Culture is incredibly difficult to intentionally shift. People actively resist when they feel they are being manipulated even if it is supposed to be for their own good.
Look how much culture has changed in the last few years, in a direction that closely matches the intentions of some powerful people.
Look at changes around public health, smoking for example.
> People actively resist when they feel they are being manipulated
The only way to change things is to manipulate people?
> It’s a worthy goal but I doubt the government could move the needle with any amount of money
If you are talking about promoting exercise, here I agree: More money isn't always needed.
https://www.globalissues.org/article/532/media-manipulation
(note: this is not an endorsement of these sites, but took me 30 seconds to locate online, and verify at least glancingly.)
Getting people to eat less, not so much.
The idea that we cannot make substantial improvements to people’s decision-making context and instead should spend all this money trying to hack the genome is obviously ridiculous.
Except piles of cash per year ARE spend trying to change people's habits for the healthier, and it's obviously falling in the US.
You're idea of, "Don't throw a pile cash at medical research, that's stupid! No, spend it on advertising, but healthy stuff!" seems like the obviously ridiculous idea.
There is very little funding of behavioral science research compared to pharmacological.
In part thanks to that advert, my entire life whenever I can pinch an inch I simply stop drinking my calories. Admittedly it is harder to eat healthy when you are time constrained and poor. But could there be anything faster and cheaper than pouring a glass of filtered tap water ? Can we advise that first before developing more PSAs about nutrition, exercise routines, etc.
But losing weight? Endless amounts of effort is already spent towards this goal, it is deeply embedded in our culture(for ex. Fat shaming).
I don't some large ad campaign would change that much.
I think being able to have healthcare discriminate based on smoking has been hugely impactful in cutting US smoking rates, I think the same should be done for being overweight.
Fat anxiety is driven by food industry propagandists (more marketers than lobbyists.) Most weight-loss companies are basically high-priced subscription food services with add-on food marketing and a hook that gets people to pay for that as a service. While they've become a big enough business too often be standalone, it's not telling that Weight Watches spent a couple decades as a subsidiary of HJ Heinz.
> I think being able to have healthcare discriminate based on smoking has been hugely impactful in cutting US smoking rates
Health insurance was never prevented from discriminating on that basis, even while smoking rates went through the roof. There's plenty of policies for which there is evidence of utility in cutting smoking rates, health insurance price discrimination isn't one of them.
The government can educate on and encourage healthy eating and fitness. The goal is not weight loss. Weight loss is just a side effect.
Don't forget that in the US they named their anti-drugs policy in schools: DARE!! lol!
That's some twisted reverse psychology stuff..
DARE is a program to increase public positive image of, deference to, and political support for the arbitrary action of police. (And t it's only demonstrated effect is on attitudes toward police; it doesn't have any effect on drug use.)
How that advances the cause of marginalizing minority groups is left as an exercise for the reader.
The claim is keeping kids off drugs was probably never the real goal, and even if it was the program continued to expand to new places and be funded in existing places long after it was proven ineffective as anything but pro-police propaganda, which wasn't an accident by decision-makers.
Which reveals that even if keeping kids off drugs was once part of the motivation, it wasn't what sustained the program.
Don't bother pointing out facts or using logic. Any time someone mentions drugs on HN, the usual group of addicts-in-denial show up parroting the same tired and disproven talking points that High Times magazine has been flogging for the last 40 years.
Also, it makes sense to publicly do one thing and privately do another.
DARE campaign was Reagan era, when they were importing cocaine by the plane load.
In the US, dependent on location, a person may be living under several different governments.
Governments recognize and/or create holidays, and holidays can go on to be cultural events.
Governments organize and finance festivals and events, which can and do become culture of a place or people.
They built statues, museums, parks, libraries, theatres, etc; all with several different levels and layers of culture.
You'd need to start defining parameters of what is a government, what is a culture shift, etc.
That doesn't mean they can't, won't, and don't, shift cultures in many other ways.