We didn't say anything when they came for the smokers...

[213374U]

However, at the risk of pre-empting the results of discussion I am trying to make the overall point that paternalist government should have a ne plus ultra.

 

Unless and until we, as democratically empowered citizens/subjects, make it clear what the ne plus ultra is ...people held accountable for our health will continuously push for more power.

 

That's a nice sentiment. And maybe in the UK it's different, but here the results for the latest voting survey were made public yesterday and, even in the face of rampant corruption and waste, judiciary manipulation (we got an official letter of admonition from the EU, for all the good that will do) and record unemployment and poverty levels, the ruling party is still expected to win the next election. I don't know what word I'd use to refer to ourselves, but it's definitely not "citizens".

 

 

     —For in a democracy, every citizen, regardless of his interest in politics, "hold office"; everyone of us is in a position of responsibility; and, in the final analysis, the kind of government we get depends upon how we fulfill those responsibilities. We, the people, are the boss, and we will get the kind of political leadership, be it good or bad, that we demand and deserve.

                           

John F. Kennedy, 1955          

Edited February 5, 2014 by 213374U

[Orogun01]

 

 

Except that we have defined 'care pathways' for cancer sufferers. Transfer the failure down the line to 'liquidating bowels' and you have to completely reorient all that care.

 

Right. The implicit basis for your reasoning is that whatever fatal malady cancer is substituted with down the road, has an equivalent or greater cost, so decreasing cancer risk means no overall savings. But cancer is a chronic disease that is particularly expensive to treat, unlike other old age-related acute afflictions. In addition, this logic can be used to justify opposing any public health-related reforms aimed at reducing the impact of lifestyle or occupational diseases.

 

 

Fair point. I am making the assumption that the cancer fail case will just get substituted for something else.

 

But I grant that for younger cancer sufferers this won't be true.

 

However, at the risk of pre-empting the results of discussion I am trying to make the overall point that paternalist government should have a ne plus ultra.

 

Unless and until we, as democratically empowered citizens/subjects, make it clear what the ne plus ultra is ...people held accountable for our health will continuously push for more power.

 

That's a very cynical view, one that completely disregard the capacity of humans for rationale. When the paternalist government crosses a line there will be collective outrage but if your argument is that we actually shouldn't have good things cause governments are evil and people are too stupid to realize it then I guess either you're right and we shouldn't or you're wrong.  I can't either prove or disprove those things.

[Mor]

 

No, the message is if you choose to neglect yourself, you better be ready to pay the price. As for the rest those are contributing factors, but overall its all about lack of self control/respect.

 

You seem awfully certain that the choice factor outweighs any others. And I may be inclined to agree, if the choice was whether to be poor or not. I'm sure you can see how absurd the implication that people willingly make an informed decision to be poor is. Because, you see, the correlation between obesity and poverty is a fact.

 

http://diabetes.diabetesjournals.org/content/60/11/2667.full

 

As Enoch excellently explained, value judgments are not the best way to handle this, regardless of how expedient they may be.

 

There are many correlations related to poverty, but correlation does not imply causation. Indeed in our case poverty means less access to healthy/diverse type of food and medical care, which leads to general health issues. But people are not getting obese because they are poor, they are obese because they can't shut their pie hole. Eating/drinking/medicating your sorrows away, Boredom eating, social eating, eating eating eating. In addition lack of exercise. Overall this lack of self control and neglecting, which is the reason why people are obese(among other things)

 

Also your study speaks about individuals who use supplemental nutrition assistance program. That is nice, but many of my engineer team are obese and they are making high tech salaries, which put them way above that. so what their excuse, no time? BS. hedonism is more like it.

[Zoraptor]

It really doesn't have much to do with shutting their pie hole, in the sense you're using. If you ate exactly the same amount of cheap convenience food as healthy food you will almost certainly be more overweight and less healthy than if you ate the 'good' food alternative, there is an inherent quality issue at play. Cheap convenience food typically has more calories, a worse glycemic performance (ie you feel hungry quicker, even if you aimed for an equal calorie diet) and stuff like salt which makes you need to drink more as well. Obviously there are choice and non inherent factors at play as well, being lazy, being poorly educated (about food), not caring, not being able to or having the facilities to cook stuff; but there are genuine underlying reasons for obesity apart from those.

 

Having said that, I still reckon you can buy and eat healthily for similar or less cost to eating from McD's/ KFC/ TV meals or whatever, if you know how. And I'd far prefer to see people told how to do that than the standard "we'll tax it, for your benefit!" justification, because if you don't know how to eat properly any taxes will just result in people having even less money to no health benefit. It'll also, as usual, hit poorer people harder. Incentivise healthy eating rather than punish bad, in other words, though that will never happen as it's hard while tax it is easy and makes money for the government.

[Hurlshort]

It's also not too easy to exercise on a fast food diet.  You might get away with it a little when you are young and your metabolism is fast, but it catches up to everyone eventually.

[Mor]

It really doesn't have much to do with shutting their pie hole, in the sense you're using. If you ate exactly the same amount of cheap convenience food as healthy food you will almost certainly be more overweight and less healthy than if you ate the 'good' food alternative, there is an inherent quality issue at play. Cheap convenience food typically has more calories, a worse glycemic performance (ie you feel hungry quicker, even if you aimed for an equal calorie diet) and stuff like salt which makes you need to drink more as well. Obviously there are choice and non inherent factors at play as well, being lazy, being poorly educated (about food), not caring, not being able to or having the facilities to cook stuff; but there are genuine underlying reasons for obesity apart from those.

 

Having said that, I still reckon you can buy and eat healthily for similar or less cost to eating from McD's/ KFC/ TV meals or whatever, if you know how.

You outlined another contributing factor, while I am saying that a person who want to loose weight will, and a person who don't will use contributing factors as excuses.

 

For example the coworkers I mentioned, we got the same coupons from work, we went to the same restaurants, they picked up junk and ate more, ontop of that they were constantly crunching stuff before and after the meal, always extra sugar on the cappuccino machine etc... I guess their contributing factor was stress eating?

 

 

And I'd far prefer to see people told how to do that than the standard "we'll tax it, for your benefit!"

People being told equals tax money, so its our money in both cases. Though people don't respond well to being told how or what todo and I am no one babysitter. If a person want to gorge himself go ahead, but I shouldn't pay for his habit.

 

Incentivise healthy eating rather than punish bad, in other words, though that will never happen as it's hard while tax it is easy and makes money for the government.

I am not certain which program you refer to, but obesity which is easily preventable, increase your risk factors in everything, so that tax money would pay medical bills and related programs. Edited February 6, 2014 by Mor

[Guard Dog]

Just reading everyone's posts here brings me to two points I'd like to make. First off many of you seem to be using the words "regulate" and "educate" interchangeably. They are of course very different things. I'd have no problem with a government at any level spending money on educating the public to make healthy choices on their vices and eating habit. I think that money could be better spent on other things but... whatever.

 

Regulation is a whole horse of another color. That is big brother coming into your homes, cars, personal spaces and pushing you around telling you what you may and may not eat/smoke/drink. It is tyranny even if he smiles and tells you it's for your own good. Sin taxes on things the government does not think you should have are a terrible idea. Taxation is not supposed to be used as a form of behavior modification. All to often it is and it ends up being both heavy handed and unfairly applied. 

 

The other point is that many of you, heck most of you, seem to view your governments as a paternal entity that cares for you and wants good things for you. Nothing could possibly be further than the truth. Governments, or the people in them, love themselves. They love their power and their influence and their (really your) money. Nothing else. They do not give a damn about you. If they think about you at all it is with indifference at best, contempt and disrespect at worst. You really do not want to give these people any more power over you and yours than is absolutely necessary to keep a society functioning. 

 

It always makes me wonder that even in this very thread many of you have vilified corporations who only care about money yet revere governments who only care about money.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Guard Dog

[213374U]

I really hate carving up posts (takes the focus away from the topic and turns discussion into a ping-pong match where reductionism is the racket), so I'm going to ramble a bit instead.

 

 

post

 

 

You know... I used to think like you. And I don't mean this in a condescending manner so I apologize if I come off that way. I used to dislike fat people and despise their indulgence, their lack of self-restraint and willpower, their weakness. Then I got to work for a time as a personal trainer and found out that there is much more to their lives than what my limited, caricaturesque images of people I hadn't even met allowed room for. Ever since coming to this realization, I have made a conscious effort to keep in check my tendency to make generalizations and quick judgments at first glance. It's an arduous effort to constantly second-guess myself, but I feel I connect better with people.

 

Now, after this heartwarming tale of self-discovery that I'm sure brought a tear to your eye, I am going to discuss a few points that don't sit well with me.

 

1. if something is a contributing factor it by definition cannot be an excuse... because it is a contributing factor.
2. "correlation does not  imply causation" is not a valid way to dismiss a correlation. In this case, the issue is not whether poverty equals obesity, but rather whether or not to tax sugar. The correlation before means that an indirect tax on sugar will hit people that are already struggling to get by harder. That's hardly fair, is it?
3. taxing is, by and large, ineffective at modifying the behavior of people. If this is, in fact, a public health matter, then the focus must be on fixing the problem rather than simply punishing unhealthy habits—not only because it is an illegitimate use of taxing power, but because it really only serves to move wealth out of people's pockets and into the "public" coffers. It does not address the public health issue, it simply accounts for it.
4. people are much more receptive to educational efforts than coercive or punitive measures. Case in point, the traffic code. Provide people with a general health roadmap and work to make it so following it is not much more difficult, and people will be healthier. Much like better roads and driver training results in less accidents.

Edited February 6, 2014 by 213374U

[Blarghagh]

Just reading everyone's posts here brings me to two points I'd like to make. First off many of you seem to be using the words "regulate" and "educate" interchangeably. They are of course very different things. I'd have no problem with a government at any level spending money on educating the public to make healthy choices on their vices and eating habit. I think that money could be better spent on other things but... whatever.

 

Regulation is a whole horse of another color. That is big brother coming into your homes, cars, personal spaces and pushing you around telling you what you may and may not eat/smoke/drink. It is tyranny even if he smiles and tells you it's for your own good. Sin taxes on things the government does not think you should have are a terrible idea. Taxation is not supposed to be used as a form of behavior modification. All to often it is and it ends up being both heavy handed and unfairly applied. 

 

The other point is that many of you, heck most of you, seem to view your governments as a paternal entity that cares for you and wants good things for you. Nothing could possibly be further than the truth. Governments, or the people in them, love themselves. They love their power and their influence and their (really your) money. Nothing else. They do not give a damn about you. If they think about you at all it is with indifference at best, contempt and disrespect at worst. You really do not want to give these people any more power over you and yours than is absolutely necessary to keep a society functioning. 

 

It always makes me wonder that even in this very thread many of you have vilified corporations who only care about money yet revere governments who only care about money.

 

What thread have you been reading? Very few people in this thread have advocated regulation and taxing as a good solution, most even hesitated before considering it a "possible" solution and almost everyone that brought it up followed it with "but this is a bad solution because" or "but I don't agree with this idea because of [reasons you just specified]" and I have yet to see a single post that didn't understand the difference between education and regulation. Most posts have been against the idea of a nanny state.

 

I mean, it's easy to make yourself look like the voice of wisdom if you just go ahead and marginalize the entire thread and everyone in it as left wing hippies, but how about you participate in discussion instead of giving yourself fake reasons to pretend you're above it all because you aren't brainwashed by the government. (See how it feels when you get marginalized just to make a point?)

Edited February 6, 2014 by TrueNeutral

[alanschu]

Even Communist Allan doesn't think that regulating this through law is a good idea.

 

213374U, your post is a home run BTW.

 

 

I think it's easy to judge those people, and even overlook that in some cases it may not actually be a serious condition (I remember learning of a triathlete who basically looked like a short, fat man, but his body vitals were pretty good).  Granted this is probably rare, but as you say it's important to not generalize too recklessly.

Edited February 6, 2014 by alanschu

[AGX-17]

It always makes me wonder that even in this very thread many of you have vilified corporations who only care about money yet revere governments who only care about money.

I can't help but wonder why you're even bothering to draw a distinction. The people at the top echelons of power are the same group that occupies the same tier of both the private and public spheres (i.e. Fed or Treasury chairmen are almost exclusively drawn from the pool of Wall Street goons who think The Wolf of Wall Street was a celebration of their values and lifestyles.)

 

In today's world, power flows to wealth, so anyone who wants either must covet both.

Edited February 7, 2014 by AGX-17

[Mor]

post

Everyone have a sad story... its not about that, just as with crime it is not about correlation and contributing factors, it is about the realization that you can overcome then and improve your life. Every social change start somewhere exposure on media, social pressure, education etc, however, there is nothing better then personal realization and will to put an effort.

 

You are a personal trainer, tell me how many of the people who came to you and said they didn't care or shoveled excuses, at the end of the road said they didn't know how they lived before?

 

So yes my bottom line is the same. It is about not giving up on yourself, self control, small steps.. If understanding contributing factors is part of that then great, but more often then not it used as excuse not to start anything. There are two kinds of people losers and winners, winners are not losers and losers are those who give up.

 

I'd have no problem with a government at any level spending money on educating the public to make healthy choices on their vices and eating habit. I think that money could be better spent on other things but... whatever.

 

Regulation is a whole horse of another color. That is big brother coming into your homes, cars, personal spaces and pushing you around telling you what you may and may not eat/smoke/drink.

"Big brother" is such a cynical term, used by certain people to describe any policy they don't like. After all the "government" says what you can and can't do about every aspect of your life, from how the wiring in your house walls should be, to what can or can't be show on TV. After all you wont say big brother telling me I can't have kidy porn(hopefully). So it is a point of view kind of thing.

 

Anyway personally, I am all in favor of incentives and education(they sound so much better then the alternative) but there are so many issues that need to be addressed and so little of the budget cake. So what you see as punishment I see as personal responsibility.

 

* You can finance educational campaigns addressed at smokers and pay for extra medical costs due to smoking, through indirect taxation.

* Drinking is trickier, because its not the alcohol per se(it is even recommended in certain cases), it is about its consumption. Which is kind of hard to address so i'll skip.

* Food is in the same category, it is about consumption, so indirect taxation to address obesity is a collective punishment and can hurt many people who can't afford food. However you can hit it through direct taxation or tax examptions, which will tackle only obese people and wouldn't hit the financially weaker part of society.

Edited February 7, 2014 by Mor

[BruceVC]

 

It always makes me wonder that even in this very thread many of you have vilified corporations who only care about money yet revere governments who only care about money.

I can't help but wonder why you're even bothering to draw a distinction. The people at the top echelons of power are the same group that occupies the same tier of both the private and public spheres (i.e. Fed or Treasury chairmen are almost exclusively drawn from the pool of Wall Street goons who think The Wolf of Wall Street was a celebration of their values and lifestyles.)

 

In today's world, power flows to wealth, so anyone who wants either must covet both.

 

 

Sorry guys but there is a lot of cynicism on these forums towards big business that I don't agree with. So I'm sure we all have our own stories about corruption and have  read books like " Confessions of an Economic Hitman" but what I don't like is these blanket and emotional statements that basically dismiss the main reason that drive our economies...the profitability of big businesses

 

In the interests of full disclosure I admit I work primarily for large corporations but that doesn't make me biased, in fact I would say it gives me a different perspective. In South Africa we have what is called "social responsibility". This is basically where the government expects and demands that corporations assist with the upliftment of the social conditions of indigent people in our country

 

And boy we can see the benefits. There are whole parts of Johannesburg  CBD that have redeveloped due to the efforts of big corporations. I've personally been involved in building low cost housing that is funded entirely by private banks in South Africa. I can cite many more examples but I think you get my point

 

We should try to see all the good that large companies do and hopefully come to the conclusion that they do more good than bad

[Blarghagh]

 

However you can hit it through direct taxation or tax examptions, which will tackle only obese people and wouldn't hit the financially weaker part of society.

 

 

This is making the incredibly false assumption that the financially weaker part of society and the obese people in society don't overlap so it fixes nothing.

[Mor]

No, it just follows tax laws in most of the world, in which the financially weaker part of society contributes next to nothing to direct taxation.(in some places they even have negative income tax)

Edited February 7, 2014 by Mor

[Blarghagh]

So, at least in the US where fresh fruit and veg is more expensive than junk food, you want to tax the fat people. Except for the poor ones. I guess that gets more money for the government from people who are fat by choice, who are not the problem and have a right to make their own choices. So it's got that going for it, which is nice.

[Kroney]

The faces change, but the game stays the same. One one side one man hugs his gun and starts talking about big brother and state interference and how they're stealing your freedom to eat yourself to death and on the other another man talks about how people need to be educated whilst he nurses his soy milk chai tea latte.

 

The fact of the matter is that the WHO can't do **** all to make anybody do anything. All they've made me want to do is neck a bottle or two of port.

 

Stop banning things, stop taxing things. Stopping people from dying is the worst damned thing a society that cares about money can do. Have a nice, publically funded healthcare system so people don't have to bankrupt themselves fixing a broken leg, find cures for the really nasty diseases but otherwise just leave us to do what we want. I've got precious little time on this Earth, if I want to spend some of it chugging mojitos, I bloody well will.

 

That said, I'm all for taxing fat people, because that ****'s gross, yo.

Edited February 7, 2014 by Kroney

[Walsingham]

I was with you right up to taxing bloaters.

[213374U]

 

post

Everyone have a sad story... its not about that, just as with crime it is not about correlation and contributing factors, it is about the realization that you can overcome then and improve your life. Every social change start somewhere exposure on media, social pressure, education etc, however, there is nothing better then personal realization and will to put an effort.

 

You are a personal trainer, tell me how many of the people who came to you and said they didn't care or shoveled excuses, at the end of the road said they didn't know how they lived before?

 

So yes my bottom line is the same. It is about not giving up on yourself, self control, small steps.. If understanding contributing factors is part of that then great, but more often then not it used as excuse not to start anything. There are two kinds of people losers and winners, winners are not losers and losers are those who give up.

 

I don't know what drives people to change their habits, because it's different for everyone. In my case, it was something as silly and vain as the hope that I would get noticed more by the opposite sex (it worked, but not quite the way I expected...). For others it may be medical prescription after a check-up, a desire to look better, a way to blow off steam. But it really is a minority that are both healthy and thinking about long-term health. So I guess many people don't really "care" but still do it, while there are others that are aware of the problem but, for whatever reasons don't ever get started.

 

I'm sorry man, but I'm not buying into this manichaean vision of winners and losers, of strong and weak. That is a division that is only really valid if made in retrospect, evaluated at the end of a person's life. But until that point, it's still up in the air; and whatever paths a person takes are the result of a myriad of factors, only one of which is willpower. Unless you believe that some people are naturally weak minded, but then the proposition is even worse (punish the weak for being weak).

 

Also, do not take this as a defense of hedonism—I am fairly frugal myself—but I honestly believe positive encouragement tends to work better at getting the point across than the tried and not-so-true A HUNDRED LASHES!!! method. For non-psychopaths, at least.

 

 

 

The faces change, but the game stays the same. One one side one man hugs his gun and starts talking about big brother and state interference and how they're stealing your freedom to eat yourself to death and on the other another man talks about how people need to be educated whilst he nurses his soy milk chai tea latte.

 

The fact of the matter is that the WHO can't do **** all to make anybody do anything. All they've made me want to do is neck a bottle or two of port.

 

Stop banning things, stop taxing things. Stopping people from dying is the worst damned thing a society that cares about money can do. Have a nice, publically funded healthcare system so people don't have to bankrupt themselves fixing a broken leg, find cures for the really nasty diseases but otherwise just leave us to do what we want. I've got precious little time on this Earth, if I want to spend some of it chugging mojitos, I bloody well will.

 

That said, I'm all for taxing fat people, because that ****'s gross, yo.

 

Right, that sounds sensible. Now, precisely where is this "nasty" threshold at? Take lower back pain, for instance. Sure, it lacks the shock value of, say, a West Nile Virus outbreak, but it's the #1 cause of lost work hours in many developed countries. That sure looks like something public health policy should be addressing, don't you think?

 

And speaking of gross, what is exactly "soy milk chai tea latte"? If it doesn't come from something with teats, it sure as **** is not "milk".

 

edit: huh, so "teats" is allowed, but the colloquial alternative isn't. Hooray for consistency.

Edited February 7, 2014 by 213374U

[Mor]

I don't know what drives people to change their habits, because it's different for everyone. In my case, it was something as silly and vain as the hope that I would get noticed more by the opposite sex (it worked, but not quite the way I expected...). For others it may be medical prescription after a check-up, a desire to look better, a way to blow off steam. But it really is a minority that are both healthy and thinking about long-term health. So I guess many people don't really "care" but still do it, while there are others that are aware of the problem but, for whatever reasons don't ever get started.

 

I'm sorry man, but I'm not buying into this manichaean vision of winners and losers, of strong and weak. That is a division that is only really valid if made in retrospect, evaluated at the end of a person's life. But until that point, it's still up in the air; and whatever paths a person takes are the result of a myriad of factors, only one of which is willpower. Unless you believe that some people are naturally weak minded, but then the proposition is even worse (punish the weak for being weak).

 

Also, do not take this as a defense of hedonism—I am fairly frugal myself—but I honestly believe positive encouragement tends to work better at getting the point across than the tried and not-so-true A HUNDRED LASHES!!! method. For non-psychopaths, at least.

It always easier todo something when you have a goal in mind, some event, some woman, whatever. But what I have been trying to say all along, that in the end you are doing it for yourself. Just like with personal hygiene, you don't shower and brush your teeth so that someone won't get grossed, you do it for yourself, fitness is exactly the same. Its about not neglecting yourself and should be a basic part of life.

 

I didn't spoke about strong and weak, I didn't tried to quantify the path a person took, refer to his past or put it in relative terms to other. I only spoke about people who give up.

 

I agree, positive encouragement, support and communication are perfect if we are talking about a personal approach, but IMO in terms of making policy this approach doesn't translate i.e. fliers on your windshield, in your mailbox, commercials, seminars and other general non personal approaches are regarded by most as "spam"... and you can't make it personal without going 1984 and big brother and becoming really intrusive.

 

 

Stop banning things, stop taxing things. Stopping people from dying is the worst damned thing a society that cares about money can do. Have a nice, publically funded healthcare system so people don't have to bankrupt themselves fixing a broken leg, find cures for the really nasty diseases but otherwise just leave us to do what we want. I've got precious little time on this Earth, if I want to spend some of it chugging mojitos, I bloody well will.

Just to make sure, no one is banning anything or saying that you shouldn't do what you want. However, some of the thing that you want todo has consequences on all of us, direct like in secondhand smoking or indirect like medical bills over smoking and obesity related issues.

 

So what I suggested is that you can do whatever you want todo, but pay for its the consequences, not shuffle it everyone else.

Edited February 8, 2014 by Mor

[Walsingham]

Whoah, hold up there, buddy. First principle, and get this straight, how a man chooses to meet his end is his business alone. Yes we do need to all get along. But the way to do that is loose fitting parts that accept a bit of friction. Like an AK.

 

Please tell me I didn't just say that the perfect world is a world built by kalashnikov.

[Kroney]

Oh man, that'll teach me for not taking the internet seriously.

 

Serious answer: Healthcare for stuff that's not your fault, smoking and drinking related illnesses you take your chances with. Sure if there's a spare liver or kidney knocking about that nobody else needs, then you're lucky. Just accept you're going to be further down the list than people that aren't doing their best to kill themselves through vice. You're an adult, you get to choose what you want to do, you are also expected to live, or die, with the consequences. Universal healthcare is a wonderful, wonderful thing, however it is not an excuse to check out of your responsibilities, it's not your mum.

 

As I said, the WHO is not banning anything, it doesn't have the power to. It's doing what it's supposed to do, make recommendations based on the evidence they have. What they've actually said is "drink and cigs* are bad, they lead to cancer. Cancer is also bad". What pisses me off is that it's taken God knows how many very clever people God knows how long and God knows how much in public funding to tell me something I already knew.

 

And if we can't tax fat people, can we at least send them to compulsory camps where they get to stuff themselves as much as they like in return for having the fat milked out of them to burn for fuel? Two problems fixed with one stone, right there.

 

*yeah, so a word for cigarettes that begins with "F" is banned on a US site. Should have seen that coming, really.

Edited February 10, 2014 by Kroney

[Walsingham]

Kroney, I'm 100% behind your last post. My point wasn't that the WHO are going to send healthtroopers into my fridge. My point is that there is an overall trend among the trans-national super-bureaucracies towards intervention under the banner of health. Expensive and wasteful research like that in the OP are just the excuse. The real motivator is that it gives the bureaucrats themselves a mandate for continued employment and budgets. 

 

I'm not saying you can't have state-funded healthcare. I'm saying that the objective can't be 'better' health for everyone. That's a mission which cannot end.

[Kroney]

Certainly. Making people "better" has definitely never had any negative consequences in the past.

[TrashMan]

Call me crazy, but people are stupid and sometimes need saving from themselves.

 

Yeah, they don't want it and it may not be right to force the issue.

 

But dammit is humanity stupid.

 

Alcohol, drugs, guns.... seems like humans can't trusted to do the right/smart thing.