Young: Oversized soda or oversized gov't?
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's proposed ban on the sale of sugary soft drinks over 16 ounces has set off a raging debate: What's more important, preserving individual freedom or promoting public health? Bloomberg's initiative is bad on both counts: It advances big-government nannyism -- and may well set back the much-needed anti-obesity campaign.
Let's start with the facts: We have gotten too fat. In 1962, only 13 percent of adults in the United States were obese; today, the number is close to 35 percent. Six percent are "extremely obese" -- up from 1 percent in the early 1960s. And one-third of American children and teenagers are overweight, while nearly one in five are obese -- a shocking rise since 1980, when the childhood obesity rate was slightly above 5 percent.
Some claim obesity is a matter of genetics, not choice or behavior; but surely we are not that genetically different from our grandparents, or from people in other countries who are far less fat. The truth is that we eat too much and get too little exercise. In a sense, we are victims of our affluence.
The costs -- private and public -- are indisputable. Obesity is linked to numerous health risks from heart disease and cancer to complications with pregnancy and surgery. And even before the recent health care reform, much of this cost was being passed on to society through higher health insurance premiums, emergency care for the uninsured, and federal spending on care for the elderly and the indigent.
In recent years, the right has engaged in a ridiculous backlash against the anti-obesity initiatives led by Michelle Obama -- initiatives that focus primarily on better nutrition in public schools and better information about healthy eating and exercise. Former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin has mocked the first lady for refusing to "trust parents to make decisions for their own children," even though she herself had sponsored similar measures as governor of Alaska. Some conservatives have turned this into a class warfare issue, asserting that health concerns mask the liberal elites' distaste for fat people and for the soda-guzzling, Big Mac-eating all-American lifestyle.
But in fact, this is an ironic reversal of the earlier politics of obesity. Not long ago, it was the left that condemned "sizism" as bigotry and "oppression" akin to racism and homophobia. Plus-sized actress Camryn Manheim was hailed by the "liberal media" for promoting "fat acceptance." Progressive municipalities like San Francisco passed size-discrimination laws that forced fitness clubs to hire fat instructors -- policies that conservatives rightly derided as political correctness gone mad.
It's one thing to say that the government shouldn't force us to make healthy choices. It's another to champion unhealthy choices as an admirable exercise of freedom. Self-restraint has always been a conservative virtue -- and it certainly wasn't liberal elites who classified gluttony and sloth as deadly sins.
Unfortunately, Bloomberg's supersized-soda ban validates the worst conservative and libertarian fears about government meddling: healthy nutrition promotion today, food fascism tomorrow. While excessive consumption of high-sugar soft drinks definitely contributes to the obesity problem, the proposed restriction will affect only a small portion of that consumption (drinks bought at restaurants, entertainment venues and street carts), and will interfere with personal choices that don't involve overconsumption (such as a couple sharing a large drink).
The negative impact of making the anti-obesity effort look nannyish and anti-choice will be far worse, further alienating those who dislike intrusive government and feel that the oversized state is even more of a problem than oversized portions and waistlines.
Cathy Young is a regular contributor to Reason magazine and the website RealClearPolitics.
