Spiked: And muesli is unhealthy after all

Do you eat muesli every day for breakfast or afternoon snack and think you're living healthily? Or do you provide your children with grains in the firm belief that you are doing them something good? I'm sorry to disappoint you. Müesli can be very unhealthy, and in some cases even life-threatening. A large Swiss food company, for example, offers small cinnamon squares. With 32 percent whole grain cereals, these sweet beasts suggest that they are a valuable food ingredient. However, they contain twice as much sugar and fat as healthy ingredients; they also taste sticky. But, well, that's not life-threatening. If unhealthy, then eat it properly and with full awareness - that has always been my point of view.

Poor childhood

What makes me rather thoughtful is another addition to the sweet cereal: the packet comes with a computer game, "recommended (!) from three (!) years of age". With "Team Hot Wheels" you can play three different night racing games. Either you race through a "dangerous harbor area and push all obstacles out of the way", you pass through a "construction zone and need all your skill to drive through the building site in the city center" or, in the "High-Speed Beach" version, you "race along the beach at high speed and against a backdrop of neon lights". Great! The effect of computer games on children and young people is regularly the subject of heated debate, usually when a youngster who was previously considered nice, well-adjusted and inconspicuous has unexpectedly shot up a few classmates and his favorite teacher. But as opinions differ on this topic, it is always quickly put aside.

Even the vocabulary used to advertise the three Müesli games sends a shiver down my spine. It could hardly be more aggressive and shallow. In the next version of "Team Hot Wheels", you will probably be able to shoot at passers-by from the passenger window. Of course, anyone who regularly consumes cinnamon muesli from the age of four does not immediately become a violent racer with a penchant for mass murder. Nevertheless, it is worrying that such young people should find it fun and exciting to behave stupidly and recklessly and endanger others - even if it is only a thousand times in front of the computer.

Credibility falls by the wayside

What's more, an epilepsy warning is printed on the cereal packet: epileptic seizures could be a consequence of such computer games. And they could be addictive, the manufacturer also warns. Now think about it: on a packet of cinnamon snacks, a speeding game is advertised that pays homage to aggressive driving and can lead to epilepsy and addiction. To me, that's like hanging a few hand grenades on a Christmas tree.

And all this is served to me for breakfast at half past eight in the morning, while the lumps of corn I'm chewing on taste like sweetened cardboard. It really makes you lose your appetite. Perhaps, in the interests of credibility, the müesli marketers should think about what kind of game might be better suited to their product - or which product might be better suited to their game. Or can you imagine people who play speeding games nibbling on cinnamon potato chips?