Forget about “three strikes” laws. A British schoolboy was recently ejected from his school’s dining hall for breaking the school’s zero-tolerance “two snacks” rule. According to The Telegraph, ten-year-old Ryan Stupples’ lunch consisted of “a sandwich, fruit, fromage frais, cake, mini cheese biscuits and a bottle of water.” The cake and “biscuits” (crackers) apparently broke the school snack limit, a crime for which Ryan was kicked out of the dining hall. Understandably, Ryan’s father is not happy with the school’s decision to do his parenting for him: “What 10-year-old boy won’t get upset when he’s out of a dining hall in front of everyone and made to eat his lunch in the head teacher’s office?“
Nor is the problem contained to the other side of the Atlantic. The nutritional noose is tightening in the Lone Star State, with food cops dropping some Texas-sized regulations on schools. Leading the charge against the Alamo of consumer freedom is self-crowned “food czarina” Susan Combs, state Agriculture Commissioner, whose new list of regulations “restricts everything from how often your middle-schooler can buy french fries in the cafeteria to where the high school drill team can hawk candy.” Said candy-hawking rules forbid fundraiser sales during lunchtime, which we’re sure won’t affect revenues at all.
Unsurprisingly, not everyone’s happy with the regulatory micro-management imposed by the state. One skeptical principal told The Dallas Morning News: “We don’t want to become the nutrition police … I don’t feel like I need Big Brother to tell us everything we need to do.“
