Positive and Negative Effects of Fast Food - Essay Example

?Positive and Negative Effects of Fast Food It cannot be disputed that fast food has become a staple in the American diet over the last few decades. The popularity of fast food is growing all the time and can be expected to continue for the foreseeable future. It was once considered normal for an American family to sit down to a fully prepared meal, but this picture is diminishing as fast food becomes a viable option for many Americans. The rise in fast food consumption can be put down to many factors, but a large part of this is due to extensive advertising. Everyone we look we are bombarded with messages saying that fast food is trendy and affordable for anyone. Another factor is due to the dramatic lifestyle changes that Americans have experienced over the last few years. When time is tight, people generally choose to eat food that does not take up any preparation time. The convenience of a drive-thru has resulted in many people being able to pick up fast food on the go. However, healthy food advocates maintain that fast food is destroying our society in many ways. This paper will look at three positive effects (cost, convenience, taste) of fast food and three negative effects (portion sizes, obesity, and disease) of fast food. The first positive effect of fast food is the low cost that it involves. For many American families, money is tight and they cannot afford to shell out on food that is moderately expensive. For these low income families, fast food offers them an option to feed their whole family for very little cost. Fast food can be produced very cheaply because of the standardized production process used to make it. Fast food chains are then able to entice low income families by offering food that fits their limited budgets. If fast food was expensive, then it would not have the same popularity because very few people would be able to afford it. The second positive effect of fast food is the convenience at which it offers customers. People are able to order their food and receive it within minutes, without having to wait 30-60 minutes as they would in a regular restaurant. For families where both parents are working full-time, fast food is a great alternative because they can buy it almost instantly and they don’t need to put in any physical effort into making it. The is accentuated by the popularity of the drive-thru, which allows patrons to order, pay for, and then receive their food without getting out of their car. When someone is in a rush, ordering fast food like this is very appealing because they can eat on the go. The third positive effect of fast food is in terms of the good taste that people get from it. Fast food has additives that are appealing to many people’s taste buds. These addictive substances taste good for a reason: to make someone want to go back for more. If fast food did not taste very nice, then not very many people would be willing to eat it. Part of the appeal of fast food, in addition to its low cost and convenience, is that almost everyone likes to eat fast food even if they don’t do so on a regular basis. Although fast food has many positive aspects to it, one negative effect is that it has increased the portion sizes of American’s meals considerably. Because fast food is processed, it takes eating a lot of fast food to feel full. This has resulted in people wanting to eat larger meals in order to fill themselves. In addition to fast food, this effect has been transported to all other types of food in that serving sizes have increased remarkably over the past few decades. This has lead to a knock-on effect, such as obesity and disease, both of which are discussed below. Another negative effect of fast food is that it is contributing to the growing problem of obesity in America. The content of fast food has a lot of calories in it, so it helps people to put on weight rather than them slimming down. The fatty oils that are used to cook most fast food are not good for the average person’s health and fast food is known to be a leading cause of obesity. A few decades ago when fast food was not so popular, the level of obesity in America was not so high. Now that fast food chains are out in force, obesity rates in America have skyrocketed. Of course there may be other factors to explain this sudden rise in average weight, but there is no doubt that fast food has contributed to it in some way. The third negative effect of fast food is that it can be the cause of many diseases, such as heart disease. The fat in most fast food meals clogs around the heart and weakens the blood flow. In the short term this may not seem so bad, but after a lifetime of eating fast food, arteries can be blocked and lead to a heart attack or some other disease. Once again the problem with this is the amount of oil that is used to cook most fast food; some oil is good for us but too much of it can have a detrimental effect on our health. This paper discussed three positive effects, such as cost, convenience, taste, of fast food and three negative effects, such as portion sizes, obesity, and disease, of fast food. While there are both positive and negative effects of eating fast food, in my view the negatives outweigh the positives because of the harmful effect that fast food is having on this country. If only people could realize what they were consuming then maybe they would think twice and choose some healthy food alternative. Despite this, I feel that fast food is here to stay as long as demand for it remains high, which it inevitably will do so long as people still enjoy eating it. Read More