Fast Food

To describe how fast food affects my life the first thing to do is to define what I consider fast food. To me fast food comes from places like McDonalds, Burger King, Taco Bell, and Arby's, to name a few. I very rarely eat at places like these. I grew up the son of a butcher so I know what good, real meat is and I know that none of those places use it. I do eat at places like Noodles and Co., Pei Wei, and Qdoba which also is considered fast food however I do feel the quality of the food is better. At these places there are items on the menu that are healthy and the food is actually made to order. The only times I eat at places like McDonalds are when I really need to get something fast or if I am on a road trip and not very familiar with the area I am in and those are the only places I can find.

After reading a little bit of Fast Food Nation I will probably not be changing my eating habits in regards to fast food, but I have become more aware of the social impact these companies have. The marketing used very successfully by Walt Disney called synergy has a strong impact on society and especially children. Synergy is actually a quite ingenious concept for marketing. If a person is a fan of the NBA for instance and they see McDonalds involved with the NBA in a commercial or sponsoring the high school all-american game then they are exposed to McDonalds name and products. The one thing that I have not considered is the effect of this on children. When I was in elementary or middle school I don't think that we were even allowed to have a soda in our lunches that we brought. Now to learn that some school systems are actually being paid by companies to advertise in the schools suprises me. This is not something that I have ever heard of and with the ongoing child obesity problem in the country I think that it is a dangerous situation. Don't get me wrong I understand why a company would want to advertise in schools and why the schools need to take the money for budget purposes, so I am not even totally against it, but I do think that it is important that young children have a healthy diet.