Tomorrow's Bullshit Today

It was tempting to append this crap to the previous article, but rank pre-determined parental abrogation of this scale deserves a fisking all of its own.

Tomorrow's news is already written today, by some daft, easily-led, submissive flower at the Times. Check the date of the article.

A tax on chocolate? Utterly idiotic...but a surcharge on sugar would be sweet

The people most likely to suffer from too much chocolate are not adults, but our children

You know what? I sometimes lay awake at night wishing someone would think of the chiiildren, don't you? I'm so glad Sarah Vine is doing exactly that. Shame she's passing her self-determination and her parental responsibility onto the government though.

Then, in an uncharacteristic fit of piety, I decided to give up chocolate for Lent. And it's only now that I have been clean for almost three weeks that I understand what Walker is getting at. He is right. If the cravings and blinding headaches I've been suffering are anything to go by, chocolate is a highly addictive, quite possibly toxic, substance. And it probably ought to be taxed accordingly.

Chocolate is a toxic substance? Really? Have you any scientific evidence? Or are you employing hyperbole to justify a quite unsustainable standpoint. If you are getting headaches, it's probably because your brain is suffering from a famine of intelligent thought. It has the capacity for much more than your stifled imagination can offer and is dying of boredom. How else can anyone explain this cockwaffle?

The main problem with this theory is that chocolate has the highest approval rating of any known substance, apart from, maybe, labrador puppies and Barack Obama. Suggesting that it be taxed is like suggesting a ban on football.

Except a ban on football would be vetoed by more than two fucking votes, even amongst miserable jock doctors.

No one likes a drunk; smokers smell; but chocolate-lovers are seen as harmlessly indulgent creatures.

I think the term you were looking for in the first two instances was 'in my opinion'. I do see your point though. You are trying (unsuccessfully) to equate binge-drinking and smoking with eating the odd bar of chocolate.

Now we have isolated the stunningly lame basis for your article, let's see what other bullshit you will be trumpeting today ... err tomorrow, sorry.

The almost universally negative response to Walker's idea is perfectly understandable.

You didn't wait long enough to see the result of the vote, did you? The rest of the world were negative, granted, but almost half the Scottish Doctors questioned seemed to think it was a bloody braw idea.

People dislike the thought of a nanny state and a tax on chocolate seems like the worst kind of attack on personal choice.

If you can suggest an attack on personal choice that is worse, I'd be most interested to hear it. I need to gen up on the sort of crap that tits like you are going to attempt to tax or ban next.

What about self-restraint, what about will-power, what about personal responsibility, the libertarians will wail. And they're right. People should be free to make up their own minds. Democracy is all about informed choices.

Yep, correct on all counts. Democracy and freedom rely on foundations such as personal responsibility and the right to make informed choices.

And that, I'm afraid, is where the problem lies.

Eh?

Because the people most likely to suffer from an exaggerated consumption of chocolate are not well-informed adults such as you and I. They are our children.

Oh I see. Shouldn't someone be thinking about them? I dunno, perhaps the parents?

Children, on the whole, do not really understand the concept of self-regulation.

That's what parents are for.

Sure, they can, if strictly trained, be made to follow certain rules, but it is in their natures to be unrestrained.

That's what parents are for.

They have no experience to tell them otherwise. Put a five-year-old in front of the TV and he or she will watch it until you pull the plug.

That's what parents are for. Are you getting this yet?

The same goes for computer games, possibly more so for sweets and chocolates.

See above. You're getting rather tedious now.

Give a child £1 to spend in the corner shop, and he or she is unlikely to come home with a banana and a pint of semi-skimmed milk. They will cram as much rubbish into their pockets as their budget permits. It's not just the clever marketing; it's that these sugary treats give their little metabolisms a hit that they - young, inexperienced, uncomprehending - are almost powerless to resist.

Give them less money then, or explicitly tell them what they can and can't buy. That's what parents are for, for fuck's sake!

And the problem is that, as a parent, you can control only what a child eats within your own four walls. All that careful indoctrination about sweets rotting the teeth goes only so far. With hundreds of brands of cheap chocolate available, and more popping up every day, protecting our offspring from the risks of excessive calorific consumption is a losing battle.

It's all in the parenting, you twat. If they don't listen to you, perhaps your parenting skills are shit. Just a thought.

Anything else you want the state to help you with regarding your kids? A council officer knocking on your door at 8pm and tucking them in, perhaps? A government-approved inspector sitting by their bed to stop them wanking when you are asleep?

So I would go even farther than Walker. I would impose a tax on refined sugar. I'm not talking about prohibition, just enough to make people stop and think;

Not talking about prohibition? How very fucking generous of you, you lazy fucking harpy?

Why lazy? Because you think that your responsibility for your kids should be absolved by allowing the state to dictate. You are one horrendous bovine, seriously.

Sugar, really, is the great poison of our generation. It's in all the things that are bad for us: fizzy drinks, processed foods, nasty cheap snacks. Not only is refined sugar (as distinct from naturally occurring sugar) superfluous to our diets, it is also the one thing that if consumed in excess when young can lead to a short and unhealthy life.

Your kids' lives are entirely your responsibility. The state should have nothing to do with it. If you can't stop them eating what you don't wish them to, try harder. And if you think that government increasing taxes is going to mean that you can relax and forget your obligations, let me remind you of this. After all, you wrote it.

it is in their natures to be unrestrained

If you can't restrain them (which seems to be your problem), what on earth makes you think that a few pence on chocolate is going to do the trick?

Budge up, Dr Walker: I may well be joining you in that bunker of yours.

Off you jolly well toddle then. With you two cuddling up together, just the one mortar shell will suffice.