I am never pleased to hear that someone is dead. But this guy spent his lifetime inventing schemes and gimmicks to attract children and others to eat crap. The supply chains this company created abuse many farm workers. Cows who grew in the poorest welfare conditions once butchered, get passed through something which looks like a steamroller to extract any extra juices, nerve tissues, glands, skin, hair and bones, all to make as many unhealthy burgers as possible. Laboratories create artificial chemicals to create strawberries milkshakes that have no milk and no strawberries. Low paid employees get used as human machines.
While I cycle to work 17 miles each way and everyday, drink lots of mineral water and eat lean balanced food, some of my colleagues drive company cars (which I refuse to have), walk at lunchtime to the main street and coming back to their desks with these brown paper bags. After years of not touching this stuff the smell of the burnt used oil and the sourness of the ketchup make me feel sick.
Very rarely I give up at home and make everyone home made chips and real burgers and believe me they taste nothing like McDonald.
I am not pleased that this guy is dead but I was wondering how ironic it is the guy who is indirectly responsible to the earlier deaths of many will not be able to draw his own huge pension funds.
Although doing triathlons does not mean that one will live longer I know that the majority of the people here are health concerned and have very balanced diets.
Somebody posted on this yesterday, and this guy was the current Ceo, had only been running the company a couple of yrs I think. He is the one responsible for the “healthier options” Mcdonalds is selling now. Like the salad with more fat grams than a cheese burger.
You pompous jackass. You think we really care how far you pedal to work, that you give up the company car etc. etc. Your announcement of a man’s death and all the bad things he did in life adds nothing to this site but a chance to tell everybody how “holier than thou” you are.
My own rant adds nothing to this site either, but your post really pissed me off.
All Pluto is saying is that McDonald’s is an exploitive company, the food is nutritionally deficient and if eaten on a regular basis may cause serious health problems. I know it, you know it and so does everybody else. So what’s the big problem here.
Having met James Cantalupo in 1996 while consulting for McDonalds, I can say that he was none of those things that Pluto says/implies he was. The way Pluto choose to live his life is his own business, but I don’t think dancing on a dead guy’s grave is quite becoming of anyone in any circumstance. It shows a decided lack of class.
Marketing is not the evil here, society at large is to blame. McDonald’s is only filling a void created by our lifestyles. If you look at the case history of class action lawsuits, I think you will find the court does not agree with your claims.
Marketing is not the evil here, society at large is to blame. McDonald’s is only filling a void created by our lifestyles. If you look at the case history of class action lawsuits, I think you will find the court does not agree with your claims.
I heard an opinion on the radio last week that the reason for the new healthier options was to stave off future lawsuits, especially those directed at childrens consumption.
Trouble is, what seems more likely to happen is that you will simply attract new customers who are prepared to eat salads rather than convetting people over from their bad habits. Still, thats not going to hurt the bottom line now, is it.
Tibbs is quite right, it’s all about the parents. Kids don’t know what they want until their parents tell them. Why, I bet he’s never bought a toy that his kids wanted because they saw it marketed somewhere. Lets see if we can’t slip a couple of cigarette commercials in between the kiddy cartoons on a Saturday morning, won’t make a difference to them, will it?
Wow, maybe you should try and eat a little junk every now and then. You sound a little grumpy.
Now wouldn’t it be great if all those other fast food CEO’s and every CEO of every restaraunt would die too. Then you could take over and we could all be as good as you.
Yes, some of the menu changes are to stave off potential future lawsuits, but in part it is a change in the positioning of the restaurants. Actually, if you add up all the calories in some of the new salad options (including Wendy’s, BK, etc.) they have more calories and fat then many of the burger options. The case law between fast food and ciggies is quite different. The courts have ruled that nothing done by the fast food industry deceived the general public, whereas the tobacco business lied to people. McDonald’s never put up a sign that said, “home of healthy eating”. For the love of swimming, people need to be responsible for their own actions and stop seeking to assign blame.
" McDonald’s is only filling a void created by our lifestyles."
Not my lifestyle.
Here’s were we have to agree to disagree. I think McD’s, etc. is doing more than filling a void. They’re encouraging a certain unhealthy lifestyle. As for class action lawsuits, I say f*ck lawyers. There’s a huge difference between what’s legal and what’s moral.
People have the right to eat whatever they want, but I just happen to chose not to eat Mc D’s. I’m not saying anyone else can’t.
Sorry Cerveloguy, I have to agree with Byran. Placing all the blame on McDonalds relieves individuals of their responsibility for their own choices. Yes, fast food eaten every day is bad for you, so is eating excessive calories of healthy food, so is drinking excessive amounts of alcohol, drinking and driving, smoking, drugs, anabolic supplements, excessive training until your body breaks down a la Scott Tinley, spending too much time in Mr. Tibbs’ Velvet Room and on and on and on… Everyone has to make choices. Making bad choices and then blaming someone else does seem to be the American way as a quick look at the lawsuit situation in this country will attest too. If you want to really point a finger, maybe the parents of individuals who make bad choices should be considered for not educating their kids well enough to avoid the pitfalls of Madison Avenue and hucksters that have been around for ages.
I am unclear where the fast food industry cross the morality line, if you acknowledge that you have a choice in what you eat.
Are malls immoral because they force you to run up high credit card debt that you can’t pay off?
If you say McDonald’s encourages an unhealthy lifestyle, what do you have to say about higher education. Last time I checked most people I know learned how to smoke, binge drink and do drugs while at institutions of higher learning.
My point and only point is that this has nothing to do with James Cantalupe and by linking the “McDonald’s is bad” to his death in the “serves him right” is beyond low budget.
Sure, but there IS a difference between what you say and what you don’t say, ins’t there?
Did the tobacco industry ever say ‘hey smoke this and you’ll be a healthier individual?’ - I’m not saying they did. What they do ( and all marketing does ) say is ‘smoke this and you’ll be a happier, more fulfilled hep-cat.’ now, subsitute eat for smoke, and whats the difference? There’s no health warning on a macdonalds meal, and there doesn’t need to be if you eat it in moderation, but thats not the same thing as saying there is nothing wrong with eating and much as you want, surely?
Not everyone can all be as savvy as us - companies market their product because it helps sell things.
I’ll be honest - I am not for individual lawsuits at all. All that will accomplish is make lawyers rich. However, I’m all for legislaton that would force the junk food industry to clean up it’s act. Ill use the arguement that they are harming society and if an individual causes harm he/she is is punished in some way by the legal system. Why should it not be the same for large corporations?
Either that or let the junk food industry pick up the health care costs caused by diseases that are directly linked to diet/obesity.
Your issue is one with the regulators not with the industry. The law never required them to post warning labels directly on the packaging, it still does not today.
The difference between the two is nicotine has been proven to be addicting, the tobacco industry knew that but it lied and said it wasn’t. The fast food industry never lied to you like that. The court has said that the fast industry had no obligation to protect you from yourself. Society relies on individual liability. Without it, we could not function as a free market.
“Did the tobacco industry ever say ‘hey smoke this and you’ll be a healthier individual?’”
Actually at one time they did. There were ads back in the 40’s and 50’s advertising a particular brand of cigarettes as “the brand most prefered by doctors”.