"A growing body of medical research at leading universities and government laboratories suggests that processed foods and sugary drinks made by the likes of PepsiCo Inc. and Kraft Foods Inc. aren’t simply unhealthy. They can hijack the brain in ways that resemble addictions to cocaine, nicotine and other drugs.
“The data is so overwhelming the field has to accept it,” said Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. “We are finding tremendous overlap between drugs in the brain and food in the brain.”"
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-11-11/fatty-foods-addi...
Not saying the science is done, but there's a strong possibility that burgers are addictive.
Surprisingly, Sweet Tea (otherwise known as would-you-like-some-water-with-your-sugar in the south) has about 15 grams less carbs in the large than a Coke. I think I might never order another coke again.
Frito Lay is possibly even more morally fraught than McDonalds, since a large part of their business involves marketing themselves into kids lunches.
I'm not sure where Campbells comes into this. It's not great soup, but it's soup.
Obviously, there are people who think there's nothing wrong with a particularly successful marketing campaign for an unhealthful product. There are plenty of people who think there's nothing immoral about selling cigarettes.
I don't think less of those people, but I strongly disagree with them.
This is the same thing as pointing to the banks for selling CDOs. Risky for the banks? No. Risky for the whole system to collapse? Yes. Since systematic risks are largely not direct risks they never get counted as risks to begin with, and therefore do not impact decision making.
Well fats are addictive. Not in the you will die from withdrawl like heroin or alcohol way, but in the way that gamblings and sex is.
And like the other guy said - it's backed up by science too. The insane amounts of fat, salt, and sugar spike the reward processors in the brain WAY past what they're built for. They are hacking you.
> "but there's a difference between an occasional indulgence"
Indeed...
> "and the business model that depends utterly on persuading the most persuadable people to harm themselves, for no other reason that they were persuadable"
You've lost me. You compare McDonald's to Philip Morris - even though one produces a highly addictive substance and the other produces (crappy) hamburgers. Last I checked, burgers are non-addictive.
In what way is McDonald's core business model dependent on something more than "occasional indulgence"? If we are to play the game that a business can only succeed if people are mindlessly, constantly, repetitively consuming its products, then we should be beating down the doors of, say, Redbox. After all, their business model works best if everyone sat on their asses all day doing nothing but watch movies.
I do not see the argument at all that McDonald's business hinges on the abusively high consumption of their foods. They are in no way worse than any number of peddlers of less-than-healthy foods. Where is the outrage for Ben & Jerry's? Frito Lay? Campbell's?