Do our children have a distorted view of foods?
By oldchem1
@oldchem1 (8132)
May 31, 2010 4:34am CST
It seems to me that food, especially here in the UK, has become a moral issue, an area that is not about enjoyment but one of huge societal anxiety.How often do you here - ‘You are what you eat’ If you read everything you read in the newspapers or hear on the TV you will believe that you are defined by what happens to you from birth to early childhood, and after that there is no way out.
Despite the abundance of cookery programmes on TV and cookbooks being at the top of the bestsellers charts, there seems to be less and less space now to appreciate food purely as enjoyment, as a question of taste understood in an entirely non-judgmental way. It is less about food but nutrition and health.
The use of food as a weapon begins when a woman gets pregnant. Suddenly any rational relationship to food and drink goes out the window because the weight of moral indignation kicks in. A woman ceases to be an autonomous adult and is reduced to the role of incubator, where all her actions are viewed in terms of how they might harm the child. My daughter is pregnant and is 'not allowed' to eat lots of food that I ate as normal during all my 5 pregnancies - liver, pate, Brie to name a few.
When the child starts school,lunch boxes are regularly checked and notes are sent to parents to scold them about the contents of the packed lunch. Programmes for free school meals are rolled out not with the objective to give kids a more enjoyable meal but to expressly test whether children will change their parents’ food habits.
I am all for healthy eating but lets not take the fun and enjoyment out of food.
2 responses
@rosie230 (1703)
•
31 May 10
I am also in the UK... and I have to say yes you are indeed right with everything you say, times have changed, and when I was pregnant with both my boys I ws given a list of do's and dont's and a list of what I should not eat etc... to be honest I think a lot of it is just a warning that tends to make us women who are carrying very worried about things... and also I have to say that I did not really give up on anything that I ate before when I was pregnant both times, I ate pate even though I was told not to, but I enjoyed it, and after hearing from my mother that she never had problems with anything that she ate, I just realised that really it was a warning, and although I did not eat things in huge quantities I just ate things as I normally would... and I have have two healthy boys....
The school meals, well I get annoyed with my sons school, even if they abide by the rules of the goverment etc, but still when I went to school, my packed lunch was a sandwich a bit of fruit a chocolate bar or similar and a bag of crisps etc, now they do not let you give your child a lunch which has UNHEALTHY foods in it... regardless of the fact that they may eat them at home... it just seems so silly... they seem to think that the whole of the UK are totally obese, and by stopping children from eating the normal foods that we ate, well they obviously think that our country will be so healthy and slim.... personally I think it could have the opposite affect, and children when not at school wil want to eat more of the foods that they cannot or not allowed to eat at school, and really who can blame them... I personally think that everything can be eaten but in moderation, does that not seem more the answer? I dont know, all I do know is that I feel we are not in control any more, like all our food decisions are made for us.
ny state!!
@alanthony333 (116)
• Philippines
31 May 10
Hm... My mother used to say that.. but actually, its not really because we have distorted view of foods but its because we don't have the APETITE! :D
