Vsauce!
Kevin here.
Chewing gum is banned in Singapore.
No gum is allowed to be bought or sold unless it’s prescribed by a doctor and the ban
was instituted due to vandals sticking chewed gum on the door sensors of public transit
trains.
As well as floors, sidewalks, elevator buttons and inside keyholes.
So no more gum!
In 2011, the French government reformed school and university cafeterias by banning ketchup.
In order to preserve the tradition of French cuisine they no longer wanted the French youth
masking the flavor of their food with the American condiment.
However, there is still one one food they're allowed to use ketchup on…french fries.
Beech Grove, Indiana has a law against eating watermelon in the park.
It’s one of those unenforced old laws still on the books but the ordinance was originally
enacted because watermelon rinds were puncturing garbage bags and creating a mess.
So they banned watermelon eating entirely.
In parks.
New York City tried to ban large soft drinks so Mississippi responded by banning bans on
large soft drinks.
The Governor signed the bill in 2013 stating …”its not the role of government to micro-regulate
citizens dietary decisions.”
Meanwhile, Mississippi has the highest obesity rate in the United States.
Horse meat.
Horses are considered pets, companions and workers in the U.S., U.K. and many english-speaking
countries so eating them is taboo.
But countries like China, Mexico and Italy eat a lot of horse meat.
Dog food manufacturers in the US stopped using horse meat in the 70s and although it’s
commonly thought that gelatin is made from horse hooves it’s mostly made from pigskin.
Which is pretty gross!
The Salmon Act of 1986 in the U.K. deals with handling salmon in suspicious circumstances.
And a Welsh pub owner was charged for doing just that in 2009 when wild salmon was found
in her freezer.
At which point she told inspectors she said salmon from an unidentified man.
Thereby handling salmon in suspicious circumstances.
Sassafras was used for flavoring traditional root beer until the FDA determined it might
cause cancer.
Safrole, which is extracted from the root-bark is regarded as a weak carcinogen in rats so
artificial flavors were invented to replace it in root beer.
However you can find some root beers in which the safrole is removed but the oil from the
sassafras roots is still used for flavor.
Finally, the UK government is trying to get the US to overturn its import ban on traditional
Scottish haggis.
The problem is that the US currently doesn’t allow one its key ingredients in food products
- sheep lungs.
And as always - thanks for watching!