News story here.
So this raises an interesting question. How much of obesity is genetic, and how much of it is nurture? This woman isn't skinny herself; is her 8 year-old son's 218 lbs. due to some gene that his mother carries? Or is it from her parenting skills and feeding him what he wants instead of what's good for him?
I don't think anyone would argue that obesity is a serious health issue. Multiple conditions are linked to obesity. Is allowing your child to become obese abuse or neglect? And if it is, how do you go about fixing it?
This 8 year-old kid weighs as much as I do. I'm obese. I have always been overweight, and I always struggle with my weight. If I don't carefully monitor what I eat, my weight balloons out of control. Is this because of my genes? Most people in my family history going back several generations have been overweight. Is this just how we were raised? My mom always tried to get a balanced healthy meal on the table, but there were always seconds and fast food and snacks. Were my parents bad parents? Did they abuse me? I played sports and was fairly active. My fiancee is very very overweight, and it is very hard to cook a healthy meal for him that he will eat. He likes "poor food", which means high fat, high sat, high cholesterolmeals.
What does this mean for society? New York has banned trans fats from all restaurants. All trans fats have to be listed on nutrition labels (although there can be trace trans fats). But studies have shown that lower income families have higher rates of obesity. They're eating at cheap fast food restaurants and a bag of chips or candy is usually cheaper than fresh fruit or vegetables (banana's are usually a buck a pound, artichokes can be over a dollar each). Organic and unprocessed foods are expensive. It is cheaper to feed a family on junk than it is to feed them healthy. By government regulations, a homerun fruit pie counts as a serving of fruit in school lunches. At my high school, most lunches were over 1400 calories.
So, if we want to say that childhood obesity is abuse/neglect, what do we as society do about it? PE and recess are being cut from schools, especially in poor districts. Should there be more of an requirement on nutrition and exercise courses in schools? What would you cut funding for to pay for it? Obviously school lunches should be rethought, but what about those children that rely on those calories as their only meal of the day? We regulate items like tobacco and alcohol that have been linked to health conditions, should we ban the sale of items with trans fats or high sodium or high cholesterol to children under 18 (21?), and fine anyone who sells or gives these items to children? And what should we do about low income families that can't afford healthier food? Should we place additional taxes on junk foods to make them more expensive than healthy food? Should the government increase subsidies to farmers to lower the cost of healthier foods? Is it the governments responsibility to ensure that it's citizens are healthy?
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I don't think I really believe obesity is either just genetic or just nurture. I believe for the most part it is nurture, However, what I do Also believe is in the fact that other things are genetic and may lead to obesity - such as being depressed, suspect to addiction, or similar. Metabolism plays some part in it as well, which I believe is linked to genetics. So rather than assuming it is just one or other, it really is just a blend of things. Some cases may be mostly nurture, some cases may the individual may be more likely to become obese due to other genetic problems (but not obesity itself).
Its just like alcoholism, it runs in families and some deem it as genetic, but really I argue that what is genetic that's running through these families is quite often the likeliness in a person's habits to become addicted.
I definitely hope that something is done in the government to help prevent the amount of child obesity in our society. I believe it begins even further than just preventing children from eating unhealthy foods or making sure PE is enforced, but it must begin with the parents. We are taught all kinds of things in school, but how much information is taught on proper parenting?
I am unsure whether I believe its the government's responsibility. It may not be, but then the question is - why do we have any government in the first place? The idea is hope that set guidelines will help prevent chaos, ie. an obesity epidemic. Therefore, I do think its in the government's best interest to try to enforce better nutrition/health knowledge in schools. It is education after all, education that can save our life.
I also think there should be stricter guidelines on food that is sold in stores and restaurants. We have the FDA yet there are so many foods out there that while they may not be immediate harm, they are quite harmful especially to children. I despise the idea of filling up growing children with sugars and sodas.
I really enjoyed this article, your brought up many great issues and questions that we should all be asking and facing. I wish I could ramble even more on how I feel about it but it would go on for days :)
Obesity....true it may be in genes but life is not always about one thing. There is always other factors that affect. In this case, yes some people are obese due to their generation and that just means they have to take care of themselves more than others. Yes many times you have to blame the parents because that is how children first encounter their behaviors. Yes, we all know that parents just want the best for their child, but giving them chocolate bars just to shut them off is not the correct way. Society is another factor, I know its hard to change the view of society, its to large to change the behaviors, but we have to start somewhere. And society has already started, organizations, civil and private activities and so on. We just have to be patient because in this situation, we will see a effect on the long run not tomorrow.
Daisy =]
I think it's horrible how PE and recess are being cut down from schools, i believe that it should be added with more time that usual. However, i don't think that schools should enforce nutrition, but rather have a variety of foods to choose from, healthy and non-healthy. Also, i don't think its genetic bc 5 of my great aunts are very very obese, but my grandma (their sister) is really small, same with me, my mother, and my sisters. I do believe it is because of poor parenting, bad food and bad exercise habits. It actually really makes me angry when people don't take care of their bodies. How hard is it to eat something that is good for you? i am thin and when i eat unhealthy food like fries or burgers i feel really really unhealthy. yeah they taste good once in a while but i dont understand how ppl can eat that stuff every day. maybe it's because of lack of time. but there r places like subway people can eat at. I just don't c y people dont try to be healthy. there are gyms, and parks and sidewalks to run at. there are soo many healthy food grocery stores now days but ppl still choose to eat out at mcdonalds.