Letters to the Editor
surprised
Published Letters: 146 Editor's Choice: 20
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A few suggestions
[Read the article: Junk food education]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Food that is marketed to the general public is much different today than it was in Ye Olde Days when we were growing up and everything was (allegedly) peachy keen. As Juliebird pointed out, much of today's food is actually "food product," loaded with high-fructose corn syrup and other elements put in for marketing, production, storage and profit reasons, not for nutritional reasons. There's much more of an agri-industrial complex than there used to be.
Convenience food and fast foods are also much more available, heavily marketed and omnipresent. In Ye Olde Days, schools didn't have to "partner" with fast-food companies to make budgets balance, for example.
Then there are the obstacles to exercise that didn't exist in Ye Olde Days. PE used to be daily, now it's more of a twice-a-week thing. Neighborhoods used to be a lot more pedestrian-friendly. And so on.
It's really not constructive to scold today's parents and point to one's own past as some kind of model. The past is past; times change and we can't go backward. For a variety of reasons, there are nutritional challenges that didn't exist when we were kids. I mean, Chinese food additives, anyone? But there are opportunities that might not have existed in the past, too, such as mandates for nutritional and (for some foods) place-of-origin labeling.
A few things that do seem to encourage kids to develop good eating habits are:
-- family visits to farmers' markets and pick-your-own farms, or wild berry patches or fishing streams;
-- eating "local" as much as possible, including from your own garden. Kids seem more interested in food if they know exactly where it comes from.
-- persistence in introducing more healthful food choices. Sometimes you have to offer a particular item or dish 10 times before a kid tries it and likes it;
-- smaller portions and fewer snacks. Some health experts have pointed out that kids who are picky eaters are actually eaters who are not all that hungry. Very young kids may not need all the food that we think they do, and if they're already kind of sated, they're going to eat only treats.
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The Good Old Days?
[Read the article: Flying the child-unfriendly skies]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Somewhere back there it was asserted that in the Good Old Days, the lives of adults and those of children were completely separate and you never saw a child on a plane, in a restaurant or anywhere else that adults like to be. Adults stayed in their world, and adults never needed have their eyes or ears offended by the presence of any child, according to that assertion. Only today's modern no-good, over-indulgent parents have messed up that wonderful social system, according to that assertion.
The assertion is incorrect. The truth is that this supposed ideal of generational apartheid is very recent, and attainable only for the very, very wealthy -- the people who have nannies and entire domestic staffs in their employ. For the great masses of people in the world, including in the type of "flyover country" where I live, children have always been a big part of and had a big presence in their parents' lives, at all times of the day and in all kinds of settings. If you ever go to some of the more rural or less-wealthy parts of this country, you will find parents and children together doing errands, at worksites, at social gatherings and so forth. Even childfree people interact with neighbors' and coworkers' and friends' children, in the world of regular, non-wealthy people. The same goes for elderly people, who mingle with people of other ages. Regular people simply cannot afford to live their lives according to a system of generational apartheid, even if they wanted to.
Now, it may be that in the Good Old Days, air travel was available only to the very rich, the type of people who could leave their offspring with nannies as they jetted off to some fancy resort. That could be the bygone time that the previous writer was referencing. But today, even those of us among the Great Unwashed -- people who have children, love their children and do not employ full-time nannies and housekeepers -- sometimes fly on commercial airliners.
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Helping out versus stewing
[Read the article: Flying the child-unfriendly skies]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"My advice - if you notice someone having a difficult time with a child, offer assistance, it is the least we can do for each other."
Amen to that, sister.
Truth be told, I know what it feels like to be annoyed and bothered by others, including restless children and their exasperated, exhausted parents on a crowded and/or delayed airplane. And I know what it feels like to help out those in obvious need, including said children and parents. The second feeling is a lot better.