The Nanny State: Feds propose monitoring how long you watch TV to control obesity

a reply to: onequestion

No, there isn't anything wrong with wanting people to get healthier, but there is something wrong with thinking that you have a moral superiority because you eat a certain way.

You don't know another's circumstances or why they are the way they are, but when you start getting overbearing about how they eat, it gets as personal as getting overbearing about other highly personal things.

In a sense, it can get bullying. We aren't allowed to bully people for any variety of things, but fat shaming is now in vogue.

a reply to: Gryphon66

Not for nothing, learning to "listen to our bodies" is spot on, as is avoiding the engineered foods that you and CranialSponge are pointing out.

But that's the scary part, it's not just engineered foods.

You can't even buy a piece of meat from the grocery store nowadays without taking the chance that it may have been injected with antibiotics, hormones, chemicals, and/or preservatives.

The only way to ensure that your foods do not contain one or all of the above is to buy directly from a local farmer. And even then you need to know that farmer on a personal level and been eye witness to how they feed/raise/grow/process their animal meats and produce.

IF the WHO gets it, why can't US consumers:

The World Health Organization (WHO) says processed foods are to blame for the sharp rise in obesity (and chronic disease) seen around the world.

In one study by Ludwig and colleagues, children who ate processed fast foods in a restaurant ate 126 more calories than on days they did not. Over the course of a year, this could translate into 13 pounds of weight gain just from fast food.

However, "When you have calories that are incredibly cheap, in a culture where 'bigger is better,' that's a dangerous combination," says Walter Willett, M.D., D.P.H., professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health.

www.sixwise.com...

So, in addition to highly processed foods, we also have the bigger is better phenomena.....remember when bagels were normal sized portions.....not behemoths that are impossible to eat....

a reply to: DontTreadOnMe

If you charge more for something, people want to feel like they are getting something in like value for what they spend. This is the root of the "bigger is better" phenomena.

a reply to: CranialSponge

I hear what you're saying. I noted above my efforts to avoid prepackaged food. Sources of protein are very hard to come by (but absolutely necessary, particularly if you're trying minimize carb intake)

It's almost impossible. But I think movements like you're suggesting, grass-roots, as it were, will be our salvation, if it comes. Supporting local farmers and growers.

a reply to: DontTreadOnMe

And it's almost always centered around carbs ... starches, flour, corn, all the corn syrups, sugar, etc. etc,

I'll be the first to admit, it's hard not to believe in some sort of organized conspiracy when you look at the situation.

But is it just greed and short-sightedness? I don't profess to know. Thanks for bringing that WHO information in, though.

a reply to: DontTreadOnMe

Sadly, most Americans don't cook. So pre-packaged stuff is easy, cheap and quick. It's either that or going out for a lot of Americans if my coworkers are anything to judge by.

They look at me funny when I tell them that you can sauté a fish filet or pork cutlet and stick some veggies in the microwave steamer bag and have dinner in about 15-20 minutes just as easily as a microwave entrée.

a reply to: ketsuko

Sadly, most Americans don't cook. So pre-packaged stuff is easy, cheap and quick. It's either that or going out for a lot of Americans if my coworkers are anything to judge by.

They look at me funny when I tell them that you can sauté a fish filet or pork cutlet and stick some veggies in the microwave steamer bag and have dinner in about 15-20 minutes just as easily as a microwave entrée.

That's okay.

I see that as a positive thing.

These non-cooks will be the first ones to die off in the upcoming zombie apocalypse... leaving that much more chemical-laden delectible foods for the rest of us to chow down on.

a reply to: CranialSponge

Yes, but that unwillingness or inability to cook also helps with the overweight thing. How many kids actually take Home Ec classes in school anymore I wonder?

a reply to: ketsuko

I don't know.

What does Home Ec teach that can't be easily learned in the home ?

But when I was in school I was forced to take Home Ec (even though I already knew how to boil water) because I had a vagina between my legs... they wouldn't let me take automotive and wood shop like I wanted.

I tried to raise a fuss, but my mother (in not so many words) told me to shut up, be a good girl, and stop trying to cause trouble.

I now know how to boil water AND toast bread.

Thanks mom.

a reply to: CranialSponge

HOme ec was destroyed by the food industry.....

It's true that in my home ec class nearly a quarter century ago, we weren't taught how to handle a knife or follow a simple recipe for a from-scratch dish. But home ec wasn't always so vapid. Graham points to New York Times reporter Michael Moss' great 2013 book Salt Sugar Fat, which contains a brief history of the home ec trade in US public schools.

The convenience food industry that's so powerful and entrenched today was just taking root in the 1950s. And as it began to aggressively market its products to a growing US middle class, it faced "one real obstacle," Moss writes: the "army of school teachers and federal outreach workers who insisted on promoting home-cooked meals, prepared the old fashioned way."

and

Public school systems are so strapped that they're already slashing equally worthy classes like art, music, and PE. But producing generation upon generation of people who don't know how to feed themselves healthily or manage their finances is generating massive, cascading societal costs—...

It could be a great tool to save kids from obesity and reliance on packaged foods.....but i don't think that is want "they" desire for us.

a reply to: CranialSponge

See that's weird. In our junior high you got both home ec and shop class, mandatory. You spent half of home ec cooking and the other half sewing. In shop you learning both basic metal crafting and wood crafting. There was even a quarter of drafting in there somewhere.

a reply to: DontTreadOnMe

That's because it's more important for kids to learn how to have sex and all the other social engineering they want to teach them.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: DontTreadOnMe

That's because it's more important for kids to learn how to have sex and all the other social engineering they want to teach them.

Are you saying that kids weren't figuring out how to have sex on their own?

Did you notice that the quote refers to "public school systems are so strapped"?

Does it seems counter-productive for the State to cut funding to it's own Social Engineering facilities?

I wonder if there's a different explanation beyond political rhetoric?

Like say big convenience food industry influencing policy influencing policy, like the linked article posits?

a reply to: grandmakdw

I didint want to waSte my time with an agenda driven op, you not only said that kids where starving and eating moldy meals, added religion and what not, your link to the health gov, no where does it say that the evil healthcare system will control peoples tvs.

But thanks for taking the time

a reply to: ketsuko

Maybe I grew up in a backwards hick town, I don't know.


Luckily, I'm a take-the-bull-by-the-horns type of person and taught myself basic auto repairs, carpentry, plumbing, etc.

The way I see it, people either take initiative in their lives to learn simple life skills, or they don't.

And (speaking only for myself here), I have no empathy for the latter type of persons....

Just my $.02

Just found this also from OPs link

"The federal government is spending more than $2 million to develop wearable insoles and buttons that can track a person’s weight in order to fight obesity.

"freebeacon.com... ion-to-develop-weight-tracking-insoles-buttons/

Edit to add ... Unless it is done without consent ... I see no prob ... I.E Leaving it to personal choice

originally posted by: CranialSponge
a reply to: ketsuko

Maybe I grew up in a backwards hick town, I don't know.


Luckily, I'm a take-the-bull-by-the-horns type of person and taught myself basic auto repairs, carpentry, plumbing, etc.

The way I see it, people either take initiative in their lives to learn simple life skills, or they don't.

And (speaking only for myself here), I have no empathy for the latter type of persons....

Just my $.02

Self-reliance?

Blasphemy!

(you didn't build that!)

a reply to: CranialSponge

Good for you

And good point too ... It is a personal responsibility ... no business of the Guv to interfere by Mandatory means ... Voluntary yes

a reply to: beezzer

Self-reliance?

Blasphemy!

(you didn't build that!)

Beware !

I have a pneumatic nail gun and know how to use it !

(right after I finish eating my round bacon sammich that I made all by my little ol' self)