What happened to my Sugar Smacks?
Up early this morning. The dogs woke me up around 6:20 a.m. with their rooting and snorting in bed, their canine way of telling me "Okay, we gotta pee now." Chilly outside, 23 degrees, clear skies. It won't be long and 23 degrees will feel pretty good.
So I got up, let the dogs out into the backyard and now I'm brewing a pot of Startbuck's House Blend coffee. Smells good. The house is quiet, it is still dark outside, the wife and kid are sound asleep. I like this "me" time, even though it doesn't last long.
As my coffee brewed, I grabbed a bowl out of the cupboard and poured myself a bowl of one of my favorite childhood cereals, Sugar Smacks. But to my horror, when I read the front of the box, it was no longer called Sugar Smacks! What the hell is going on here? "Dig 'em," who has long been the cutesy frog mascot of Sugar Smacks, was still prominently displayed on the cereal box. The cereal looked and tasted exactly the same (oh, the Satis-SMACK-tion!). But Kellogg's found it in their politically correct wisdom to change Sugar Smacks to Honey Smacks. Are you kidding me? Seriously, are you kidding me? When are we going to stop this pathelogical dishonesty?
In our country of political correctness, we will lie to ourselves in order to make everyone feel better. We will call a fork a spoon even if it is a knife, as long as it sounds less threatening. These days, you don't have a heart attack, you have acute coronary syndrome. Doesn't sound as serious, does it? And then to make it even less sinister, we dismantle that into just three letters "ACS." But you know what? ACS will kill your ass just as quick... because ACS is a damn heart attack. How inconvenient.
Likewise, it is no longer Kentucky Fried Chicken, is it? Nope, it is KFC, which stands for Kentucky Fried Chicken, but we've seemed to have adopted a don't ask, don't tell policy. Honey Smacks sounds wholesome and healthy. Sugar Smacks sounds sweet and fattening. Parents won't buy Sugar Smacks, but Honey Smacks sound great!
HOWEVER, boys and girls, when I discovered that my Sugar Smacks had been turned to Honey Smacks, I flipped the box around to look at the ingredients. Ah-ha! Just as I suspected. The first three ingredients (in order on the box) are: SUGAR, WHEAT, CORN SYRUP. What a relief! (Oh yeah, and below the ingredients list, I was reminded that the cereal contained wheat ingredients. I guess that was the "wheat" part on ingredient list. I would ask if people are truly this stupid, but I already know the answer.) Anyway, I was relieved to know that my Honey Smacks were quite sugary after all, but it also pissed me off that I'm being lied to.
Yet all of this has deeper implications. We have become comfortable with the notion of lying to ourselves in order to make ourselves feel better. Worse yet, we begin to actually believe those lies. That's left me wondering this morning, when did this start and why? Companies don't layoff employees anymore, they simply downsize. Planes don't crash, they just have unplanned landings. Grandma isn't constipated, she just has a logjam up the river.
Come to think of it, we really don't lie to ourselves, we are politically correct.
I don't think that's very healthy. At least as unhealthy than Sugar Smacks.
So I got up, let the dogs out into the backyard and now I'm brewing a pot of Startbuck's House Blend coffee. Smells good. The house is quiet, it is still dark outside, the wife and kid are sound asleep. I like this "me" time, even though it doesn't last long.
As my coffee brewed, I grabbed a bowl out of the cupboard and poured myself a bowl of one of my favorite childhood cereals, Sugar Smacks. But to my horror, when I read the front of the box, it was no longer called Sugar Smacks! What the hell is going on here? "Dig 'em," who has long been the cutesy frog mascot of Sugar Smacks, was still prominently displayed on the cereal box. The cereal looked and tasted exactly the same (oh, the Satis-SMACK-tion!). But Kellogg's found it in their politically correct wisdom to change Sugar Smacks to Honey Smacks. Are you kidding me? Seriously, are you kidding me? When are we going to stop this pathelogical dishonesty?
In our country of political correctness, we will lie to ourselves in order to make everyone feel better. We will call a fork a spoon even if it is a knife, as long as it sounds less threatening. These days, you don't have a heart attack, you have acute coronary syndrome. Doesn't sound as serious, does it? And then to make it even less sinister, we dismantle that into just three letters "ACS." But you know what? ACS will kill your ass just as quick... because ACS is a damn heart attack. How inconvenient.
Likewise, it is no longer Kentucky Fried Chicken, is it? Nope, it is KFC, which stands for Kentucky Fried Chicken, but we've seemed to have adopted a don't ask, don't tell policy. Honey Smacks sounds wholesome and healthy. Sugar Smacks sounds sweet and fattening. Parents won't buy Sugar Smacks, but Honey Smacks sound great!
HOWEVER, boys and girls, when I discovered that my Sugar Smacks had been turned to Honey Smacks, I flipped the box around to look at the ingredients. Ah-ha! Just as I suspected. The first three ingredients (in order on the box) are: SUGAR, WHEAT, CORN SYRUP. What a relief! (Oh yeah, and below the ingredients list, I was reminded that the cereal contained wheat ingredients. I guess that was the "wheat" part on ingredient list. I would ask if people are truly this stupid, but I already know the answer.) Anyway, I was relieved to know that my Honey Smacks were quite sugary after all, but it also pissed me off that I'm being lied to.
I believe Kellogg's should be sued for false advertising. Sugar Smacks are, and always have been, Sugar Smacks, not Honey Smacks. They are not wholesome. They are not healthy. They are full of sugar and bad for you... but they are oh-so-yummy!
It would be refreshing if just one company stepped forward and said, "Enough of the bullshit. Our product is not close to being healthy. If you eat too much of it, you will get fat. But boy-howdy is it dee-licious!" Do not print on your candybar "a good source of calcium" unless you are also willing to print "but a BETTER source of calories, fat and cholesterol!"Yet all of this has deeper implications. We have become comfortable with the notion of lying to ourselves in order to make ourselves feel better. Worse yet, we begin to actually believe those lies. That's left me wondering this morning, when did this start and why? Companies don't layoff employees anymore, they simply downsize. Planes don't crash, they just have unplanned landings. Grandma isn't constipated, she just has a logjam up the river.
Come to think of it, we really don't lie to ourselves, we are politically correct.
I don't think that's very healthy. At least as unhealthy than Sugar Smacks.
