May17
Dairy Council Issues a 'Takeback' on Weight Loss Ads
Posted at 11:52 AM | Permalink
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Comments (6)
Because milk doesn't actually help you lose weight, which makes the ads ("Milk your diet. Lose weight!) just a teensy bit misleading. Here's how it went down, according to The New York Times: The ads, which were overseen by our old friends the USDA (whom you may remember from such hijinx as failing to enforce their animal welfare regulations and having lousy, inadequate regulations in the first place) made claims such as that three servings of dairy products a day can help people stay thin, and featured celebrities such as Yankees superstar Alex Rodriguez to help promote those claims. But, two years after the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine petitioned the F.T.C. to argue that the ads were misleading (on the grounds that there's just no substantial scientific evidence for the claim), the Dairy Council has decided to withdraw the ads "until further research provides stronger, more conclusive evidence of an association between dairy consumption and weight loss." Here's what PCRM's president, Dr. Neal Barnard had to say:
“I think people will start to recognize that the dairy industry, which used to have a mom-and-pop image, is a huge commercial entity that will exaggerate to sell its products.”
This isn't the first case of misleading ads from the Dairy Industry. You may remember the "Happy Cows" ads from the California Milk Board, which had the tagline "Great cheese comes from happy cows" and the insidious implication that the living conditions for California's dairy cows made them happy—which is like saying that Abu Ghraib was a five star hotel. Though PETA sued the Milk Board in that case, it was eventually decided that the state is exempt from its own false-advertising laws, so the ads were allowed to stand. I’m not even kidding. As you can imagine, watching the Dairy Industry finally being held accountable for its misleading advertising is immensely satisfying. Let's hope this trend continues.
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Comments
The USDA supports, enables, covers for the Puppy Mill business.
They do not uphold the Animal Welfare Laws and allow criminally abusive breeders to break rules and keep right on going.
They perceive that their role is to help animal abusers make more money.
Many USDA staff members and senior staff slander animal welfare groups and people, and repeat the same anti-animal propaganda as the industries they are supposed to be policing.
There is terrible corruption in the USDA, and in many State Depts of Agriculture as well.
(Look for instance at the Georgia Head of the Dept of Ag who had to be SUED in order to uphold a state law banning gas chambers to kill pets in pounds there! He was flagrantly breaking the law)
Citizens need to take a good, hard look at the USDA and the people and businesses it colludes with. These USDA employees work for US and their salaries come from OUR tax dollars!
Posted by: kelly | May 17, 2007 01:19 PM
heck yes!
Posted by: woo | May 17, 2007 01:52 PM
Nice job. Those ridiculous dairy ads made me so angry.
Posted by: Canaduck | May 17, 2007 02:36 PM
Great job.
Posted by: Robert Rodriguez | May 17, 2007 03:28 PM
Got Soy Milk? I do!
Hey, I'm sure there are a TON of animal-rights celebs that wouldn't be comfortable with baring all for an anti-fur ad, but would JUMP at the chance to sport a soy-milk mustache for a vegan ad! Whaddya think?
Posted by: Beth | May 18, 2007 11:15 AM
Perhaps the USDA has lost its brains.
(Reminds me of a new tagline... "Got Brains? Drinking Milk doesn't give you any!")
Posted by: RabidLeroy | May 21, 2007 04:33 AM