There are finger-wagging Tin-Hitlers out there, lecturing us about the dangers of alcohol, smoking, coffee, sugar and now they're onto the hobby-horse of fatty foods. One trouble with the scientists on whom they rely, and whose opinions are central to a lot of government thinking on these subjects, is that they seem to blow with the wind: one week, a couple of glasses of red wine a day are good for you and, more or less the very next week, ever having drunk any alcohol at all leaves you with a heightened risk of developing cancer. One week, coffee is a clot-busting miracle drug and the next it is the stuff of which heart attacks are made - and so it goes on. And on. And on. And on.
Apparently, the Danish have dreamed up a super-tax aimed at fat people. The idea is to tax them on fatty foods; not to raise revenue as such, but to lessen expenditure, because it is aimed at deterring people from needing medical treatment as a result of indulging in fatty foods (the only up-side is that Ronald MacDonald might hit the skids).
The ban on smoking nearly everywhere has almost certainly left the governments without a great big wedge of revenue from tobacco taxes. Hence the state-funded health services are going to suffer. They can no longer financially cope with treating fat people, who need stronger beds and more food than thin people. So they have come up with the perfectly brilliant idea of taxing them and if not out of existence at least taxing them down to size. The eugenicists of the early twentieth century would have been right behind all this political nonsense, because it is also, in part, about creating 'perfect' human specimens and controlling what they consume and even how they think.
There's a book kicking around about how the world would have been had Hitler and the Axis forces won WWII. Their genocidal tendencies aside, I really do wonder whether Hitler and Mussolini would actually have laid so many personal freedoms so low, as the modern 'great western democracies' have done. There was even a recent news item that children had been taken away from their parents and put into local authority 'care' because their parents were over-feeding them!
And the really shocking thing is that no one much seems to notice; let alone care. Maybe it is time to take note of a few words of wisdom from Tacitus: 'summum ius summa iniuria': [more laws, more injustice].
That's a warning that should be heeded before it's too late. And it nearly is too late.
Today's picture is of Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle being fed a face-full of fatty acids by Mabel Normand.
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Somewhat surprisingly, the Danes are very keen on smoking. Cigarettes are one of the few items that are cheaper than in the UK. Most people seem to smoke in pubs. We even saw an elderly pipe smoker in one packed bar. Pipes seemed to disappear from view in the UK in the early 1970s.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, you Latin quote means "The extreme law is the greatest injustice" and seems to stem from Cicero, not Tacitus.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, isn't one disqualified anymore for involving a Nazi comparison in an argument?
Thirdly, how is this Danish tax "aimed at fat people", when you yourself hint at the somewhat dubious correlation between dietary fat and obesity?
There are many reasons for having a fat tax. Not a single good one though. One of the main reasons why the tax is being implemented in Denmark is that it is relatively easy to implement. Many live with the illusion that all fat is dangerous, and therefore this tax meets little resistance. It's also quite easy to put a tax on fat, it would be much harder to do so on carbohydrates. Even though, as every athlete knows, the carbohydrates is the first thing you cut if you want to loose weight. But this is how it goes when you put greedy and corrupt bureaucrats and politicans who doesn't know anything about nutrition to manage things. Straight to hell. This tax will only make people either poorer or fatter.
ReplyDeleteKingstonian - That's very interesting about the smoking. I suppose one way around a fat tax is to keep a few apple-fed pigs in an orchard!
ReplyDeleteLa Sombra Sofisticada - Well said.
ReplyDeleteNJS
Herr Gosebruch: First of all, thank you for your kind corrections.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, what disqualifies me from 'involving' a Nazi comparison in an argument? The modern Germans themselves are making laws and busying themselves prosecuting even foreigners for 'denying the holocaust', which, I seem to recall was a Nazi attempt to exterminate whole races of mankind. Certainly, if one were: British, Polish, French, Belgian, Dutch, Czech, Slovak, Yugoslav, Russian, American, Canadian, South African, Indian, Australian, New Zealander - or any from a host of other countries which combined to defeat the Nazis, one would feel compelled, from time to time, to remember the Nazis, to ensure that the freedoms secured from extinction by them are not being pissed away (as I fear that they are), by some extremely ignorant, corrupt and myopic politicians of the modern age. One would feel the same if one had parents, as I do, who remember seeing, from 40 miles away, Plymouth burning in the wake of Nazi bombs, or if one had a grandmother (as I did) shot at (for fun) as she walked in the street by a Nazi fighter pilot retuning home.
I don't understand your third point - and neither, frankly, do I care. Why not visit a site which you might enjoy and where you might be more welcome?
NJS
I ought to add, for the sake of comity between modern people that I bear no grudge against the German people or, despite my utter detestation of the EU, have any reason to dislike or disparage the people of the countries which constitute it. Indeed, we have a charming German friend in Rio and, indeed, Germans I have always found to be friendly and polite people.
ReplyDeleteNJS
NJS,
ReplyDeleteI should have been more precise. I was referring to Godwin's law. To quote from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law): "For example, there is a tradition in many newsgroups and other Internet discussion forums that once such a comparison is made, the thread is finished and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever debate was in progress."
I just find in unnecessary to envoke a Nazi comparison, when the issue at hand is (silly) taxes.
Regarding my third point, the tax (ill-conceived as it may be) is aimed at fatty foods, not fat people. If skinny people buy fatty foods, they are taxed, too. If there is no or little correlation between fatty foods and obesity, fat people are not hit harder by this tax.
As far as your question "Why not visit a site which you might enjoy and where you might be more welcome?" is concerned, let me put it this way: I enjoy your site and your books. If I am not welcome here, because my comment didn't seem to concur completely with your views, when it was just asking questions, I don't know what to make of it. Are you actually trying to be rude? I did not insult or attack you in any way.
I can see why a German might be browned off by this.
ReplyDeleteJulian Bremner.
The ordinary German people alive during WWII, let alone the modern German people, are no more responsible for Fascism than the ordinary British people are responsible for the UK government's disgraceful war-mongering in Iraq and Afghanistan. Moreover, the world needs to remember the evil in its past, to ensure that such history, at least, does not repeat itself.
ReplyDeleteNJS
Roland G - the later comments have appeared in a strange order. I did misunderstand your original post and I apologize for at least a fair attempt at rudeness. I also now understand your points and see strong arguments. I previously knew nothing of Godwin's law; however, my reason for the reference to the Nazis (and the same would apply to Stalinists, come to that) is that even they did not, in certain respects, intrude as much into people's private affairs as some modern governments do.
ReplyDeletebest,
NJS