Should Shops Take More Responsibility In Tackling Obesity?

[Si Hunt]

Supermarkets stand accused of undermining parents' efforts to feed children healthily by displaying junk food near checkout queues.

The Children's Food Campaign says most high street supermarkets place snacks near tills despite promising a decade ago to reduce or remove them.

Researchers surveyed hundreds of checkouts at 48 stores in London.

The British Retail Consortium (BRC) said the report ignored the bigger, positive picture.

The authors of the report, Checkouts Checked Out, say they found that in many cases, junk food was positioned at children's eye level, prompting them to pester for sweets, crisps and soft drinks.

But this is just the story that reminded me of how much this irritates you. Do you know who the prime offender is? WH Smiths!

I can't believe that they pile the counter with reduced chocolate then force the staff to verbally try and persaude you to buy it when you try and pay for a magazine. And I can't believe that if you use the Express Tills a special screen flashes up which requires you to click past it if you DON'T want to add some sweets to your purchase.

Isn't this disgustng? How is it allowed? It's just unbelievable.

I mean, they could even be doing this for fruit packs or nuts and going the other way, persauding people to buy healthy things. But instead they are talking you into eating things that are bad for you.

Anyone else wondering how they get away with it?

Si.

[Rob McCow]

Perhaps they should go the whole hog and tell you to buy some cigarettes and a bottle of tequila on your way out!

No Si, shops are businesses and it's their job to make money. And if a few people have to suffer chronic obesity so that they can line their pockets, that's perfectly fine in my book and totally in line with the Capitalist way of running things. After all, it's entirely your choice to buy chocolate... lovely chocolate which gets waved in your face at the counter until all you can think about is delicious chocolate and it's all you desire.

Might be being slightly sarcastic there...

[Si Hunt]

Sometimes I struggle to tell the difference!

You unwittingly make a good point though. Shops arn't allowed to even display cigarettes now, so why are they allowed to literally flash an image of cream eggs at you when you try and buy DWM?

I mean this only half-jokingly, but who out there is protecting the stupid people from themselves?

Si.

[SiHart]

Yes and No. yes, they should stop offering chocolate at discoutned rates at the checkout when you buy some scummy gossip mag or the Daily Mail or whatever, but no, I don't see why they should have to take away chocolate from by the checkouts.

What people fail to realise is that there is a choice. You DON'T have to buy the chocolate wherever it is. It's time the individual took some responsibility for their actions rather than blame the shops for selling the things in the first place. I think as a population we're all too happy to let someone else take the blame for our failings if we can and it's time instead that people thought about what they were buying.

Why shoudl the state have to pretect stupid people from themselves. Sorry if this sounds heartless, but where does it stop? Do we stop the sale of chocolate altogether, because some people eat it to excess? Yes, the way it marketed at the counter is bad, but people can say no. There is always a choice, even for stupid people.

[Anthony Williams]

But the fundamental problem there is that the State eventually ends up paying for peoples obesity-related illnesses through the NHS.

So, while I believe that it shouldn't be the State's responsibility to try and prevent people from eating too much (and thus infringing upon the freedoms of the people), eventually the buck falls with them, when people have heart attacks, diabetes etc.

I don't think it's quite as simple as that the State shouldn't have to protect people from themselves, when it's eventually at the State's (and thus the taxpayer's) expense that the problems are dealt with.

So yes, there probably should be laws against pushing chocolate and other high-calorie snacks in peoples' faces at checkouts.

[SiHart]

Yes, passing a law is so much easier than actually educating people isn't it?

[Si Hunt]

Why shoudl the state have to pretect stupid people from themselves.

Because it is obliged to pay for their treatment when they get ill. By all means, leave them to their stupidity but don't then pledge to have to pay for the consequences.

Yes, passing a law is so much easier than actually educating people isn't it?

I don't get what you mean, Si. The law is to stop businesses taking advantage of people who don't know any better. It's to prevent a practise which goes AGAINST an education of healthy eating and which really doesn't help anyone (except their profits). Are you saying educate the shops instead? I fear they know only too well, they just place profits before responsibility.

Why not educate people as well? But you're defeating your own efforts if you then allow the shops to go on thrusting sweets in peoples faces all the time.

Si.

[Anthony Williams]

Yes, passing a law is so much easier than actually educating people isn't it?

The thing is, Si... I don't disagree with you. But the sad part of it is that I get the impression that a lot of people won't listen unless they have to take responsibility for their health. Take a look at smoking - the only way that the number of people smoking ended up dropping was to ban it in enclosed public places, thus forcing smokers to essentially be socially ostracised. Sad, but true.

Equally sad is that we live in an age in which governments always take the easy, short-term options. And yes, legislating is the easy option. It's not what I'd prefer, but it's far more likely to be what happens.

[SiHart]

Oh I get all that. I really do, but I just think that it is odd that it is easier to pass law that stops people being stupid than to actually stop people being stupid. It seems to me that we're going about this the wrong way round, and that, as I said, people should take responsibility for their own stupidity.

[SiHart]

Ban everything!

ban alcohol because people can't use it propetrly and fill A&E up on a saturday night. Ban cars people kill themselves and others with them. Where do we stop?

[Jason Thompson]

You DON'T have to buy the chocolate wherever it is. It's time the individual took some responsibility for their actions rather than blame the shops for selling the things in the first place.

I don't think anyone is blaming the shops for selling the things in the first place. It's the way they are selling them that is the point of contention. Knowing that a child (or even an adult) will be bored while forced to stand near the row upon row of sweets is a cynical (and successful) marketing ploy. Yes, there's always a choice of saying no, but to put the junk food at the end of what most people consider a chore, and at a point where you cannot simply walk past it or avoid it, deliberately so bored kids will start making a fuss about having some of the tempting things on offer and bored adults will be more likely to buy it is the questionable practice here.

Yes, we can all say no, but after a long hard day at work, a long session of weaving in and out of other people's shopping trolleys to get your weekly essentials, and a lengthy queue at the checkout with a whining child behind you and the idiot in front who insists they definitely have got the right change and that thing was definitely marked up at a different price on the shelf, one's resistance to naughty treats may be severely diminshed. I hate shopping, and I'm not stupid, but my god that small bar of chocolate looks twice as nice by the time I'm at the checkout than the bigger bar on the shelf in the main part of the supermarket did when I walked past it earlier!

So it's not about protecting stupid people from themselves, it's about stopping businesses exploiting frustrated customers in order to line their pockets at the expense of their customers' health.

[SiHart]

yes and again bored kids is just an excuse. Plenty of parents say no. Mine always did. Maybe I was just lucky there? I just don't see that this is all the fault of the shops. Some of it, yes, but not all.

[Jason Thompson]

No of course it's not all the fault of the shops, but they have to take some responsibility because it is well known that they do put those things by the checkouts precisely because it's the point where you can't just walk past them and ignore them and they are therefore more likely to be bought. And bored kids is not just an excuse: it is a part of their marketing strategy. Yes, plenty of parents say no, but plenty don't because my god this has been a hellish trip round the shop and now I've got a whining child to deal with too so let's just give him the damn sweets and shut him up.

Surely consumers and suppliers have to share responsibility for these matters? No-one's saying stop them from selling them at all, just stop using cheap marketing tactics to exploit the frustrations of customers in order to sell more of the things that are bad for them just to get more money in the company's pockets.

[Jason Thompson]

Ban cars people kill themselves and others with them.

Interesting that you picked out cars there, Si. We can educate people on the dangers of speeding cars, but we still had to have national speed limits imposed in order to stop most people doing it. Education of the masses only works to a point. Even the most law-abiding drivers sometimes wish they could do a bit more than 30 to get where they are going, and only the law and the threat of a fine or a jail sentence stops them doing so.

[SiHart]

True! Hoist by my own irrational argument.

[Si Hunt]

I just think that it is odd that it is easier to pass law that stops people being stupid than to actually stop people being stupid.

Isn't this because they are stupid?

Si.

[Rob McCow]

Sadly, we're talking about 'Stupid' people as if they're a breed apart. Yet we all make stupid decisions from time to time, particularly when it comes to chocolate and especially when it's just there, waiting to be eaten!

People should, however, be prepared to take responsibility for their own actions and solely blaming the shops for making people fat is no excuse!

[Si Hunt]

I didn't solely blame them, but they don't help.

Si.

[Jason Thompson]

People should, however, be prepared to take responsibility for their own actions and solely blaming the shops for making people fat is no excuse!

But no-one is solely blaming the shops, are they? They're just saying they are not helping, and are encouraging people to make those stupid decisions. Again, it's not the fact that shops sell them, it's the way they sell them.

[Rob McCow]

Surely consumers and suppliers have to share responsibility for these matters?

But what can be done about that on a practical level? You can educate us about the benefit of eating healthy food, but if the shops are waving brightly coloured wrappers containing delicious sugary treats in the faces of children (and everyone!) then it would take a heck of a lot of education to convince us not to buy them.

[Si Hunt]

Wasn't that my point?

Si.

[Rob McCow]

I don't get what you mean, Si. The law is to stop businesses taking advantage of people who don't know any better. It's to prevent a practise which goes AGAINST an education of healthy eating and which really doesn't help anyone (except their profits). Are you saying educate the shops instead? I fear they know only too well, they just place profits before responsibility.

Why not educate people as well? But you're defeating your own efforts if you then allow the shops to go on thrusting sweets in peoples faces all the time.

Uh... yes. Yes it was.

But I made it as well! Just a bit later than you.

So er... Supermarkets, eh? Tsk. They never learn.

[SiHart]

Supermarkets aren't at fault (for a change) as they no longer put sweets at the checkout... unless they do it in Tesco. They might, but I haven't been in one of their supermarkets for an age. Thank goodness.

[MinaHarker]

I'm very surprised at your posts, Jason. Are you being sarcastic? This doesn't sound like you at all!

[Si Hunt]

He should have run those views by the boss first eh?

Si.