Tightening the belt: Nassau bans trans fats

[MODU]

I have no problem with local governments pushing for a change in the way food is prepared commercially.  It's been done in the past to protect the general population.  Otherwise, we could all be eating food cooked in lard in dirty kitchens with rat dropping all over the place and cigarette ashes in our meals.

[John Dibble]

they can't be called poison with any degree of intellectual honesty.

I just called them 'poison' and justified my claim.  I really don't feel any degree of dishonesty went into my comment either.  perhaps I just know too much about the topic.

Your justification is "it's always unhealthy" - well a lot of things are always unhealthy. Perhaps to a lesser degree yes, but "unhealthy" does not mean something is a poison. Eat a few fries with trans fats in them every now and then and you're not going to die from them. Eat a few fries with cyanide in them and you're gonna die. Big difference between poison and something that just isn't healthy. Show me evidence that the consumption of trans fats generally leads to death in the short term and I'll say it's intellectually honest to call it poison, but if the damage to kill a person with moderate consumptoin takes decades to accrue then as far as I'm concerned calling it a poison is simply a thinly veiled demagoguery.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

The irony here is that public outrage about how unhealthy their old french fry oil—93% beef tallow—was what resulted in the introduction of their current cooking oil.

The problem is that going "trans-fat free" is more about marketing than it is anything else.  I mean, sure, trans fats aren't good for you—no kind of fat in the quantity people consume at a place like McDonalds is going to be.  It's not like people are going to stop having heart attacks from eating at McDonalds now.  The problem always was, and always will be, people eating too damn much of the stuff.

The free market is already moving away from trans fats because it's a great advertising gimmick.  But whatever, so long as the government feels good about itself.

[John Dibble]

The free market is already moving away from trans fats because it's a great advertising gimmick.  But whatever, so long as the government feels good about itself.

Indeed, though I really wish the government would require greater accuracy in the nutrition labels - due to rounding anything with .49 grams of trans fat or less per serving can label it as 0 grams. It's really annoying to have to read the ingredients to be absolutely sure. Though I don't support a ban, I would support changing labels to have the trans-fat rounding to be to every tenth of a gram.

[Sam Spade]

The irony here is that public outrage about how unhealthy their old french fry oil—93% beef tallow—was what resulted in the introduction of their current cooking oil.

The old french-fry oil made the fries unbelievably good.  I was only a child when they put in the change, but the new fries were always terrible in comparison.  Quite frankly, if anything makes it like the old beef grease fries, I'm happy.

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Yep.

[© tweed]

everyone's missing the point with "aren't good for you."  milano cookies aren't good for you.  trans fats are a whole different level.  not a good concept.  healthy/unhealthy isn't a black and white thing.  it's a continuum.

[John Dibble]

everyone's missing the point with "aren't good for you."  milano cookies aren't good for you.  trans fats are a whole different level.  not a good concept.  healthy/unhealthy isn't a black and white thing.  it's a continuum.

No one said it isn't - we just don't confuse poison with something that's just not very good for you. Nobody is denying that trans fats are worse for you than say saturated fats, but the difference between trans fats and poison is even grater. Which would you rather take - 20 grams of trans fats, 1 gram of cyanide, or 1 gram of arsenic? Unless you're suicidal the answer is obviously the trans fat, for the simple reason that you know that the trans fat won't kill you even though you'd be taking 20 times more of it. Of course it won't be good for you by any means, but to put it on the level of consuming an actual poison is a blatant exaggeration.

[© tweed]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.  it exists only for monetary purposes. it can't be laid out any clearer than that.  don't deflect the argument into semantics.

[© tweed]

hell, for the f.uck of it, let's play semantics.

poi·son      /ˈpɔɪzən/

1.   a substance with an inherent property that tends to destroy life or impair health.

[John Dibble]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.  it exists only for monetary purposes. it can't be laid out any clearer than that.  don't deflect the argument into semantics.

I never denied any of that, did I? All I said is that it's not a poison, that calling it that is an exaggeration.

hell, for the f.uck of it, let's play semantics.

poi·son      /ˈpɔɪzən/

1.   a substance with an inherent property that tends to destroy life or impair health.

You say "don't deflect the argument into semantics" then you bring the dictionary definition into it? But if you want to argue by that definition, I'm sure theres lots of things you don't consider poison that meet that definition. If you wanted someone dead, would you use trans fats to poison them? No, obviously not. The degree to which it impairs health requires consumption in massive amounts over a long period of time to create any significant degree of harm. Consume an Oreo (which contains trans-fats regardless of what the nutrition label says, read the ingredients) and your health won't be impaired to any degree that you could possibly notice.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

Banning trans-fats(or Hydrogenated corn syrup) to me seems the same as banning poison from food. I have no objection to this at all.

[© tweed]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.  it exists only for monetary purposes. it can't be laid out any clearer than that.  don't deflect the argument into semantics.

I never denied any of that, did I? All I said is that it's not a poison, that calling it that is an exaggeration.

well it's undeniably a substance with an inherent property to that tends... to impair health.

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because it doesn't kill on contact probably isn't a great argument for legality.

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perhaps, but if you eat a few oreos every day, your CHS risk will shoot up.

remember...

Because of these facts and concerns, the NAS has concluded there is no safe level of trans fat consumption. There is no adequate level, recommended daily amount or tolerable upper limit for trans fats. This is because any incremental increase in trans fat intake increases the risk of coronary heart disease.[2]

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.

Which of these three will stop applying to eating at McDonalds once they make the switch away from trans fat?  (Hint: None.)

[Ebowed]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.

Which of these three will stop applying to eating at McDonalds once they make the switch away from trans fat?  (Hint: None.)

Alright, Mr. Devil's Advocate, let's put trans fats in everything, since their effect is so negligible.  The food's unhealthy anyway, so let's not bother trying to improve it...

[© tweed]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.

Which of these three will stop applying to eating at McDonalds once they make the switch away from trans fat?  (Hint: None.)

per gram, trans fat is 15x more damaging than saturated fat in term of raising risk of CHS.  and there's anecdotal evidence to suggest it has other negative health effects, too.

[John Dibble]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.  it exists only for monetary purposes. it can't be laid out any clearer than that.  don't deflect the argument into semantics.

I never denied any of that, did I? All I said is that it's not a poison, that calling it that is an exaggeration.

well it's undeniably a substance with an inherent property to that tends... to impair health.

So are a lot of things you probably don't consider poisonous. Consuming apple seeds can impair health, but I don't see you arguing to ban apples. As you said, there are degrees of unhealthiness. I don't consider the degree of health impairment that trans fats cause to be to the degree which it could be considered a poison. Unhealthy substance to be avoided yes, poison no.

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because it doesn't kill on contact probably isn't a great argument for legality.[/quote]

Did I say that? I'm arguing that it isn't a poison right now, not whether it should be legal or not. That's a seperate issue entirely.

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perhaps, but if you eat a few oreos every day, your CHS risk will shoot up.[/quote]

Right, but you'd have to do that for a long, long time. It wouldn't kill you in a year, or even a decade.

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Which is why it should be avoided, but I'm still not going to concede it's a poison. You act as if I don't already know the things you're telling me. If it's a poison, it's not a very good one given how long it takes to do severe damage. I certainly wouldn't use it to try to kill someone. Lots of things taken incrementally will increase your risk of heart disease, this may be somewhat worse than most but it's not very different in that respect.

[Smash255]

I have no problem with local governments pushing for a change in the way food is prepared commercially.  It's been done in the past to protect the general population.  Otherwise, we could all be eating food cooked in lard in dirty kitchens with rat dropping all over the place and cigarette ashes in our meals.

^^^^^


Glad my county is doing this.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Hardly. It's not like you can't make food without trans fats. This law isn't banning food, it's banning the introduction of unhealthy substances into food.

Well some people like unhealthy substances in their food. I know I do.

I know ice cream and candy bars aren't the healthiest food choices around but that won't stop me from enjoying them when I want.

This arguement can apply to tobacco and Alcohol pretty well but not to food.. I mean what exactly does the average person about half the things he eats in a daily meal.

This should be sorted by a local referendum btw. And I would vote in favour of the ban. At the very least all ingredients list must state clearly whether they contain trans fans (and what %) and E Numbers too. Though by my own admission I don't really enough about Trans Fat to give an accurate assessment except it's baaddd.

[© tweed]

...

well, that's why I didn't want to enter a semantic argument.  it destroys the debate.  but using that definition for 'poison' from dictionary.com trans fat certainly qualifies, although not in the Romeo & Juliet fashion (which is the window you're looking through.)

also, about the apple seeds, I honestly did not know that, and thank you for the information.  but two key things make that silly parallel fail.  1) apples have known health benefits, trans fat does not; and 2) I'm pretty sure almost everybody doesn't eat the apple seeds.

and out of curiosity, what are the downsides to consuming apple seeds?

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

and out of curiosity, what are the downsides to consuming apple seeds?

In general, none.  First of all, the seeds would need to be ground up, otherwise they'd pass through the body undigested; second of all, you'd need to eat a lot of them, because your body is capable of detoxifying the very small amount of cyanide inside and apple seed.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

it's entirely unnecessary, has no health benefits whatsoever, and can be directly correlated to increased risk of coronary heart disease.

Which of these three will stop applying to eating at McDonalds once they make the switch away from trans fat?  (Hint: None.)

Alright, Mr. Devil's Advocate, let's put trans fats in everything, since their effect is so negligible.  The food's unhealthy anyway, so let's not bother trying to improve it...

The biggest problem here is more the fact that transfats are a "red herring" in the debate about the health problems associated with fast food.  Banning transfats sends a message that "McDonald's food is heatlhier now—eat up!"—of course, a very dangerously inaccurate message.

Changing the usage of transfats really does nothing to address the obesity epidemic—which is honestly the REAL problem here—while giving the impression that food that is very bad for you is all of a sudden good for you.  Certainly I'm not the only one who's seen unhealthy snack foods plastered with "TRANS FAT FREE!" advertising?