Lynn Ruth Miller: The San Francisco-based writer urges you to say no

No one likes to take responsibility for their own destiny and the American people are a prime example. They have blamed the car manufacturers for our automobile fatalities, the cigarette manufacturers for lung cancer, and now they are blaming dessert creators for our obesity. It turns out that unsuspecting consumers are not at fault for increasing their circumference faster than the speed of light. Nor is it their doing that they no longer fit in a revolving door. The blame is now on those “profit-mongering villains” who make delectable biscuits, marvelous confections and delicious drinks to quench our thirst. Indeed, these greedy monsters are deliberately adding a ton of sugar to all the goods we adore for the sole purpose of making diabetes our national disease.

The latest scientific studies confirm their corruption. Sugar is toxic and unscrupulous manufacturers like Sara Lee (yummy cheesecake) or donut shops have deliberately stuffed their products with this substance that has been proven to kill us even faster than fatty beef will clog our arteries.

In less informed times, these bakers were our heroes. We longed for their recipes, gobbled up their products and revelled in the sugar high we got to finish our meal. We reached blindly for them in the mid-afternoon to pep us up when the “threesies” hit.

Now, thanks to those experts who conduct scientific studies that destroy our confidence in our own preferences, we all know better. We have been the innocent pushovers of a diabolical plot to put money in the pockets of the obscenely rich manufacturers of cookies, cakes and pies, even as we collapse in droves from insulin failure.

The baking industry and the soft drink tycoons are scandalised at the accusations the scientific community has made to smudge their good name and destroy their public image. After all, they say, all they did was create a product that people enjoyed eating. “Don’t talk to me about nutrition,” one reportedly said. “Talk to me about taste, and if this stuff tastes better, don’t run around trying to sell stuff that doesn’t taste good.”

I cannot help but remember my sister who turned to hypnotism to help her when she topped 400 pounds. “My right hand was hypnotised so it would not touch the refrigerator,” she said. “So I learned to open it with my left.”

Now, I know perfectly well that it has become politically incorrect to blame the consumer for what he consumes but I cannot help but remember my dear old mother (who wasn’t dear all the time but sadly almost always right) when she said. “If you don’t want it, just say, ‘no thank you’.”

I would love to see a scientific study that figures out why the obese among us are incapable of pushing away that second piece of pie, or turning their noses up at their fifth glass of soda pop. I suspect that if we could create a ‘no thank you’ serum to inject into ourselves before dinner, we would save a fortune in diabetic remedies, fat farms and gastric by-passes. Isn’t it funny, how simple solutions seem to escape us?

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life
Is “No thank you,” it will be enough. – Lynn Ruth and Meister Eckhart