a rant on a serious topic

i was reading this just now, and felt that i must comment on it. and i think i have the right to, since i myself am obese.

i'm not saying that you shouldn't be able to sue food companies because you're obese. in fact i think that you should be able to sue anybody you want for anything you feel like, you just shouldn't win.

it's not like the food company execs were sitting around going, "you know that new product that tastes so great? we should totally make that bad for people." they didn't even decide to make the stuff that was bad for you taste so good. it's just that the same stuff that makes food taste good happens to be bad for you. cheeseburgers taste great, but they're bad for you. does that mean that mcdonald's (evil for other reasons) shouldn't sell them to you? no. you know they're bad for you; if you want to eat them anyway, that's your own problem. yeah, they should offer more healthy stuff, and put some effort into making it not taste like cardboard, but i'll be damned if anybody (the government, food industry, etc.) is going to say i can't have a cheeseburger.

i am not fat because they use cartoon characters to make me want unhealthy snacks. it's just that most of my favorite foods contain enough sugar and/or fat to choke a horse. there are very few foods that i enjoy that would qualify as healthy, and most of those i prefer prepared in an unhealthy fashion (i.e. breaded and fried, or smothered in butter). there are plenty of seriously unhealthy foods that i don't like and won't eat, like pork rinds or mayonnaise, but very few healthy ones i will eat.

it's a lot like smoking. if i end up with lung cancer or something, it's my own damned fault. i'm the one who decided to do it. and anyone who says they didn't know it was bad for them is fooling themselves. i don't need a freaking scientific report to know that. anyone who tells you that the first time they had a cigarette (and inhaled) didn't cough, is lying, or doesn't remember right. maybe they didn't know how bad it was for them, but they knew it wasn't good. you might not know drinking causes liver damage, but you're not likely to get past the morning after without realizing it's certainly not healthy.

okay, that's my rant. off to bed, have to work tomorrow... today, whatever.