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Tell McDonald’s: Stop Using Toys to Push Junk Food on Kids

If you want to know who is making your kids fat, ask Shrek. Or Barbie. Or Yoda, Darth Vader, and R2-D2. These are all characters that McDonald’s uses to entice kids into its restaurants so they can chow down on Happy Meals. But one non-profit aims to call the company out for using toys to unfairly market junk food to impressionable children.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) recently issued a challenge to McDonald’s: Stop using toys to pimp out unhealthy foods to kids, or we’ll sue you. CSPI claims that using toys to market unhealthy meals to children is a practice that’s unfair, deceptive, and illegal under some states’ consumer protection laws.

And while McDonald’s responded to CSPI’s demands by reiterating its commitment to stocking all Happy Meals with toys, it seems like the company might actually be running scared. In its very public demands to McDonald’s, CSPI highlighted the fact that all 24 Happy Meal combos contained more than 430 calories, the recommended caloric intake for lunches eaten by kids ages four-to-eight. According to the Appetite for Profit blog, just three days after CSPI issued its request to McDonald’s, the Golden Arches updated its Happy Meal nutritional content information on its Web site. The new info indicates that three Happy Meal combos contain fewer than 430 calories. McDonald’s claims it simply noticed an error in its nutritional information, but the timing seems a little too coincidental.

While McDonald’s is hardly the only restaurant that uses kid-friendly characters to market unhealthy foods, CSPI makes a good case against Happy Meal toys. According to CSPI, back in 2007, McDonald’s agreed to only advertise kids’ food that meets certain nutrition standards, an agreement reached under Council of Better Business Bureau’s Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative. But despite the fact that Shrek may only advertise Apple Dippers and low-fat milk on TV, a CSPI study showed that when kids or parents order Happy Meals, they’re given French fries 93 percent of the time. Kids get lured into the restaurant through the promise of a new toy — they’re rewarded with foods high in fat, sugar, calories, and salt.

From the McDonald’s example — and countless others, for that matter — it’s clear that using cartoon characters and other kid-friendly incentives to push junk food contributes heavily to America’s childhood obesity epidemic. Kids beg parents to go to McDonald’s to get Happy Meal toys. When children or parents order Happy Meals, they are
automatically given French fries 93 percent of the time, and offered soda first 78 percent of the time. These sugary and salty snacks give kids a taste for unhealthy foods, so the cycle repeats itself, setting children up for an increased risk of obesity, diabetes, and other diet-related disorders.

And sure, it’s up to parents to say no to their kids. But McDonald’s and other junk food purveyors make parental duties exceedingly more difficult. “I try my best to educate my kids about healthy eating, but it’s hard when I am competing against the allure of a new Shrek toy,” Sheila Nesbitt, a mother of two kids, told CSPI.

A Happy Meal toy may make kids giddy in the short-term, but developing obesity and diabetes sets children up for a lifetime of health issues. Support CSPI and sign its petition demanding that McDonald’s stop using toys to market unhealthy meals to children.

Photo credit: Cosmic Kitty via Flickr

Psychiatric Meds 101: A Surprising Discovery

By Shane “The People’s Chemist” Ellison
Author, Over-The-Counter Natural Cures

I may be a perfect candidate for psychiatry.

I ask questions with period marks to shorten conversations. I avoid eye contact with strangers in fear (maybe it’s anxiety) that I might learn too much about them. I secretly think that Metallica would be making better music if they went back to bludgeoning themselves with party drugs and alcohol, instead of “therapy.” I’m trying to master the Law of Un-attraction to shield myself from a “real job,” small homes and junky cars.  And, I’m constantly giving my children advice, only to give it to myself.

Psychiatry, can your drugs help me?

Perhaps these questions are what motivated me to pursue a career as a drug design chemist, winning multiple awards for my work. Nothing gets me more excited than drugs and how they affect the body (except my wife’s abs). I’ve studied their molecular anatomy, risked life and limb to mix and match explosive chemicals in a round bottom flask, and even sold my soul to Big Pharma in exchange for a lab bench and chemical hood.

During this time, I’ve made some surprising discoveries about psychiatric meds, which include antidepressants, antipsychotics, stimulants, and anti-anxiety drugs. Understanding what I’ve learned will protect you from the flood of side effects that are now being discovered at breakneck speeds, courtesy of the myriad of patients being prescribed psychiatric drugs in the name of mental health.

Your Own Personal Hell

Antidepressants strive to increase the levels of a “coping” molecule known as serotonin in the brain. It supposedly helps us find happiness when it’s covered in an avalanche of nastiness. But, it’s never been proven. Still, the drugs attempt to boost serotonin by “selectively” stopping the “reuptake” among brain cells. This is where the whole SSRI acronym came from—“selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor.” It’s a slick name, but a stupid idea. Nothing is selective in the body.

While trying to block the reuptake of serotonin, antidepressants can also prevent its release and that of another brain compound known as dopamine. The areas of the brain responsible for release and reuptake of these neurotransmitters are so damn similar (after all, they work on the same molecule) that an antidepressant drug isn’t smart enough to understand which one it is supposed to work on. So it does what any dumb drug would do, it blocks both. That’s why users usually carry a glassy stare in their eye. Fully under the psychiatric spell, they’ve tuned out.

Deep sadness, fear, anger and aggression can set in over time. By removing serotonin and dopamine from the brain, long-term antidepressant users can’t find or feel happiness. Instead, they may become buried in the avalanche of nastiness. And if you can’t find or feel happiness in life, what’s the point? What’s going to stop you from snapping your own neck or spraying bullets on your classmates? Not much when you live in your own personal antidepressant hell.

Think this is all opinion?

According to the FDA, antidepressants can cause suicidal thoughts and behavior, worsening depression, anxiety, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, impulsivity, aggression, psychotic episodes and violence.  Some even cause homicidal ideation according to the manufacturers. Many long-term antidepressant users will tell you they no longer feel normal emotions—they’re numb, like zombies.

But the side effects of these drugs aren’t limited to hijacking your feelings and emotional state, causing violent and psychotic states. Physical side effects occur too and include abnormal bleeding, birth defects, heart attack, seizures and sudden death. Over one hundred and seventy drug regulatory warnings and studies have been issued on antidepressants, to sound the alarm on these side effects.

For Elephant Use Only

Psychiatrists prescribe antipsychotic meds such as Zyprexa and Seroquel, for anything from schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, delusional disorder, psychotic depression, autism or anything else they can think of, even “pervasive developmental disorder,” which is perfect for boosting sales because it targets children who suffer from irritability, aggression, and agitation. It’s a shame ‘cause these drugs are good for nothing but sedating irate elephants, not curing psychiatric disease.

According to a study published in Psychological Medicine, antipsychotic drugs cause brains to shrink – they lessen brain matter and volume. Originally designed for those deemed “schizophrenic,” the drug companies came up with a brilliant marketing campaign to sell these drugs to a much wider market—unsatisfied antidepressant users. You’ve probably seen the ads—if your “depression medication” isn’t working, then don’t blame the drug; you may just have bipolar disorder!

Once swallowed, antipsychotics sail through the blood stream where they’re carried to the brain. Like a giant oil spill, antipsychotics cover the brain in a medicinal slick, where brain wave transmission is blocked. Users become devoid of normal brain activity. Motivation, drive and feelings of reward are shunted. If psychiatry considers this a “treatment,” they’re the crazy ones.

If you’ve ever seen someone who has suffered from the “spill” courtesy of following doctors orders, you can’t mistake one of the most common side effects, it’s called Akathisia. Involuntary movements, tics, jerks in the face and the entire body can become permanent side effects for antipsychotic users.

Antipsychotics also cause obesity, diabetes, stroke, cardiac events, respiratory problems, delusional thinking and psychosis. Drug regulators from the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa warn that they can also lead to death. I wouldn’t be surprised if psychiatrists considered this a cure…

Use This to Jump The Grand Canyon

If you’re going to attempt to jump your scooter over the Grand Canyon, or ride your snowboard off Kilimanjaro, stimulants are great. They flood the brain with dopamine and trigger an inhuman surge of adrenaline, responsible for making you believe life is grand, despite eminent death. Outside of that, you’re either a speed freak, a college student trying to learn an entire semester of Biology 101 in 4 hours, or a fifth grader “following doctor’s orders.”

Top stimulants being prescribed today are nothing more than a mix of amphetamines packaged into trade names like Adderall, Dexedrine and Ritalin.  Street thugs sell it as meth, poor man’s cocaine, crystal, ice, glass and speed. It’s no wonder kids are now abusing Ritalin, Adderall and these drugs more than street drugs, they’re cheaper to get and they’re “legal,” hence the term kiddie cocaine.

Even the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) categorizes Ritalin in the Schedule ll category, meaning a high potential for abuse—just like cocaine and morphine. All of them have the same effects regardless of how they’re named: Central nervous system overload leading to heart attack and/or heart failure. And kids are dropping faster than Meth Heads at Raves…

I’m not exaggerating.

Eleven international drug regulatory agencies and our own FDA has issued warnings that stimulants like Ritalin cause addiction, depression, insomnia, drug dependence, mania, psychosis, heart problems, stroke and sudden death.

Bash Your Head in with Anti-Anxiety Drugs

If you’re not man enough for a drug that could sedate an elephant like antipsychotics, then psychiatrists will prescribe anti-anxiety meds, particularly benzodiazepines. Choosing between the two is akin to deciding whether or not you should be hit in the head with an aluminum bat or a wooden one; anti-anxiety meds being the latter.

Discovered in the stinky chemistry labs of Hoffman La Roche in 1955, anti-anxiety meds aim to trigger sleep receptors in the brain, just slightly. So, rather than being riddled with anxiety, you are put to sleep, halfway. It’s “treatment,” and psychiatrists have been “practicing it for decades.” But, it has yet to work, because drugging your problems away is more dangerous than anxiety. The use of anti-anxiety meds is coupled with a host of nasty side effects such as seizures, aggression and violence once the drug wears off. Hallucinations, delusional thinking, confusion, abnormal behavior, hostility, agitation, irritability, depression and suicidal thinking are all possible outcomes according to Big Pharma’s heavily guarded research papers.

Getting off the drugs could be harder than abandoning a heroin addiction. Some have described withdrawal from “benzos” being akin to pulling hundreds of fish hooks out of their skin, without anesthesia. If you doubt their addictive nature, go to Google search and type in a few of the leading anti-anxiety drugs like Klonopin or Xanax and here is what you’ll find:

“Klonopin withdrawal” 1,860,000 results

“Xanax withdrawal” 1,980,000 results

Exposing Psychiatry: How to Get The Truth

In total, the side effects of psychiatric meds spread far and wide. And most are hidden from patients and doctors alike. Fortunately, Citizens Commission on Human Rights has solved this problem with a state-of-the-art database that allows people to search through the adverse reaction reports sent to the FDA on psychiatric drugs. It also provides international drug regulatory agency warnings and studies published on the side effects of the drugs.

So, can psychiatry help me? No. And that’s surprising because psychiatric meds are some of the biggest selling drugs, poised to seal the hopes and dreams of millions.  Regardless of what mental state I might be in (or anyone else for that matter), there is not a single drug that cures, treats or solves the perceived problems of mental health.

While people can suffer miserably from emotional or mental duress that can hinder their lifestyle, the pseudo-science of psychiatry has yet to solve any of these problems, and in fact only contributes to poor health as seen by the wide array of side effects. Marketing campaigns and ghostwritten medical journals are designed to obscure these facts. But the psychiatric drug side effect database courtesy of CCHR ensures that all patients have access to the truth, to the documented facts, which could save their life or that of a loved one.

About the Author

Shane Ellison holds a masters degree in organic chemistry and is the author of Over-The-Counter Natural Cures.  An award winning chemist, he has been quoted by USA Today, Shape, Woman’s World, as well as Women’s Health and appeared on Fox and NBC as a natural medicine advocate.  Sample his book free at www.thepeopleschemist.com

Girls now begin puberty aged 9

Submitted by Drew Kaplan on July 4, 2010 –

GROWING numbers of girls are reaching puberty before the age of 10, raising fears of increased sexual activity among a new generation of children.
Scientists believe the phenomenon could be linked to obesity or exposure to chemicals in the food chain, and is putting girls at greater long-term risk of breast cancer.
A study has revealed that breast development in a sample of 1,000 girls started at an average age of 9 years and 10 months — an entire year earlier than when a similar cohort was examined in 1991. The research was carried out in Denmark in 2006, the latest year for which figures were available, but experts believe the trend applies to Britain and other parts of Europe. Data from America also point to the earlier onset of puberty. Scientists warn that such young girls are ill-equipped to cope with sexual development when they are still at primary school.

“We were very surprised that there had been such a change in a period of just 15 years,” said Anders Juul, head of the Department of Growth and Reproduction at the University hospital in Copenhagen, a world leader in the study of hormones and growth.

“If girls mature early, they run into teenage problems at an early age and they’re more prone to diseases later on. We should be worried about this regardless of what we think the underlying reasons might be. It’s a clear sign that something is affecting our children, whether it’s junk food, environmental chemicals or lack of physical activity.”

Hitting puberty early can mean longer exposure to oestrogen, which is a factor in breast cancer. There is also a greater risk of heart disease.

A number of artificially produced chemicals have been blamed for interfering with sexual development, notably bisphenol A, a plastic found in the lining of tin cans and babies’ feeding bottles.

Juul’s research team is now testing blood and urine samples from girls in the study to see if a direct link can be drawn between early sexual maturation and bisphenol A.

Another factor in puberty could be diet. Children are eating more than previous generations and growing bigger — and in many cases becoming obese.

There has been a steady lowering in the onset of puberty. In the 19th century, it was at about 15 for girls and 17 for boys.

The international standard for normal puberty in white girls was set in the 1960s at 12Å for the age when periods begin and at about 14 for boys when their voices break and their growth surges.

A more recent consensus in Britain has proved elusive. “Although we don’t have clear data here, there is evidence the same thing [as in Denmark] is happening for reasons that we don’t understand,” said Richard Sharpe, head of the Medical Research Council’s human reproductive sciences unit in Edinburgh.

“We don’t know if this is the result of better nutrition or environmental factors, but it does create social problems for girls who are already living in a sexualised society.”

Sharpe said boys had also been affected by the phenomenon. Choir schools have reported an increasing number of boys dropping out because their voices had broken at the age of 12 or 13.

Richard Stanhope, an expert in hormonal disorders in children who recently retired from Great Ormond Street hospital, said specialists in his field believed they were seeing more children going through early puberty.

“All the things we experience as teenagers are difficult enough to cope with, but when it happens at 10 or 11 it is much worse,” he said.

“These children are also at a much higher risk of being sexually abused because it is hard for some adults to understand and behave appropriately towards them.”

Girls who reach puberty early often find themselves teased at school. “I had to wear a bra at 9,” said one girl, who did not want to be named. “I used to pretend to be ill to get out of changing for PE.

“The worst part was men coming on to me as though I was an adult when actually I was 11.”

A study published in the journal Public Health Nutrition last Friday showed a link between high meat consumption and earlier puberty in girls.

Researchers at Brighton University found that 49% of girls who ate meat 12 times a week at the age of 7 had reached puberty by the age of 12 1/2, compared with 35% of those who ate meat four times a week or less.

Tuning In – Channeling

This movie is absolutel amazing. I was sent this to me by my good friends Pete & Cathy which you can view their websites by clicking on their links on the side bar (Voice of the Prymids & Mystery Labs). I was exposed to Bashar awhile back as well as Ester and Jerry Hicks with Aberham, but it’s great to see many of these people able to do this!

What’s also amazing is that I did a Full Moon meditative re-dedication ritual to my selfless service to God and all beings and I asked a question and this video had the answer. I’m not going to share what it was, but God/The Universe had answered it quicker then I realized!

What magic huh?

Great movie, check it out!

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TUNING IN is a truly unique feature-length spiritual documentary, the result of 10 years of inquiry into the phenomenon of spirit channeling by filmmaker David Thomas. Channeling is a practice dating back to antiquity wherein an individual, usually in a trance state, makes a psychic connection with a spirit being. The “channeler” is then able to act as a dimensional go-between in bringing other humans in contact with the entity, as well as interpreting messages from the entity.

For the very first time, six of America’s prominent channelers are featured in the same film in order to gain insight into the phenomenon, as well as the information being received. They are Lee Carroll–channel for Kryon, John Cali–channel for Chief Joseph, Shawn Randall–channel for Torah, Darryl Anka–channel for Bashar, Geoffrey Hoppe–channel for Tobias and Wendy Kennedy–channel for the Pleiadian Collective.

The entities coming through—each with a strong and distinct personality—were interviewed at length by the filmmaker and the result is remarkable: across space and time it appears the entities are speaking as one, delivering a clear and profound message of empowerment for humankind.

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