When I was a child my parents made sure I had a balanced diet by the standards of the day. Sure, they let me have junk food and skip some vegetables, but they always said, at least try it. If I didn’t like something I didn’t have to eat it. I was always fed for health and survival. So why wasn’t I fat as a child? Exercise, limited TV and no video games.
After school, I went outside to play until my mother yelled “dinner!” We played baseball, football, hockey, kickball, tag, raced, guns with sticks, etc. If I didn’t have too much homework, I could go out after dinner and play some more. That’s more activity than I get today as an adult. So, as a child, give me cake and ice cream for dessert, I always burned it off.
Eventually we had Atari. But my parents limited my time and enforced outside play. Today most children do nothing but watch TV, play video games, “surf the Internet” and maybe do their homework. I encourage outside play, but most kids go outside to a friend’s house to play video games! The majority of parents today are more concerned with themselves and let their children do what they want.
Michelle Obama may have good intentions, but our money would be better spent encouraging exercise and reinstating proper physical education in the school curriculum instead of telling people what they should eat. Most of the food forced on our children is tossed in the trash. It’s a waste of taxpayer money and will lead to malnourishment. School lunches were fine for me and are still fine today. Encourage exercise instead of dictating what we eat, while you pig out on ribs and fries. Hypocrisy at its best.
The real cause of childhood obesity… a lack of exercise.
~3Jeeps3
Here's another one I noticed: When the elementary and middle school buses come to my cul-de-sac--the entrance to the subdivision is 0.3 miles from the furthest point--they make a stop at every house with kids. I don't know if it's the parents or the school that decided kids can't walk less than 0.3 miles to one bus stop, but they don't (I assume they drop them off in the afternoons in the same manner, but I don't know because I work). Before I moved into the house, my morning commute took me past three elementary schools, each clogged with parents lined up to drop their snowflakes off not more than 10 feet from the door. And then they waste classroom time they should be spending on math on "anti-obesity" activity when they could be getting free physical activity on their way to school every day. But expecting your child to walk to school, even part way, is almost prosecutable as child abuse these days. Ho-hum.
ReplyDeleteI remember having to run to the bus stop if I was running late. If I missed the bus, I was toast. Today, they do stop at just about every house and beep the horn. It takes my kids 30-40 minutes to get home! Great point!
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