Fast Food Like Heroin!
Salt, fat and sugar. The North American’s triple health threat.
Don’t tell me you can have just one french fry. We both know innately that it isn’t true and scientists are starting to figure out why. Rats offered a selection of heart-stopping goodies, from bacon to chocolate cake, began to overconsume and they would keep doing it even when they had to endure an electric shock. In short the researchers say, they were behaving just like heroin addicts.
I’ll do you one better. Junk food addicts behave just like rats, eating whatever garbage comes their way so long as it has enough fat, salt and sugar in it. And the fast food companies know it. Just like the tobacco giants that “enhance” cigarettes by making them more addictive, junk food makers ensure that their products will make the bell ring in just the right parts of the brain and then call it Freedom of Choice. The scientists say that their rats showed signs of compulsive behaviour, that their eating appeared to be beyond their control. They also found that fast food triggered the same chemical responses in the brain as highly addictive drugs.
A magic thing about the human brain, when it wants something it is a remarkable tool for self-deception. An addict can always rationalize one last hit. But there is only another hit after that. For addicts there is no freedom of choice.
The trouble with fast food addiction is that the pusher is on every corner in every town and there is always some clown on the TV telling you to try the new one-third pound patty covered with cheese and AN EXTRA SLICE OF BACON. Even if you want to recover you will face a life of temptation.
I admit that I am not quite on the side of the angels here. I have a soft spot for anything crunchy. I love a juicy burger now and again and I have ten kinds of cheese in the fridge. But there has to be a limit to the ability of the big chains to convert our children into addicts.
I’m sure you try to feed your kids the most balanced and varied diet that you can and you may even talk about what makes foods good and bad, but evenutally you have to send them out into the world and they – being young – are bulletproof. Danger does not apply to the young.
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