always seen as winners for years and began to collapse as losers are protected by the government (auto industry) so that no smaller company can even try to compete.

My ideal is a place where everyone can equally succeed or fail, based purely on their ability to do so. In that situation, even the biggest winners of the past will falter or fail at some point.

In your system the benefits for accomplishments are higher, but so are punishments.

You may fail, and you may suffer in my system, but because those who succeed are allowed to grow as they see fit, they will need someone to work for them. The more and bigger the winners, the more those who can't climb to the top have an opportunity to still participate. This is where I sit, in lower management, trying to find an opening into middle management. I know enough to know that I cannot reach the top any time soon, but I will work my way there.

But - you might not notice that as much as I do, you pay a price for that. I don't know if I would be willing to pay it.

It is easy to pay because the rewards for mediocrity are larger here. I am barely considered middle class by many, but I have way more things than I need to live in my society (like three home video game systems, one portable, large screen HDTV, two PCs, etc).

I guess that's a little offtopic. I guess waht I was trying to say is, that one the one hand I understand you and that on ther other hand you probably wouldn't suffer from more regulations as much as you think now. At leats in longterm. Rules and regulations also create safety, predictability and stability. Which can result in a crtain comfort that even you like.

One of our founding fathers wrote, "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." I consider the freedom to chose what I do or do not do with my body, so long as I do not force others to do things as well, to be an essential liberty.

The results are lists, a ranking of happiness. I can tell you - the country with the happiest people is neither Germany nor the States.
Although I'd say that the level of freedom in your country is pretty high, probably one of the highest overall, maybe along with Canada.
So a maximum of personal freedom doesn't seem to be the key to happiness.

You know who is pretty damn high in that list, I even think first ? Denmark.

Again, I just want to remind you, the US now is not the US I envision.

That said, happiness is not a right. The ability to pursue it is, but achieving it is not a guarantee. It is easy to be happy when you know that your neighbors will pick you up when you fail. I moved out from under my mother's care when I graduated college because I was ready to make my own decisions and mistakes. Since then I have been tied financially to only one other person, my wife, and we share a mutual dependency as part of a financial agreement (marriage) we made because we chose to spend our lives together for emotional reasons.

If I had to summarize it : They focus on "we" instead of you against me. Who owns more, who works harder, who can make more money etc. Obviously not the way to achieve happiness.

But the we is only happiness for those that don't work the hardest and produce the most. A "we" mentality punishes those who do the most while rewarding those who do the least.

The more rules and regulations by the government you have, the less you depend on the uncontrolable, unpredictable and often questionable quality of parenting.

And like all other things, where that stops is a great big question. I know parents questioned because a teacher reported a student as being untreated for ADHD. Is that questionable parenting, or a teacher unable to control an unruly student? This has a very long discussion that defines good parenting and where the government's place to intervene should stop. I draw my line at an immediate threat to the child's safety.

The "nanny" state functions as a wise nanny and - if done correctly - improves the situation for the majority of people.

Needs of the majority do not outweigh the needs of the few. That is how all kinds of civil liberties get violated. The US Constitution is designed to protect the minorities from the government intervention desired by the majority, and the smallest minority is the individual.

As you said before - without taking risks you could still live at home with your parents.

Which is slightly more preferable to living under the thumb of the government.

Government regulations for "safety" are trying to remove risks, nany adults, or act like they are the parents of all consenting adults.

Well being able to drive a car and function in traffic is not the same as being able to construct and build a car from scratch.
Playing videogames is not as difficult as programming one.
Having sex is not as difficult as being a responsible parent.

If you determine them as legally capable of doing these things, which can directly result in the harm and deaths of others, you cannot dictate what they may or may not eat to protect their own health. It is their health, but letting them drive risks others health.

If you don't trust them to protect themselves, why would you trust them to drive a death machine down the street?

They are legal, consenting adults. To refer to them as too stupid to make decisions for themselves is an elitist attitude.

You say you know best waht is best for you. How do you come to that conclusion ? You take everything into consideration and draw a line.
But what is everything in that regard ? It's what you know. And as I described before, that knowledge is pretty limited. So you are in fact coming to a conclusion without knowing all the facts.

I know what I want. I know what doctors and scientists tell me can help me and I factor that in, and make my own decisions for my own life.

But again - I could argue that you may be degrading the importance of your health too much in your calue system, because you don't know what can happen and what the results exactly are.
For example many people think : ok, then I don't become 90 years old, but hey, I enjoyed it. Dying at 75 is fine for me. That harming your health means not only dying earlier but maybe also suffering 10 years before dying is often forgotten.
I at least partly know what seemingly unimportant small lifestyle aspects can do to several of your organs and what consequences that has. What level of morbidity that means. What side effects the medication has, that is needed to treat these consequences. And what deseases result from treating the first desease.

So, if medical experts in their fields come together and come to a result, that is convincing enough to create such a law, then I say : it's worth a try.
And I say that the average joe is not capable of truly understanding all this.
Even he thinks he can. He doesn't know or understand all the facts. So - philosophical question - to what degree can he know what's best for him ?
I don't know.

Do you realize that you sound like the computer in i Robot? "We know better than you ever can what is best for you, so we will make you have to live safely for yourself."

You stated that as a doctor you recommend to your patients. Then stop there. If you (via government) go any further you overstep your bounds as a doctor. I would even argue that you harm (do no harm) my rights. You suggest, via government regulation, treating diet the same way you would a psychology patient that is an immediate threat to themselves and needs to be restrained.

That's pretty strict. Almost too strict. Sticking to a principle is not that smart then, is it ? If circumstances change, then the statment , that was labeled as "principle" changes.

No. I do not call it a principle unless I am willing to defend it, even in the face of Armageddon, and die doing so. You may not call it smart, but I call it honorable. It is how an all-volunteer military works. Why poor farmers pick up guns to fight a trained military.

Sticking to a principle no matter what doesn't seem to be that reasoned.

Tell that to man who is willing to kill to protect his family, his country, and his freedom. Were the American colonists unreasonable? They found a principle and put their lives on the line in defense of it.

Because Rand Paul probably is against a regulating nanny state and therefor not a pneumonia but part of your immune system, because he fights pneumonia from within.

Just for fun: Rand Paul is a doctor. His father, Ron Paul (also a doctor), is in Congress and known as Doctor No, for voting against pretty much any new regulation. Yes, I am supporting a candidate who claims to want to vote bring back what our founding fathers wanted.

 

[niky]

Thank you. If even we, who should know best, are not capable of reaöizing all dangers to our health out there, how should anybody else ?

That is the argument for such a law.

Actually... that's an argument in favor of FK's stance... if people in the know can't be trusted to make decisions for themselves, why should we allow them to make decisions for others?

No, honestly. That's human I guess. Some ignore it, some don't care and soem don't know !
If you get your M.D. degree on January 1st 2010, your level of knowlege in general medicine ( not the one you specialise in ) basically remains at 2010.
As sad as it is, but that's what statistics say. It is impossible to keep up with science. Even in your field, you couldn't keep up with every detail, even if you read publications 24 hours a day.

Part of professional responsibility. Keeping up-to-date. Although the dangers of smoking and caffeine are well known and have been well-known for decades, they still do it anyway.

Do you know what i was tought about the danger of trans fat acids ? 3 sentences at most. One reader mentioned it once in one lecture. Future internists will learn it, but not future surgeons. Why ? Because it takes some years before all new scientific knowledge reaches our classes and books.

Another aspect is arrogance. Many M.D.'s think they know best. Medicine is a rather competetive course of studies. Here in Germany you have to be among the best if you want to get a place in med school right after highschool. There are other ways to get in, like waiting lists, connections, etc but there are certainly a lot of naturally selfconfident people in here. That doesn't help.
And even if they are not arrogant, they still often think that they know best or at least better than the doctor treating them.

It's this reason why doctors make terrible nurses (the surge of demand for US nurses in the last decade caused many doctors in less developed countries to take up Nursing to emigrate)... too arrogant and too unwilling to do things they "know" are wrong (whether they're right or wrong... it's the Doctor's call)

I'm sure there are many lawyers in prison. Same paradoxon. You'll find that everywhere.

You'll find lawyers in prison because they're bad lawyers. Evolution in action.

The fact that they often work so hard ( and by that put their health at risk ) also has other reasons : They either want to make a career and a lot of money, or they are obsessed with helping people.
It is after all an important job. You can't just go home, if there are still many patients in need of your help and doctors just don't grow on trees. Too few for too many sick people.

That's the sad part. And it gets harder every year to convince people to spend the time, money and effort to become a doctor...

Well I agree. But is it that negative ? They try to do what they can do ( baning sth that is not healthy, but nobody cares because it is an ingrediant you can pretty much replace with sth a little healthier without noticing ) and don't do what is useless anyway ( because it would end in protests ).
I think that's smarter than doing nothing...

Actually... ignoring the evidence completely would be doing nothing.

Warning the public of the danger and forcing into effect an aggressive labelling law seem to be in order.

Completely banning the item for no other reasons than the fact you can and because there are no lobby groups supporting the industry sends the wrong message to the public... that foods you don't ban are healthier... when they are not.

On the side note of lobby groups... Dairy Farmers have been trying to kill margarine for years... first with laws that it couldn't be labelled as "butter"... that it couldn't be made with enough artificial coloring to look as yellow as butter... and now... well... I think some people are going to be getting a few years' worth of free milk after all this dust has settled... [/conspiracy theory]

 

[Max_DC]

Actually... that's an argument in favor of FK's stance... if people in the know can't be trusted to make decisions for themselves, why should we allow them to make decisions for others?

No that is a faulty argumentation. Because you take all doctors, no matter when ( 1960-70 or 1990-00 ) and where ( not every country has equal standards in their med schools ) they got their education and what kind of doctor they are ( endocrinologyst or surgeon etc ), working in privvate practice for 20 years or working in university clinics at the pulse of the latest research and draw a line.
Those who are resposible for those kind of health recommendations know what they are talking about, because they are experts in their fields and therefor by defintion superior in knowledge in that area compared to most other doctors who work in other fields, and of course to general public.

Also don't forget, that you study medicine in the age of 18-20. Every fault that has been in their childhood ( because of insufficient regulations for example ) determines also life of doctors.
Nicotin is one of the most addictive drugs. If a future doctor stars smoking in the age of 15 it is very difficicult to get rid of that in the stree while studying or working 14 hours a day !
Same goes for bad eating habbits and everything else.
I don't drink alcohol at all, I don't do any drugs and never did, I run almost 3 miles every day, 7 days a week, I eat healthy most of the time.
It's not impossible, but I for example had the luck of having responsible parents. Others didn't.
I don't miss anything, I live a happy life without massive amounts of trans fat acids, although here in Germany it is quite hard to avoid them. And it's not that I don't eat unhealthy food from time to time. It's a question of balance.

Part of professional responsibility. Keeping up-to-date. Although the dangers of smoking and caffeine are well known and have been well-known for decades, they still do it anyway.

True, but ultimately impossible. As I said, there a studies that proof, that a doctor couldn't even keep up to every detail in his special field because research produces more literature than one person can read, even if he does nothing else than reading 24/7/365.
Of course you can keep up with huge steps in science etc but our problem is, that in the end the human body is a huge complex machine that can't be divided into subfields of medicine. Everything affects everything else in your body to a certain degree. We work together interdisciplinary, but it is still impossible to do a perfect job and know everything.

It's this reason why doctors make terrible nurses (the surge of demand for US nurses in the last decade caused many doctors in less developed countries to take up Nursing to emigrate)... too arrogant and too unwilling to do things they "know" are wrong (whether they're right or wrong... it's the Doctor's call)

I see, I'm not familiar with that. In Germany a nurse is inferior in education compared to the states. You don't study it, it's simply 3 yars of formation, you don't need a high school diploma for it ( well we don't have high schools here, so let me put it this way : we have 3 schools for people older than 10 years. The best one is needed in order to attend university ( medicine, law, engineer etc ) and the second best is needed to become a nurse ).
And if German doctors work abroad, they are doctors. But I believe you, I wouldn't be a good nurse I guess

You'll find lawyers in prison because they're bad lawyers. Evolution in action.

Yeah, maybe, but not necessarily. Maybe some of them are among the best out there, thought that they are bettter than the system itself, tried tzo make money out of it and then somehow made a mistake and got caught.

That's the sad part. And it gets harder every year to convince people to spend the time, money and effort to become a doctor...

Actually not in Germany. We have a limit of about 8000 students per year. Because we have so high standards ( small groups in unversity hospitals ) that it is impossible to get education for more, it is the most expensive study path in Germany, over 1.000.000 dollars per student and it's free ! Government pays for it. We actually have about 40.000 applicants for those 8000 university places, as I said, rough competion.
Well it is after all the job with the highest social prestige according to statistics and while the average doctor doesn't earn as much as in the USA, earning at least 100.000 EUR / year after a few years of work isn't that bad.
If you are pushing you career by trying to get leading postions in hospitals or going into private practice 200-300k EUR a year is possible, some doctors even earn several million EUR a year ( though very few ).
And in these times it isn't tht bad to have a job you won't lose because the shortage of doctors is increasing every year ( In Germany that also has sth do with its population structure, we're rapidly getting older, since less people have children )

Actually... ignoring the evidence completely would be doing nothing.

Not ignoring and not taking action is still pretty close to nothing in my book.

Warning the public of the danger and forcing into effect an aggressive labelling law seem to be in order.

I agree that is another possibility. Not as effective, but in general it is the better solution. In this particular case however, I'm not so sure. Because a forced reduction doesn't hurt ... well... I wouldn't say anybody, but as you also said - nobody iwll notice, so in this case, I'd prefer the more effective solution over the more attractive ( less nanny state as foolkiller would say ) solution

Completely banning the item for no other reasons than the fact you can and because there are no lobby groups supporting the industry sends the wrong message to the public... that foods you don't ban are healthier... when they are not.

Well they are. Trans fat acids are worse than saturated fat acids because of their biochemical behavior. Both make you fat if you don't do sports, but the first one is even more dangerous to your cardiovascular system than the other.
Also, you can avoid that effect of positive publicity for in reality also health threatening fats by simply not making a big deal out of the restrictions.
If media don't care, nobody does and they simply dissappear.

On the side note of lobby groups... Dairy Farmers have been trying to kill margarine for years... first with laws that it couldn't be labelled as "butter"... that it couldn't be made with enough artificial coloring to look as yellow as butter... and now... well... I think some people are going to be getting a few years' worth of free milk after all this dust has settled... [/conspiracy theory]

Of course the world works like this, but it's the same with unhealthy products. Industry tries to fight for their profits, even if that means harming the health of people. There ar ecountles examples, one being the fact that the tabacco industry did everything to hide the information about causing cancer etc for decades.

That's why we need independant research and media.

All this doesn't change the fact that trans fat acids are not that healthy

 

[sumbrownkid]

Banning something trivial like trans fats ain't gonna teach people the proper dietary routines.