Italian Color v. American Express

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I think a more concerning question is, "why were they sweetening milk in the first place?"

However, if they're talking about "flavored" milks, like chocolate, stawberry, etc, then I would suspect that it should be immediately obvious that the shit is bad for you, no matter what they're sweetening it with.

They're not, though. Flavored sweetened milk isn't "bad" for you as long as you're within a reasonable intake of sugar for the day, just as fruit-flavored yogurt isn't "bad" for you and jam isn't "bad" for you. Chocolate milk still has protein and calcium; the sugar adds extra calories, but the milk still has its basic nutritional value. It could, however, become "bad" for you if they are allowed to put artificial sweetener in it without labeling it, which they almost certainly want to do so they can reduce the calories and sugar content on the label without disclosing that the reduced sugar is compensated for with artificial sweetener.

[LMNO]

Ok, you're right.  I mis-used the word "bad".

However, I personally feel there's too much sweetener out there in our foods already, making it much harder to be reasonable in the amount of sugar one is eating, and adding it to milk is, I feel, perhaps overdoing it a bit, especially if it's being added to so-called "plain" milk, which I'm still not sure if it is or not.  But you are correct, that's a different subject than what we're discussing.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Ok, you're right.  I mis-used the word "bad".

However, I personally feel there's too much sweetener out there in our foods already, making it much harder to be reasonable in the amount of sugar one is eating, and adding it to milk is, I feel, perhaps overdoing it a bit, especially if it's being added to so-called "plain" milk, which I'm still not sure if it is or not.  But you are correct, that's a different subject than what we're discussing.

There's too much sweetener in prepared foods, I agree. This is not a problem I run into much because I'm a filthy hippie and I cook most everything from scratch, but I do think it's important to distinguish between products that are SUPPOSED to be sweet treats, like chocolate milk, ice cream, caramel corn, etc. and the really insidious shit that extra sugar is added to that reasonable people don't usually think about it being in, like spaghetti sauce and linguini alfredo and tamales and chili con carne and ravioli and essentially all other ready-to-eat foods in the grocery store.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, the average person isn't going to go "SUGAR IN MY BROWNIE MIX? YOU MONSTERS!!!  "

But they might, if they knew, wonder WTF sugar is doing in their enchilada sauce.

[Don Coyote]

if they could be arsed to read the ingredients maybe.

[Cain]

I just went and doublechecked my linguini.

I'm OK.  This time.

[Junkenstein]

I mean, the average person isn't going to go "SUGAR IN MY BROWNIE MIX? YOU MONSTERS!!!  "

But they might, if they knew, wonder WTF sugar is doing in their enchilada sauce.

I'm not so sure. Sugar, like salt is in great quantities of foodstuffs. I think these things may have reached cultural acceptance. When was the last time you heard umbrage about E-numbers?

For the vast majority, you could probably list cyanide, arsenic and my shaved arse into the ingredients and see no substantial changes. Brand name goods would never do anything suspect. I guess if you'll see any change here it will come from the back of the current horse-meat hoo-ha.

Something like you can give information to the consumer but you cannot make them think beyond "HUNGRY/THIRSTY/WANT"

[Pergamos]

IS THEY PEOPLES, OR IS THEY AINT?

Ah, the joys of the Free Market™.  You have the choice to use their service and not complain, or not use their service and go out of business.

Dunno. What would happen to me if I killed one?

You might get to run for president.  Mitt Romney was pretty much a serial killer of corporations.  They're a bit harder to kill than the human sort of people though.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, the average person isn't going to go "SUGAR IN MY BROWNIE MIX? YOU MONSTERS!!!  "

But they might, if they knew, wonder WTF sugar is doing in their enchilada sauce.

I'm not so sure. Sugar, like salt is in great quantities of foodstuffs. I think these things may have reached cultural acceptance. When was the last time you heard umbrage about E-numbers?

For the vast majority, you could probably list cyanide, arsenic and my shaved arse into the ingredients and see no substantial changes. Brand name goods would never do anything suspect. I guess if you'll see any change here it will come from the back of the current horse-meat hoo-ha.

Something like you can give information to the consumer but you cannot make them think beyond "HUNGRY/THIRSTY/WANT"

That's because most people don't read the ingredients list, and not only that, but if they do (as we are increasingly learning to) manufacturers deliberately seek ways to circumnavigate the listing laws by breaking substantially similar ingredients into different categories in order to mislead consumers.

I would caution heavily against placing blame on the end consumers, as the schemes to mislead them are myriad, even assuming they are so informed as to realize they are likely to be misled in the first place.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

The interesting thing is that many of you are missing the point that the new regulations sound like they're oriented toward misleading a populace who is, in fact, increasingly likely to read the label.

[P3nT4gR4m]

The interesting thing is that many of you are missing the point that the new regulations sound like they're oriented toward misleading a populace who is, in fact, increasingly likely to read the label.

This! It already takes a magnifying glass and a degree in Newspeak to work out what the fuck is in the swill they sell over here. Something like this would only serve to muddy the waters even more. Case in point - UK consumers are freaking out over the revelation that there's horsemeat in their findus lasagne. Horsemeat is the one single ingredient in that long list of carcinogenic bioeffluent that I wouldn't bother too much about putting in my body but everyone is already conditioned to ignore the other shit.

"Waiter - there's meat in my raw sewage!"