New York City may be the city that never sleeps, but it almost slept on something pretty important: soda legislation.
For some reason, the day before Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s controversial soda ban would take effect, New York Supreme Court Justice Milton Tingling in Manhattan overruled it.
Sort of.
Back in September, the city’s Board of Health approved Bloomberg’s plan to limit the size of sugary soft drinks sold in restaurants, movie theaters, stadiums and arenas to no more than 16 ounces a cup.
“In October, groups representing beverage makers, restaurants and theaters filed a petition in state court, seeking to block the measure,” reported Bloomberg, the news publication, not the mayor. “They called the ban ‘unprecedented interference’ with consumer choice.”
“In anticipation of the soda ban, Bloomberg on Monday released new data tying sugary drinks to the city’s fattest neighborhoods,” said a CNN Money article. “The new city study showed nine of the neighborhoods with the 10 highest obesity rates were also the highest in sugary drink consumption. At the other end, the three least obese neighborhoods were also the lowest in sugary drink consumption.”
We’re pretty sure people should just, at the very least, try not to ruin themselves.
People are complaining that the state is attempting to take too much control over everyone’s everyday lives, but, like, maybe don’t drink giant sugary soft drinks.
Is that too much to ask?
“This is America,” they yell. “We can do whatever we please.”
“It is arbitrary and capricious because it applies to some but not all food establishments in the city, it excludes other beverages that have significantly higher concentrations of sugar sweeteners and/or calories on suspect grounds, and the loopholes inherent in the rule ... serve to gut the purpose of the rule,” Tingling wrote.
What’s crazy to us is the judge waited until the day before the ban was going to start to make any kind of decision on this challenge.
Like, did you forget this was coming up, dude?
Are businesses just complaining about losing customers even though this decision will make customers healthier?
And don’t try to claim this ban wouldn’t, at least, make small strides toward a healthier New York City. The mayor released a study that clearly illustrated what people this ban would positively affect.
“Nearly 60 percent of New York City adults and 40 percent of city schoolchildren are overweight or obese,” reported the CNN Money article.
Those numbers are only slightly higher than the national average, as about 36 percent of Americans are obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That’s one-third of the adults in this country.
It doesn’t seem like we, as an American society, can be trusted to make our own decisions when it comes to junk food.
