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Big Mother Is Watching
theodp writes "Newsweek reports that high-schoolers are being denied the joy of ordering unhealthy lunches thanks to their schools' adoption of services like MealpayPlus. New web-based services allow moms to prepay for cafeteria food, specify what their kid can and can't buy, and go online to track his purchases." From the article: "If the child tries to buy a prohibited item, an alert flashes on the cashier's computer. Of course, the system isn't foolproof. According to a KRC Research survey, 73 percent of 8- to 12-year-olds are throwing out part of their lunches at least once a week; 36 percent are trading them." All I ever got was PB&J.
If you feel the need to control what your kid eats in high school through a system like this, you've allready failed as a parent.
"The more you tighten your grip on the galaxy, the more star systems will slip through your fingers!"
I realize that is not the original text of the quote, but I revised it for clarity. Also, before you mod me offtopic, how many of you won't admit that your parents were like the evil empire? I know mine were.
Ah, nothing beats the love and care put into making your child's lunch... ...checklist.
When I read "alert" I though of a loud siren.
I wonder how they know what percentage is trading.
I doubt the kids are going to be cooperative enough to get a valid value.
What would be good is "dessert credits."
When you buy enopugh good stuff you can get same bad as well.
Well unless you are in Arizona then "desert credits" might be reasonable.
Why don't you guys have friends or journals?
When your in school, you're already bound by what you can and can't say, write, hear and wear. That said, why not just serve only HEATHY food in the first place!!! Now that would be something worthy of enforcing.
The amount of porkers I see in the malls these days scare me! Their shit diet is going to cost society massive amounts in health care!
Life is not for the lazy.
For the love of god wont someone PLEASE think of the children???!!
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
people think kids cant think for themselves i dont even understand this just dont give your kid money and pack his lunch then???? dosent really matter kid will just have his freind buy it for him
Too much is made about child's rights and too little is spoken about dubious advertising for unhealthy food items. In Japan, there is a huge promotional campaign to get kids eat Whale Meat for Lunch!
Obesity in kids is the no. 1 health problem facing the US today, and if parents can have a say on what their kids can order, it's great! The choice is between listening to one's parents and listening to (untrulthful) advertisemsnts. Parents ought to know better.
As usual, the title Big Mother is misleading and mischevous. Parents watching their children cannot be equated to the Government spying on citizens. The former is a duty, the latter is a violation of rights to privacy.
Too bad, Slashdot is resorting to Flamebait to ensure more replies.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
My mom occasionally brought me fast food, and made damn good sandwiches.
MealpayPlus doesn't charge for its system; it makes money on transaction fees when parents put money on kids' accounts.
If this is like some offices, you can't pay in case (article doesn't specify). Approach the counter without a card and you're just met by a queer look from the cashier.
The site says it's a flat $2.00 fee per transactions. Now you're torn between a 1% tax to give the kid a whopping $200 on the card (max) or a 10% tax if you just give them a benjamin every few days.
Bill Thompson, the only kid at Deerbrook High School still granted pizza privileges, has become the youngest person ever to retire at age 17.
My Hello World is 512 bytes. But it's also a valid Fat12 boot sector, Fat12 file reader, and Pmode routine.
Are these kids in school or jail? Is this technology just making subservient graduates who will become accustomed to being monitored and not being able to make decisions for themselves?
I applaud them for throwing out parts of their lunch and for trading and subverting the system. At least some of them still have shreds of self determination left inside.
My guess is that most of the /.ers with kids are asleep by now; it will be interesting to see how the character of posts changes in 5 or 6 hours. There seems to be way too much misplaced indignation at this hour.
I get it, it seems kind of stupid, and pretty easy to get around. What is funny is that it seems that in general our school systems are not very good at finding problems. When they do find one, they are generally even worse in solving them.
So what they did here is find a problem. Too many kids are lazy and fat. In order to solve this problem they... oh god... give mothers the option to monitor what they can order.
So what is wrong with this? Simple, fat fuck kids are GENERALLY fat fuck kids because they have... yep, fat fuck parents! Do you think that these parents are really going to monitor what their kids are eating from an online interface while they sit on the couch chowing down on their 18th Burger King run of the week, sipping on diet cola, so they can have a little cancer with their 3000 calorie nutritionless meal? Of course not!
What is going to happen, is the same thing that happens with ALL OF OUR PROBLEMS, the kids who are pretty good, active, and eat relatively well, are going to suffer because the day they want a couple ice cream cones the alarm bell goes off and he will embarrasingly be turned down at the counter. Then Janine the 300 pound depressed girl with messed up parents orders 3 cheeseburgers and goes to go sit down by herself at a table.
How about this instead. Stop serving dog shit food. Stop selling dog shit food. Teach kids that you actually feel better and have more fun in your life when you are healthy and take reasonably good care of yourself. You don't need to be an athlete, just stay healthy.
When it comes down to it, you can't fix bad parenting in school. Schools can do a lot of good, expecially if you fill it with great inspiring teachers. Of course, it is tough to fill schools with people like this when they make 30K a year and have to teach bullshit like Intelligent Design. We are becoming a society of band-aids and patches. People need a leader. I'd do it, but i'll be damned to hell before I get into politics. If you make it very far in that profession, you have been stripped of what would have made you a good leader many years before.
Now go eat an apple!!! YOU WILL BE WATCHED
You take it, I don't want it...
But over here (Australia) its Jam, not Jelly and when i tell people about my secret love, they look at me very funny. I havn't had it in ages, because i dont eat a lot of sugary fatty stuff anymore, appart from the 12 donuts, 2 blocks of chockolate and box of musli fruity things i ate over thursday, friday and saterday!
PB&J rules!
Giving IE users a taste of their own medicine since 2005 - http://pods.-is-a-geek.net/
In Finland school lunches are free. Not only are they free, but kids get a healthy meal including fresh vegetables and often fruit every single day, bread and milk is included as well. Everyone eats the same meal, including the teachers. The only exceptions are people with allergies / ethic issues (vegetarians etc). You're free not to eat if you don't like the food, of course.
I strongly believe that good eating habits at an early age is paramount for learning a healthy lifestyle. One can have many opinions of socialistic solutions, but when it comes to nutrition and education I'm all for it. Having seen the muck english school kids have to eat I'm rather grateful I was born in Finland.
My 2 cents, anyway.
.: Max Romantschuk
What about the bullies and their likely drop in revenue from those who use this service? I see hard times for this industry. And all you people think about is kid's rights, I swear.
Videogames made me kill people...I also eat mushrooms to grow bigger.
The solution is for schools to serve only health food as determined by a qualified nutritionist. However, states, or better yet, the federal government, needs to throw more money at making school lunches healthier. In fact, why not make it so school lunches are 100% free, limit one per student per day, if all the food there is healthy.
As for soda in schools, charge more (like $1 to $1.25 per 12 oz can). Plus, the caffeine can be beneficial in my opinion.
Y'know, some of these kind of practices produce some surprising results in the real world. Whilst you or I probably look on slightly bemused, this kind of behaviour in schools can produce some interesting quirks.
Here in the UK, there has been a similar kind of healthy food drive. Although parents are not given the levels of oversight seen here, fast food and vending machines are quickly becoming dirty words.
However, in some cases children are fighting back in rather funny ways. In one school (I'd find the link if I wasn't late for work!) a group of children started buying snacks, cans of fizzy drink and chocolate from a local wholesaler, and then sold them on to children during break time and lunch.
Expect to see something similar happen here; and make a note of the kids that start doing it, because they might just be the kind of people we see doing well in the business world in a few years time. Of course, it'll cause this prepay system to fall apart and be branded a failure as well, which is probably no bad thing.
I hear so many people talk about how Americans eat too much, how kids are too fat, and how it's always the parents' fault if a kid is fat.
Now here's a way for parents to control what their kids eat, and people are screaming about how it's invasive and controlling.
Screw you guys. If you're gonna play two sides of an issue, at least seperate it by a few degress, don't sit here and say how it's wrong for parents to let their kids eat crap and then say it's wrong for parents to NOT let their kids eat crap.
Christ.
This is just another step towards a complete surveillance society. Indoctrinate the youth into accepting that they're being controlled and monitored all the time. Before long this will become more and more common.
Cham
We had NO junk food in italy at school
up to university (included).
It really was cheap and healty way to feed kids:
they gave you simple food that was properly cooked.
I live in uk and I've been in the States and now
I'm more than proud of this way.
Just forbid "lunch trading", that is it. The school does not exist to bring the ideological libertarian start in the kids. The school exists to teach children the subjects - math, physics, etc. If the parent wants the kid to eat healthy, school needs to help.
Good job, school systems. Now, to the submitter or whoever stuck the stupid "YRO" category to this: "good" job.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
This is more of a way for parents to delegate their responsibility by spending a little cash. Sort-of how we delegate our lawn mowing to day laborers instead of doing it ourselves, soon we'll be able to delegate our parenting to the state.
I'm 18, so my experience with school cafeterias is still fresh in my memory. I can tell you this: almost every 12-16 year old likes at least one kind of fast food. AND? Fast food means burgers, pizza, and chips, right?
You can't stop them from eating it. They love the stuff. Hell, I know I like it.
The fact is, if your food is COOKED PROPERLY you can get most of the grease and fat OUT of said dishes. You can also reduce the portion, and serve it with healthy food - even INSIDE it. Tomato slices are definitely healthy, and make a great garnish to burgers.
I can't name many situations in which direct "bans" like this should be used, or even work. The article even points out how flawed this system is.
We should be controlling the actual food they eat - not preventing them from eating specific things. Kids just won't eat "health" food unless you bring them up that way from day one. And even then, once they hit 13 they're likely to turn against their upbringing.
It's easier for both them and you if you improve the quality of the food they eat in schools rather than limiting their options.
If my mother had done this to me, I'd have shouted at her until she stopped it, or never paid a penny on school lunches again.
(Yes, I'm a brat. Deal with it.)
And am whole-heartedly offended by a lot of these comments. This program is yet another level of abstraction between parenting and the children.
I have raised my kids, taught them right from wrong. I am also smart enough to realize that my kids are not idiots. They are not stupid and will find ways around things they don't understand or agree with... Just like I did as a child. When that happens, all you can do as a parent is hope you instilled the proper morals into the child.
I'm sorry, it is NOT up to the lunch lady to determine what my kids eat. If I am that concerned about what my children eat at school, I'll make it myself! At one school they attended, this is exactly what I did. "Some parents don't have time for that!", you might say... Bullshit. If you have the time to screw around and have kids, you MAKE THE DAMN TIME to raise them. It's called parenting.
This shit ranks right up there with Net-Nanny type things. If you mistrust your children to these kinds of extents, then you have failed as a parent and nothing can fix this. More and more the definition of "children" is getting pushed further up the age curve. This lunch program is in High-Schools for crying out loud. Kids who have their driver's licenses and are nearly the age of majority, yet they can't pick their own lunches? Um, yeah. That makes sense.
I could rant on, but I'm tired. Night.
Are you going to pay for that? Or the health bill caused by morbid obesity?
The owls are not what they seem
Disclaimer: I am 17 years of age and have just recently finished my grade 12.
;-)
;-)
First off, I would like to say that I enjoy the (mis)use of technology to help students in what they eat. However, this is not going to stop them. I am definately not fat or over weight, and I try to eat healthy as often as I can. I cook my own meals, so sometimes I like to relax and just grab a burger... but only once in a while! Although, I am not the greatest role model, as I do sit around on the computer a little too much.
My younger brother is just entering high school this up-coming year. I hate to admit it, but he seriously needs help in controlling his weight. He weighs much more than I do, and I am very concerned for him. He's an absolute genius in his school work, and he's also very into computers/animation. He's really into Flash Animation, so he sits around a lot. This up-coming year I am going to make sure he get's into a sports team of some sort, but I know that alone wont be enough.
I hate to say it, but right here is wheer Peer Pressure can do some good. These kids need to eat healthier, why not start with the children that do? Have them weasel their way into these kids minds and help show them the way! We need not restrict them, but try to show them that healthier food leads to a healthier lifestyle.
Threats and restriction only lead to uprisings... expect them.
The sadist in me wants to know if this works the other way: "Yes Johnny, I know you would like an apple, but the computer says you have to have a triple chocolate fudge delight."
Someone had to work and pay taxes for that "free lunch". Contrary to what your local Socialist Indoctrinator says, it just didn't spring out from a magical "lunch machine".
Personally I think parents have the right to restrict what foods their kids eat (through this system if need be), but I believe the system is the best of a bad situation. In fact, I bet the Coca-Cola's of this world would endorse the system since it means they can still sell their crap to the majority.
Fathers can't participate in this process then?
Hi,
> If you feel the need to control what your kid eats in high school through a system like this, you've allready failed as a parent.
Aw, come on now. You wuss. You don't have kids or you wouldn't make a dumb-ass statement like that!!!
You really think a Kid is going to go for the healthy lunch if all the other kids are eating hormone-e-preservative infested grease bombs?
Sure, the kid will know it's an unhealthy lunch but it tastes kind of good and everyone else does it...
And after a while you've got a big fucking chamber-elephant instead of a kid.
Part of being a parent is taking responsibility for your child. If you let them stuff their faces with whatever because it's on offer, it's no different from letting them do drugs. And YES, some foods are as bad or worse then drugs in the damage they do to the body.
Forced to go to work, you have to choose between a packed lunch or a school meal. Since it's better to have a hot meal around midday, it's good to have the option of giving your kid some choice while still being able to make sure he eats a (reasonably) healthy diet.
But then you didn't think things through trying to get first post, did you?
Parents, I'll say it again: the more you try to micromanage your kid's lives, the less responsibility for their own well-being they will learn. Remember that the GOAL of parenthood is to give the world a sensible adult. Sensible adults are made by teaching the kid the "why" of what's important, not just keeping an electronic beeper on them at every checkpoint to flash lights and sound alarms. The kid will resent your intrusive treatment of them as if they were a lab rat and grow up to rebel at the worst, and even at best will be ill-equiped to make responsible choices as an adult without green and red lights or buzzes and beeps to guide them.
And why does George Orwell keep getting the credit for predicting the future when Ira Levin was the one who really pegged it in his novel "This Perfect Day"? What flavor totalcake can you have today? Touch the bracelet to the scanner... and bless Uni for the wisdom.
There is no obesity problem.
The truth is, there are skinny six-year-olds who think they are too fat, and Anorexia Nervosa has been diagnosed in boys.
What there is, however, is a government desperately angling to slap a tax on food.
This talk of an "obesity epidemic" is a blatant attempt to whip up the Daily Mail readers {none of whom personally know anybody who is over- or underweight, and would not consider it a problem if they did, but they do see images of overweight people, who clearly have less money than they do, on Sky TV} into a frenzy, running around like headless chickens demanding for Something To Be Done. And when the "ordinary" people call for it, the Chancellor will hold up his tatty red briefcase and announce VAT on certain, "unhealthy" foodstuffs. Not, of course, the sort of foodstuffs the Daily Mail readers eat. And the Daily Mail readers will be satisfied. The Sun will be given a new story {most probably involving minor celebrities or paedophiles} to divert attention from the new tax.
However, once the scope of VAT is broadened, it never, ever narrows. Following a panning by the press after the initial announcement in the March budget, the bad news will have been sufficiently well buried by the November budget for the "VAT on food" experiment to be trumpeted as a success, and an intention will be announced to extend it. Pretty soon, the Daily Mail readers will find 22.5% VAT on their saumon en croûte and mange tout.
It's all about money. It's not even really about power as an end in its own right; this concept certainly does exist, but often is just a side-effect of the unfortunate human tendency to conflate means with ends. Power is always initially a means to some end, often a noble one, but eventually the means becomes more important than the end.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
When I was a kid, you either brought your lunch or ate the same meal as everyone else until high school. Once you reached the high school level in my area, there was an a la carte cafeteria, but before that it was a planned meal. This article makes it sound like kids as young as 8 are choosing their own meals. Hell, I wouldn't let my kids choose their own meals at home at the age of 8, much less at school.
Even in High School. If you're a parent and you eat junk or have junk in your home, ie: buy it for your kids or have it around for 'snacking' then you're responsible for your child's bad eating habits. You want your kids to eat right? Keep good healthy food in your home...
Fresh vegetables and fruit.... once a week buy fresh stuff and put it out where it can be seen... fruits in a bowl and vegetables on display, both in fridge and on counter in a nice container or basket. Pre-make good salads... don't keep them in the pre-mixed bag you buy them in.. put them in a nice salad bowl that has a freshness feature (clay to keep moist but also has holes in bottom and sides to let extra moisture out... and add in some extras, carrot slivers, almonds, cranberries, etc. make them look tasty... if you eat meat add some hard-boiled egg white slices and turkey chunks
Make good meals and stick them in the fridge as instant left-overs. These will be cheaper and better than a frozen dinner (less preservatives, etc.) and your teen will actually eat them, cause they can grab them late at night or whenever and heat them up on their own schedule, instead of grabbing a bag of chips or something.
Easy pre-made meals: Lasagna or any Pasta dish, Stir-Fry, Burritos, Taco ingredients, Pre-made sandwiches and wraps, Roasts that can be sliced into cold-cuts (teen-age boys love cutting stuff and they'll just slice off a hunk and grab some cheese and bread), hard-boiled eggs (peeled or not), sliced up veggies (carrot sticks, cucumbers, brockley, etc.) with a good dip (humus or veggie/cream cheese is great).
This might not sound like health-food but compared to the crap they'd stuff their faces with (think any fast-food or junk from convenience store) it's completely healthy and they'll eat it if it's made convenient for them.
In the end you'll find that they will end up looking for similar foods when they are out of the house too. They might even end up taking their lunches to school because the food that's available at home is so much better than the crap at school... but let them keep their 'lunch money' as a reward or else they'll stop taking their lunch just to get the money so they can spend it on other things... who cares what,
Point is they'll be healthier and it will only take a few hours a week on your part to make the food available in a appetizing form that's also convenient.
BTW same thing applies to drinks... get rid of the canned sodas.. just put some pitchers of old-fahioned lemonade (cut the sugar down) and Iced tea and juice and plenty of water bottles.
They'll still have some junk in their diet when out with friends but they won't be creating a habit while at home and the reality is that we all really spend the longest part of our 24 hour day at home... so make it a healthy one and you'll have healthy kids.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
I'm sorry, but this must be in some high school in a different state or country. I have never heard of this, and not only is it ridiculous, but in the article, they state that "...percentage of 8 to 12-year olds are throwing out their lunches once a week".
last time i checked... that's elementary school.
What normal parent would have the time to mess with something like this? This brings up images of an overcontroling mother.
This ad space for rent.
You know what? When I was in school I went crazy and ate utter junk - we're talking like 5 Mars bars a day. Why? Because I could. Because the junk was there and because I could buy it [with parent's money], I was a teenager and I didn't know any better. Yeah sure, healthy food existed, but that was for "other" people.
Then the inevitable thing happened: I got fat and it took many years to regain control of my weight, even after I graduated.
But you know what? Now I eat healthily, look after my body and indulge in a Mars *monthly* insted of *daily*.
I'm a firm believer that you *need* to make mistakes. That's the only way I learnt to take care of myself; when my own body ballooned. When you're a teenager you're a snot-nosed git and knucklehead.
Leasons learned the hard way are the ones most savoured. Sometimes you just have to be wrong before you can be right.
This is obvious flamebait, but I'll bite anyway. The key words in my original post are "transparent" and "democratic".
Slashdot: news from nerds.
When it comes to raising kids, if it's mom and dad's money then mom and dad have some control. If the kid wants a twinkie, let him pay cash out of his allowance.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Overprotection does indeed leave children underprepared. For example, the parent's parents always corrected his spelling and broke apart his run-on sentences. Now look. For shame, overprotective parents...for shame.
\documentclass[slashdot]{snippet}
\begin{document}
\section{Humor}
Where I went to school we didn't have a cafeteria. The kids parents and siblings didn't help them pack lunches either. We just had pictures of food. Sometimes there weren't enough pictures to go around and we'd be both hungry and bored.
\section{Truth}
Peanut butter and jelly is god's gift to lazy. It's a delicious combination of two cheap things that won't turn your bread all soggy. So far as unhealthy brown bag lunches go, it's one of the best.
\end{document}
I'll be your candy shop of infinite deliciousity if you'll be my discotheque of endless rump-shaking.
You, on the other hand, have too much confidence that the parents won't be control freaks. "Over-protective" doesn't sound that bad until you end up basically in a straitjacket of motherly love that crushes the life and sanity out of you. Don't underestimate how much "over" there can be in "overprotective."
/. it contained such gems as one mother getting horrified and confronting her daughter because... said daughter had bought 3 ounces of juice to wash down the food with. "Noooo! Think of all the calories in 3 ounces of juice!" Not an exact quote, but the same idea.
The last time such a system was discussed on
To start with the _lesser_ problem, she was trying to raise her daughter as... what? An Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder case? Yes, obesity is bad, but if you're at the point where you count the few calories in a quarter of a cup of juice, do yourself a favour and kill yourself. We're not talking buying a big bottle of Coke, we're not talking even a can, we're talking 3 ounces. Of juice.
Moving a bit upwards on the scale, such a remotely-controlled kid will grow to be completely unprepared for life. They never were trusted with making a decision of their own, and seeing the results, so they (A) just don't know what to do when mommy isn't around to remote-control them, and (B) completely lack the data to base a decision on. Playing and exploration in childhood are learning. Someone who has grown up with mommy taking all their decisions for them, hasn't learned anything.
I know I basically went off guidance as every time I was out of reach of my control-freak parents. I ended up in an alcoholic coma in one of the few summer camps where they didn't tag along, as well as doing a thousand other stupid things. Partially because it was one occasion to vent all that built-up frustration of being little more than a remote-controlled puppet to my parents the rest of the time. But in retrospect the largest part was the aspect that I just had no freaking clue how to function without them remote-controlling me.
Even after finishing college and moving away, it was like running into a brick wall as learning curves go. Without mom telling me what to do and when to do it, I suddenly had no flipping clue what _am_ I supposed to do and when. It took some rediscovering from scratch how to even function as an adult. (In all fairness, mom still tries to remote-control me. She'd be more than happy to still tell me exactly what and when to do, but at that point I had decided to at least try functioning as myself for a change.)
But maybe more important is the psychological damage. Kids like adults (and like most animals, including your dog and cat) need some breathing space. Even the most affectionate lap cat needs its moments of being alone or doing its own thing, or it will go neurotic.
E.g., I only have to look at my brother who at one point had a fit of anorexia over my parents complete control over his food. At one point as a kid he just stopped eating, and eventually ended up in hospital. They even ran all sorts of medical tests on him, because they suspected cancer the way he was losing weight. He was basically deflating as fast as, well, someone who doesn't eat at all any more. I can easily see that possibility in the future of such kid as the girl with her 3 ounces of juice.
I managed to do somewhat better (or at least not swing to such extremes), partially by finding refuge in programming, partially by cherishing the moments I was finally out of my family's reach. I certainly didn't hate school too much. I actually had more freedom there than at home. Still, I ended up with some long term damage of my own anyway.
E.g., I basically have to roll for willpower (if I'm allowed the D&D metaphor) to do anything, because some circuit in the back of the brain says "you know, mom would disapprove of me doing that. Or doing it that way." And I don't mean doing bad stuff, but even stuff like taking the trash out. Mom would certainly find something to complain
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
I think it is already well-known now that the US has a frighteningly high ratio of fat and obese people. It should be well-known by now that the health status in the US is lower than in most other western industrialized countries, with diet-related diseases like diabetes being extremely frequent and getting even more frequent still.
It should be well-known that feeding high-fat and high-sugar fast food to school children who get carried around in cars all the time is not a good idea. It is not a good idea for a school to raise money for getting their kids hooked on junk food.
So anything that will restrict this tragedy is a good thing. For instance the simple fact that schools would offer non-crap food that actually tastes good (which is a challenge to do at a low cost) would be an incredible improvement already. There is not much sense in restricting a child from eating the unhealthy stuff if the alternatives are missing or just some sad and terribly tasting vegetables.
Also, better than forcing your child like this would be to raise it in a way that makes it easy for them to just choose the healthy stuff out of their own free will. Educate them about what is going on (schools could help here instead of helping the fast food companies) and provide them with well-tasting, home-cooked, healthy stuff at home.
So, knowing that there are many ways how to do this better, this option is probably still better than nothing, given the monstrous situation of how kids get fed in the US.
My own kids rarely feel the urge to eat fast food and know why high-sugar stuff is unhealthy and while they love sugar like all kids they know how to avoid getting too much of it. They prefer natural juices over sodas simply because they taste better.
There are lots of topics related to this, including how the US actually supports the production of cheap sugar and including how schools cannot really decide on this because of low budgeting and bad education politcs.
The bottom line is that anything that will raise awareness about the tragedy of the food situation in the US is good.
...being taught nutrition
. stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/5216960
I'm new here. Does the constitution allow you to become as fat as you want so eventually you crush the health system?
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
I'd say the problem is they're treating this as a supply problem rather than a demand problem: if you deny them the bad food, then they'll eat healthier.
But kids, especially resourceful high school kids, will figure out a way to get the food they want to eat. This is a demand problem. You need to focus on changing how kids feel about eating healthy food.
It's up to parents to raise their kids from an early age to enjoy food that's good for them. I know so many people may age or younger who don't care for vegetables, only like white bread, and think of fries as a vegetable.
From a young age, my parents forced healthy food on me. Although occasionally I was miserable and felt deprived, most of the time I greatly enjoyed the food I ate despite being "healthy".
In a sense, this is a supply problem being tackled too late. You need to have your house stocked with healthy food at an early age when the child is developing their food preferences, *not* when they're already in high school and set in their ways.
It's a shame that these parents are waiting until middle or high school to control their kids in this way. It suggests a lack of trust, and it also suggests that if the kid is unwilling or unlikely to make healthy food choices voluntarily.
Probably the best step would be to limit their budget for school food, but let them get whatever they want. Instead, focus on getting them to have a larger breakfast before they leave, and a larger dinner when they get home, minimizing the food they eat at school. Parents can easily control the food available at home so long as the child doesn't yet have the funds or wherewithal to do their own grocery shopping.
In a sense, this is what happened to me. Years of candy deprivation means it was the first thing I went for when I had my own spending money in high school. But because my funds were limited (around $5-6 per week or so, I think) I had to make my own lunch at home, and used all my money on candy or soft drinks. When I got home, there generally weren't easy snacks available, and we didn't have much in the way of frozen dinners (or a microwave), so I was forced to cook something for myself if I wanted to eat something before dinner (and on nights when my parents were busy, I'd have to cook dinenr). This had two benefits: one, it meant that I was eating food that was relatively healthy (at worst, "fast food" meant opening a can of vegetable soup) and two that I was learning to cook, something which is not encouraged enough I think.
Sorry this comment is so long but I did not have time to write a shorter one.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
I'm enjoying the first 50 comments on this story. The thought of Slashdot types, who have mostly lived on colas and greasy snacks since they left home (if they've left home, that is) discuss the finer points of parenting skills and nutrition is certainly entertaining. It seems many have forgotten the basic tenet: "GIGO"
You are welcome on my lawn.
Chances are good, they're eating those buck-fifty greaseballs 'cause healthy food is out of their financial reach.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Who goes voluntarily into a sports team? Jocks. Who are the chief bullies in a school? Jocks. Who is the main picking target? The weakest link.
Think about that for a moment.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Then maybe the answer is making healthy lunches enjoyable.
Kids have different tastes than adults, most of us are well-aware our own taste has changed over the years. Fast food chains get it, why can't the people who make healthy food understand this simple fact and start preparing meals the way kids would actually like them. Yes, that may mean adding a bit more fat or sugar than "none", but atleast it would be a lot better than what they buy now.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
HAH, with this new system the freshman 15 will become to freshman 50. (Google it if you don't know what the 'freshman 15' is)
But seriously, what the hell is going to happen when all of these kids go to college? A kid has never been taught very much about proper food choices and when mommy isn't there to do it for them, they're screwed.
And furthermore, what is all of this "preparing students to make good choices for later in life" crap that we hear all the schools spewing at us? You don't prepare people to make choices by making the choices for them and then setting them free all at once.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
Face it. No law parents set up a child does not understand will be broken. Period. That starts with "don't go to construction sites" (without giving a reason why not to) and does not even end at "you won't go out with Jonny Sleazebag". Kids break through Net Nanny, they sneak out while under house arrest, they disable parental control on the remote.
Why should something like this work? Kids will trade their lunch with kids who can buy "normal" food, or they will pay those kids who do (and get ripped off too). Kids will leave school for some burger restaurant during lunch break, and if that isn't allowed, they will sneak out. Oh, the threat of being suspended? Hell, where do I sign to be thrown out of school!
Face it parents: You can't force your kids to do what they don't understand. Also, it's kinda hard to understand for Jonny why he should eat his broccoly and drink his healthy water while mom and dad are guzzling down greaseballs with root beer.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
If you think that the human species was always based on babysitting your kid until the age of 21, sad to say, you're the one on the "utter bull" side.
For starters, for a large portion of the human history (in fact, for _the_ largest portion), the average life expectancy was in the 30 to 40 years range. Yes, literally. The life expectancy in ancient Egypt for example was in the low 30's. In the European middle ages and renaissance it wasn't much better, since they had very high mortality. In fact, all medieval cities had such high mortality (because of being filthy disease-ridden places) that they needed a constant influx of peasants moving in just to maintain their size. So, again, the average person would have a really really shitty life expectancy.
So pay attention: you wouln't have _time_ to babysit them until 21. If you got married at 21, took a year to get your first kid, and then babysat him to 21, that's a total of 43 years. Add a few tries, because of the extremely high infant mortality, and you'd end up needing some 50 years for such a bullshit babysitting utopia. It's more than 50% more than the actual life expectancy you'd have.
So for most of the human history, at 12 to 14 years old you'd be considered _adults_. At that age you'd be expected to get married, run a business, fight in a war, or, yes, maybe command a ship or an army. There were a lot of kings, nobles, generals, etc, who ruled a country or led its troops in battle at that age. There were decisions which changed history, at least on a local level, taken at that age.
Thinking that they always had mommy pack their lunch and check if they wear a sweater at that age... heh... to quote your own words: "is so utterly retarded I don't know where to begin."
So, yes, if you're trying to tell me that a modern 14 year old can't can't even decide what to buy without mommy deciding for them, then, yes, there must be something awfully wrong with the current crop of kids. Because "kids" of that age are what throughout most of human history were the _adults_, and perfectly capable of functioning as adults.
Or maybe, just maybe, it's not the kids, but their parents who are retarded. Just a thought. Maybe the kid would be perfectly capable of taking a mature and responsible decision, if mommy and daddy had taken the time to give him the data and the opportunity for those decisions, instead of just controlling what the kid does.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
In my high school, the burgers, fries, pizza and icecream were the only things that were edible. The alternate choices were wilted salad bar, disgusting canned green beans, dried out baked pasta and gravy soaked everything. eew. Kids wouldnt eat so much pizza if the alternatives were slightly appetizing. Is it any wonder i spent a year in high school starving myself because I couldn't find anything healthy to eat and there was nowhere to refrigerate or microwave a packed lunch?
Common sense gets modded down again. I thought when I was a kid I was smarter than I really was. Gave my parents hell, and they gave some back. But now that I'm much older I realize the wisdom of what they preached. Don't always agree with some of it, but I understand that it was all done with love. Making my own mistakes aka the hot stove method of parenting. Yeah I made those, some contrary to my parents wishes. Paying for them now. Listening to my parents would have been much easier than being some kind of rebel trying to prove that we don't need our parents.* Back to the story. I think things like net-nanny and this program are tools, nothing more, to help make a difficult job a bit easier. At least the users care enough to use them unlike some parents.
*An attitude carried into our ages, when we don't need [insert authority here].
And I was a fucking idiot. So was my straight A sister. So were all my friends. In fact, so was everyone I went to school with. I'll bet your kids are fucking idiots too--regardless of what you think of them.
Now, if this had happened when I was in high school I woulda been up in arms over it--the idea of my parents controlling one more facet of my life would've caused the same kind of spluttering rage and cries of "bad parenting" that I've seen in the comments so far. But you know, I'm not a kid any more. I've been out of high school for quite a while, and when I read this my only thought was, "Good idea." This is just a TOOL. Nothing more, nothing less. It can be used or misused. I'm sure there are parents out there who force their poor children to eat nothing but salads and sandwiches with it. I'm sure there are plenty more who sit down, look at the menu and try to do a little rudimentary balancing of lunches--your kid likes pizza, let 'em have pizza on Wednesday, but don't let him have the fried chicken on Tuesday. And it's not like the damned system will force you to pick out every single lunch. I'm sure you can leave most of it up to your child's discretion.
This is not that different than a mom sitting down and packing lunches--and I don't think anyone in their right mind would scream "BIG MOTHER IS COMING" and reach for the tin-foil beanie just because someone's mom packed them lunches every day and didn't cater to the kid's every fucking whim. Well, maybe your average Slashdot poster would, but I did use the qualifier "anyone in their right mind".
Reduce, reuse, cycle
I'd go as far as saying that going through the hot food bar in my middle school was pure damage to one's health. Overgreased pizza, corn chips with fake cheese sprayed on them, fast-foody meatballs (all of these foods proudly displaying the logo and slogan of the company producing it, as to allow another way for them to advertise). Sometimes there was a small, measly salad, dwarfed by these fast food giants, trying hopelessly to pretend that it has some taste.
Luckily for me, my school had an alternate food route in the form of a sandwich stand (from which I could choose sandwiches that only had vegetables, only to get a look of surprise and the repeating question "No meat? No cheese?"), but most schools do not provide that kind of choice.
To all parents concerned about the health of their children, I suggest that instead of using such a system, simply take up the job of fixing your children's lunch (or, at high school age, have them fix their own lunch). It's a bit more work, but the nutritional benefits are amazing.
My new blog
We had a similar system when I was in school ages ago, it was called carrying your lunch. Mom got to choose what you ate. If you couldn't find a trade you either ate what you had or did without.
So you walk up to the register with all of the items you really want--pie, ice cream, whatever--and the klaxon goes off. Do you put the items back? Are they prepackaged? What if they're not? Also: doesn't this slow the line up as kids have to keep going back through until they get a lunch the computer likes?
Saying stuff can be restricted, reading stuff can be restricted, the gender of the adult you can marry can be restricted, your movement can be restricted, your access to a fair trial can be restricted, your ability to sue for redress from government wrongs can be restricted, but if any corporation is blocked from marketing to you or in some way making money off of you, then that is the very freedom for which the forefathers fought, and a great wrong has been committed. All other freedoms are really luxuries.
There is another dynamic; high school age kids who either work after school and have access to their own money or have very generous allowances and can buy their own lunch and bring it to school.
I think that it might be interesting to have a study of four groups of high school kids:
Group One -- has the resources to buy what they want to for lunch and bring it to school
Group Two -- doesn't have the resources to buy their own lunches, and their moms tell the school what they can buy for lunch
Group Three -- doesn't have the resources to buy their own lunches and their moms don't tell the school what they can buy for lunch
Group Four -- doesn't have the resources to buy their own lunches and their moms pack their lunch
Groups Two and Three assume that school lunches are prepaid by the parents and/or the government
What is the difference in the nutrition in the lunches that the kids in these four groups actually consume?
Ten years after high school graduation, which group produced the healthiest adults?, the happiest adults?
No soup for you! ;-)
First off I want to point out the similarities between this issue and one we discussed earlier and I made my position quite clear here.
Parents are responsible for the upbringing of their children and this means teaching them to make the right choices in life and guiding them to make resposible and informed decisions. It also includes protecting them from both the dangers around them and also from themselves while you teach them things like self discipline.
While I admire the idea behind this, it's a bit like Net Nanny in that it will circumvented in an instant by a smart kid and is a poor substitute to correctly educating a child in the dangers of poor eating habits. Maybe it could be adapted so that instead of blocking poor food choices it alerts the parents so that they can be made aware of their failures as a parent and then take action to educate their offspring into making better food choices.
This is just 'lazy parenting' and that breeds lazy kids. It is a parenting style which fails to take resonsibility and that just breeds kids who do not take responsibility. I have been amazed at the 'fat camp' approach to parenting which has spread from the US to the UK in recent years... if your kid is fat then it is because YOU are a bad parent and that's the end of it, just as if your kid meets someone on the internet who rapes and murders them then YOU are to blame for not educating them in the dangers of the internet, for not supervising them correctly and also for letting them go and meet someone they met on the internet (or not knowing they were doing so). I personally think parents with obese children (who continue to spoil them with twinkies) should be prosecuted for child abuse because they are negatively affecting their child's long term physical and emotional health.
Technology will never replace parenting skills and in this case although it could be useful to monitor what a child is eating so you can speak to them about it, putting blocks on foodstuffs will just increase the likelyhood that your child will move their illicit junk food habits underground.
Be nice, sponsor me: http://jailbreak.ragabonds.org.uk
That's the way it was for my school in the 80s. The cafeteria served one meal. If you didn't like it, you skipped lunch that day. Those were your only options. The concept of cafeteria as "mall food court" is completely foreign to me. Why are schools spending their money on that when they could be spending it on academics?
Constitutionally Correct
In Japan, there is a huge promotional campaign to get kids eat Whale Meat for Lunch!
Fish? Meat? Both!
It is early in the morning where I live, I stayed up later yet I got up early and I feel fine. I am lucky my parents are not total overlords, as much as other parent might be. I do not think they would limit my lunch, unless I became obese. My mother is obese, but I hardly ever see her eat, and I myself LOVE video games. I play video games all the time, in fact I sit at the computer for very long periods of time, yet I do not gain weight! A typical lunch day for me involves me sitting in the office (they let me stay in there because I don't like how crowded the cafeteria is) and asking an attendant to fetch my lunch for me. I usually have Pizza and chocolate milk, this fills me up. Every day there is pizza, they change around the other food choices but there will always be pizza. I remember one pizza that I ate was so greasy, it was literally a piece of bread with tomato and a carpet of sausasge. That is not typical but the pizza's are greasy. I am not fat nor am I muscular. I also have aspergers, a social/mental disorder, which is the reason I sit in the office for lunch. Every day there are fast food choices for lunch, the food usually involves cheese meat and bread. I do not remember there being any vegetables in the cafeteria there are shelves with candy and assorted fruit sodas and drinks. There are posts with candy hanging from them (costs you extra), with snickers bars, reeses pieces, etc. The lunch is most definitely unhealthy, some students leave campus for lunch and go to mc donalds, or dairy queen, however recent events have caused the staff to threaten to close campus (littering, people complaining that high school students walk on their lawns). There are some rumors about the school and what may happen, each year the agenda/rumors change. Last year they threatened to close campus because of the littering, this year I heard none of it. It seems like these 'topics' are part of one large agenda, and some goal I cannot fathom. This year we had a very stupid "chat" session every wednesday, where students from different grades sat in a classroom for 20 minutes to talk and do activities. Whether this will occur again next year I do not know, the teacher who asked for this session said at the end of this year this: "It's the end of the year, why bother doing this anymore?". This is what I call politics, it is confusing and stupid. Nothing ever really gets done. Every year we discuss how to help freshman become good at passing classes and be aware of the challenges they face, but nothing helpful ever gets done. The jr. high alone is another issue, and I believe the staff there, and even our own government has some secret plot to control minors. I have a theory that all of the events recently are connected, in a way to prevent minors from having any power, influence, or fun. What do I mean you ask? Well I am talking about the law that bans 'social sites' such as myspace, I see this as a way to prevent minors from having an influence (the butterfly effect, similar to starting a rumor). Already we cannot vote, no one listens to us, and no one takes us seriously. At the old jr.high, the principal was a WITCH, she was a obese, and stupid BITCH. The teachers would have none of it, I was in 'special ed' (And have been since as far back as I can remember, for reasons that still escape me). I got in trouble with the law again (misdemeanor), and ended up at a JDF (juvenile detention facility) I had been there before, I met a 12 year old who had been sent there by the notorious principal from my jr.high. My years at that jr.high were a living HELL. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one who sees these things.
...when we were living in london (i'm british). she just didn't get the obsession in the media and government policy about parents having "choice" in where their kids go to school. her view was that choice intrinsically implied that everynone could see some schools were very good, and some very bad (and this is indeed the case in the UK). her view? "why isn't the government's policy about trying to make _all_ the schools good?" so simple. so obvious. and nobody was talking about it. she wasn't claiming every school in finland was exactly as good as every other, but that this was pretty much the aim. no gross disparities, so everyone has about the same sort of chances in education, and it isn't distorted by market "choice", where that choice is dependent upon your parents' economic power to move house/pay fees, etc. seems that attitude percolates right through the school system, and it's the sort of attitude we could all do with...
This type of system is not needed if you raise your children to eat properly. You cannot expect children to eat properly at school if you've been feeding them crap at home. And, if your kid is eating well at home, a less healthy lunch at school really isn't going to hurt them.
Much of this stems from trying to feed children what YOU LIKE instead of what THEY LIKE. Most kids don't like green vegetables: broccoli, spinach, peas, asparagus etc. There is NO REASON for kids to eat foods that do not taste good to them. There are a lot of foods that simply do not taste good to children. There are plenty of tasty alternatives and it's the responsibility of parents to find healthy foods that their children like.
I can't tell you how many nights I had to sit at the table until I finished some nasty food that my mom made for me. That's a power trip and has nothing to do with me eating something that's good for me. In the end, I never ended up eating it anyway and everyone just ended up pissed off.
> I agree they need some guidance . But there are different approaches to it . If you tell your childeren why something is bad , explain the consequences and let them take responsibility for it , you will teach them more than you will by simply disallowing them to do it.
I fail to see why these two things are mutually exclusive. This service is useful for those kids who have been taught properly and still get the foods that aren't good for them. As one of the previous threads wrote, kids will be kids, and some kids will go for the junk food even after they're made aware of the consequences. Oversight is part of the toolset one uses to determine how much autonomy kids can handle. Some kids will respond to the advice, but if not then parental regulation is not out of order. Think on this: some kids will drive safely when they're taught to drive, and some kids will drive dangerously even after they've been taught properly. Taking away the keys shouldn't be the first step, but it's certainly reasonable that it's one of the steps down the road (pun intended).
Virg
Just let the damn kids have a Hershey bar.
"One day your going to wake up and realize that your not as witty as you think you are." -Me.
Mashed potatoes school food style. That's some badass mashed potatoes right there, I wonder if it could be used for construction in seismically active areas.
We had something similar to this in a school I went to. As mentioned before, in Sweden the schools are supposed to provide tax-paid lunches for the kids (and for the free marketeers out there, I'm happy to report that two out of the three schools I've gone to have served excellent, restaurant quality lunches). But the third school didn't have any kitchen or dining hall, so in order to provide our lunches without having to build stuff, they gave us these fancy cards that were recharged with virtual money every month, and they were accepted in most of the restaurants near the school. The only restrictions were that you could only buy food and you could only use a fixed amount of virtual money per day.
This worked just fine, and was really great in many ways. Among other things, because we were only allowed to use 55:- per day (less than $8), even the somewhat fancy restaurants who wanted our business quickly added 55:- lunches to their menus, which would have costed more otherwise.
Every year, parents of new kids would complain and try to get the school to add more restrictions, such as banning soda and orange juice and narrowing the definition of "food" used by certain places that allowed us to buy cookies. It never happened, and after eating one cookie a day (I saved cookie money by eating at the cheap place) for the three years I went to the school, I still didn't have a heart attack, get fat, or have my teeth rot and fall out.
So now that I think about it, maybe this is a bad idea after all, since its purpose is to restrict and ours was the total opposite. Never mind, then.
Frog blast the vent core.
73 percent of 8- to 12-year-olds are throwing out part of their lunches at least once a week; 36 percent are trading them.
Good for them. Just goes to show that humanity naturally routes around authoritarianism.
Bastards!
we had what was called lunch tickets. You paid for a week, or got free luches from the state, and it got you a lunch based on the 4 food groups. If you wanted to buy extras, you paid cash. Now my kids get an account that I have to put money in and they can choose what to buy (mostly french fries because mmost cafeteria food is gross). I don't want to pay $3 for french fries and a sports drink formy kids, I want to buy them a lunch and they can choose what to eat. I think it's just scam to make money for the school. Last year, I got fed up and we bagged lunches.
Also, when I was a kid, there was no junk food or soda in school. About 10 years ago, pepsi/coke/et al started making sweet deals with schools to put pop machines in the lunch rooms. Now the school oficials are finally waking up to the fact that kids will eat junk if it's around. Duhhh!
Also, I think the recent obesity epidemic in the US, is caused or at least helped by the massive addition of high fructose corn sweetener introduced in almost all mass produced food. This cheapest of the cheap simple sugar (I'm speculating) spikes blood sugar then insulin levels causing low blood sugar and more eating.
q a z
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If you haven't foed me yet, what are you waiting for?
I recall being in high school. I didn't buy lunch much from the caf because the food mostly sucked, but sometimes I would. And I didn't pig out on junk food, I knew I should have it in moderation, because that's what my parents taught me. I had no problems.
Why doesn't the school (especially elementary/junior high) ONLY sell healthy products? Then they're would be no need to restrict certain items. If the parents want the kids to eat junk let them bring it from home. Too many schools are getting subsidized by the fast food markets.
I *can* see the case for something like this in case of allergies. If it could alert the cashier that the kid picked up something with peanuts by mistake, for instance, that could save a life.
If you've never been modded as "flamebait" or "troll," you've never tried to argue a minority viewpoint here!
But... but... democracy != socialism! Socialism == communism! And communism == teh evil!!11oneone
This is not about our rights on the internet, this is about the rights of some high school students (citizens of a country that is 65% overweight or obese) to not eat sugar- and fat-laden junk food.
Really, why can't we have an Other News section?
Here here!
The problem is so obvious. Kids get the junkier food because the stuff that suposedly meets health guidelines is the most disgusting stuff ever.
Those $0.99 microwavable dinners you can get from your local grocer are alot better tasting (and that says alot, they're not that great to begin with either) than the crud school cafeterias cook up.
School lunches are the best example of the low-quality of processed foods. Nothing gets done to change this because kids have no political power and parents generally have little participation in their children's education.
Healthy food does not have to be bad tasting. Why does it seem that our parents or grandparents can cook healthy foods that taste good but when our schools offer it, it comes in the form of bland disgusting blocks of meat or reformed vegetables?
The time and effort you spend on being "a parent" is much better used better being *with* the child, rather than making lunch for the child. Especially if the school can provide a healthy and tasty meal for the children. There is no magic attribute that makes mothers or fathers food any more healthy.
The only silly thing about the system is that it is individualized, the school should provide healthy food for all the pupils, rather than just the ones whose parents have asked for it.
Only the parents cannot set limits on what their child can purchase, but they can log on to some website and see what the kids have been buying.
The result?
Kids didn't buy junk food from the cafeteria.
Other, enterprising students bought a bunch of junk food from 7-11/Fasmart/whatever and sold it. They made a bunch of money too. Hell, even I dropped $1.50 for a 20.oz Mountain Dew/Vault(Later in the year) every day(Our school cafeteria didn't sell them, and I didn't have time to buy one in the morning), and my mom never even logged onto the site. These kids made all sorts of money off of us, and I actually applaud them for their enterprising attitudes.
This is just a waste of the school's time and money. We all were(Or are) high schoolers, we know how shrewd and clever kids can be.
Ok, point duly taken and thanks for the correction, but then "life expectancy" was the wrong word. Yes, I literally mean that even excluding infant mortality, most people of ancient Egypt, at least in the Old Kingdom times, did drop dead before they reached the 40's.
:)
What I mean is like this. We have a ton of records, including tombs, mummies, tablets, etc, which are sorta our sample for determining that kinda thing. So now let's imagine we group them into a "how many died at each age" curve. You know, with the X being the age when they died, and the Y being how many records we have of people dead at that age. That graph had not only a spike in the low ages, but also the peak of the gauss curve would be somewhere in the 30-39 years old range. Even ignoring those early infant deaths, getting past 40 years old wasn't very common.
That's basically what I meant there: where the peak of that gauss curve was, rather than the correct meaning of the term.
Yes, some people lived until their 60's, 70's or beyond, especially among the rich classes, but at that point it was the trailing end of the gauss curve, rather than something you can count on. And that was "balanced" by other people whose death happened in their teens and twenties.
If you want the "average life expectancy at birth" in the (correct) meaning that you use it, _including_ the infant mortality, we know for example from the Roman census data in the area that for example for women it was 22-25 years. Scary, but, as you've said, distorted by the high infant mortality.
At any rate, to get back to the real topic of how long it took to "produce" an adult, in ancient Egypt the age of marriage at least was 15 years old for males and 12 years old for females. It's not just "probably", those are the historical ages. At that age you'd be expected to be mature enough to have your own family and your own children. I.e., for example as a girl of 12, not only you wouldn't get mom packing your food, but you'd be expected to cook for and feed your husband and maybe children.
It's not even the lowest ages. I'm pretty sure that in the middle ages men would be considered mature at 14 or even 13 years old, but I'm too lazy and it's a too long message already
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
At the young age of 12 I used to weigh about 110kg. My family was quite poor, and I certainly didn't have any pocket money, whatever I needed had to be requested from my father... so nearly all of the foodstuff I ate was supplied by my parents.
In story, it is my opinion that a child's responsilility of his obesity should be attributed to his family. I think this system is a great tool and should be used by all parents. However, negligent or strict parental diet control should be kept in check by authorities just as child abuse is!
I know the last statement might seem too far fetched, however, as a person who has suffered a lot of social, psychological, and physical problems because of obesity, I think that authorities should treat parents who overfeed their children on par with other kinds of child abuse. Overfeeding anyone who is not able to take complete care of himself/herself (such as children) is cruel and careless!
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P.S. Thank God, now that I'm 27 I weigh about 10kg less than when I was 12. Weight is OK, but I still suffer the effects of my former obesity... I really wish some authorithy could have done something about it back then. Where's big brother when you need him?
- "They misunderestimated me."
A lot of it is about the sugar to me. I was skinny throughout high school even though I ate a ton of junk food, but my concentration skills seemed to grow worse every year. Sugar is a big contributor to this, so if the only thing achieved is a reduction in sugar intake, I'm for it. Besides, kids with obesity problems need all the help they can get. Healthy school meals alone won't solve the problem but they are a big part of the equation.
Nutrition issues are HUGE here in the United States. Children are getting diabetes decades earlier solely based on poor nutrition choices by their parents, and many here are saying to let children eat what they want. As a dad, I say, crap to that.
My daughter can eat what she wants when she gets past 18. For now, no sodas, reduced trans-fats, tons of fruits and vegetables, and good meats. That's the rule in my home, and I'm sticking by it.
Not monitoring what your kids eat is in my opinion, really bad parenting, and attracting trouble. If you can use a tool to help when you're not away, its not big brother, or big mamma, it's common sense.
Newsfollow.com
Hear hear!
Oh, wait.
That was sarcasm, wasn't it?
NSA, put a tracer on this one. He's doubleplusungood as they get.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
Which is a good argument against socialist healthcare programs. The right to choose what you eat equates with the responsibility of dealing with (mal)nutrition) and (bad) health issues. If you want someone else to pick up the tab, then expect them to impose strictures on your freedom - forfeit your responsibilities, forfeit your rights.
Constitutionally Correct
Not to mention the kids that are selling drugs to buy food that doesn't suck.
Error 2101: all your sig are belong to us
Only pay for school lunch one day per week. In the home, provide solid food choices and make them pack their lunch. Once in a while a kids load gets high and just being able to buy a lunch makes sense. So let them do that 4 times per month and let them choose when.
Done early, they will become used to eating good food for lunch, thus making the poor choices and their low energy content, more than obvious.
There is little to be done about trading. When you make your solid food choices, include some really great stuff. This keeps the incentive to trade down in that they will be at the top of the school lunch pecking order.
Most of my kids are into high school now. I wish I had done this earlier. The transition to packing lunch was difficult. Peer pressure to not bag their lunch is high. My schools have setup a kind of food mall, which only makes this worse. The haves, being those with excess lunch money, get to "shop" at the more upscale offerings provided by the school. The have nots get the standard fare. Why schools encourage this crap is beyond me. Don't they have enough trouble with student tension as it is?
If school lunches went back to a lower choice model, and quit bulk buying stinky old fast food for resale, our kids would have a better time of it. Everybody says how horrible their school lunch is. The schools have fought this by trying to improve their offering. The silly thing is that everybody still says school food sucks, but they will work like hell to get the better offerings!
Back to monthly menus and two choice meals. Everybody gets the tray and chooses one main course or the other, and either eats it, or doesn't, or brings their own. This does not have to be that hard.
Remembering back to my lunches, they were not bad in hindsight. The reality is that kids are used to specific foods and will discourage alternatives, unless forced. This is where the bad school lunch perception comes from. By keeping the choice very narrow, the overall food value can be kept high with out all of this passive aggressive control crap. It's gonna affect our kids in more ways than their waistline.
The other nice thing about this approach is that the kids do get to provide effective feedback too. Once our High School made this horrible Quech (however you spell it). Nobody ate it! Well, maybe a couple suckers went for it, but by and large the food sat right where they left it. One special mid-afternoon assembly later and the school decision was clear. No more of that kind of food ever. Done, next.
Blogging because I can...
And that's just an example of the "if you're for X, then you must be automatically, unthinking pro any X-related solution" fallacy. It's like saying "if you like water, then you shouldn't mind having your house flooded." Or "if you were saying that the government should do something about unemployment, then you shouldn't mind an euthanasia program to get rid of those." Or "if you're not for terrorism, you must support the war in Iraq and the PATRIOT act." That bogus. Just seeing that a problem X exists, doesn't mean any wrong solution is automatically worthy of unconditional support.
It has nothing to do with group think. Sometimes a solution is just snake oil, and bad snake oil at that. That's all. Even if it proposes to address the right problem, it may be the kind that doesn't really solve anything, or even makes it worse. It can be of the calibre of using mercury to treat syphilis in the past: it didn't actually cure the disease, and only added mercury poisoning to the list of problems.
It's not just that it'll make a few kids life even more nightmarish than it already is (e.g., see again the girl berated by her mom for buying 3 ounces of juice.) It's that even as solutions go, it's the kind of crap "solution" that tries to suppress the symptoms rather than fix the problem.
The problem is that kids, just like adults, take decisions based on the pre-existing data and habits they have. They're doing what they've learned from their parents, and by that I also mean immitating what they see daddy doing. They're pretty much pre-programmed to. (Hence, "do as I say, not as I do" doesn't really work.) Or if mommy and daddy weren't available for that, what they've seen Tom, Dick and Harry down the road doing.
The correct solution is to give them enough data and personal example to make a good decision, not to just build more barriers against the symptoms. If a kid's only knowledge about food, for example, is along the lines of "if I try to buy something bad the alarm rings", what do you do when they grow up and no longer have that artifficial surveillance? Or is it ok to go obese and diabetic in the 20's, just because it's not your responsibility any more? Or what do you do about them trading lunches to get past such restrictions? Is it ok just because now you have an online checklist as a conscience lullaby?
Solutions that just suppress the symptoms are often worse than no solution at all. They just maintain a false facade of everything being all right, when everything really isn't. They allow a bad parent to seemingly see results out of crap "explanations" like "because I said so" or "as long as you're in my house, you'll do as I say and stop asking why", and get back to watching the football game. But the problem is still there. As soon as that kid gets out of surveillance range (summer camp, college, growing up, whatever), he still doesn't know what not to do and _why_ not to do them.
If the only thing bad about a certain act or food is that "daddy say so", guess what will happen when daddy isn't around to say so? If the only rule they know about something is that is tied to living in your house, guess what follows logically when they're _not_ in your house? Etc.
In a nutshell, that's why: because it's the wrong solution.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
The grandparent post is an obvious troll.
Peer group pressure is everything at the age of early teens. If the other kids think fast food is trendy and cool, you don't want to look like mother's boy by eating healthy food... When I looked back, our gang probably chose the utmost unhealthy food of the day. On one hand, we wanted to eat like a "real man". On the other hand, we fell prey to a sneaky local fast food shop. For almost 3 consecutive years, our ideal lunch was a rice dish with two cheap fried sausage + a slab of deep-fried chicken *skin*+ a glass of coke. (The chicken meat was sold to lunch boxes more popular with ordinary office worker in the region).
Comparison between kids can be a bad thing. Either letting them to choose whatever they want to eat or allowing the school to take over. The argument here is similar to that of school uniform. In a sense, the Sweden/Finland system of free and compulsory school lunch can solve a heck lot of problem for everyone.
A: "Er .. Hi" ... heard from friend that .. uhm .. one can get some .. eeee .. controlled substances here ... ?" ..." ... you said Peter, right ?"
B: "Hi"
A: "I've
B: "If you're talking about dope, talk to Peter there, second desk on right."
A: "Actually i was thinking about chocolate bars my parents won't let me buy
B: "..."
A: "But now, that i'm thinking about it
What am I offered for this fine piece of chocolate cake. .80, i'll trade it to you for that 3.00 sandwich.
I bought it for
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
This is a doubleplusgood idea!
Install COX in your backend today!
If you light a man a fire, he'll stay warm for the night.
If you light a man afire, he'll stay warm for the rest of his life.
Do you hear puking sounds a few minutes after a meal?
Let's see. Mom's money, mom's kid. Mom's say on what you can buy. End of story.
/. will chime in so this doesn't become a HS gripe session.
Maybe the other parents on
THIS SPACE FOR RENT
This is the first time I've ever been hungrier after reading Slashdot...
Actually, this made me thing of something interesting in terms of parental vocabulary.
Mothering a child: Usually means to some degree controlling or organizing the life, and participating to possible an un-necessary level
Fathering a child: Getting somebody pregnant
Just a thought that crossed my mind, as even in such common terms we basically associate men as sperm-doners and not with the general rearing of children. There are, however, families where fathers are the more active participant in childrens' lives, or the only one, or one of two in the same gender. I have heard of men "mothering" children before, but never of a woman "fathering" one, so it does seem that there's a lot of parental-gender focus in such things.
How many of the kids do eat healthy at home? Does one of their parents make a balanced meal every day and do they sit at a table, or do they stuff themselves with fastfood and snacks in front of the tv?
The parents that are aware of these problems will most likely be parents that eat healthy at home as well. Parents that eat fast food all the time themselves will most likely not care.
Not having unhealthy food available in schools should be the standard. Educating children about food schould be a standard. And what better place to educate children then in a school?
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Why don't we leave it up to the parents to decide whether they want to use the system instead of passing judgement either way? This is just a method of enforcing parental rules, let the individual parents decide whether their kids need it or not.
When I look back at when I was a kid and think about all the things my parents told me I shouldn't do I think about why they told me not to do certain things. Of course the reason is that they loved me and didn't want me to get hurt, but they always knew, regardless of punishments or groundings, that the choice was mine in the end.
It still the same today, except now there are technology companies trying to sell their technology (most of which isn;t even new) to make a buck off of parents fears. The technology companies make a promise they can't keep: We can help you force your kids to make the right decisions through technology.
The kid still makes the choice in the end and the parents still need to be good parents and explain why certain things aren't good. The differnce now is that tech companies have developed a business model to involve themselves in the equation and make a buck without offering anything in return.
Well, taking a very wild guess about the motivations:
1. Because of protective instincts of the parents and not knowing when to give up. As I was saying in another message, mom still tries to control me, and I'm at an age when in the Old Kingdom times chances I might be already dead, embalmed and burried. Or having grandkids and telling them "back in my days" stories. So basically parents get attached to treating someone like a baby, and eventually if there's enough of them, society gets it that way.
2. Because society needed increasingly high numbers of educated people, and there's only so much education you can cram into someone until the age of 14. So a lot of people need at the very least high school too. So it makes sense in a way to extend the limit until their parents have to take care of them to include at least that, even if they're really past the biological maturity date. Unfortunately, as I was saying some people don't realize that they're supporting an adult, and are still stuck with the mentality that they have a really big 6-year-old.
(E.g., true story, the last time I got a "Moraelin, have you said 'hello' to the nice lady?" from mom was at the age of 30. The only reason it stopped there was the resulting conflict.)
3. Because the ensuing "teenagge crisis" has become not just something considered normal or, paradoxically, a sign of immaturity, but something that the whole western culture _depends_ on. The conflict and rebellion against an arbitrary authority and against being officially little more than another adult's slave, is followed by eventually just accepting it. So society gets most of its new members already "housebroken" and used to obeying someone else. It was probably more of a nice side-effect than parents collectively thinking "damn, I want my son to be an obedient sheep to anyone claiming any authority", but it's a nice effect anyway. So I just don't see anyone giving that up.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Admiral Farragut was given his first command (a prize ship) during the War of 1812 when he was twelve years old.
For every Farragut, there are THOUSANDS who "took a prize ship" into their dock and ended up with a LOT less fanfare as a result.
Consequently, the boatmasters also ended up with child support payments.
Less Talk. More Stab.
I don't know anything about this particular program, but I do run a similar service. On the whole, American kids ARE too fat and the parents usually DO deserve a good chunk of the blame. It is also true that trying to control the children invasive and ultimately counterproductive.
This service is useful in that it is a great monitoring tool. It can give the children the freedom to make their own choices, but also give the parents enough information to know if their children need further education on the value of good nutrition.
Conversation with a 5-year-old:
Me: I'm the big hungry daddy. I'm going to eat all the broccoli.
Kid: Nooooo! You share! Little boys need broccoli too!
Me: You eat ice cream.
Kid: Mom! Stop him! He's eating all the broccoli!
Anything better would have to involve mandatory measurements.
Example: If you go a year without gaining height, you're declared an adult.
I think you're eating bitter melon.
n
Bitter melon is a bit more warty than the typical cucumber. It tends to be pointy on the blossom end.
Bitter melon has all sorts of weird psyiological effects. From wikibooks:
Bitter melon has some interesting effects on humans. It has been used in traditional Chinese medicine as a treatment for diabetes and to cause abortions. It impedes many things: viruses, bacteria, tumors... and the immune system. It lowers blood cholesterol. It is a laxative.
Wild, huh?
There is a picture there are well:
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Bitter_Melo
As for the carrots: the bitterness has been bred out of modern carrots. Bitter ones are more nutritious and more poisonous.
It's not usually something they are fully aware of.
Being fat isolates you. Especially for a person who is uncomfortable with sexual advances, obesity offers an escape.
Talk about screwing it up... Look at this from the MealplusPay website; Your Browser Is Currently Not Supported Your browser is not supported for use with this site. This site requires one of the following browsers: * Internet Explorer 5.5 or above (5.1 or above on Mac) * Firefox 1.0 or above * Maxthon 1.2 or above * Netscape 8.0 or above Your current browser: Firefox Version 1.5.0.5 Now, what's wrong with the above ? Anyone ?? Anyone ?? Beuller ??
I am suprised that you think that there is a contradiction in preparing lunch or dinner and spending time with your children.
And I wouldn't rule out that the food that I prepare might be healthier than food prepared in a canteen kitchen (because of e.g. healthier ingredients).
Ok, I failed, whatever. Does this mean, somehow, I should give up and stop trying to watch, what my kid is eating? What exactly is wrong with "a system like this"?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Actually, it was more irony that sarcasm, and even so I was trying to explain a worldview I see around me.