Thread: what...no toy in the happy meal?

I thought that there were fewer fries in the meal ... just thought it was my imagination

It's one thing if Happy Meals were government issued meals but this is a product of free enterprise. If you don't like it, don't buy it....not that our choices of meals should be government mandated. Where's the freedom to choose?

What next.......cut down the size of the hashbrowns?? Might as well.......did this organization even THINK of how many parents bring their kids to Mc's for breakfast every day???

Shhhh.... don't tell them ....

(going a bit off topic here, but how much groceries could you..(in general)...buy with $280-$360 a MONTH?? That's how much she CHARGES at Mc's for their breakfasts.)

Someone else is likely to be paying that bill

Calif. kids can have Happy Meals, judge rules
By The Associated Press



Children in California will still be able to get toys with their Happy Meals.

A San Francisco judge has dismissed a proposed class-action lawsuit that sought to stop McDonald's Corp. from using toys to market its meals to children in the Golden State. The suit had been filed in late 2010 by Monet Parham, a California mother of two, and The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.

The suit had claimed that the world's biggest hamburger chain was violating consumer protection laws and exploiting children's vulnerability by using toys to lure them to eat nutritionally unbalanced meals that can lead to obesity. The lawsuit did not seek damages.

McDonald's spokeswoman Danya Proud said that the lawsuit was without merit and detracted from "the important issue of children's health and nutrition."

"We are proud of our Happy Meals and will vigorously defend our brand, our reputation and our food," Proud said in the statement. "We stand on our 30-year track record of providing a fun experience for kids and families at McDonald's."

The Center for Science in the Public Interest said in a statement that it will discuss with Parham whether to appeal the case. The group called the use of toys to market food a "predatory practice that undermines parents, causes rifts in families and harms kids' health."

The suit, filed in the county of San Francisco, was dismissed by Judge Richard Kramer on Wednesday.

http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_new...ge-rules?lite/


Do you agree with the judge's ruling?


Yes, parents can figure this out.
No, obesity is a national health issue and this contributes to it.


Results : Total of 45,927 votes

93.9% ~ Yes, parents can figure this out. (43,120 votes)

6.1% ~ No, obesity is a national health issue and this contributes to it. (2,807 votes )

Taco Bell will drop kid's meals
Tuesday, July 23, 2013 - 10:14am

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Taco Bell announced Tuesday it has become the first national fast food chain to drop its kid's meals, saying it will discontinue the toy and food combos at some locations this month and across the brand by next year. "Kid's meals and toys simply no longer make sense for us to put resources behind," said Greg Creed, chief executive officer of Taco Bell, in a statement early Tuesday.

He added that the move will have an "insignificant impact on sales."

Taco Bell is owned by Yum Brands, which also owns KFC and Pizza Hut. KFC offers kid's meals as well, but the company did not immediately respond to questions about whether it will also drop its kids meals.

Kids meals have been criticized by some public health groups for contributing to childhood obesity by making young children more eager to eat high-calorie, fast food meals. The decision was cheered by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, which called on competitors such as McDonald's, Burger King and Wendy's to follow suit. "Taco Bell is taking a constructive step forward by no longer using toys to encourage kids to pester their parents to go to a restaurant," said the group.

But at the same time, it expressed concern that parents will now get adult meal combos for their children. "It's not as if its adult menu is full of health food," it said.

The CSPI said that the Jack in the Box chain stopped using toys to market children's meals in June 2011. But Jack in the Box is not a national chain.

http://www.nbc33tv.com/news/taco-bell-will-drop-kids

Happy reads? McDonald's to put 20 million books in Happy Meals
By Carolyn Kellogg ~ October 11, 2013, 4:52 p.m.

Most people heading to McDonald's know what to expect: They can get a cheeseburger, fries and a drink. And in November, kids can also get something to read -- 20 million somethings.

McDonald's will distribute 20 million print books in Happy Meals from Nov. 1-14. Each book will feature a McDonald's Happy Meal character and, according to the press release, "brings nutrition, imagination and play to life in a fun way."

A similar program was launched in England in January after a successful pilot project. McDonald's officials said that response to the test book giveaway was "overwhelmingly positive" and that nine out of 10 parents said they wanted to see more book promotions at McDonald's.

The company is also creating a series of custom interactive e-books that will be accessible through its McPlay Happy Meal app (you read that right, its McPlay Happy Meal App). Some of the books will be created by partner DK Publishing, which has a strong record of creating attractive print books. The print Happy Meal books will also be available in an e-book editions.

What are the books that kids will be getting with their fries? There are four. Each also will be available in a downloadable Spanish version too. Here's the official list and description of the books:

"The Goat Who Ate Everything" -- Tells a story of a goat who has a big appetite and struggles to eat right. But when he does, he feels great and becomes the playful 'kid' everyone loves.

"Deana's Big Dreams" -- Shares how Deana, the world's smallest dinosaur, grew tall by eating right.

"Ant, Can't" -- Features Ant, a bite-sized bodybuilder who's big on encouraging physical fitness through exercise and eating right.

"Doddi the Dodo Goes to Orlando" -- Follows happy-go-lucky bird Doddi who travels the world. She eats right because this dodo is always on the go-go

I'm not the target audience, but they sound a little more like lesson books than happy books. But what do I know? In the years since I last ate a Happy Meal, apple slices have been added to it, and its soda has been swapped out for milk, chocolate milk or apple juice.

http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketc...0,174154.story

One of the reasons I prefer the Chic Fil A kids meals is because they offer books and educational "toys" instead of movie promotional tie-ins....

Science Teacher: McDonald's Diet Led to 37-Pound Weight Loss
Monday, 06 Jan 2014 05:36 PM By Morgan Chilson

An Iowa science teacher ate only McDonald's food for 90 days and lost 37 pounds and 79 points off his cholesterol to prove a point to his students. “The point behind this documentary is we all have choices,” teacher John Cisna, of Colo, Iowa, told KFOR-TV. “It’s not McDonald’s that makes us fat it’s our choices.”

Showing two pictures of a side view of Cisna, one with his stomach bulging over his shorts, it's easy to see Cisna’s changed physique.



The teacher challenged his students to help him figure out appropriate daily nutritional limitations of 2000 calories and hitting recommended daily allowances of things like carbs and fats, KFOR said.

In addition to eating the McDonald’s meals, Cisna started walking 45 minutes every day. “I tell people not only can I see my shoes now, but I can actually tie them,” Cisna told KFOR.

Cisna typically started his day with two egg white delights, a bowl of maple oatmeal, and 1 percent milk, KFOR said. Lunch was usually a salad but dinner was a meal of some kind. “So this isn’t something where you say, ‘Well he went to McDonald’s and he only had the salads,’” Cisna told KFOR. “No, I had the Big Macs, the Quarter Pounders with cheese, I had sundaes, I had ice cream cones.”

A local McDonald’s manager agreed to give the teacher his meals for free to see where this experiment would lead.

Cisna, 54, was interviewed on the "Today" show Monday and told hosts there that while everyone was paying attention to how much weight he lost, he was more impressed with his blood cholesterol levels going down. “I knew I was going to lose weight,” Cisna told Today. “Math tells you that if you only eat 2000 calories a day, your body has to use more calories than that just to operate.”

http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/scien...#ixzz2pgBYdoNk


Science Teacher Loses 37 Pounds Eating Nothing But McDonald’s,
Sets Terrible Example for Students
By L.V. Anderson

It’s tempting to simply ignore morning shows, which so often peddle feel-good stories while paying no mind to the world's pressing problems. But sometimes a segment comes along that so perfectly encapsulates the perversity of modern American life that it basically demands analysis. This morning, the Today Show produced one of those segments, interviewing a middle-aged high school teacher named John Cisna who lost 37 pounds and lowered his cholesterol by eating 2,000 calories’ worth of McDonald’s food every day for 90 days.


Cisna enlisted his students as nutritionists, turning his weight-loss plan into a school project by having a few of his kids plan his daily menus. He also began walking 45 minutes each day, a change from his usual sedentary lifestyle. He got all his food free from his local McDonald’s, whose manager surely predicted that the good publicity would make up for the tiny amount of lost inventory.








I suspect that the response from the medical establishment will be that Cisna is setting a bad example for people who want to lose weight, since most of McDonald’s menu isn’t nutritionally ideal, and since eating every meal at McDonald’s is not a sustainable (or affordable) regime for most people. But I’m more concerned about the example Cisna is setting for his students.


If John Cisna wants to try to lose weight by eating at McDonald’s every day, fine—but it’s his responsibility to monitor his diet, not his students’. And teachers should be particularly careful about talking about dieting in the classroom given teens’ susceptibility to eating disorders and negative body image. Add in the pro-business political implications of Cisna’s project—“Hey, it’s choice. We all have choices; it’s our choices that make us fat, not McDonald’s,” he told a local news station http://www.kcci.com/news/central-iow...t/-/index.html — and you have what looks like the dissolution of appropriate student-teacher boundaries.


What’s worse is that Cisna’s not even teaching his kids good science. “Math tells you, if you only eat 2,000 calories a day, your body has to use more calories than that just to operate,” he told Matt Lauer and Savannah Guthrie. This “calories in, calories out” equation doesn’t tell the whole story. The composition of your diet affects your metabolism, and your metabolism slows when you lose weight. Unsurprisingly, the effect of weight loss on metabolism means that most people who lose weight gain it back—study after study has shown that most people can lose lots of weight in the short term, but few people can keep it off. (By the time Cisna gains back his lost weight, the Today Show will have moved on to another incredible, feel-good weight-loss story—perhaps someone will lose 40 pounds eating only submarine sandwiches or pizza. Oh, wait.)


What’s more, there’s not even strong evidence that losing weight is good for you. A meta-study published last month indicated that weight loss is not correlated with improvements in cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood sugar levels. What has been shown to improve these metrics? Exercise. The majority of Cisna’s cholesterol improvement was probably a result of his new daily walking routine, not the McDonald’s diet. But the truism that exercise improves health is far too boring to attract the attention of morning-show producers.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/..._terrible.html