San Francisco lawmakers advance proposal to require soda warning labels

[Little Tich]

Source: Yahoo! News / Reuters

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A panel of San Francisco lawmakers voted on Monday to advance a package of laws targeting soda and other sugar-sweetened beverages, including what would be the first warning label in the United States.

“Drinking beverages with added sugar leads to obesity, diabetes and tooth decay. This is a message from the City and County of San Francisco," the proposed warning label on the beverages would read.

The proposals, which a panel of three supervisors voted unanimously to forward to the full board for consideration, would ban advertising of sugary drinks on city property and forbid city departments from buying sugar-sweetened beverages.

The proposals were billed by Supervisor Eric Mar as “Round Two in the battle against Big Soda” after a proposed 2-cent-per-ounce soda tax failed to pass in San Francisco in 2014. It won the backing of 55 percent of voters, short of the required two-thirds.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/san-francisco-lawmakers-advance-proposal-require-soda-warning-010456631--sector.html

[AngryDem001]

1. Do we REALLY need this?

[vlakitti]

2. Damned right we do!

And as soon as possible!

[yeoman6987]

3. No we don't.

California has major problems and this is the focus? Taking away choice an inch at a time.

[Taitertots]

4. Really? Why?

Are they going to put warning labels on ALL food, warning about how over consumption results in obesity, diabetes, and other health problems?

Or should they just focus on stuff that YOU don't like?

[KansDem]

5. Check out what companies have been putting on their labels...

ThinkSlogans: Soda Slogans

Madison Avenue has been quite successful in getting us to buy and consume soft drinks. Why not some warnings of what might happen if we continue to do so?

[Taitertots]

6. Why arbitrarily choose soda? Almost all products have grandiose slogans.

And the health impacts of over consumption of almost any food will cause the same health problems as soda.

[KansDem]

7. True...

Any consumer product that has been scientifically proven to cause health problems should be labeled. It's just that soda drinks are typically marketed for children and adults "who think young." I would think such a label would help a parent decide if he or she wants to give soft drinks to their children.

[Taitertots]

8. Over consumption of almost any food/beverage has negative health impacts

We would need warnings on almost everything.

All beverages already have nutrition information for concerned parents to review before feeding their children.

[Psephos]

9. You do realize that what govt. and science told us about diet for 40 years was wrong?

You trust those guys WAY too much. Your choice, but it should also be my choice to keep their snouts out of deciding what I choose to put in my body.

And no, I don't drink soda.

[BigDemVoter]

10. I didn't see that they forbade anybody to do anything. . . .

A warning is just that-- a warning.

And no, not all foods are equally bad. Sodas offer ZERO nutrition, and I mean zero--nada--none. If you want to drink one, go ahead-it's fine. There's no ban on sodas, no laws that say you can't buy as many as you want. You can hop in your car and drive down to the Safeway right now and buy as many as will fit in your trunk.

Stating the city is deciding what you put in your body is about as silly as those crazies who say gay marriage is a threat to heterosexual marriage. Strange analogy, maybe, but equally absurd.

[Psephos]

14. you missed the point completely

camel...nose...tent

The premise that authority justly resides outside of individuals and must be obeyed is the basis of the master/slave relationship.

You stop the encroachment now, or its incremental advance will lead to the ban you pretend isn't coming some day, and a host of others. Do-gooder government has no business "warning" me about soft drinks. The infantilism of such thinking is a microaggression against the sole proprietorship of my body.

Government is free to publish its propaganda already without incorporating it onto package labels. I remain free to remember how many millions have died from diabetes, heart disease, and cancer from following government's decades of "scientific" advice to make grain-based foods the major element of a "healthy" diet, and treat fats like poison. Homicidal bullshit propagated in service to politics not science. As with the banksters, no one is accountable, and no one has faced any consequences for their gross malfeasance.

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of
its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under
robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber
baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be
satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us
without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
- C. S. Lewis

[Hekate]

17. The point you missed is that food is no longer something life-sustaining but a commodity to be...

....pushed as hard as possible. Once food became commodified most of it became "food like substances," much of it unhealthy. And it's pushed, like drugs. There's a whole lot of laboratories and behavioral scientists between the farm and your plate or cup.

K-12 classroom photos tell the story. You can certainly find samples online from the past 100 years. Overweight children used to be rare, and obese children nearly nonexistent. In the past 20 years or so, childhood obesity has skyrocketed -- and with it, juvenile diabetes. Look at the group photos.

It's all well and good to take the stance that you as an adult can wreck your own health if you want, but the big corporations that commodified what we put in our mouths have the same mindset as those who deliberately targeted 10-12 year olds with the Joe Camel cigarette ads (speaking of camels). And it's the kids who are paying the price.

[Psephos]

18. you skipped right over the part about the government advocating a deadly diet

because it doesn't fit the narrative

You want a reason for those k-12 photos...ask the FDA about the food pyramid, about sugar subsidies, about price supports for grain, about why they never took responsibility for the murderously bad science they promulgated for two generations.

And you got the idea 'that you as an adult can wreck your own health if you want" exactly backwards. As a free person, I have the right to PROTECT my own health and that of my family's. With no do-gooder interference based on politics, not science.

reread the C.S. Lewis quote

[Prism]

11. I like California's cancer warnings on, literally, everything

I forget the exact proposition, but more or less every shop and restaurant in this state warns you that their products may cause cancer. I was in a coffee shop this morning, and on the shelf with milk/sweetener, there was the giant cancer sign.

Really, no one cares.

[Nye Bevan]

13. As soon as I saw one of those signs in Disneyland I started to totally disregard them.

Obviously Disney is not going to kill off its visitors by giving them cancer. And so anywhere else I see those signs I assume that it is probably as safe as Disneyland.

[petronius]

16. Proposition 65 (1986) I think

http://oehha.ca.gov/prop65/law/P65law72003.html

Those signs do seem to crop up in surprising places, and often don't seem all that useful - in your cafe, for example, it may have been telling you not to eat the shelving system...

[shanti]

12. i'm in CA

as are my three grandchildren. it pleases me to no end that all of them PREFER water to anything else, soda included! soda was a rare treat in my family, mom never bought it, and we only had milk, koolaid (rarely), fruit juice, lemonade, or water growing up. when i was i kid, i never enjoyed drinking water, and after turning 18, became hooked on soda, which i drank continually, but now drink diet soda (i know, i know, but i'm diabetic). i do like a nice big glass of cold water now though.

glad to see the tide is turning.

[Hekate]

15. 5th rec