Conveniently becoming fat

With a busy schedule and a pinched pocket, fast food has never been so appealing. It seems that fast food restaurants are popping up everywhere. It is affordable, convenient and quick, and unfortunately, I am guilty of eating a greasy burger from time to time. The critical value placed on time in our society, is creating this fast food frenzy; further developing a fat, lazy America. This fact is very depressing.

When eating fast food, there is no hassle in buying the necessary ingredients, preparing and cleaning up a meal. You do not even have to get out of the car to finish a meal, and once the meal is complete, you simply toss the bag; yet, what happened to caring about the health of your body?

Now served in restaurants, airports, schools and sports venues, fast food is now a booming industry in America. Fast food restaurants not only have larger portion sizes and value menus, but they stay open late. McDonald's is located worldwide and is conveniently open 24 hours. Although it is hard to pass up that greasy burger, we really should start making more of an effort to stop giving in to our cravings.

Some fast food restaurants now list the calories, fat grams and sodium on the wrappers and provide Web sites to access nutritional information. After visiting one of the Web sites, the overwhelming amount of junk in each item repulsed me and discouraged my fast food eating for months. Inevitably, even having access to nutritional information, people still line up in drive-thru's for their quick and easy meal, but I suppose that knowing a double quarter-pounder with cheese has 42 grams of fat is not that intimidating to everyone.

According to an article in Rolling Stone, "Americans now spend more money on fast food than they do on higher education, personal computers, software or new cars. They spend more on fast food than on movies, books, magazines, newspapers, videos and recorded music, combined." It is a shame that people would rather invest money in stomachaches and greasy fingers than enjoy a good book or newly released CD.

It is estimated by the American School Fund Service that 30 percent of U.S. public high schools serve branded fast food. Pizza Hut, Domino's, McDonald's and Chick-fil-A sell food to the nation's schools. Taco Bell sends its food to approximately 4,500 cafeterias.

Wendy's, McDonald's, Krispy Kreme, Sheetz and Arby's are located directly across from ECU's campus. Students cannot help but acknowledge the presence of fast food restaurants. I am certainly guilty of sliding through the drive-thru between classes to pick up a crispy chicken sandwich or even picking up the occasional double cheeseburger-conveniently the smallest thing available on the late night menu at McDonald's.

I am one of many Americans who have been trapped by the fast food insanity, but I feel that we need to make a better effort to break this fattening cycle. Until healthier options are available at affordable prices, fast food restaurants will continue to have loyal consumers. But, we should at least try to stick with the chicken sandwiches and water, no fries. And at all costs, avoid super-sizing, value-sizing or sonic-sizing anything.

This writer can be contacted at opinion@theeastcarolinan.com.