Of course, we must do anything at all to protect the children, even ban things. Yes, ban Marmite:
After being served at a school's breakfast club, the yeast extract has been removed from the menu for being too salty - and parents are blaming 'Nanny State politicians'.
Well, no, it isn't Nanny State politicians actually. We'd really all be rather in favour of their banning aconite or strychnine from the school menu. The problem is idiocy:
The food industry's Guideline Daily Amount of salt for a child aged five to ten is 4g. A child's serving of Marmite is 2g, providing 0.25g of salt, or six per cent of a child's recommended intake.
As Paracelsus tried to drum into us all those years ago, it is the dose which is the poison. The idiocy doesn't stop here of course. Back awhile there were rules drawn up for what may not be advertised to children on the grounds that some foods are harmful to them. Yes, Marmite got caught up in this as well. For those drawing up the regulations decided that 100g would be the appropriate serving size to use as the basis of their calculations....yes, you've spotted it. Marmite was banned for its salt content for they had decided to use a 50 portion serving size to work out the salt content.
So far so trivial of course (although it is the subsequent lack of advertising revenue which is leading to all those calls for publicly funded childrens 'programming) but it's worth noting in the larger debate.
Say, about the financial markets, something which clearly isn't trivial. Perhaps we should have more regulation. Perhaps we should have less, or simply different such. Whatever the theory of such regulatory measures, we mustn't lose sight of the fact that at least some of those who devise the regulations in our fair land are identifiably and provably idiots.
There, now doesn't that make you feel better about the future and the delights it holds?
