As far as I’m concerned, fast food really only has one advantage over home-cooked or restaurant food: it’s fast, hence the name, right? But other than that one quality, I really don’t like fast food (except for an innate weakness I have for Taco Bell), and here’s why… here are 8 reasons to avoid fast food.

1. It’s fattening

Reason number one for avoiding fast food: it’s fattening. Actually REALLY fattening. A Whopper 40 grams of fat. A Big Mac has 29 grams. For the sake of comparison, and in the pursuit of full disclosure: my entire lunch at Taco Bell (a bean burrito with sour cream and a cheese roll-up) has 22 grams of fat. That’s a LOT of fat, considering these aren’t total meals… most of us eat fries with our burgers, and those add a whopping 22 additional grams of fat — in other words, there are as many grams of fat in my entire Taco Bell meal as there are in just the fries… and we’re really only supposed to get, maximum, 195 fat or sugar calories a day… do the math! A Whopper has 40 grams of fat, which is 360 calories… ick!

2. It’s a lot of empty calories

While it’s true that some of the calories in fast food are from fiber and other “good” carbs, most are not, so they’re useless, or “empty” calories. Empty calories aren’t going to keep you full or help your body, so why bother?

3. It’s disgusting!

Let me be blunt, but gross: there is a certain amount of animal feces in your hamburger. A LOT of animal feces. When you hear of fast food tainted with E. Coli, that, my dear, is where it’s coming from — animal poop.