The fact that wine and beer bottles are exempt from those Nutrition Facts labels is utter nonsense.
If people knew how much sugar and calories are in their drink maybe they would think twice
this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2023
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I was drinking a while claw with my mother-in-law, and reflected that 100 calories was pretty good.
She responded she preferred her normal vodka sodas because they have 0 calories...
There are nutrition labels on alcohol in Europe, but people there drink as much as here.
Europe drinks way more alcohol than North America
Excerpt from the article:
If you feel that Europeans drink a lot, your hunch is correct: people across the continent consume more alcohol than in any other part of the world. Each year in Europe, every person aged 15 and over consumes, on average, 9.5 litres of pure alcohol, which is equivalent to around 190 litres of beer, 80 litres of wine or 24 litres of spirits. Thatβs according to the 2021 European health report by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Meanwhile cannabis beverages are required to have:
-Nutrition facts including calories, sugar, etc.
-Gigantic yellow warning with random health warning (e.g., don't use if pregnant)
-Huge red stop sign cannabis leaf logo
-KEEP OUT OF REACH OF CHILDREN
-Big pain in the ass plastic childproof thing
None of these required on a can of beer.
From a harm reduction perspective, it's a massive failure. Many cannabis beverages have very low nearly zero calories, sugar-free. For your physical health they are almost certainly less harmful than alcohol and I know many people would enjoy them as an alternative to alcohol.
We have faced a similar failure in harm reduction strategy regarding vaping versus tobacco. I think in both cases it's a result of vested interests (tax revenue, lobbying, don't know) trumping what is best for people.
In fairness, cigarettes contain known carcinogens. You are ripping apart your DNA with every dart. Can the same be said for having a few drinks a week?
I say this as someone who's never taken a single drag or had even a drop of alcohol (cooking notwithstanding).
Alcohol is a carcinogen.
Right. It's a question of where the threshold is before we consider something dangerous enough to warrant a warning.
That would require actual science and research instead of regurgitating the same debunked data study 20 times a year for government propaganda dollars though...
Because those health warnings are meaningless to begin with. We know it's bad for us, we don't need a nanny state to hold our hands at the same time.
We know it's bad for us
You have the knowledge in the back of your mind. The warnings make you have it in active thought.
we don't need a nanny state
Do you truly believe consumers usually/always make rational and reasonable decisions, that don't go against their own interests?
You have the knowledge in the back of your mind. The warnings make you have it in active thought.
What kind of manipulative power trip behavior control bullshit logic is this?
Do you truly believe consumers usually/always make rational and reasonable decisions, that donβt go against their own interests?
Who the fuck cares? I decide how I live my life. If you want to wear bubble wrap and consume nothing but distilled water and unflavored soy bean paste so you can totally live forever and never need medical treatment, have at.
I'd rather live.
How would warnings stop you from that? It's informative text, it can't hurt you. Not any more than the alcohol itself.
I would rather my government spend my tax dollars solving real problems, not creating hoops for companies to jump through so people can ignore them (which is your narrative, in reality, it is intended to stagmatize the product and the people who consume the product and try to shame them into stopping).
That's false, these warnings are successful ib preventing people from consuming the drug and therefore directly decreasing healthcare costs for society.
In fact, some countries pursue it even further, mandating bland packaging for cigarettes. This is especially effective in preventing minors from smoking.
Sounds like our are adept "ib" being a giant fascist tool who relishes the idea of getting some degenerates to stop drinking an smoking. Like savages.
And coffee, and butter, and sugar, and artificial sweeteners, and cannabis, and cars.,,. prohibition is stupid. Mind your own fucking business. Stop trying to control others.
Artificial sweeteners are very safe and sugar is carbohydrates, which you almost need for energy and a healthy diet. Coffee and butter is also quite safe.
But alcohol and tobacco? Any amount is harmful. Warnings wouldn't be unreasonable for people to make more informed decisions. You'd be surprised at how many think alcohol is harmless. And its stuff you quite literally don't need to live.
You clearly don't follow the news and aren't very educated on the topic of carcinogens.
Artificial Sweeteners are being found to be carcinogenic. Sugar causes obesity and diabetes. Coffee is addictive and causes vascular disorders. Butter causes high cholesterol and heart attacks.
Tobacco and alcohol have no notable adverse impacts for at least 20 to 40 years (unless you drink to the point of alcohol poisoning, that is immediate).
You clearly aren't interested in knowledge or having a productive conversation. You just want to do the propagandist prohibitionist circlejerk.
It's just a warning label not a prohibition
Alright, if that is true, and its not a baby step towards prohibition, let me fill you in on it. We fucking know and we don't fucking care.
Stop wasting government time and resources on empty soapboxing.
We know what the propaganda says.
Slippery slope fallacy. Also a lot of people actually don't know that alcohol causes cancer and heart disease as well as homicide, etc. A lot of gullible people drink it because they are socially led to believe that it's OK or perhaps even necessary, but these are not thinking or informed people. The fact that you call legitimate health information about alcohol "propaganda" shows that you're not really in the "know" camp, doesn't it?
Alcohol causes HOMICIDE?!
Jesus, can I have whatever you are smoking?
Slippery slope fallacy.
Argument from fallacy. Just because an argument contains a fallacy doen not mean that its conclusion is false. In this context I feel like it would be much more effective to point out that cigarettes are totally unnecessary, while owning a car (depending on where you live) is not. Putting a warning label on something like cigarettes is not comparable to putting warning signs on something that you actively need to survive.
"[cars] something that you actively need to survive."
You almost just made me spit out my beer.
"[cars] (depending on where you live) something you actively need to survive." Seems like you conveniently forgot something there. If you live in a place where you can walk to work and the grocery store that's amazing for you! For many people having a vehicle is not a choice, but a necessity.
Uber.
Let me say again, Uber.
Busses, trains, scooters, electric vehicles of any kind.
I'm not saying electric means no fossil fuel emissions of any kind. Almost everywhere is feeling varying growing pains exploring how to responsibly keep an ever more drawn upon electric grid charged.
I'm saying gas fueled cars need to go away, not yesterday, but at least 15 years ago.
Gas cars are what we as a species NEED to quit.
Simple vices pale in comparison.
If this was meant to invalidate my argument:
Red herring fallacy
Just invoking a simple fallacy without establishing it within the context is making a red herring of fallacies themselves.
Sure I'll establish it with in context. Just because "other things are also dangerous" doesn't mean warning should not be on the label of a known carcinogen. This is coming from someone who drinks more than he should.
Putting a warning on the label of a product known to cause harm isn't "controlling others". You are free to still consume the product. It is allowing you to make an informed choice, even if you are unaware or unable to access that information from other sources.
- I am in the US, and we have warnings but no nutritional facts on alcohol. In practice, I don't like wasting government time creating restrictions on labeling just so they can be ignored, because the real reason for it is to baby step at making it a bespoken cultural norm that it is bad, therefore it should be banned and people who partake are bad by association.
I think nutrition facts should be on everything, and if there is NO "hey kiddies, this is alcohol" on the can, okay, there can be one. Before I checked the context myself, I thought this was a "put pictures of tumors on cigarette packs, the simple warning isn't good enough!" kind of conversation.
- Discounting my comment in the conversation of specifically putting warnings on alcohol as "slippery slope fallacy" takes all the other stuff I just mentioned out of the equation. Just like a simple "Alcohol can cause X" on the can, putting a simple "Butter causes high cholesterol and heart failure" is also a good idea. putting a simple "Caffeine causes addiction and vascular issues" is also a good idea. Putting a "Fossil Fuel Emissions cause cancer and global warming" on the gas pump/gas cap cover on your car is a good idea.
I guess my point is that putting "Warning: Hot" on coffee cups is a waste of both government and private business resources. It does have some minimal merit though, but where do you start? I would be starting with Fossil Fuels. Those seem the most pressing and devastating of hazards we need to be addressing. If you are fixated on smokes and alcohol first, I think you have lost the plot.
It IS possible to establish basic simple warnings on everything that should have them though. Not doing that, to me, reeks of pushing for prohibition.
I agree with you that prohibition isn't the way to do things. In my opinion the war on drugs is a waste of tax payers money and more importantly human life stuck behind bars. If you are speaking against criminalization of substances I'm with you. I'm however, not against harm reduction and education, including warning labels on products that are harmful.
Sounds like we are really close to meeting in the middle, I'm just a little more cautious about one part than you are and you are a little more cautious than me on a different part.
Cheers!