Current Events > White House wants to put food labels on food. Do you agree with this?

(+) Yeah! (+)

VIXVLV posted...

This is pretty much the most important stuff, right here. It's also about having the energy, physical and emotional, to even think about cooking at the end of the day. In other words, put a poor obese person in the lifestyle of a wealthy person, and the likelihood of them adopting a healthier relationship with food is much higher.

This 100%

People don't eat fast food because it's cheaper. They eat it because it's already cooked and the packaging can be thrown out it doesn't need to be washed.

Smashingpmkns posted...

Tbh I'm not really sure where this misconception that healthy food is more expensive than junk food comes from.

Produce, at least at my market, is extremely cheap compared to junk food. I could get more greens than I could actually eat in a week for the price of a bag of chips. Salmon is like $14 for 2.5 lbs, which can be up to 6 or 7 (if not more) meals. If anything I've saved way more money by avoiding junk food all together.

The reasons are probably based on many things. Like how prices will range depending on where you are. Some places have much cheaper produce, while its more expensive in other places Another could be based on where they buy them. All the people I know who buy more healthy stuff normally end up shopping at places that are more expensive. So, when people hear the amount the other people spent, it could turn them away Could be other stuff, as well

I do nutrition outreach with lower income, working class people and tbh this is worth trying but probably won't help much. The biggest problem isn't time, money, or accessibility. Those definitely impact it, and I can get into the nuance of why I don't think those matter as much if anyone wants, but in my experience that's all secondary to the plain fact that healthy food isn't as enticing unhealthy food. Not in terms of taste, culture and familiarity, social visibility, or anything else.

Even accounting for affordability and accessibility, we've had people shun cheap, nutritious food all for the simple fact that it's not what they want. They want the high fat, high sugar, high sodium stuff even if it's bad for their health and their budget.

Until we stop the flow of junk food by holding its producers responsible, promoting healthy eating is a losing tactic against obesity. That's a wildly unpopular approach though, so we're effectively doomed.

So they expect me to read letters AND numbers? The fuck is this? Algebra?
I just want to eat the sad away!

/S

I agree ingredients are way more important than the numbers.

For example there are a lot of foods that have (and even advertise) 0g of teams fat per serving but still have hydrogenated oil as a main ingredient.

Put as many labels as you want on food; Oreos are still Oreos and people are still gonna eat them over granola. Mountain Dew is still going to be drank instead of good, clean water. It's a waste of resources to do this. Americans mostly know that veggies are good for you and fatty and/or high sugar foods aren't, and it doesn't matter because one of those groups taste way better.

The labels already dont really stop people from buying them. Chances are shoving the label in their face wont change anything Just because its more visible doesnt mean people will actually see it Or read it

Doesn't make a big difference to me personally, but it would be nice for vending machines and stuff like that to list carbs and allergens somewhere visible before buying. Sucks when the blood sugar goes low and I can't tell which items have stealth gluten for no goddamn reason.