I came of age in the strange era when frozen yogurt was a popular pretend-diet snack. There was a little drive-through wanna-be ice cream parlor called T.C.B.Y. right off the main drag in my hometown. Even though, knowing they couldn’t compete with Greece, it still had the gall to name itself The Country’s Best Yogurt, a dubious honor at best. Being fake ice cream, isn’t that like R.C. Cola claiming to be able to compete with Coke and Pepsi, or calling your inflatable fuck doll your girlfriend?
I believe this frozen yogurt did have fewer calories than ice cream, but it still wasn’t exactly health food, just a lamer version of its competition. It wasn’t bad for you, but it wasn’t good for you either, just a lamer version of ice cream.
There were toppings, cones, adorable little demitasse spoons, bored teenagers manning the counter, bright kid-friendly lights, a glass display case, all the trappings of real ice cream, other than the actual reason people like ice cream, the ice cream. Much like ankle socks, lap dogs and wooden fingers, frozen yogurt was the premier fake thing of its time, roughly the 1990’s.
I consider this a decent example of the extreme fakitude that has accompanied the runaway capitalism of our time. When you’re routinely buying bottled water, the free liquid that covers 2/3 of the planet, you know that capitalism has gone off the rails. Frozen yogurt is just one of many pieces of proof of this one. We also elected a “businessman” who managed to lose money running a casino as president. Another solid piece of proof that we really ought to think about nudging capitalism back into the saner territory it once held.
Thankfully frozen yogurt has largely gone away, or at least doesn’t live in every town in America. Now if we can just get rid of that “businessman” and all the other fake crap, we might be a heck of lot happier.