Parents Please Wake Up

Maria, I agree with you 100%. Its nobodys business what someone else feeds their kids. Feed yours what you want and leave it at that.

Actually, it is my business what your kids eat. If you kids are too fat to work, end up on medicaid, and then get so fat they have a heart attack, we all pay for that with our taxes. Obesity is driving up the cost of health care in this country at an alarming rate. Type two diabetes hardly existed 40 years ago!

I grew up in the 60's and 70's when fast food was not the norm, parents still cooked dinner and families ate together, and type 2 diabetes was commonly referred to as "adult onset diabetes" because it was extremely rare for a child to contract it. Sadly nobody calls it that these days. I will never understand parents that try to justify feeding their children poorly.

Well, maybe you're onto something-- maybe we should address why parents don't cook dinner and families don't eat together anymore-- but to do that opens a whole 'nother can of worms-- working mothers.

You think people will get upset about being "attacked" for what their kids eat? Try suggesting that society's problems have more to do with latch-key kids and moms in the workforce.

Parental justifications don't just start and end with "feeding the children poorly" to use your quote...it's justifying why mom is working instead of being home taking care of the kids, and making sure they're eating right, cooking dinner and making sure the family dines together. Family vacations, nice homes, electronic gadgets, Nautica jackets, second cars.... 'the American dream' has come at the price of our children.

Whole' nother ball of wax....

In the case of childhood obesity, it's pretty obvious. When my parents were children they were kicked out of the house at 8 am and came home when it got dark. Sometimes they were given food to eat while they were out playing in the form of bread and cheese.

When I was a child in the 1980s, I would go out at maybe 10 am on my bike in the holidays, come home for lunch, back out straight after. In the summer we would be running around outside all day, every day. And I was a fairly podgy child by the standards of the 80s, but would have been considered absolutely normal today.

Today children don't play out. You never see children playing in the street, nor in the fields in the countryside. You don't see 6-8 year olds cycling around without adult supervision. At least, not middle class ones. You occasionally see gangs of 8 year olds out causing trouble in London, but not in other towns, or the countryside. Going out is an occasional occurrence, an hour a day at most, whereas even 30 years ago, most children were outside running around 8 hours a day.

It's not the food that's at fault, it's modern culture. And food, but primarily modern culture. And computers. And video games. An hour on the Wii is NOT the same as running around outside. I wouldn't allow my children to have a Wii, or a playstation.

In the case of childhood obesity, it's pretty obvious. When my parents were children they were kicked out of the house at 8 am and came home when it got dark. Sometimes they were given food to eat while they were out playing in the form of bread and cheese.

When I was a child in the 1980s, I would go out at maybe 10 am on my bike in the holidays, come home for lunch, back out straight after. In the summer we would be running around outside all day, every day. And I was a fairly podgy child by the standards of the 80s, but would have been considered absolutely normal today.

Today children don't play out. You never see children playing in the street, nor in the fields in the countryside. You don't see 6-8 year olds cycling around without adult supervision. At least, not middle class ones. You occasionally see gangs of 8 year olds out causing trouble in London, but not in other towns, or the countryside. Going out is an occasional occurrence, an hour a day at most, whereas even 30 years ago, most children were outside running around 8 hours a day.

It's not the food that's at fault, it's modern culture. And food, but primarily modern culture. And computers. And video games. An hour on the Wii is NOT the same as running around outside. I wouldn't allow my children to have a Wii, or a playstation.

Maria, I agree with you 100%. Its nobodys business what someone else feeds their kids. Feed yours what you want and leave it at that.

Actually, it is my business what your kids eat. If you kids are too fat to work, end up on medicaid, and then get so fat they have a heart attack, we all pay for that with our taxes. Obesity is driving up the cost of health care in this country at an alarming rate. Type two diabetes hardly existed 40 years ago!

I grew up in the 60's and 70's when fast food was not the norm, parents still cooked dinner and families ate together, and type 2 diabetes was commonly referred to as "adult onset diabetes" because it was extremely rare for a child to contract it. Sadly nobody calls it that these days. I will never understand parents that try to justify feeding their children poorly.

Well, maybe you're onto something-- maybe we should address why parents don't cook dinner and families don't eat together anymore-- but to do that opens a whole 'nother can of worms-- working mothers.

You think people will get upset about being "attacked" for what their kids eat? Try suggesting that society's problems have more to do with latch-key kids and moms in the workforce.

Parental justifications don't just start and end with "feeding the children poorly" to use your quote...it's justifying why mom is working instead of being home taking care of the kids, and making sure they're eating right, cooking dinner and making sure the family dines together. Family vacations, nice homes, electronic gadgets, Nautica jackets, second cars.... 'the American dream' has come at the price of our children.

Whole' nother ball of wax....

I have to agree with this.

My mother was able to work at my school when I was a child and spent a lot of time with me until a was in middle school when she got a full time job and I was fending for myself by 12.

Also, not just mothers in the work force but single mothers who not only work but have the full time job of taking care of their kid.

I'm talking about the root of the problem-- not the current trend many people find themselves in. yes, NOW, people feel they have to have two incomes to get by-- the root of the problem goes back decades to women entering the workforce to begin with. Now salaries are lower (compared to cost of living) because employers have generally assumed that there are two incomes to live on.

No, this is not all as packaged and tidy as I make it seem in my 30 second post-- however, the roots are long ago sown, and the society has grown around it... To our shame as a nation.

and why the mother? Because we're the nurturer. He's the hunter. We're the homemaker. Kinda the way it was established way, way, way ago-- I'm cool with it.

I can respect your point about wages however, it couldn't stay like it was. Women and men used to work alongside eachother in the fields until the industrial revolution. It wasn't fair to continue to treat women like second class citizens. It made it hard for women who HAD to work to get by. It's a lot more than just women wanting to work. It's a have to thing. Our society changed with things becoming more computerized. I'm sure there are many women who would resent being told to go back to the kitchen barefoot and keep popping out babies.