Let me tell ya a story about foodstuffs...
So back in 2020, the Official Mexican Standard (or NOM, for its spanish abbreviation, basically the ISO for Mexico) decided that children were getting too fat and too diabetic really fast, so in order to deter parents from buying stuff that could potentially harm their kids' health in the long run and prevent children from buying all these candies, chips, and all kinds of junk food, the NOM-051 Standard was set in place.
Basically, anything that has excess [calories/sodium/sugar/fats/etc] and/or would contain stuff not suitable for children (artificial sweetners, caffeine, etc) would get a big, glaring black emblem like the ones shown in these pics, either as part of the packaging, or lazily shoved in as a sticker.
If you think this did absolutely nothing to change the dietary habits of the people over here, you'd be 100% correct, lmao.
However, that wouldn't be the end of this crusade, for the NOM-051 had another trick up its sleeve: Phase 2.
Phase 2 was all about doubling down on making sure kids don't ever buy junk foods at all. And they went straight for the jugular: Mass extinction of all cereal mascots (as well as other other food item mascots).
Left: Before the standard was set in place.
Right: The aftermath.
This happened with basically any food item that had a mascot, with cereals being the biggest victim.
This mass extermination of mascots basically meant that companies had to get creative with their packaging. Bimbo bread decided "if we can't brand our bread with our mascot, we can put it on the napkins most moms use to wrap their kids' lunches!"
Sometimes, they just give up and give you the whole "You haven't unlocked this character yet" silhouette.
Now, this is all fine and dandy to an extent. This doesn't help with the health problems in children and this doesn't really deter parents. It's even jokingly said that "the more emblems something has, the tastier it is". Status quo remains the same except advertisers get to eat dick for a while.
However, this becomes an issue with border cities; the cities that lie in the border between Mexico and the US.
Because The Land of the Free™ isn't subject to these standards, they can have all the mascots they want. This becomes a problem when stores sell imported goods from the US, because they still have to abide by the "SHOW THE SEALS" and "BAN ALL MASCOTS" clauses.
The seals issue is simple: just slap the seals in there and call it a day.
But for the mascots themselves, the results are... hilarious to say the least.
It's like when they try to censor dicks in a hentai manga, but with stickers.
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