Recently Prince Charles shot his mouth off with a reporter in earshot. Seems that Bonny Prince Charles suggested to a nutritionist at a diabetes center he was visiting that she should try to get McDonald’s banned. (See here and here)
Money quote:
Prince Charles asked nutritionist Nadine Tayara: “Have you got anywhere with McDonald’s, have you tried getting it banned? That’s the key.”
Now, I would agree that banning McDonald’s would probably be a step forward in promoting good health, but I’m too much a free marketer to ever suggest such a thing. Besides, people who go to McDonald’s and make proper food selections can lose weight and be healthy. So it a choice thing, not a McDonald’s thing. McDonald’s sells crappy food, but it also sells good food, albeit in much lesser quantities than it does the crappy. But grocery stores sell cigarettes. Does that mean we should ban grocery stores?
What I find so hypocritical in Prince Charles recommending a ban on McDonald’s is that he is affiliated with a UK company that produces and sells a ton of what could easily be called junk food. Granted, it’s organically produced junk food, but your pancreas doesn’t really care. Sugar is sugar.
So says HRH Charlie:
I wanted to demonstrate that it was possible to produce food of the highest quality, working in harmony with the environment and nature, using the best ingredients and adding value through expert production. I also wanted to engender increasing funds for my Charitable Foundation, which receives all the profits through which I can then support an increasing number of worthwhile projects.
I suppose profiting from junk food, then using those profits for good causes is better than just profiting from junk foods, but…
If you navigate through the website of this company, you will find it product-heavy in the cake, pie, biscuit, and chocolate department, and sadly lacking in meat. There is some, but not much that hasn’t been processed or baked in a pie. I’m sure that if a person with diabetes dined solely on foods from this company he (or she) wouldn’t be any better off than if dining at McDonald’s.
Before Prince Charles worries about the mote in someone else’s eye, perhaps he should consider the beam in his own.
He’s well meaning but in reality he’s from another planet and spouts too much woo!
Mind you, I wouldn’t swop positions with him.
Sir a book a few yrs ago by Giles Brandreth about Liz n Phil (and they were interviewed extensively by GB) stated unequivocally how ostentatiously they feel Chuck lives.
Now can one imagine if they feel like that.
He’s a phuqing idiot of the highest order..prattles on about the environment and yet flies a few weeks ago to NYC with a party of 17 i think it was to receive an award for Environmentalism.
Same with Gore..if they really meant what they said..truly deeply they would simply not go and give their reason by video linkage or what have you.
I’m all for the Royals but they should each get a little house in the country and a salary of say 60k a year and that’d be their lot.
I know fat tailed power laws explains how and why things like this happen in systems but the moral questions of a man having so much simply by birth are in no small ways answered by FTPL’s.
Hi Simon–
Agreed.
MRE
This isn’t the first tine HRH has put his foot in his mouth and I am sure it won’t be the last!
Oh, leave him alone. Why should it be headline news what he says? Duchy Originals is good quality – if mostly only suitable for occasional treats. Just as with McDonalds there are low carb choices in the range, e.g. a delicious celeriac soup which I have had on several occasions!
The thing about McDonalds is not that one can’t choose a low-carb option, but that most people don’t.
HRH’s main point is about connection with the methods of production, farming, animal welfare and the environment, and on that I think he is right. (Not when it comes to architecture or nanotechnology though…)
Hi Kate–
You wrote
Which is my point precisely. It’s the choices one makes, not the company that provides the choices. HRH shouldn’t have shot off his mouth about someone else’s junk food when he’s promoting his own.
Cheers–
MRE
Why has nobody commented on the absolutely great good fun photo of HRH that accompanies this blog? Love the socks, love the cane (does he need it or is it a Scotland-themed prop?), love the mug shot, love how Camilla seems to be getting a kick out of him too.
Hi Robyn–
Looks like HRH us suffering a little dyspepsia from his diet of chocolate and biscuits.
Cheers–
MRE