Super Size Me

[Cagliostro]

When my fiancée asked me if I wanted to see this I thought she said "Super Jaime!"

I had nearly the same reaction when my wife mentioned this to me, except I thought she said "Super Hymen." True story.

[danlo]

I don't know if you guys mentioned it but the salt content is really dangerous too. I wanted to see Super High Me, but The Pineapple Express kind of took away that desire (but I really want to see Jame Franco in 127 hours, we I believe, is about a rock climber from NM). Dunkin' Donuts are much better than Krispy Kreme, you can taste the raw dough in Kremes aside from the liquid sugar. Starbucks burns their beans, but their customers are too stupid to notice, does taste slightly like Arabica, though... And ,the worst coffee IMHO, or turpentine, is, you guessed it: McDonalds.

[finn]

I agree with some of what you said on the previous page Z, but there is also some responsibility required in ensuring that information about foodstuffs is readily available to allow free choice. A short while ago I was drinking OceanSpray Juice regularly when someone pointed out that it had about 9 tablespoons of sugar in each bottle! Now I could've gone to calculator and worked out the "measures" and "per 500 whatevers" and "per portions" but I went primarily on the fact that it was fruit juice and supposedly healthy..... not a major intake of sugar!

Had it had "contains 9 tablespoons of sugar" written on the label, I would not have bought it or consumed so much of it. Likewise if something has "2 teaspoons of salt" you migh pass it by if you have blood pressure or heart problems. Instead we get food which meets regulatory guidelines for information of ingredients but tells us little in any everyday terminology and as in the case of Taco Bell, actively misleads.

There are a number of beliefs that are fostered and nurtured by food manufactureres and resellers. Such things as "beneficial" "healthy" "nutricious" etc, along with statements like "for strong bones" or "for healthy teeth" or "low/no fat" with people showing space in oversized pants is actively misleading. Whilst the concept that if a little is good, a huge amount must be better...we know that a glass of red wine is considered good by many nutritionists, but that's not a recomendation or licence to become a drunk.

"Eat ABC, for energy. Its healthy and nutricious and contains Omega 3"

However it also contains sugar, caffeine and salt and the healthy Omega 3 is in such a small quantity that its only value is to qualify the statement under the regulation.

My point is that the actual content of things like (and especially) Sugar, Salt, Trans and Saturated Fats, plus additives is running amok in foodstuffs. whether this is addictive or habit forming I don't know, but I do know and care that it is not easy without developing a body of knowledge, to differentiate between produce that is good and balanced for your overall health and produce that is not, but suggests otherwise.

In Oz we have a 'red tick' from the heart foundation for heart-healthy produce...Woolworths used this for a "W" logo on their produce, using two red ticks together, suggesting that it had two heart foundation ticks....this was on pies and pastries! The food lobby is a strong one and the regulations are always contested furiously and the simple things, like a tablespoon of sugar, gets argued out due to the varying size of tablespoons or the expansion rates of sugars in dry climates skewing the gross amounts.

This type of nonsense simply disables attempts to eat and drink more healthy products as the degree of difficulty in being able to tell the difference becomes too onerus on the consumer. Do producers and resellers do this knowingly? Most assuredly! The practices governing disclosure are designed to be too difficult to determine "at a glance", are formulaic ie, you need to make a mathematical calculation to determine amounts of constituants. They are cynically concealed in language which promotes the healthy benefits of a trace element whilst actively ignoring the potentially harmful effects of sugar, salt, fats, additives, etc.,

The degree of regulation seems to be..................

"Will it kill or make anyone sick?"

"No."

"OK, its fine then".

Nobody from the fair trading bureaus or misleading advertising departments takes them to task, yet diabetes, heart disease, obesity, etc. goes through the roof. You don't have to over-regulate, you just have to regulate for the consumers benefit not the producers....they already know what they've put into the product. Spell it out in simple terms.

EDIT: sorry, just spotted this is "flicks"...maybe this is more "tank-centric"

[Rigel]

That's OK, I don't frequent the tank so it's fun to see the occasional rant