GPFontaine wrote:

Pandajuice, I agree with your point on moderation, however I simply think that the elimination of HFCS from one's diet can't hurt.

No, it can't hurt obviously, but will it help all that much? No one knows and frankly I don't even really care. I think it's all much ado about nothing and there's no need to go out of one's way to eliminate all intake of HFCS in the name of health. Once HFCS is eliminated, you'll just find something else that's allegedly unhealthy.

GPFontaine wrote:

There is a reason why we are hearing more about natural foods now than ever before. Children are no longer expected to live longer lives than their parents. Why is that? I mean, for fuck's sake the baby boomers did crazy amounts of drugs.

Well, I haven't heard that and I'd like to see your source for coming to that conclusion. As far as I've heard, every generation lives longer than the next and continues to do so. And people are talking about natural foods and organic foods more than ever because it's a hot topic right now. There was a huge organic health food movement in the 70s, but it went away for a while. Now it's coming back and businesses have found that in the current hysteria, claiming your product is "all natural and organic" is a great way to sell it to silly people.

GPFontaine wrote:

Personally I think there are two causes. One is the reduction of physical exercise in school and home. Without recess kids move around less. Also with computers and video games, many children just aren't inclined to go out and play. The second cause is the increase of inexpensive shitty food substitutes. While people's personal time is their own, I would love to see recess time be mandatory as part of a school day for all attending public educational facilities. And I would really like to see synthetic food products carry a tax if they are deemed to have negative side effects to human health. That tax could subsidize the cost of natural foods.

Taxing foods for containing certain ingredients would be ridiculous. And again, you're operating on the assumption that natural foods are automatically healthier simply by being "natural" which isn't always the case. All food products are unhealthy and have negative side effects if they are abused so it isn't really fair to single out particular synthetic ingredients and deem them unhealthy. Again, we're consuming more artificial ingredients than ever before in human history, and yet we continue to have the highest average life expectancy of any era before.

Also, where do you live where recess has been banned? As far as I know, it's still a major part of most public schools. My kids still have recess, and even when they're home are constantly running around and playing. Sure, they use the computer every now and then, but they aren't sitting on it all day like slugs. They play like children play and I imagine it's the same for the rest of the country.