And they made good quality healthy, yummy, and nutritious foods like fresh fruit available instead, right? Right?
this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2025
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This is some American prosperity-gospel bullshit. "If you're poor, it's a moral failing. You're lucky you get anything at all, and you certainly aren't allowed any treats!" I do have to wonder though how big of an impact this will have on 'big-corn' (ie, ADM).
Hate how hateful and society and from this thread even lemmy is toward those they view as "worthless eaters" makes me so depressed and hopeless all the time.
"Look at these hateful people wanting people to eat healthy meals which doesn't damage their health in the long term."
You can tell a lot about a country by how they treat their most vulnerable.
please just eat a carrot
I have no real opinion on this until they define "other foods". That could mean anything.
If it's basically junk food, I can get behind that.
Not sure what to think of this one actually
I do, we’re continuing to punish poor people, and it really seems cruelty is the point
Being able to buy junk food instead of actual nutrition with food stamps is a large boon to the junk food industry paid from by tax dollars. Poor people are more likely to buy junk food as well, so not enabling that vice with tax money could be seen as a positive.
On the other hand giving the government powers like this is usually a slippery slope which will get abused more and more in the future.
So instead of holding junk food companies in any way responsible, we are going to make sure that poor can’t get anything enjoyable! Steamed cabbage and leftover meat cuttings is all you’ll get and you’ll like it! Or else you wouldn’t be poor!
Junk food companies could be held responsible by people not being able to purchase their goods in a subsidized way if they aren't healthy. Thus they make less profit. Whether that actually is what will happen here is doubtful.
You act like junk food is the only thing enjoyable they can get. Naw junk food is a complete waste of money. Ive thought for years it shouldve been restricted, i have known people who blew ALL of their food stamps on shit. Its a government program to feed people, not to induce diabetes.
It betrays a deep lack of education, palate, and kitchen experience in yourself that you equate junk foods to "enjoyable" and that [healthy greens] and [meat] are in any way punishments.
Food deserts and people working multiple jobs, rough sleeping. It's cruel. Allow them to buy hot prepared meals for a comparable cost or stop harassing them.
Can't say I disagree with that. My biggest gripe is that it's mainly poor people who suffer the vicious cycle of bad nutrition from junk food. I think it's reasonable to say a healthy alternative should be availible before taking away the junk food.
I mean some large convenience stores will sell a 4oz boxed salad for $8-9 or 4 1oz bags of chips for $2. Corporate farms and Frito - Lays both get subsidies. Plus people with bad or no teeth can hold a chip in the mouth until it's soft. Not so much an apple. Also instant cereal packets of oats or grits cost as much for 8 small packets as a whole 16 oz box -- if you only had time, tools and space to cook it.
Recently on my way to work, a convenience store let me get a hot cup of water for my green tea bag for free. A cup of bad coffee was $2. I think most stores charge for the cup of water, though.
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I think that the better question is why these were allowed in the first place for a supplemental program.
Corporate lobbying, mostly. It's the reason why whole "genres" of "old" foods are covered (any milk, for example), but the "new stuff" (say probiotic shakes) are on a case-by-case basis. The level of unhealthiness in today's junk food was almost unheard of when food stamps were started and they've only managed to wriggle their way into eligibility as being grandfathered in to the program or lobbying.
If the SNAP program was put in place today, believe that only Tyson Farms chicken and Wonder bread would be allowed.
This is a good explanation.
Who decides which SKUs are healthy or not? Can I buy a birthday cake?
Some breakfast cereals or snack bars are just as loaded with sugar as candy. And I'm sure the ban doesn't include juice either which is not much better than soda. And if the ban is broad enough it might include sugar-free sparkling water.
While soda and candy are really frivolities they're also not a guaranteed cause of health issues. The ban doesn't force people to eat lean protein and vegetables or a well-balanced diet in general so this is mostly a play to make SNAP recipients more miserable. Whether that encourages people to work harder to buy their own junk food or steal junk food I don't think they care.
Or flour, butter, and sugar to make a birthday cake?…
…and if we let them get their hands on unadulterated sugar and butter, who knows what luxuries they could make on their own; hidden from our oversight. Don’t they know they’re poor? Don’t they know their place?
They’re practically making us do this to them…
Should probably ban bottled water, since it's practically free from the faucet.
Seed oil is unhealthy and should be banned. Only tallow fat.
Organic foods are luxury items with standard counterparts.
Dehydrated milk flakes are a better use of money than expensive liquid milk. (That actually used to be a thing!)
Only store brands are allowed, unless there is none available. A designated overseer must be appointed at each place of business.
Eventually, only vouchers will be provided (again) so that specific items can be purchased. To be considered for the list, please apply at FDA.gov/fat cats.
Yeah that's the conflicting part. But also Pepsi and Lays don't seem like a great way to get people fed.
Food is also a part of celebrations and special occasions, not just raw calories in to sustain you. We have enough food to feed people in the US, we don’t need to police how food stamps are spent.
But you're using an exception to circumvent what it's about. Feeding people. It's especially poorer people who enter the vicious cycle of primarily eating easily availible cheap junk food
Until we get UBI saddly we should. Theres only so much money for these programs. Anyone who wastes it is then stealing from someone who really needs it.
There’s not an infinite money pot everyone on food stamps gets access to while they’re on it. If you’re given $100 for the month and spend $10 of it on a cake, you don’t get extra to make up for it. You just have to budget the remainder differently. You don’t become less eligible for SNAP because you wanted a cake, and it doesn’t take money from anyone else’s SNAP account. The answer to funding shortfalls is returning the tax rate for the megarich to reasonable levels, not squeezing the poor even harder.
If a person is eligible for food stamps, then it’s paternalistic as hell to cordon off huge swathes of the supermarket from them because it doesn’t match some ideal picture of what you should eat for every single meal—something I would bet 90% of the people in this thread also don’t live up to.
If you’ve never been on food stamps or WIC in a place that polices food choices like that then you genuinely have no idea what a nightmare it makes weekly shopping, because there’s no such thing as a way to implement ‘common sense restrictions’ on what types of foods poor people are allowed to buy without overlooking some dietary need that some people have.
Theres not an infinite pool of money so of course then people should not be wasting it on candy chips and energy drinks. Its not squeezing poor people by not allowing it to be wasted. And i come from a family who used food stamps, and my mother still is so i know. I still bitch at her for wasting it when she has to then get me or my grandfather to buy food for the rest of the month.
I agree completely that snap and wic are needed in the current environment of this god forsaken country. But just giving out 500 dollars a month to spend on anything that isnt hot and fresh doesnt teach people how to spend wisely.
Im not sorry that most people poor and rich are rather stupid, people on government benefits should be restricted on wasting money provided by taxes the same as rich people should be held accountable to pay their fair share.
Cake is not nutrition. I think it should ban all ultra processed Nova class 4 products.
Is butter nutrition? Is flour? Is anything with added sugar automatically ‘not nutrition’?
Allowing poor people to buy the ingredients to make cake but not a cheaper premade cake (or probably a boxed cake mix either under the vibes-based Nova classification system) just makes it so that they have to add even more work to their lives to achieve normalcy for themselves and their kids. Let them buy their kids a birthday cake.
The desire to have total control over every food poor people can buy is nuts. Worry about what you eat. Go into the community and hold free cooking classes if you’re that worried about other people. ‘I’m so worried for you that I’m restricting your choices’ isn’t worry, it’s moralizing.
and its also not like things like this tend to snowball ounce you start no nope never happened
Its a slippery slope. On the one hand people living at the edge of getting enough calories shouldn't be filling up on sugar and junk food. On the other the government wont even stop nut jobs from buying firearms but choose to go after these folks first.
Its bad for one everyone should have access to food they need and its not like grocery stores aren't throwing away junk food with all food waste they are but also until artificially inflated prices of "healthy food" is down its even more gross.
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Its bad for one everyone should have access to food they need and its not like grocery stores aren't throwing away junk food with all food waste they are but also until artificially inflated prices of "healthy food" is down its even more gross.
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