The End of Toys in Happy Meals is Just Beginning
In a move that is sure to strike fear in every child’s heart, Santa Clara County (California) has voted to ban toys and other promotions that are commonly offered with high-calorie kid’s meals – often called by the McDonald’s moniker of Happy Meals.
“This ordinance prevents restaurants from preying on children’s’ love of toys” to sell high-calorie, unhealthful food, said Supervisor Ken Yeager, who sponsored the measure. “This ordinance breaks the link between unhealthy food and prizes.”
As the parent of children that rarely eat at fast food restaurants, this seems like something that will make my life easier. While I can control where my children eat and whether or not they eat at McDonald’s, the issue has to do with where they want to eat, and frankly that’s at the place that’s giving them the toy. Truth be told, my kids don’t even like McDonald’s, but they love getting toys – and there are no healthy alternatives – at any location – that include a toy with a salad and vegetables for kids (for the record, the pickle is not a vegetable).
Unfortunately, this ban impacts only a small number of vendors in a relatively small area, meaning that most parents are still going to have to deal with the pain that comes with seeing your small child eat a meal that offers no redeeming value short of the calories that are included. Most areas – and most parents – are still going to have to (for now) deal with fast food vendors rewarding children for eating deep friend and unhealthy food.
“This ordinance breaks the link between unhealthy food and prizes,” Yeager said. “Under this ordinance, restaurants are still permitted to give out toys. This ordinance merely imposes very specific, common-sense nutrition standards for children’s meals that are linked to these incentives.”
The ordinance will ban restaurants from giving away toys with meals that have more than 485 calories, more than 600 milligrams of sodium, more than 35 percent of total calories from fat or more than 10 percent of calories from added sugar. It would also limit toy giveaways on single food items with more than 200 calories or more than 480 milligrams of sodium.
This is obviously an overly aggressive move – but in the interest of protecting our children it seems necessary. As a parent, this protection feels as though something that has been long overdue, if only by the adage that it takes a community to raise a child. Our vendors – fast food vendors included – need to think about our children as theirs and protect their interests.
Interestingly enough, one of the opponents of this, a McDonald’s franchisee with multiple locations, went on record that he had recently been recognized (by McDonald’s Corporation) for his efforts supporting sports teams and community groups. As though this offers some sort of balance between the excesses of the food his restaurants serve. Really, I applaud his willingness to give back, but this simply seems as putting the interests of a few before the many.
Obviously, these are my opinions. My rant, as a parent, but I am appreciate that someone is starting to look out for the parents to help them raise their children in a healthy and otherwise rewarding manner.
Ranter
P.S. As an aside I was really hoping to bring some nutritional guidelines to this article, but received the following error when trying to access nutrition facts on the McDonalds.com site.
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