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France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

bbc.com

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Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#81

Post by imatworkyo »

canadian_voter wrote: post #24

I'd rather live in a country that provides comprehensive free health care and limits soda consumption, than one that allows me the "freedom" to consume as much sugar as possible and makes me pay for the consequences. I must be a radical hippie leftist: I think we should tax the sh-t out of refined sugar and subsidize organic vegetable farms.

I agree much more with jdam's thoughts - why are we controlling other people with laws. Its sad, ... scary at worse. Is your idea really to start policing people's everyday interactions that we don't support?

Just the judicial and monitoring overhead alone makes this really silly. What do you do to a restaurant that serves unlimited sodas? What resources do you expend to find them and bring them to trial?

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#82

Post by realusername »

MarcusBrutus wrote: post #75
realusername wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

socialist = banning unlimited soda refills ? seriously ?

If a business is willing to offer me free soda refills and I freely choose to patronize thar business, then it takes a hardcore Stalinist to dare stand between us two and prevent by the force of guns this peacefull, voluntary exchange. Does one really need to explain that in the 21st century?

It's called a public health service! A wonderful thing which avoids becoming a society full of overweight and unhealthy individuals like the United States.

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#83

Post by SomeStupidPoint »

teddyh wrote: post #33
rhapsodic wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I remember my vacation in the states (in the South). I got served a absolutely massive glass of coca-cola with my dinner. When I had finally managed to finish it a waiter came and refilled the bloody thing when I wasn't paying attention. How can you enjoy your meal with that much to drink? Are you from a place where there is a cultural taboo against only drinking part of the beverage a restaurant serves you? Saying…

Are you from a place where it’s culturally accepted to let left-over drinks simply go to waste?

In a situation where the water is recycled effectively and we have massive stores of it far in excess of what we need?

Yes. That's the whole point of modern water systems in the US -- that we're very wealthy and water cycles anyway, so why not cycle it a little faster if it makes us happy?

In the US, our troubles with water stem from corruption from people meant to be maintaining the system and inefficient agriculture. Personal consumption is well covered.

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#84

Post by Retra »

jMyles wrote: post #21
Jdam wrote: post #14

Is it just me who's thinking that individuals in modern societies are not capable anymore of making meaningful decisions, including how much to drink? We're sacrificing freedom here because we became incapable. That scares me.

Is there evidence that lack of capability is the culprit? Is it possible that people are perfectly capable, but make informed unhealthy choices because it's what they want to do? I can't stand even 8oz of sugary soda, but I also can't imagine judging or restraining someone (let alone with the violence of the state) who wants to.

The whole advertising industry is built upon the evidence you're asking for.

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#86

Post by oblio »

zeroer wrote: post #76
canadian_voter wrote: post #24

I'd rather live in a country that provides comprehensive free health care and limits soda consumption, than one that allows me the "freedom" to consume as much sugar as possible and makes me pay for the consequences. I must be a radical hippie leftist: I think we should tax the sh-t out of refined sugar and subsidize organic vegetable farms.

I suppose I have to agree with you. You apparently want a nanny state and to tax me to pay for it.

> You apparently want a nanny state and to tax me to pay for it.

What's it with Americans and these expressions. I've heard "nanny state" used 0 times by non-Americans (non-Americans use it only when quoting Americans).

Also, you're making it sound like you're _the only one_ being taxed. He will also be taxed.

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#87

Post by FrancoDiaz »

Jdam wrote: post #14

Is it just me who's thinking that individuals in modern societies are not capable anymore of making meaningful decisions, including how much to drink? We're sacrificing freedom here because we became incapable. That scares me.

So suddenly people became incapable of making meaningful decisions? We're perfectly capable of making "meaningful" decisions, but nanny-state, authoritarians know that they can get away with it now, rather than 30 year ago, when they would've been "run out of town" with stupid laws like this.

We're not sacrificing freedom. Places like France and NY are.

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#88

Post by jessriedel »

stinos wrote: post #60
rhapsodic wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I remember my vacation in the states (in the South). I got served a absolutely massive glass of coca-cola with my dinner. When I had finally managed to finish it a waiter came and refilled the bloody thing when I wasn't paying attention. How can you enjoy your meal with that much to drink? Are you from a place where there is a cultural taboo against only drinking part of the beverage a restaurant serves you? Saying…

For me, and probably many Europeans: yes, that is how we are raised. It's not su much of being taboo, more like a sense that it makes no sense to waste anything (not just food/water) and is bad for the planet in general. (well, there is truth in that). My parents even had a picture of a bunch of underfed kids from Ethiopia (or so) on the wall in the kitchen. If we didn't eat our plate, they'd point to it and say some…

The marginal cost of that sugar water is less than the cost of the waiter's time to walk to your table.

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#89

Post by [deleted] »

tnzn wrote: post #62
claydiffrient wrote: post #50

When I was living in France and Switzerland free refills were basically unheard of. About the only place that I ever found that had free refills was IKEA.

Mostly just KFC and Subway have been doing that, and it only started like 10 years ago at most, this may be why.

[deleted]

Re: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills

#90

Post by gdulli »

nkrisc wrote: post #71
Jdam wrote: post #14

Is it just me who's thinking that individuals in modern societies are not capable anymore of making meaningful decisions, including how much to drink? We're sacrificing freedom here because we became incapable. That scares me.

It's not that people are incapable, it's that they're being given ever increasing and complex decisions to make in their daily life without being given the education to support it. Some people do receive such an education or are aware enough of the knowledge to seek it themselves but that's not the case for everyone.

Lots of educated people make bad choices about health. It doesn't take education or sophistication to know that you're better off without a lot of Coke. We're bombarded with messages about drinking Coke and not drinking Coke and we've made our choice.

An completely optimal diet does get very complex, and probably subjective. Definitely over my head. But we shouldn't pretend will power isn't a problem where the low-hanging fruit is involved.

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