My Nanny State Done Told Me

The nanny state has gone mad. In an act of stunningly patronizing condescension some of our local council people believe that poor people are too stupid to feed themselves. No. Really!

Los Angeles City Council member Jan Perry has introduced a two-year moratorium on new fast food restaurants in South Central Los Angeles. She believes that this will combat the bad choices those people make and therefore reduce both obesity and obesity related illnesses. I’m sure she means well. I’m also sure that obesity and poor food choices are real problems.

There are few who disagree that the American diet is too high in fat, salt and sodium—the unholy trinity of unhealthful eating. We consume all of these because they taste good. There is no one who thinks that fast food burritos, burgers and fried chicken are health foods. Most fast food restaurants do offer healthy choices—healthy choices studiously avoided by people who eat for taste not nutrition.

The premise that a fast food moratorium will lure markets with great produce and sit down dinner houses with better choices is empirically untrue on several levels. Markets and sit down restaurants open where they believe they can make money. They don’t stay away out of malice. Their market surveys simply don’t point to the people wanting their products. They don’t stay out because they are racists and willfully reject money from black people, brown people or poor people. They’d be delighted to take their money. They just don’t believe that they can compete.

There is no evidence that the middle level sit down dinner chains are any more healthful than fast food. From salad bars with high fat cheese dressings to steaks, ribs, pasta in cream sauces, there are all the same tasty opportunities to commit culinary hari kiri.

We modern Americans have a situation that is unique in history. For the first time poor people are fatter than rich people. Think about that for a second. Wealth used to be associated with weight. A proper German Burgher was expected to have some heft. The peasant was scrawny. Teveye dreamed of being a wealthy man so that his wife, Golda, could have a “proper double chin.” In the Third World, and for most of history, the peasants were thin and the shopkeepers fat.

Today we have turned the body weight wealth assumptions inside out. Walk through Beverly Hills and the wealthy look like they’re starving, while the members of the service classes are identifiable by bellies cascading over belts and tushies pushing the outer limits of miracle stretch fibers.

There is little question that the poor eat worse than the wealthy, mostly by choice. So, the great question is whether changing choices should come from education or prohibition?

Using the prohibition model does not auger well for this well-intentioned effort. And if alcoholism is a greater problem with the poor than the wealthy, should we restrict alcohol sales to the poor? What other choices should we take away from them—for their own good?

Do we really want to profile, by race or socio-economic class, who gets licensed to sell food? If we want the poor to eat better, shouldn’t we also look at the wealthy and the trend of expensive steakhouses? Both classes make bad choices; the rich just spend more at it and have better access to healthcare to remediate the damage from their sins of indulgence.

Perhaps the answer could be like the prohibition of serving alcohol to people who are clearly intoxicated. Maybe no one should be allowed to order any French fries if their body mass index (BMI) is over the normal (24.9). Over 28 and no beef. Reach 30 and you can only order the egg white omelette with steamed veggies. Yeah, that should work.

As bad as a steady diet of fast food may be, the more immediate problem in South Central is lead poisoning—the lead that comes from guns. Dear Council Member Perry, please do something about that!