9 ms·

It's up to individuals to make decisions about what they do and do not eat and live with the consequences. True, but when that level of individual freedom has

by finid 10y ago

It's up to individuals to make decisions about what they do and do not eat and live with the consequences. True, but when that level of individual freedom has negative repercussions on the community, the government has to step in. Else the society will cease to be. Imagine if our (USA) govt allowed us to buy gas (fuel, petrol) with lead in it, ignoring the long term impact of lead in the environment. Individual freedom is not absolute. An one should not be allowed to engage in habits that harms the community in that fashion. Yes, there are things we can't avoid, but when necessary, the govt has the powers to regulate individual habits. Unfortunately for these countries, membership in the WTO does not serve their interests in this regard.

Zak 10y ago
There's a significant distinction between polluting the environment, which harms other people directly and making unhealthy decisions in one's own life, which has only indirect effects on others.
- tqkxzugoaupvwqr 10y ago
  There's the scale of economics. If only few people buy healthy food, supermarkets have no incentive to offer it at all. Even if they offer healthy food, the price is higher because they can't buy in bulk or else they waste much of it.
  - lend000 10y ago
    > If only few people buy healthy food, supermarkets have no incentive to offer it at all. Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food? If it truly was a minority group that wanted to eat healthy food, what right do they have to force the majority to buy what they want to make it more economical? Although the premise is flawed, because the real reason 'healthy food' is expensive is because the foods considered healthy inherently cannot use many methods that increase yield like pesticides. And then some go so far as to claim GMO's are unhealthy/cannot be organic, further driving up the prices of foods that get to wear the healthy food labels. Increasing demand for healthy food would make it more expensive, certainly in the short term.
    - jordanb 10y ago
      > Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food? All over America there are many areas known as "food deserts" because stores do not stock fresh foods and produce. In those areas the only food readily available is shelf-stable, highly processed, very high caloric density junk food. Now think about being on a Pacific island where leaving your food desert is not just a matter of a long drive or bus ride down the road to a different community.
      - slaveofallah93 10y ago
        There's not strong evidence that food deserts lead to an increase in obesity.
- kwhitefoot 10y ago
  A fat slob overflowing the seat next to me on an aeroplane has a direct effect on me and I would be perfectly happy for measures to be taken to mitigate it.
  - lend000 10y ago
    Or we could get rid of anti-discrimination laws and allow airlines to charge based on weight/have assigned seating types. But I imagine that wouldn't go over very well with the people who want to ban junk food.
    - Zak 10y ago
      Most airlines in the US have an official policy allowing them to require passengers who cannot sit in a single seat with the armrests lowered and seatbelt fastened to pay for an additional seat. They usually try to employ alternatives, but on full flights, people do get bumped if they don't fit in one seat.
    - concinds 10y ago
      I'd be fine with both. Where's the conflict?
      - lend000 10y ago
        Huge difference. One allows free association, whereas the other involves using government force to take away freedom.
        concinds 10y ago
        Those are arbitrary "principles" that only make sense in the context of a given arbitrary political ideology. I want to live in a country where it's easy to be lean, so that as many people as possible are lean, because there are no downsides to being lean, and infinite upsides. Paying in relation to what you use seems fair. Sending small packages costs less than big heavy packages. What's a few bucks' difference anyway?
    - deleted 10y ago
- vosper 10y ago
  In countries that provide publicly-funded healthcare you are arguably directly effecting other people's lives by the cost of the medical treatments you'll end up needing if you are obese - these treatments will be funded out of the taxpayer's pocket, when that money could be going to better schooling, infrastructure, or some other use.
  - Zak 10y ago
    This is also true with privately-funded health care based on insurance with shared risk pools that don't take behavioral risk factors in to account. It's the very definition of a moral hazard. But if you accept that argument, where is the line? What personal decisions, if any shouldn't be subject to regulation?
    - vosper 10y ago
      True, but I was arguing that poor personal health choices are not only an indirect negative effect on other people, which is what you said. And I neglected obvious direct negative effects it can have on people close to you, such as children who now have to care for a parent who loses their leg due to diabetes, or who don't get to experience play because of a parent who's so obese and unfit that they can barely walk around without wheezing. Edit: I can't give you a list of personal decisions that I think should be subject to regulation, because it's not as simple as that, and there's a debate to be had for each one, and that will depend on circumstances and ideology. But I do think that in this case it's reasonable, since the cost of treating diabetes patients is crippling a small, poor country.
  - forrestthewoods 10y ago
    By that definition there is literally nothing the government can't, and arguably shouldn't, regulate. That won't end badly I'm sure!
    - khedoros1 10y ago
      That seems like the logical conclusion. Where's the dividing line between what the government should and shouldn't regulate, if they judge it to be in the best interests of the people (and the government's will being theoretically derived from the collective will of the governed)?
lend000 10y ago
> Imagine if our (USA) govt allowed us to buy gas (fuel, petrol) with lead in it, ignoring the long term impact of lead in the environment. Lead has a quantifiable effect that directly infringes on the rights of others -- eating junk food does not. You cannot say that my choice to get fat infringes on anyone's freedoms more than you are infringing on my freedom by preventing me from eating what I choose. It's not a characteristic of a free society. Pure democracy is mob rule. We might as well ban gay marriage, too, because there are more people who don't like it and claim it infringes on their rights than there are people who want to get gay marriages (see how that can be twisted the other way?)
- finid 10y ago
  Lead has a quantifiable effect that directly infringes on the rights of others -- eating junk food does not. Well, if you have to receive public assistance because of your bad eating habits, then that's a "quantifiable effect" on my pocket book.
  - Mz 10y ago
    Under Obamacare, their increased health care costs also costs everyone (in part because Obamacare is the worst of all worlds -- it would be difficult to intentionally design something worse).
    - lend000 10y ago
      I agree with both comments, but those problems have other solutions.
    - finid 10y ago
      I always wonder how a group of people can come together and made a bad decision. I mean, if one person makes a bad decision, you can say, OK, we all make mistakes, but a room full of smart? people...
      - Mz 10y ago
        As I understand it: Good ideas come from individuals. Good sorting of ideas comes from a crowd. Trying to get a crowd to make good ideas is apparently not very functional.
jordanb 10y ago
Wow I just had a thought. Imagine if the WTO had been around when countries started banning the sale of Tetraethyllead. The TEL industry fought very hard against such action first by attacking the science, then fighting in courts and political arenas. Imagine if they had access to a super-national court explicitly created as a way for large corporations to punish governments for creating laws that are bad for their business?
iopq 10y ago
> True, but when that level of individual freedom has negative repercussions on the community, the government has to step in Good, then I guess the government should tell everyone to exercise too? I mean, people not exercising has negative repercussions on the community, so the government has to step in. Mandatory exercise for everyone. I guess the same logic applies to limiting gaming/Internet time too.
- baddox 10y ago
  Mandatory exercise is certainly consistent with banning unhealthy food, but I wonder why (presumably) very few people who advocate the latter would advocate the former. My guess is that the enforcement mechanisms feel different on the surface, because forced exercise requires physical force (or fines, etc.) on each individual, while banning junk food requires force on manufacturers and/or retailers (I'm not sure the distinction is very clear, since these entities are comprised of individuals). Yet that doesn't feel like a sufficient explanation, since many people advocate the prohibition of certain drugs, which does require the use of force against individuals.

by finid 10y ago

Zak 10y ago

There's a significant distinction between polluting the environment, which harms other people directly and making unhealthy decisions in one's own life, which has only indirect effects on others.

tqkxzugoaupvwqr 10y ago
There's the scale of economics. If only few people buy healthy food, supermarkets have no incentive to offer it at all. Even if they offer healthy food, the price is higher because they can't buy in bulk or else they waste much of it.
- lend000 10y ago
  > If only few people buy healthy food, supermarkets have no incentive to offer it at all. Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food? If it truly was a minority group that wanted to eat healthy food, what right do they have to force the majority to buy what they want to make it more economical? Although the premise is flawed, because the real reason 'healthy food' is expensive is because the foods considered healthy inherently cannot use many methods that increase yield like pesticides. And then some go so far as to claim GMO's are unhealthy/cannot be organic, further driving up the prices of foods that get to wear the healthy food labels. Increasing demand for healthy food would make it more expensive, certainly in the short term.
  - jordanb 10y ago
    > Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food? All over America there are many areas known as "food deserts" because stores do not stock fresh foods and produce. In those areas the only food readily available is shelf-stable, highly processed, very high caloric density junk food. Now think about being on a Pacific island where leaving your food desert is not just a matter of a long drive or bus ride down the road to a different community.
    - slaveofallah93 10y ago
      There's not strong evidence that food deserts lead to an increase in obesity.
kwhitefoot 10y ago
A fat slob overflowing the seat next to me on an aeroplane has a direct effect on me and I would be perfectly happy for measures to be taken to mitigate it.
- lend000 10y ago
  Or we could get rid of anti-discrimination laws and allow airlines to charge based on weight/have assigned seating types. But I imagine that wouldn't go over very well with the people who want to ban junk food.
  - Zak 10y ago
    Most airlines in the US have an official policy allowing them to require passengers who cannot sit in a single seat with the armrests lowered and seatbelt fastened to pay for an additional seat. They usually try to employ alternatives, but on full flights, people do get bumped if they don't fit in one seat.
  - concinds 10y ago
    I'd be fine with both. Where's the conflict?
    - lend000 10y ago
      Huge difference. One allows free association, whereas the other involves using government force to take away freedom.
      - concinds 10y ago
        Those are arbitrary "principles" that only make sense in the context of a given arbitrary political ideology. I want to live in a country where it's easy to be lean, so that as many people as possible are lean, because there are no downsides to being lean, and infinite upsides. Paying in relation to what you use seems fair. Sending small packages costs less than big heavy packages. What's a few bucks' difference anyway?
  - deleted 10y ago
vosper 10y ago
In countries that provide publicly-funded healthcare you are arguably directly effecting other people's lives by the cost of the medical treatments you'll end up needing if you are obese - these treatments will be funded out of the taxpayer's pocket, when that money could be going to better schooling, infrastructure, or some other use.
- Zak 10y ago
  This is also true with privately-funded health care based on insurance with shared risk pools that don't take behavioral risk factors in to account. It's the very definition of a moral hazard. But if you accept that argument, where is the line? What personal decisions, if any shouldn't be subject to regulation?
  - vosper 10y ago
    True, but I was arguing that poor personal health choices are not only an indirect negative effect on other people, which is what you said. And I neglected obvious direct negative effects it can have on people close to you, such as children who now have to care for a parent who loses their leg due to diabetes, or who don't get to experience play because of a parent who's so obese and unfit that they can barely walk around without wheezing. Edit: I can't give you a list of personal decisions that I think should be subject to regulation, because it's not as simple as that, and there's a debate to be had for each one, and that will depend on circumstances and ideology. But I do think that in this case it's reasonable, since the cost of treating diabetes patients is crippling a small, poor country.
- forrestthewoods 10y ago
  By that definition there is literally nothing the government can't, and arguably shouldn't, regulate. That won't end badly I'm sure!
  - khedoros1 10y ago
    That seems like the logical conclusion. Where's the dividing line between what the government should and shouldn't regulate, if they judge it to be in the best interests of the people (and the government's will being theoretically derived from the collective will of the governed)?

lend000 10y ago

> Imagine if our (USA) govt allowed us to buy gas (fuel, petrol) with lead in it, ignoring the long term impact of lead in the environment. Lead has a quantifiable effect that directly infringes on the rights of others -- eating junk food does not. You cannot say that my choice to get fat infringes on anyone's freedoms more than you are infringing on my freedom by preventing me from eating what I choose. It's not a characteristic of a free society. Pure democracy is mob rule. We might as well ban gay marriage, too, because there are more people who don't like it and claim it infringes on their rights than there are people who want to get gay marriages (see how that can be twisted the other way?)

finid 10y ago
Lead has a quantifiable effect that directly infringes on the rights of others -- eating junk food does not. Well, if you have to receive public assistance because of your bad eating habits, then that's a "quantifiable effect" on my pocket book.
- Mz 10y ago
  Under Obamacare, their increased health care costs also costs everyone (in part because Obamacare is the worst of all worlds -- it would be difficult to intentionally design something worse).
  - lend000 10y ago
    I agree with both comments, but those problems have other solutions.
  - finid 10y ago
    I always wonder how a group of people can come together and made a bad decision. I mean, if one person makes a bad decision, you can say, OK, we all make mistakes, but a room full of smart? people...
    - Mz 10y ago
      As I understand it: Good ideas come from individuals. Good sorting of ideas comes from a crowd. Trying to get a crowd to make good ideas is apparently not very functional.

jordanb 10y ago

Wow I just had a thought. Imagine if the WTO had been around when countries started banning the sale of Tetraethyllead. The TEL industry fought very hard against such action first by attacking the science, then fighting in courts and political arenas. Imagine if they had access to a super-national court explicitly created as a way for large corporations to punish governments for creating laws that are bad for their business?

iopq 10y ago

> True, but when that level of individual freedom has negative repercussions on the community, the government has to step in Good, then I guess the government should tell everyone to exercise too? I mean, people not exercising has negative repercussions on the community, so the government has to step in. Mandatory exercise for everyone. I guess the same logic applies to limiting gaming/Internet time too.

baddox 10y ago
Mandatory exercise is certainly consistent with banning unhealthy food, but I wonder why (presumably) very few people who advocate the latter would advocate the former. My guess is that the enforcement mechanisms feel different on the surface, because forced exercise requires physical force (or fines, etc.) on each individual, while banning junk food requires force on manufacturers and/or retailers (I'm not sure the distinction is very clear, since these entities are comprised of individuals). Yet that doesn't feel like a sufficient explanation, since many people advocate the prohibition of certain drugs, which does require the use of force against individuals.