A coroner in New Zealand has listed Coca Cola as a substantial factor in the death of a woman in her thirties. She drank at least 8 litres of Coke every day and died of cardiac arrest. She exceeded the guidelines for sugar and caffeine consumption every day she drank the massive amounts of Coke. She didn’t just exceed the daily recommended limits she probably set records for over-consumption of caffeine and sugar.
The Coca Cola corporation is disputing the coroner’s report because they did not make the woman drink litre after litre of Coke every day. They did not go to her house with free bottles or threaten her family if she didn’t consume her daily minimum. The woman bought the Coke and the woman drank the Coke. Consumer groups in New Zealand are calling for warning labels on Coke.
Consumer groups in Canada and the United States have tried to blame fast food producers for our expanding waist lines. Consumer groups have also tried to blame credit card companies and banks for our huge consumer debt levels. Are banks and fast food restaurants to blame because I have too much debt and I am chubby?
Let me say that Colonel Saunders was a genius. His fried chicken calls to me when I sleep but he did not put anything addictive in the secret recipe that forces me to want more. There are no subliminal messages in his television commercials. The food tastes great and I want to eat it. The same goes for McDonald’s french fries. What a wonderful thing they are. They are so tasty and so salty that I think they have invented a way to make salt taste saltier.
Credit card companies advertise great offers such as 6 months no interest on balance transfers when you open a new card. Banks offer credit card consolidation loans and lines of credit with only minimum monthly payments required. I receive offers all the time in my mailbox, email, when I am checking accounts on-line and of course when I am standing in front of the bank teller.
Who is responsible for all my debt and my problem with fast food? Have I been tricked by fancy marketing? Have I been tricked because of the fine print in credit card statements and the lack of nutrition labelling on my Whopper wrapper? Have I been led astray by the flashy tv commercials showing people having fun with friends at a fast food restaurant or enjoying time on a tropical beach now because they charged it instead of saving for it?
How have the credit cards and banks been able to render us helpless to ask questions? Why have we stopped asking questions if we don’t understand how our credit works? The bank has people to talk to and all we have to do is make an appointment. Every fast food chain has their nutrition content on their websites and somewhere in the restaurant and all you have to do is ask to see it.
I have moved credit card balances to my line of credit. I have used my line of credit for wants instead of needs. I owe a lot, $19,800, on my HELOC (home equity line of credit) but no one made me run it up. The extra weight I carry from eating KFC and McFries and all the money on my HELOC was my own decision.
The poor woman in New Zealand drank her self to death using Coke instead of alcohol. Many of us are compromising our futures by paying interest we can’t afford for stuff we don’t need but really want to have. No one made her drink the Coke. No one makes you have debt . All you have to do is educate yourself. Why do so many people feel that we are not responsible for our own actions because the decisions involve thought?
Somewhere there must be a consumer protection group who feels that we can no longer be responsible for our own decisions because some big corporation has made us that way.
