So here's something that baffles me about this country. We have a really shoddy safety record when it comes to a lot of domestic products or even imports from China. Yet we have some really idiotic bans on innocuous products, mainly foreign imports that have either been proven safe or have a safety record better than most products. Some examples of this are sheep lungs (for human consumption), all legal forms of absinthe and absinth, fugu that's either farm raised or has been certified butchered (you can currently only legally import fugu if you have a license and are employed in cooking it) and others.
To me, the ban and draconian enforcement on kinder surprise seems the most idiotic. For those who don't know, kinder surprise is a chocolate candy made by Ferraro consisting of either a chocolate shell with a plastic egg and toy inside or a plastic egg with one half chocolate and one half sealed toy. Now there may be some issues with choking as safety but the counter argument to that would be that
1. There's a big label saying that the candy isn't for children under 3.
2. Ferraro's been around for quite a few decades, they make a lot of popular products including Nutella and for all their sales, there have only reportedly been 7 child deaths in their entire history. Compare that to Happy Meals or US toys that are still on the market. Maybe I'm being insensitive but considering that it's a cheap children's candy that's been on the market for around 35 years, 7 out of something like 1 billion seems like a pretty damn good safety record.
The most stunning thing is that though you can find it in some US stores, the police and courts have been going outside of their jurisdiction with some cases being reported of people being fined $300 FOR POSSESSION. This isn't a controlled substance or serious contraband. It's a ****ing chocolate.
And just as a double standard, Nestle Wonderballs were a similar concept that were allowed until someone pointed it out. So Nestle changed the design to instead incorporate no plastic egg and no toy, but irregularly shaped, sweet tart-typed candies inside which are easy to choke on.
Thoughts?
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It might have made some sense at one point when Kinder Surprise toys were actually a bit complex and had small parts. Now though they have at most three parts which are rather large and come packed with a disclaimer about how they present a choking hazard in many languages.
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Statistically speaking, that's a better safety record than almost any US company.
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I'm amazed. Maybe it's just an Irish thing, but as nice as the chocolate was, kids wanted it for the toy in the first place, and it always came in a big plastic casing that you'd have to be pretty stupid to swallow.
Of course nowadays, you appreciate the chocolate more, but still...
I really, really love being not American sometimes.
__________________ Recently Produced and Distributed Young but High-Ranking Political Figure of Royal Ancestry within the Modern American Town Affectionately Referred To as Bel-Air.
You can't get Absinth here (the czech dreck) or the more potent and flavorful bleau absinthes or Spanish Absentas for the most part. So far only the fairly humdrum green verite stuff has been approved.
__________________ Land of the free, home of the brave...
Do you think we will ever be saved?
In this land of dreams find myself sober...
Wonder when will it'll all be over...
Living in a void when the void grows colder...
Wonder when it'll all be over?
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The way the banners are crying on, youd expect T-Shirts saying "I Survived Kinder Surprises" to carry some impressive weight with them.....
Man I Feel bad for those seven kids, but I'd bet choking on boiled sweets and nuts is way more common.
I wonder if the real reason for the ban was the trend in fool proof dope stashing offered up by the airtight plastic egg....
Well...foolproof except for this guy: http://cannazine.co.uk/cannabis-new...capes-jail.html
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Last edited by Sadako of Girth on Mar 3rd, 2011 at 02:24 PM
If the chocolates are that insignificant... and if they're available in many stores anyway... why do people give a shit if they're banned?
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And to some its like Concorde being recalled, the end of Space Shuttle Orbitors, like when the Amiga was ran into the ground before its potential could ever be fully realised by incompetent and stupid, profiteering management by one man..
Unique iconic things that are stamped out, often for seemingly silly reasons.
But mostly its the dope smuggling thing, methinks.
Maybe they want more US goods sold, so they find ways of blocking foriegn stuff.
It is hypocritical when you consider how much poison like Aspartame and Flouride ridden goods they allowed to be sold, they even flouride in tap water for fooks sake.
God, you people just don't understand. An egg with a big, had plastic egg in it is dangerous. An egg with no plastic egg but lots of small, hard, irregularly shaped sour candies in it, like wonderball, is safe. Also boba tea is safe. Hot dog on a stick is safe. Cereal with toys in it is safe. popcorn with unpopped kernals is safe...
__________________ Land of the free, home of the brave...
Do you think we will ever be saved?
In this land of dreams find myself sober...
Wonder when will it'll all be over...
Living in a void when the void grows colder...
Wonder when it'll all be over?
Will you be laughing when it's over?
Well then we should outlaw every single food and toy on the market other than gluten-free non-dairy gruel, shouldn't we. Can't have any foods that have reported any kinds of deaths so anything containing saturated or transfats, milk, wheat, bones, foil wrappings, meat, honey, nuts, peanuts, eggs, shells, that needs to be chewed, or is of a consistency thicker than ketchup is out of the question because all of those products kill thousands individually every year through spoilage, food borne illness, choking, allergic reactions, atherosclerosis, and celiac disease, right?
__________________ Land of the free, home of the brave...
Do you think we will ever be saved?
In this land of dreams find myself sober...
Wonder when will it'll all be over...
Living in a void when the void grows colder...
Wonder when it'll all be over?
Will you be laughing when it's over?
Didn't you get her joke? She said that she "argee(s)". Clearly she's being ironic.
__________________ Recently Produced and Distributed Young but High-Ranking Political Figure of Royal Ancestry within the Modern American Town Affectionately Referred To as Bel-Air.
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Mar 2nd, 2011 10:00 PM
