Obesity? This is a job for Supernanny(neo soviet barf alert)

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2088-2330255,00.html ^ | 8 27 06 | Minette Marrin

[philled]

So when they make the next remake of "Oliver Twist" I trust they will make sure that all in the ilk of Oliver and the Artful Dodger will weigh at least 17 stone. No more gruel, they will be given only french fries and milkshakes and are forced into servitude at Walmart. Being poor and thin is so Victorian...

[Irish_Thatcherite]

It's strange how they don't seem to be anywhere near as worried about anorexia and bulimia - psychological disorders as compared to just mere overeating.

[fortunecookie]

No one's too poor to eat healthy. Fresh produce and meat costs far less than the prepackaged frozen stuff.

I do think some people are too uneducated to know how to eat healthy and resistant to change, a welfare mother I knew several years ago would trade her WIC stamps for cigarettes and use her welfare food 'dollars' for daily's fruit drink and cheetos and popsicles because her kids 'won't eat nothin else'. But she's an exception.

But I do disagree, in a way. Maybe not many are too poor to eat healthier, but it is a challenge. I've found (since I've taken a cut in pay) that produce is not cheap. Just as one example - a single walmart red pepper, $1.43. No-name mac n cheese, 3 boxes for a dollar. And more filling, so some may be tempted to go with the mac and cheese. I've had to be creative, what's on special today and we can cut around that bad spot and so on. Meat, also the cheap meats, pre-made, fattier and less healthy (additives), are much cheaper than a nice or budget cut.

And it depends on location, too. I'm constantly amazed how my sister in a major city pays less for produce, meat and other grocery items than I do in a rural area. Of course, she pays more for many other items, but they eat well.

[Froufrou]

Being poor and thin is so Victorian...

The pleibs!

[Gingersnap]

Fast food, processed food, and microwavable snacks taste good. End of story. It might not be as good as good home cooking but none of these people have tasted good home cooking. They have tasted fat-free, baked, fake-meat alternatives with plenty of steamed veggies (but no salt or butter). They've tasted it and it can't compare with a cheeseburger and fries.

We don't eat a lot of processed food because I'm a good cook and I'm thrifty but half the people in the country have never even had a homemade soup.

The other part of the problem is fat acceptance. Higher income, well educated people are less likely to be fat because fatness screams "lazy pig" and these people are anything but. It's just not socially acceptable to look out-of-control in some circles.

[A knight without armor]

Fresh produce and meat costs far less than the prepackaged frozen stuff..

Produce (even though it's August) and meat (even hamburger) cost a fortune around here. Pasta, potatoes and bread are cheap. And you'll get fat on them. Stouffer's frozen stuff is expensive, but Banquet frozen dinners go for $1 apiece; their potpies are $.69.


Produce and meat are sky high in my area, too. Pasta, potatoes, bread, white rice, oleo are cheaper. If you have $3 for the week you buy those things instead of a bag of grapes. Of course portion control is so crucial. That being said, people come home hungry and stressed and tired like everyone else and tend to overeat. They do get fat and humiliated. I know people who do this and I have my poor times, too. I suppose the sin starts at being poor and stupid and ignorant in the first place.

[Gabz]

I have helped a friend cut her family food budget nearly in half this summer by teaching her how to make some of the family favorites (like lasagna) at home instead of buying frozen ones.

I took the amount of money she was going to spend on frozen lasagnas and purchased meet, cheese, pasta, onions, and tomatoes and a couple of disposable foil pans. We then spent a day putting together the pans of lasagna she then put in her freezer. The same amount of money she would have spent on 3 meals of frozen store-bought lasagna provided her family with 9 meals of homemade.

[aimee5291]

French women don't get fat...

[Gabz]

That's scary stuff.

[Froufrou]

It's true, what you say. Bottom line is, we're unhealthy on many levels. Fat is the physical. I won't get into what's become of morality.

[Gabz]

You're probably right!!!!

[elmer fudd]

These are the same people who "celebrate" the gay lifestyle, which, according to health statistics is a very unhealthy way to live.

You're absolutely right about that, but from an employment standpoint it's also much harder to regulate. You don't always know if a perspective employee is gay or very promiscuous, but if they're obese it's obvious.

[Just A Nobody]

YaknowGabz.....I wasn't going to comment, but what the hey!

Fat is a class issue. Rich, educated people are not fat;

Bravo Sierra! I am rich, educated AND fat.

Obese means not just podgy, but dangerously, disablingly, distastefully fat, as in American fat.

Exactly what the does this mean? 5'2" @ 110 pounds is considered "fat" these days.

This is not just shocking; it has also happened shockingly fast.

Easy to do when one keeps moving the goal posts.
Years ago there were these little chart thingys. They had different charts for men and women and they included 3 different bone structures. I think some even had a different chart for age groups etc. Do they still exist?

[A knight without armor]

Some do! I watched the Tour de France on TV and there were several round ladies standing and sitting along the road. It seemed to be in the more rural areas.

[Aquinasfan]

Fatness and obesity are directly related to lower education and lower incomes.

Generally true, because a box of Twinkies is a relatively inexpensive form of entertainment.

[Verloona Ti]

Speaking of Tang (shudder! ) and astronaut viands , do you remember Space Sticks? (or was it Space Stix?) Chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry IIRC, softer than Tootsie rolls and much larger. I kinda wish the nostalgia industry would bring them back, if only briefly, just so I can try them again-I think I was 8 or so when I last had one.

[Atlas Sneezed]

Produce (even though it's August) and meat (even hamburger) cost a fortune around here.

---

What is your daily budget that does not buy enough normal ingredients?

(And frozen veggies are always cheap, lots for around a buck or two a pound.)

(Pork shoulder is usually about $2-3 bucks a pound. Damn good stuff if you simmer it long enough)

Brown rice is just a cheap as white, and is quite good for you, and won't make you chubby.

[Gabz]

And it depends on location, too. I'm constantly amazed how my sister in a major city pays less for produce, meat and other grocery items than I do in a rural area.

I totally agree with you. It drives me absolutely insane about the cost of chicken around here ---- the processing plant is closer to my house than the supermarket.

But that is the problem - shipping costs. Tyson and Perdue ship the chicken processed here down to the warehouse of the local supermarket chain in North Carolina and then it is shipped back up here.

Produce is not a problem, except in the winter, what I don't grown myself I buy it directly from the farmers (or they just give it to me).......but it seems that meat (of all types) is outrageously expensive every where.

[Bonaparte]

"Rich, educated people are not fat..."

Hasn't this writer ever heard of those "fat cats" who pull the levers of commerce?

Besides, shouldn't the government at least set an example before presuming to offer impertinent advice to America?

Hey, where's my bucket of fried chicken?

[Overtaxed]

Three words: rice and beans.

Too many carbs. :)