Rich Manhattan moms hire handicapped tour guides so kids can cut lines at Disney World

[Sans Souci]

Ironic.. I find far more fresh food markets in urban areas than I do in suburban areas due to the dependency on local neighborhoods vs the large scale homogenization you see in suburban living. In the 'burbs you see only the grocery stores (Safeway, etc) while in the city, you see more local markets that tend to carry far more fresh food.

The issue isn't urban vs rural - but social and economic. When you have people that can't cook for themselves because they can't or won't... you will see a lot more marketing and push of processed/fast foods into that demographic. That goes hog wild.. and eventually it becomes hard to reset to a normal balance and introduce 'fresh food' businesses in those areas because the consumer base won't support them enough to be viable. Then it's a vicious cycle.. can't get out of the rut.

Yes, I should have specified that I was referring to low SES urban areas. I wasn't expecting a health policy discussion on a WDW message board.

 

[Goofyernmost]

Well, when ones objective is to support their own superiority by belittling the less then perfect, almost anything will be fair game. We all know that life can be brought down to just a few basics, there are no complexities.

 

[backinaction]

Mods should close this down. Everyone agrees that if the story is true, its a pretty evil thing to do. Now this thread is just a debate about why people are fat. come on now. Nobody got time for that!

 

[The Empress Lilly]

That's a load. No one is forced to eat unhealthy day in and day out. And people managed to eat healthy when there was no nutritional labels at all.

On top of that.. when you do get to the point of needing to do something about it - the food industry/lobby isn't the one keeping you from exercising, or making healthy choices in how you live your life. Blaming the food industry is just another example of people passing the buck vs looking at themselves. The food industry isn't the one who made you drive somewhere instead of walking or riding a bike. The food industry isn't the one who put you on the couch for the day instead of going outside. The food industry isn't the one who doesn't make time in their day to eat at the right time. The food industry isn't the one that makes you buy a TV Dinner instead of buying ingrediants and making the meal yourself.

On top of that - there is more help available than ever when it comes to getting help from medical or clinical resources to manage your weight.

The 'blame the industry' crock is more of the 'Im a victim..' thinking instead of taking some self responsibility. Yes, there are lots of bad foods out there, and bad information... SO WHAT. You aren't forced to eat it or believe them.

That's like saying I poor because I bought everything I can't afford because I got all these solicitations in my mailbox everyday telling me to buy all this stuff.

[question mark galore]
Is it always fair to blame people for their own unhealthiness? Should one point at every overweight person and say 'your own fault'? What of perfectly slim, fit people, who get into a traffic accident, end up in a wheelchair/scooter, and gain weight drastically? What if this weight gain is not from lack of exercise, but from stress and sorrow, and lack of disposable income to buy healthy food with? What if the stress and sorow was not from an accident, but from losing their only child to a terrible disease?


My previous job consisted of selling crack to semi-illiterate poor people. (It's a tough job but somebody's got to do it!) Do I get a 'get out of gaol card' by claiming personal responsibility of the addicted teenage mums I sold my poison to?

On a sliding scale, what if instead of a Mexican drug cartel I worked for the tobacco industry? If you sell cigarettes - addictive drugs - can you exonerate yourself by claiming people are responsible for their own choices? What if you sold them to minors, and got them addicted before adulthood?
What if instead of selling addictive drugs, you sell addictive, unhealthy food to minors, instilling unhealthy eating habits into them?
[/question mark galore]


Even WDW got a right good taste (some sort of pun!) of the food lobby. Food lobbyists and 'fat acceptance' groups attacked Disney for having the nerve to teach children that getting overweight is unhealthy - this was said to hurt their feelings and lower their self-esteem. It has really come to that. Children are miseducated under the guise of protecting them. Strangely, here our mutual opinons touch very closely: wouldn't it be better to simply speak the truth and teach kids that eating unhealthy food makes you fat, which causes health problems. Which, coming full circle, is exactly what Sans Souci did, only for her to be booed off stage.

 

[BryceM]

Mods should close this down. Everyone agrees that if the story is true, its a pretty evil thing to do. Now this thread is just a debate about why people are fat. come on now. Nobody got time for that!

Agreed.

Love your avatar by the way!

 

[Clever Name]

Mods should close this down. Everyone agrees that if the story is true, its a pretty evil thing to do. Now this thread is just a debate about why people are fat. come on now. Nobody got time for that!

I don't agree. I see no reason why a healthy person (or group of healthy people) should not be able to hire a disabled person as a tour guide. As an added bonus the entire group gets to use a GAC so that the tour guide will not be separated from their customers.

It would be a hardship on the disabled tour guide and the group not to use a GAC. The evil would be to deny a GAC to a disabled tour guide.

 

[flynnibus]

[question mark galore]

This is what you call hyperbolye followed by a complete flip-flop. Tell me again how that post had anything to do with your earlier claims that others are to blame for people's inability to make healthy choices?

Not everyone is graced with inherent health - the difference is what you do with the cards you are dealt!

 

[Hakunamatata]

Not everyone is graced with inherent health -

for a moment I thought that read "Internet health". I was going to ask for the web address. Lol.

 

[englanddg]

for a moment I thought that read "Internet health". I was going to ask for the web address. Lol.

Here ya go - http://www.akamai.com/html/technology/dataviz1.html

 

[Hakunamatata]

Here ya go - http://www.akamai.com/html/technology/dataviz1.html

Sorry. It doesn't like iPad.

 

[englanddg]

Sorry. It doesn't like iPad.

Check it out on a computer sometime. It's a fun little link.

 

[Hakunamatata]

Check it out on a computer sometime. It's a fun little link.

Will do.

 

[englanddg]

Will do.

For example, it will show you that currently 4.1% of all internet traffic is coming from New York, and 4.7% from TX, which is nearly equal to the entire country of Brazil...at the moment...

My state of GA is 2.6%...we luvs our series of tubes!

 

[The Empress Lilly]

Tell me again how that post had anything to do with your earlier claims that others are to blame for people's inability to make healthy choices?

Selling drugs to semi-literate teenagers shows that the teenager is mostly not responsible for his unhealthy habit. If one takes it from there, via the example of selling him cigarrettes, to addictive food with too high sugar and fat and salt, you arrive at my point that obesity is not merely a simple matter of overweight people lacking discipline. There are larger forces at work.

In Europe, I'm perfectly slim and fit. When I'm in America, I gain a kilo a week. The difference is not a personal responsibility failure which I suddenly aquire from being 10000 feet up in the air.

 

[englanddg]

Selling drugs to semi-literate teenagers shows that the teenager is mostly not responsible for his unhealthy habit. If one takes it from there, via the example of selling him cigarrettes, to addictive food with too high sugar and fat and salt, you arrive at my point that obesity is not merely a simple matter of overweight people lacking discipline. There are larger forces at work.

In Europe, I'm perfectly slim and fit. When I'm in America, I gain a kilo a week. The difference is not a personal responsibility failure which I suddenly aquire from being 10000 feet up in the air.

"Semi-literate" teens? Ok, I see. So, adults are able to "read" foods first, and therefore stay healthy, but teens somehow have not been able master that yet.

I love ya Lilly, but this post was just confusing, and frankly, a bit snarky.

 

[The Empress Lilly]

"Semi-literate" teens? Ok, I see. So, adults are able to "read" foods first, and therefore stay healthy, but teens somehow have not been able master that yet.

I love ya Lilly, but this post was just confusing, and frankly, a bit snarky.

No, that is me assuming that most teenagers are, in fact, literate people able to make sensible decisions.

The example is the exception. The semi-literate teenage high-school dropout. These can hardly be expected to make an educated, mature decision. Hence, when you sell them drugs, it is not their moral failure, but of the one selling them drugs. And of a society - parents, teachers, government - which fails to protect them.

 

[flynnibus]

Selling drugs to semi-literate teenagers shows that the teenager is mostly not responsible for his unhealthy habit

So the fact someone sells something.. people are obligated to buy it? What stupid leap of logic is this? The fact unhealthy stuff is available is not why people fail to make healthy choices.

In Europe, I'm perfectly slim and fit. When I'm in America, I gain a kilo a week. The difference is not a personal responsibility failure which I suddenly aquire from being 10000 feet up in the air.

It is your choice of how you eat and where while on vacation vs your normal life. Do you eat out 15-20 times a week while at home?

 

[flynnibus]

The semi-literate teenage high-school dropout. These can hardly be expected to make an educated, mature decision. Hence, when you sell them drugs, it is not their moral failure, but of the one selling them drugs. And of a society - parents, teachers, government - which fails to protect them.

Oh yes.. the 'protect the children' mantra... Hopeless to carry this conversation on with you if you think children can't be held responsible for not buying drugs, etc.

 

[englanddg]

No, that is me assuming that most teenagers are, in fact, literate people able to make sensible decisions.

The example is the exception. The semi-literate high-school dropout. These can hardly be expected to make an educated, mature decision. Hence, when you sell them drugs, it is not their moral failure, but of the one selling them drugs.

Given the fact that eating healthy and not doing drugs is beat into our heads through media and other resources (such as school education, where we have "health" courses...for me I had them every year from age 8 through 16 in public schools around the US...I went to 10 schools in 12 years, we moved a lot)...

Anyhow, point is, I don't think that it's a matter of ignorance, as you imply. It's a matter of not caring. Which is an individual choice.

 

[The Empress Lilly]

So the fact someone sells something.. people are obligated to buy it? What stupid leap of logic is this? The fact unhealthy stuff is available is not why people fail to make healthy choices.

Few are completely obliged to ever do something. Few smokers were ever put a gun to their head by the tobacco industry. But still they were sold lethal drugs by a cynical industry which employed marketing, lies, deceit on a public subjected to forces such as peer pressure and a failing drug policy.

Don't look funny at me. Look funny at the US supreme court which in recent years has adopted what responsible people have been saying with me all along: smokers are not the only ones to blame, the people selling them junk are too, and the tobacco industry can not escape its responsibility any longer. I predict Big Food will be next.

It is your choice of how you eat and where while on vacation vs your normal life. Do you eat out 15-20 times a week while at home?

When I go to DLP, I lose a kilo. When I go to WDW, I gain a kilo.

One witnesses the same phenomenon at large too: are Americans more ill-disciplined than Frenchmen? Are Americans lacking in personal responsibility more than Germans? I think not. I think the vastly different obesity rates on both sides of the Atlantic are not a matter of moral failure of Americans, but of larger societal forces. (And no subsidised corn syrup in Europe...)

I also understand that Americans are more prone to think in terms of personal responsibilty, individualism, and with a certain disregard for the government and social factors. You'll never agree with me!
And to think that in Europe they call me names for refusing to agree Americans are ill-disciplined fatties!