Maybe soon, within the ever-burgeoning glossary of medical terms for abnormal disorders and addictions, the term 'McDonalds Withdrawal' will become standard. I say this because today, some three months after the coronavirus lockdown, McDonalds are re-opening its drive-thrus. And boy, did they come. The queues in my native city of Glasgow were embarrassing to say the least, with queues reaching down whole streets and round the corner. If you can imagine the queues for the movie Star Wars back in '77 stretching round whole blocks, then you're almost there, except here people were replaced with cars. And you kind of think that certain people have been praying (gnawing their hands) for McDonalds to re-open. Notably, parents who 'take care of their children' by taking them to McDonalds. I've seen it with my own two eyes, parents feeding their toddlers nutritionless cheeseburgers, chips, and coke, the so-called Happy Meal. I have in the past had discussions with managers asking them if they think that serving a toddler a happy meal is something of a form of child abuse. My queries as you can imagine have been met with surprise, the manager almost always retorting that their food is 'of a high quality'. Yet, to take your child to McDonalds, whether you like it or not, is like feeding your child crack. What with the McDonalds environment aimed squarely at children, the psychological heft of 'free' toys, playpens, and, now, table-top games consoles, of course they're going to like it. Of course, it's going to calm them down (for the moment), and of course you're going to think with the limited brain-span that most parents have, that you have done good. But you haven't. Like putting your child in a car, taking your child to McDonalds is a form of child abuse. Psychologically, biologically, ecologically, spiritually.
The happy meal by its mere existence suggests to the child subliminally that all other meals are therefore 'unhappy'. Not only this but the accompanying 'fun' in the form of fashionable toys and cartoon figures amounts to a form of psychological abuse: using positive images and text to deliver a product that is without nutrition and thus negative (since food by its very definition must be nutritious if it is to 'feed' you). McDonalds' food however does not feed as in 'deliver nutrition' therefore it is a lie as concerns 'food', fast or otherwise. This is how corporations like McDonalds thrive: by doing as the devil does and preying on the weak and the wounded (exhausted parents and children without the wits and werwithal to decide for themselves) and through employing mesmerizing devices like kaleidoscopic adverts, movie tie-ins, catchy jingles, toys and games, and all the beeps and flashes that fasten and fix a child's brain onto the target product. As far as this is concerned, and in terms of knowing food and developing a healthy relationship with food and all its ancillary logistics, McDonalds is an atrocity hidden in plain sight: a crime against food, a crime against animals, a crime against children, and a crime against the land. What more reason could you want to avoid these 'golden' arches that are actually yellow?
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