Guns and Kids

Bill Schorr, Cagle Cartoons.

McDonald’s CEO: ‘We don’t serve junk food’

Raw Story: Confronted by a 9-year-old girl during a shareholder’s meeting, the CEO of McDonald’s insisted that the company does not sell “junk food” and defended advertising practices that target children with colorful characters.

“Something I don’t think is fair is when big companies try to trick kids into eating food that isn’t good for them by using toys and cartoon characters,” 9-year-old Hannah Robertson told McDonald’s CEO Don Thompson. “If parents haven’t taught their kids about healthy eating then the kids probably believe that junk food is good for them because it might taste good.”

“It would be nice if you stopped trying to trick kids into wanting to eat your food all the time,” the younger Robertson told Thompson, reading from a prepared statement. “I make cooking videos with my mom that show kids that eating healthy can be fun and yummy. We teach them that eating a rainbow of fruits and veggies makes kids healthier, smarter and happier because that is the truth.”

Thompson seemed to balk at Robertson’s question and scolded her. “First of all, we don’t sell junk food, Hannah,” he said. “My kids also eat McDonald’s. When they were about your size, to my son who is with us today, who was a little bit bigger, he was a football player, and also they cook with me at home. I love to cook. We cook lots of fruits and veggies at home.” He added that the company wants to sell more fruits and veggies, and pointed out their salad selection and the inclusion of apple slices in Happy Meals.

In 2012, McDonald’s put the nutrional information for their menu online and we learned that the Premium Southwest Salad with Crispy Chicken had more calories than a double cheeseburger — so maybe bragging up the “healthy” salads isn’t a great idea.

McDonald’s faces increasing criticism for marketing their food to children. One is reminded of Camel cigarette’s “Joe Camel” marketing campaign which used a cartoon character. According to the report, “McDonalds faced a lawsuit in 2010 over marketing processed foods loaded with salt and fat to children through the use of toys and cartoon characters, which the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) calls deceptive, and a main driver of the childhood obesity epidemic in the U.S.” That lawsuit was defeated in 2012, but this has done nothing to silence the criticism.

[photo by pointnshoot]

Just an average day in America…

Raw Story: Authorities in Oregon are considering whether to charge an off-duty security guard who accidentally shot and killed his girlfriend’s 9-year-old daughter while practicing drawing his weapon.

Oregon City police spokesperson Lt. Jim Band said that 32-year-old Joseph Wade Wolters was at home on Sunday prepping for his new job as an armed security guard by holstering and unholstering a loaded weapon. Fourth grader Shayla May Shonneker was about 50 yards away when the gun discharged, sending a bullet through a wall and striking the girl in the face while she was playing outside.

The girl was later pronounced dead after being rushed to Oregon Health & Science University Hospital by LifeFlight helicopter.

Sandy Hook got our attention because of sheer number of deaths all at once in one place. But the fact is that there are the equivalent of about two Sandy Hook massacres every single day. They’re just not one crime, in one place, by one shooter. According to the Children’s Defense Fund, “In 2008, 2,947 children and teens died from guns in the United States and 2,793 died in 2009 for a total of 5,740—one child or teen every three hours, eight every day, 55 every week for two years. Six times as many children and teens—34,387—suffered nonfatal gun injuries as gun deaths in 2008 and 2009. This is equal to one child or teen every 31 minutes, 47 every day, and 331 children and teens every week.”

47 kids shot every single goddam day and the soft-on-crime crowd is fine with that. They don’t want to do a damned thing about it. Two Sandy Hooks a day and that’s an acceptable amount of collateral damage. And hey, we don’t have to do anything about guns, right? We can put armed security guards in all the schools, because if this incident has taught us anything, it’s that underpaid and under-trained rent-a-cops are great with firearms.

Just another average day in America. Pay no mind to all the blood.