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Its not really a luxury item, its a good substitute for drinks that are a lot more expensive and could be considered luxury items.
But nobody is saying tea is worse than soda. My point is that tea is unnecessary. You might say "hey, tea is a great drink!" and give me studies about its antioxidant properties and so on and you'd be right. However, it's still not a necessity. Water is a perfectly good thing to drink and is quite capable of supporting life. And by that I don't mean "supporting life in a state just above death." I mean "water's actually normal to drink for any living organism and therefore is fine for a poor person to drink."
It's sort of like if I found you dying in the Arabian Desert and I offered you water and you slapped it out of my hand and were like "no herbal tea??" That's how we literally view poor people in America. We go on and on about how impoverished and destitute they are, then oddly get outraged that they "only" get eggs and white bread and 75% lean ground beef. It's like "no wild-raised salmon from filtered low-mercury water served with hand-churned Belgian butter and cilantro sprigs with organic lemon wedges?" Uh, yeah, none of that.
so not only do people have to deal with being poor and on food stamps
there are some food police out there telling them what kind of food they should eat
if someone buys a frozen pizza or doritos let them if that works for them, i know at times in my life i would have killed for a bag of doritos
poor people generally buy whats on sale, cheap stuff like turkey necks and what have you
aint nobody trying to eat beets and other bullshhh to make the food police happy
The thing is, a person surrenders their ability to live irresponsibly without judgment when they choose to put the responsibility of feeding their self onto others.
The people paying high taxes each day and having cash taken out of their own personal family's mouths in order to feed you, most certainly do have a right to complain. We are continually stuck in line behind morbidly obese "starving" Americans with 100.00 shoes, 300.00 smart phones and multiple children, squandering our cash paying for a boatload of kool aide and processed, expensive junk food when whole, unprocessed foods are clearly healthier and less expensive.
Hats off to the little old, frail ladies that I see living frugally and within their means, buying a loaf of fresh bread and a few veggies at each visit.
My point is that tea is unnecessary. You might say "hey, tea is a great drink!" and give me studies about its antioxidant properties and so on and you'd be right. However, it's still not a necessity. Water is a perfectly good thing to drink and is quite capable of supporting life. And by that I don't mean "supporting life in a state just above death." I mean "water's actually normal to drink for any living organism and therefore is fine for a poor person to drink."
You seem to be under the impression that I said that water was bad. Its not bad. People, rich or poor, should be drinking water. Its very important for your body to be hydrated, and water is definitely the best.
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It's sort of like if I found you dying in the Arabian Desert and I offered you water and you slapped it out of my hand and were like "no herbal tea??" That's how we literally view poor people in America. We go on and on about how impoverished and destitute they are, then oddly get outraged that they "only" get eggs and white bread and 75% lean ground beef. It's like "no wild-raised salmon from filtered low-mercury water served with hand-churned Belgian butter and cilantro sprigs with organic lemon wedges?" Uh, yeah, none of that.
Again, I'm talking about something that is 4 cents a glass. Not really sure how that is comparable to "wild raised salmon from filtered low-mercury water" or "hand churned Belgian butter".
Another poster had just said that it was a good option instead of soda or kool aid. And I agreed with them. Soda is 6x more expensive then making tea at home. And again, I'm talking about buying a box of tea bags for $2 that will last at least a month, if not more. Not some organic herbal detox tea that might cost $$$ for a box of three bags.
If someone really wants to buy something to drink, then there are other "healthier" options besides soda that are even a lot cheaper. That is all that is meant by that comment. It has nothing to do with poor people shouldn't be drinking water. That was never said, and I don't really see why you are so latched on to that idea.
Yeah, but if they're actually poor, then people generally make choices to cut out luxuries. Tea is a luxury. That's the point, people don't actually grasp any of this any more because we have a group of people who say that poor people should not be impacted by their poverty. Like if I point out that some supposedly destitute person has a cell phone, it's like "so?" Um ...so ...then they're not poor. And then someone like JrzDefector will charge onto the scene and go "so you're saying a poor person shouldn't have a cell phone??" Uh ...yeah, that's generally how it works.
I have a pre paid smartphone and my husband has an Obamaphone. He gets free minutes. When i grocery shop, i get points that go towards my phone, if i have enough i can buy minutes or i can use EFT like anyone else to pay for my plan. Since losing my husbands income, i chose to use those points instead of pay $25/mnth. Im still poor even with a cellphone.
I learned to cook in a house with bountiful food and a mother who was a decent cook - and moreover a healthy cook. I can make a decent meal with pretty much anything because I've learned over the years how to make really tasty and easy healthy meals. ... My friends who grew up in very poor homes often did not have a parent who could cook or had time to cook. They didn't have a lot of food around. And what they did have was as often as not pretty unpleasant (one of my exes has a story about beef stroganoff made with "discount meat" that will curl your hair).
Then you add in the fact that a lot of traditionally poor people food is actually not THAT healthy. Look at soul food and Southern cuisine, for god's sake.
So beyond food deserts and expensive ingredients, there are a TON of other factors. The reasons poor people are often obese are directly linked to life skills, time, education and a pretty understandable desire for a cheap stress-reducer.
I grew up in an upper class home with absentee parents who did nothing but work and vacation. My mother NEVER cooked, ever in my entire life, and she wore it as a badge of honor and prided herself on being a working yuppy career woman out of the 1960s. I literally grew up making myself cans of mushroom soup, spaghetti, and ordering pizza, and eating at Taco Bell after school, every day of my life. I would literally live on fast food and pizza - she would leave her checkbook with me so I could order pizza non stop to feed myself. She never even bought groceries.
How come I taught myself the basic life skills of throwing together a healthy meal made from real food? It is because it is one of the easiest things in the world for any adult to do, cooking with real food. I cannot use "being poor" for an excuse to keep eating like that as an adult, but I grew up eating disgusting, processed food just like your friends.
No. By that, I meant that you were comparing tea to soda and saying that poor people should be drinking tea instead of soda. Sure, if they are the ones paying for it. But they can also drink water instead of tea OR soda. Even if it's 4 cents a glass, that's actually pretty expensive compared to water. It's also still a luxury item. Poor people shouldn't be drinking Kool-Aid or soda, either, since those are also luxury items. Poor people should be eating basic foods which are healthy and inexpensive, including water, white bread, milk, common vegetables, and potatoes. This isn't aimed at you, but people who act like that's a barbaric diet are fools and I don't have time for them.
so not only do people have to deal with being poor and on food stamps
there are some food police out there telling them what kind of food they should eat
if someone buys a frozen pizza or doritos let them if that works for them, i know at times in my life i would have killed for a bag of doritos
That isn't what this thread is about. The OP wasn't saying "Hey, we should make laws that require poor people to only be able to eat from a list of approved foods." If you want to eat frozen pizza or Doritos instead of something healthy, then have at it. But don't be saying that you are eating pizza and Doritos because they are the only thing you can afford. THAT is what the thread is about. Is Healthy food too expensive? Is it cheaper to eat processed junk then it is to eat healthy food? No. You can eat healthy even if you are on a limited food budget.
I don't really know how much a bag of Doritos are, but I'm guessing they're $3-$4. For $4 I can buy 12lb of apples (on sale this week 3lb for $1). Thats about 36 apples. Of course I wouldn't buy all those apples at once, but buying them once a week would allow for a whole month's worth of snacks. How long is that $4 worth of Doritos going to last? Maybe three days? So you're going to need to buy a lot more bags of Doritos to last the month, and that is just going to get more and more expensive.
Apples are in season right now, so they're cheap. For different seasons, sub in different fruits/veggies that are in season and cheap.
The ignorance in this thread is truly astonishing, as is the hypocrisy.
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Originally Posted by Sundaydrive00
If they live in a food desert and have to take the bus to get to a grocery store, then they're probably also taking the bus to work. Is their entire commute to work also a food desert? Probably not, so stop by the grocery store on the way home from work instead of taking a separate trip at a later time.
Do you know this for sure? How familiar are you with every bus route in every city? Do you know each person's individual circumstances, anything that might prevent him or her from hopping off the bus, shopping, and hopping back on the bus to get home? Like picking up the kids from day care, or a dozen other things that living-on-the-edge families have to deal with?
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Originally Posted by jlawrence01
However, I am sure that some if out of date and they will probably throw most of it out.
Depends on what it is. Do you know this for sure? Did you call and ask? Do some research before making ill-informed statements.
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Originally Posted by paperboyo
That's one of the issues here. In our society, it's not even a question of "perhaps people should be grateful that they are getting money for food." That ended a long time ago. Now it's like "yeah, of course you should be giving me money for food, who is you?" The question is "how much" and not "whether or not to."
You're mistaken about many points in this thread, including this lame statement. The rationale behind choice pantries and providing quality food to people is about improved health and about dignity, which every human deserves no matter their station in life.
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And if you give it, it's like "oh, yeah, don't make them feel bad that they're using food stamps, that's bad for self esteem." So we have EBT cards that are designed to look like credit cards so there's no shame.
Actually, the change was made to limit fraud and misuse. Go do some research before posting, please.
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Originally Posted by Sundaydrive00
You can even get other cuts of chicken for cheaper then that.
Ah, but then some of our fine friends in this thread would be saying those cuts of chicken are too fatty and that people shouldn't be allowed to buy them with their SNAP benefits.
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Originally Posted by paperboyo
It's sort of like if I found you dying in the Arabian Desert and I offered you water and you slapped it out of my hand and were like "no herbal tea??"
Your "arguments" get more and more ridiculous as this thread goes on. Go read a sociology book and come back.
No. By that, I meant that you were comparing tea to soda and saying that poor people should be drinking tea instead of soda. Sure, if they are the ones paying for it. But they can also drink water instead of tea OR soda. Even if it's 4 cents a glass, that's actually pretty expensive compared to water. It's also still a luxury item. Poor people shouldn't be drinking Kool-Aid or soda, either, since those are also luxury items. Poor people should be eating basic foods which are healthy and inexpensive, including water, white bread, milk, common vegetables, and potatoes. This isn't aimed at you, but people who act like that's a barbaric diet are fools and I don't have time for them.
Of course they can drink water. NO ONE is saying they can't drink water. This thread isn't about how poor people should only eat the bare minimums. Its "is healthy food too expensive". And the poster that I originally quoted about tea gave it as an example of a good substitute of a drink that is healthier then soda or kool aid. OF COURSE water is going to be even cheaper. No one is saying otherwise. But if a person is buying soda and claiming that they can't buy any other (flavored) drink cheaper because a 2 liter of soda is only $1, that simply isn't true. Yes water is cheaper, but someone who is drinking a 2 liter of soda a day probably doesn't want just water as a substitute. They want something with some taste to it. When I stopped drinking soda last year, I started drinking tea as a substitute. Yes, I still drink water, I drink the 8+ glasses of water a day as recommended. Most people don't JUST drink water, and that is what we are talking about. Items that are cheaper to buy then the junk food that people normally buy.
Again this thread is about people who are buying junk food and claiming that they buy that instead of healthy food because its cheaper. So someone who is able to afford that 2 liter of Coke, not someone who doesn't even have 4 cents to their name.
The ignorance in this thread is truly astonishing, as is the hypocrisy.
Do you know this for sure? How familiar are you with every bus route in every city? Do you know each person's individual circumstances, anything that might prevent him or her from hopping off the bus, shopping, and hopping back on the bus to get home? Like picking up the kids from day care, or a dozen other things that living-on-the-edge families have to deal with?
Why yes, I do know every single bus route in the world, as well as every living person's unique situation
But of course there will always be excuses as to why something can't be done. But more then likely they don't live in such a huge food desert that no where they go ever is nowhere near a grocery store. Getting to a grocery store is not as impossible as a lot of people want to make it out to be. It might take a little extra work, but being poor isn't easy. It shouldn't be easy, there needs to be motivation for people to want to better themselves. Everyone shouldn't be handed to you so that you (and I don't mean you personally) want to live in squalor for your entire lives and have the next generations also wanting to live like that.
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