Growing up in the 1970’s I recall being rather spooked by dire warnings of an impending ice age and the threat that I would spend my adult life shivering in a cave. Some twenty years later that apocalypse vision had been melted clean away by the dire (and considerably shriller) warnings about global warming and, according to everyone who is anyone, I now face the threat of spending what remains of my adult life sizzling like a sausage.
Two decades in which to manage a complete polar reversal in doomsday-scenario is pretty good going but it pales into ‘also-ran’ status by an eerily similar polar switch in the rather more mundane field of eating disorders.
This is from the BBC website in July 1998:
Doctors have hit out at the media and advertisers for encouraging anorexia by portraying skinny supermodels as the beauty ideal instead of ‘more buxom wenches’.
The British Medical Association’s annual conference in Cardiff voted overwhelmingly for a motion condemning the media obsession with ultra thin supermodels.
Dr Muriel Broome, a former director of public health, said “the constant image of very thin models” encouraged girls to develop eating disorders. “We urge the media to be more responsible and show more buxom wenches,” she said.
I know not whether Dr Broome’s advice was acted upon, but I am now informed that we have, indeed, taken on the mantle of buxomness with some considerable gusto. From the BBC website today:
Improving children’s eating habits is the key to tackling an obesity “timebomb”, MPs have warned.
The Commons Health Select Committee attacks the government, food industry and advertisers for failing to act to stop rising levels of obesity.
From ‘ultra-thin models’ to ‘obesity timebombs’ in the space of slightly over half-a-decade. Now I am no statistician but I think even I am qualified to regard that as a quite remarkable national metamorphosis. Nor are these select MPs (who clearly have nothing better to do) speaking out in some frolic of their own. The media that only five years ago was, apparently, inciting and encouraging starvation and skeletal thinness is now tripping over itself in scolding us for being too fat!
From today’s Telegraph:
The food industry should be given three years to end the “cynical” promotion of high-fat, high-sugar food aimed at children, MPs say today.
In a scathing report they criticise high-profile advertising campaigns that use sports stars and celebrities to sell chocolate and crisps and call for a voluntary ban on television food advertisements aimed at children. If the industry fails to act the Government should step in, they say.
And from today’s Independent:
Britain’s “devastating” epidemic of obesity could threaten the very existence of the NHS, a report warns today.
So it’s not all bad news then. And (as if they were going to miss out on all the fun) from today’s Guardian:
It should not be a surprise that we have become gripped by an obesity crisis. After all, the warning signs have been there for some time. Lifestyles have become more sedentary. We have become more attached to our cars. Life is also faster; there is less time to prepare food and eat. More parents are working and have less time to cook for, and with, their children. Meanwhile, the food industry has become hyper-competitive and, in the battle for market share, children have become fair game.
This last article is the most significant because it is not from any of the Guardian’s usual columnists (although it is written in the same hectoring politburo party line style) but from a certain John Krebs who, we are informed, is:
…chairman of the Food Standards Agency.
So clearly his opinions are above and beyond the febrile scribblings of the average hack. This article is an ex cathedra statement of intent.
Those companies that fail to respond with healthier products will, like the dinosaurs, be doomed to extinction.
For once, a reliable prediction. Reliable because it is self-fulfilling. What he means is that suppliers who do not toe the Food Kommisars line on acceptable products will be actively driven into extinction by the said Food Kommisar and his obedient minions.
I must say that I am rather glad that Mr Krebs has come out and laid it on the line because otherwise there are some unwordly people who might be fooled into believing that this tsunami of propoganda in the press is merely a coincidence or, worse, a reflection of concern about a genuine problem. It is further proof of the axiom that one must never underestimate or dismiss the power of vested interest.
The Food Standards Agency was set up at the tail end of the 1990’s as a response to the BSE crisis. Such was the trauma of the ‘mad cow disease’ outbreak that all food suddenly became suspect and ‘da gubbament’ had to do something. The something they did was the same thing they always do: they set up another government agency to ‘restore public confidence in the food we eat’.
When I first heard of the FSA, I predicted (yes, we can all play that game) that this would spell trouble. And this is why it pays to be cynic because I was right. The BSE crisis has long-since slipped into history and there are no mad cows roaming the quiet countryside anymore (or, at least, the fear of them has been played out). So do we still need a lavishly-funded, well-staffed FSA? Of course we do because food is dangerous once again.
Take careful note because if this is not a text-book case of bureaucratic empire-building, well then, I don’t know what is. And if those press articles have not been drafted (or, at the very least approved) by apparatchicks in the FSA then I will eat my hat (fried in butter!).
There is no ‘obesity timebomb’ in this country or any other country and the only thing that needs to be put on a strict diet is our bloated, grasping, greedy, flatulent public sector. Starve them down to the bone, I say. Make them anorexic. Then we can all get on with enjoying our lives and the fruits of our labours without being nagged into an early grave.
Thank you for a most enlightening post. I laughed aloud yesterday at Radio 4’s threatening us all with an ‘obesity epidemic’ (- the substance containing the infectivity has been identified as what a layman would recognise as ‘food’ – ) but, with foolish and cynical optimism, had interpreted the BBC’s saturation coverage of this story as meaning good news from Iraq – no fresh disasters in which to luxuriate.
The minute I saw this item in the paper this morning, I knew David would have a piece up about it.
What is sinister is that the government should feel confident in shovelling such incompetent and ridiculous propaganda out in the certain knowledge that otherwise rational editors will find space for it on the front pages.
Apart from the fact that it’s only the Labour government telling lies again, their primary claim is specious.
But the passionately independent British media is meekly cooperating. The Telegraph had a story about an “obese” 3-yr old kid who chilled of a heart attack. On the front page. How obsequious is that?
That the new obesity may break the NHS is exciting news, though.
Referring back to the health crisis before the anorexia health crisis, mad cow disease, David says there aren’t any mad cows wandering around any more.
Well, what about Tessa Jowell, then? Patricia Hewitt? Rebecka Wade? Polly Toynbee? Mary Riddell? I could name a whole herd.
Unless I’m much mistaken (who, me?), this latest bout of hysteria was predicted and extensively discussed on this very blog, sometime last year.
And, indeed, it has been easy to chart its growth – like watching a wave build out at sea. The early, isolated pronouncements of academics (it always, isn’t it? Funny that…), the theme being picked up by the occasional journalist, then echoed and repeated in harmony and counterpoint by a rats’ chorus of MPs, ‘experts’, TV pundits, and other assorted braindead statist hacks, until at last you have the full, hysterical symphony blasting out at you like the trump of doom.
The truly astonishing thing is that when some puffed-up popinjay, like Paxman on last night’s Newsnight, starts strutting around, self-righteously pretending he has a clue what he is talking about, asserting that everyone is at fault and that the world is about to end – no one has the requisite coolth to stare the fraud down and tell the truth.
There is no ‘epidemic’. What there is, is a greater number of overweight people, at a time when we eat fewer calories and exercise more. Whatever is going on, quite clearly, it is not accounted for in the tightly-locked minds of MPs, self-styled ‘nutrionists’ and the other choristers.
But scrape the surface of this peculiarly mouldy dish and note how salt intake (Paxman was particularly hilarious on this subject) has been cunningly conflated into the subject . Salt may (or may very well not, as it happens) be bad for one’s health – but it has bugger-all to do with obesity.
Ah! But it does enable an attack on ‘big food’.
Which is what those extreme Left wing academics who started this (are you listening, “Professor” Tim Laing?) were trying to do in the frst place and have been working towards for over a decade.
And that is precisely how (and why) these Leftist crusades are built.
“Radio 4’s threatening us all with an ‘obesity epidemic’ ”
This morning Lord Tebbit used that very medium to reveal the real reasons behind the epidemic
Food ought to be banned, or at least rationed by trained medical staff in public service centres, since people are not rational enough to use it properly. At the very least food should be labelled “Food can be bad for you”. Those who make billions of pounds growing and distributing food should not be allowed to give people what they want. It turns my stomach to thing of all those multinationals making money out of producing delicious food. There ought to be a march against it. Think of the children! In a modern society politicians have a democratic mandate that decide what we should have for tea each day. I vote for the party that raises taxes in order to pay for more regulators
I now face the threat of spending what remains of my adult life sizzling like a sausage.
Actually, one of the more likely outcomes of Global Warming – long term – will be another Ice Age. IIRC there is also an argument that the Ice Age is probably only be staved off by whatever is causing global warming – that would be amusingly ironic too.
sizzling like a sausage
Mmmm, sausage.
I had the misfortune to watch the BBC’s nine (or is it ten?) o clock news last night. Before long I was screaming at the TV with rage, “why can’t you all just leave everyone alone?” Is there anything that politicians feel is outside of their scope? And despite promises from the anchorman, no-one suggested that diet has nothing to do with government (after all, this epidemic will cost the NHS money).
The slippery slope (GCooper is right, this was predicted previously on this blog – I think we’re at about step 3 now); the sense of an unstoppable machine; certain knowledge that there is another “epidemic” of bad stuff just around the corner; it’s all so miserably depressing. I’m seriously considering moving to New Hampshire.
Last night I saw a “news story” (it ran like a long advertisement) for a dental device aimed at reducing the size of your mouth (it fills in the roof of the mouth) in order to make you take smaller bites of food and therefore eat less.
How can they possibly believe that people who cannot put their fork down will bother to put an uncomfortable “retainer-type” thingy in their mouths? What makes them think that these people won’t just take more, albethey smaller, bites?
The inventors are obviously brilliant capitalists and will get rich off the device – more power to them. But as a society, we’ve all gone mad.
All this talk of food’s making me hungry. like the time the BBC was talking about implementing a new “fat tax”, by which I interpreted that they meant to tax foods high in fats (instead of the usual taxing of “fat cats”?). While discussing the issue, they showed New Orlean’s Paul Prudhomme (one fat cat indeed) making what looked like a wonderful fettucine alfredo and stating “in our restaurant we use more butter in one day than most people use in a year”.
Can’t wait to go back to New Orleans!
PS, Rob, New Hampshire, (I remember “Live Free or Die”), OK, but don’t cross the state line to Vermont, which is now in the list of most endangered places due to the prospect of cheaper, more convenient shopping because Walmart’s opening there (see http://story.news.yahoo.com, Monday, May 24)
In my country, the very same people that agitate for farm subsities, aslo want special fat-tax. Now those people even have an institution for that silly propaganda.
Nothing is new under the sun.
The obesity ‘time bomb’ is only such because the government makes it so, in essence forcing me to stand close by the ‘device’. To take the analogy further, this scenerio, if it were a real bomb, would force to stand close by while they go about trying to make sure the companies that made the components are prevented from conducting any further business. Of course my natural inclination would be to run away, which should be my prerogative in terms of Fat Bastard’s heart condition and consequent financing of health care.
Being indignant that the government sees fit to try and recondition people is rational enough, and discussing it too. But the root of the problem is the government making ‘your’ problem ‘my’ problem, and vice versa. People enter and exit this world every day without my say so, and I like to keep it that way. If someone desires to eat cream pies resulting in an early grave, it is no interest to me. The problem obviously solves itself individual by individual. Food police is simply a tertiary symptom of the root problem of the collectivist mentality.
Hmm can we discuss this over fish and chips?
If only government scientists could find the optimal temperature for our porridge, we’d all be just right.
Or, wait – does porridge have too many or too few carbohydrates?
Why do all these articles blame obesity on people not having enough time to prepare good food when everyone’s working less and the same articles complain that people lie on the couch watching TV too much and don’t get out and do enough stuff? It’s insane. Eating is not a crime. One big reason people may eat too much is the massive guilt trip laid on them by the social engineers if they get any flesh on their bones. I look around and see many people admirably well prepared to survive famine.
Global ice age and global warming came from the same “scientist.”
His solution to both perils? Massive government controls over the economy and lifestyles and massive reduction in individual choice.
No No! will be Britain in risk of sinking in Atlantic due to weight increase? I think that deserves a Gov. Comission at least!
Todays post: spelling errors and all.
I’m feeling old. I also remember growing up with the dire perils of living in a cave by the time I’m 25, and praying to whatever gods that I’d survive the climactic ice age that is going to sweep over the earth and destroy us! I think I have a global cooling shirt somewhere still too…remember indoctrinate when the kids are young…we got it at school, grade 2 or something. Such beautiful stuff…now that I’m ‘all growed up’, I get to listen to the same types of idiots spew on about how I’m going to cook like a sausage(as one said mmm…sausage), or I’m going to bake like beans in a can; stuck in a fire.
In the end, what I really find funny about all of this, is it comes from the same groups looking for a cause; when disproved…latch onto something new in hopes of breathing life into their dying ends. I suppose seeing and hearing things like that in my youth made me quite cynical, with due purpose I suppose. It atleast lets me look at things with a scientific mind.
I’ve pretty much come to a good conclusion; it will or won’t happen. If it does, well chances are we should have a few years to prepare. If it doesn’t then the enviromentalists will have to find something new to latch onto, maybe no terraforming of the moon? Preserve the moons ‘white-grey essence’ or something.
Today is Thursday.
The movie (documentary actually) “The Day After Tomorrow” premiers Friday.
Therefore the day after tomorrow is Sunday.
Woe is me.
What we REALLY need is a National Food Service . . . .
Well, the panic’s over in Britain. According to The Telegraph, Blair puts obesity on the back burner.
On the other hand, their front page carried a panic story that readymade supermarket meals, like pizzas, may contain too much fat! Hold the front page! Oh, wait! They already did.