I think many people have come to believe this, and not just about Mississippi.
Your optimism about the potential for government policy-based solutions is refreshing. But it reminds me of the optimism of institutions like the World Bank that under-developed countries can fix their woes if only they would stop being so backwards. If they would adopt the cultural and economic policies of the first world, then surely their economies would begin to prosper just like ours…there’s always room at the top, right?
I can’t completely discount the theory that some communities are poor because they’re backwards, but I think this explanation is somewhat self-serving when deployed by more prosperous outsiders. And regardless, the influence is far stronger in the other direction: from Uganda to Mississippi, communities are backwards because they’re poor.
I’ve been thinking about this whole jailable offense dilemma some more, and just in case anyone here has a job in advertising or marketing etc. has made it this far downthread, here’s my free pitch for y’all, in keeping with the trend of disemvowelment of various dot-coms lately:
When Impossible burgers gets cheaper than Beef? I am kind of concerned that shady places will start using it to adulterate their hamburgers. Is a 51% beef 49% Impossible-like burger product hamburger still a “burger”? Right now, it would be.
And it’s not that I think Veggie burgers are wrong or are less than beef burgers, it’s just that I want to make sure that what the food says on the label is what is in the package, even at restaurants. Personally, having a pork casing on a beef hotdog causes me a LOT more problems than accidently getting slipped a Vegetarian Hotdog on occasion, but I don’t know if there are other people who that isn’t the case for, and I want to make sure that they are protected. (I know that there are a LOT of people out there with Soy allergies.)
Sure, but all the legislation in the world won’t stop companies or restaurants from lying. I remember when I was in high school, the cafeteria once left their shipping crates in view of the lunch line and we could all see the boxes of frozen burger patties that said “frozen hamburgers, beef with soy product”, and when kids complained, the school insisted we were getting 100% beef burgers.
The only folks that are really aided by new laws like these are the lawyers profiting off of the endless lawsuits, honestly.
But no one is buying something labeled a “veggie burger” by accident.
Although… personal anecdote, I am vegetarian and I avoided field roast for a while thinking it was just organic or grass fed meat. a closer look at the packaged cleared up the confusion pretty easily.
I’ve never seen those in with the meat-based sausages; they’re always in their own veggie/bio/alternatives area and the labels seem to make it pretty clear that this isn’t a meat product.
In my corner market, there is no separate section. And yes, if you are familiar with the brand and read the label closely, you see that it’s labeled vegetarian and vegan. But all those parts of the label are in a much smaller font than the word “Frankfurters” (or “Sausage” on their other products) and the title “Grain Meat Co.” is placed prominently. Am I to blame for not reading the label closely enough? Sure. But can average folk be confused? Yes, and you have two examples in this thread, one who bought it not knowing it was meatless, and another who didn’t buy it because they thought it was meat.
it’s one thing to suggest that labels should be clear and not confusing. it’s another thing entirely to say specifically that the word “burger” can only be used for meat, considering that “veggie burger” is common english usage and confusing to no one.
I meant the backwards people that make laws like this possible. I’m sorry if I have to clarify that. I obviously don’t mean everyone there.
There are plenty of people like this in my own state of PA. I’ve come to learn over the last 3 years especially that there’s plenty of stupid going around.
Think about running for office, and change your state. I’m considering it myself. Starting to think theres nothing else that will work
Conservatives like to bitch about “government overreach” and the “nanny state”-- does this law bother them?
Is the law designed to protect the public, as if buying something called a “veggie burger” would harm them when they were looking for hamburger (also not made of ham)-- why doesn’t the law also apply to turkey-burgers and turkey-dogs?
Why only apply it to “slaughtered livestock” unless the government is in the business of picking losers and winners here? They can pretend to have the welfare of the public in mind, but what’s really going on here is an attempt to favor the meat industry.
In the UK we have a plant-based milk called Mylk that all my vegan/lactose intolerant/just-don’t-like-milk friends swear by. Nobody’s going to mistake it for cow’s milk from the packaging, but they might if it were in tea or coffee.
There is an extremely small minority who actually believe in the ideas that conservatives have pretended to believe in since Reagan. They are all currently scratching their heads wondering where all their supporters went, still too far out of tune with how people actually think and behave to understand that no one took them seriously in the first place. The vast majority of proponents of that philosophy were just using it as a thin excuse to consolidate wealth in the hands of oligarchs.
