Responsibility to Obesity
Argumentative Essay: Topic 1
By Wei Bai
English 1D (11:00-12:30)
Instructor: Buettner
January 29, 2015

Increasing trends of obesity happens not only in the US, but is also in other developing countries such as China. There were few overweight people in China at the beginning of 1990s. Along the soaring Chinese economy, the number of overweight boys and girls surged rapidly. The American fast food restaurants started flocking in. People always debate who is at fault for high rate of obesity. Some people argue that it is the big business’s fault. However, I do not agree with them. People should be responsible for their health, people have free will to make their choices.
The filmmaker Morgan Spurlock did an experiment to prove fast food caused obesity. In his experiment, he tried everything on the McDonald’s menu at least once; he ordered complete meals, which include a main course, fries, and a beverage; he finished everything; he always accepted “supersize” if possible; he walked no more than 5,000 steps per day. After the 30 days of experiments. He gained weight and felt depressed, hence he made the conclusion that McDonald was the cause for his bad health (Bhaumik 38). In fact, this so called experiment was more like a documentary. It neither had a control group, nor an independent variable, so the conclusion was not scientific. It just provided a result people love to accept. Many people then can join Spurlock’s side to avoid their own responsibility. In Spurlock’s experiment, he ate over 5000 calories per day, and he barely consumed too much energy. An adult needs about 2000 calories per day. A simple math will show Spurlock got 3000 extra calories per day. Even if the 5000 calories were from whole foods, he would gain weight anyway (McCook 35). There is no excuse, people should blame themselves for their own irresponsibility. We are the owner of our mouths; adults are responsible for their behavior and their children’s. McDonald does not do anything wrong. In a free market, it offers “supersize” to satisfy as many people as possible. In addition, McDonald has labeled the calories each meal has. Consumers in McDonald are aware of the calories they would eat, just like all smokers know smoking is bad for health. If McDonald’s supersize meals are to be blamed for high rate of obesity, the cigarettes would be blamed for many lung diseases. Under this logic, many lung cancer patients could sue cigarette companies for compensations. The same, gun producers or sellers are the main reasons for school shootings. The murders would be victims of guns, too. They buy the guns that kill people. If the guns were like old days, single shot, low accuracy, short range, so many people would not die. However, we all know the shooters are responsible for their crimes. Guns do not kill people, people do. Likewise, fast food doesn't make people fat, eating too much does. Then, who is responsible for eating? Ourselves. Perhaps big business has spoiled people. McDonald paid huge money to an old lady who was burn for the hot products; GE paid huge money to a driver who thought automatic transmission would drive automatically; Honda paid huge money to a customer whose lawn mower rushed into neighbor’s yard because he didn't hold the handle. When unpleasantness happens, we push the responsibility to companies as if they must babysit us. McDonald never pushes us to choose the supersize meal or finish everything in the plate. It is ourselves choose to do so. However, nowadays, many people seemly forget adults should take the responsibility for their own choices.
Some people argue that the 1.4 billion dollars spent on advertising is a sort of brainwash. McDonald’s influence has deeply impacted children’s minds. This cause obesity among children. I doubt this excuse. In fact, Nike spent 1.6 billion dollars in 2015 on advertising. Thus, Nike should have the similar influence which is a counter effect to