[LIBERTY] London Bans Obesity

It's as of January this year prohibited to advertise food that is considered unhealthy (ie food that contains too high levels of fat, sugar, salt etc) in London's public transport system. Posters are taken down, except for the advertisers who have longer contracts. Mayor Sadiq Khan believes that the ban will yield results and counteract obesity among the population. He especially wants to tackle childhood obesity. A total of 82 percent of respondents thought it was a good idea when the proposal was presented in May 2018.

This is a clear example of what is sometimes called paternalism or nanny state. Where politicians believe they know better how citizens should live their lives than the citizens themselves, and where the elected representatives choose to introduce various prohibitions of moral or highly selective scientific character to advance the development in any specific direction.

Obviously, obesity is not good, but will we really be able to counteract obesity in society by prohibiting advertisement for certain kinds of food?

What kind of food is to be considered healthy or unhealthy is also strongly debated, and whether we should perhaps rather focus on the eating habits, or the amount we eat (and obviously the amount of exercise we participate in).

Few (or no) dishes are unhealthy in small quantities. And if you exercise a lot, you can eat large amounts of so-called unhealthy food without gaining extra weight.

So, maybe it's rather specific lifestyles the politicians should prohibit? We aren't there yet, fortunately. The prohibition of adverts becomes far-fetched and mainly of symbolic value. The idea of wanting to tackle the increasing childhood obesity is good, but it's not quite as simple as removing pictures of pizzas and burgers. And how do we decide what is unhealthy or not? If I order a pizza but only eat half, is it still unhealthy for me? Will juice adverts also be banned (after all, juice contains loads of sugar)?

But the story doesn't end there. There are more dangers with such paternalism. Who should or can decide what is healthy and unhealthy? Should it be a little committee of politruks? Who appoints them, and on what criteria? Is this just another pointless expense for we the sheeple? A way for government bureaucracy to grow even further, and take even more power and initiative from citizens and civil society?

Why not ban obesity altogether? And introduce weight controls around the cities, performed by state officials? If you are too fat, you'll simply end up in a state diet camp, where you get to learn to live healthy. I mean, after all, we don't want you to burden the public healthcare system which is so kindly given to you for free.

The categorizing of food as "healthy" and "unhealthy" also teaches us that some food is sinful and wrong. We should "deserve" it and should feel ashamed when we eat it. Is this really the message we want to send to our children? Maybe we shouldn't talk about food and diet at all? How about hanging out with our kids, having fun together and doing activities that enrich our lives?

Obesity is a result of having received more energy than you have expended, and NOT of eating individual foods or dishes. Obsessing about individual food items or dishes is one step away from orthorexia nervosa. It is, contrary to what media reports, quite possible to eat and enjoy all kinds of food without getting obese.

Moreover, the advertisers aren't very happy about the prohibition and say that it may affect the Londoners negatively. In the long long run the citizens may have to pay more for their tickets due to declining advertising revenues.

In the end, it's the individual who has to make a decision what he or she wants to eat. Eating "healthy" must be an individual realization and not come in the form of regulations or edicts from the government. Any centralized effort is utterly vain and ignorant of human psychology and will thus ultimately fail. Prevention informed by the vast and growing body of empirical knowledge in psychology and child rearing is significantly more effective than any law or regulation which ultimately will only move the problem around.

In order to really tackle the obesity epidemic, one has to first understand the underlying psychological factors. If we aren't asking the question WHY people overeat, we will never solve obesity. For that I refer you to the following articles:

The Link Between Childhood Trauma and Obesity
https://dworakpeck.usc.edu/blog/the-link-between-childhood-trauma-and-obesity

Toxic stress from childhood trauma causes obesity, too
https://acestoohigh.com/2012/05/23/toxic-stress-from-childhood-trauma-causes-obesity-too/

Adverse childhood events are associated with obesity and disordered eating: Results from a U.S. population-based survey of young adults
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2748336/

Dr. Gabor Mate on the real cause of emotional eating, anorexia and more.
https://www.empowerhealth.ca/dr-gabor-mate-emotional-eating-anorexia-addiction/

 @SteemSwede