Apparently the Province of Manitoba wants to bring Physical Education classes to back to its schools.
There's no shortage of culprits to blame for why your nine-year-old kid is 30 pounds overweight.
And if parents try hard enough, they can probably absolve themselves of blame altogether.
But the truth is, the only people to blame for today's fat kids are parents.
Parents, that is, who feed their kids daily doses of pop, candy and chocolate bars. Parents who serve their kids fatty foods on a daily basis, provide them with bowls of potato chips and cheesies every day, while Johnny is mesmerized in front of the TV. ... ... whether it's 30 minutes or 60 minutes [of P.E. class], it won't make much difference for the kid who has a chocolate bar, a can of Coke and a bag of chips in his backpack every day -- the same kid who comes home and has a helping of ice cream and fatty foods for supper, with no physical exercise between the school day and bed.
That kid is going to be fat regardless. And that's the parents' fault, not the school system.
Politicians can't speak in those terms because they don't want to offend anyone. And while I appreciate the Doer government is showing some leadership in this area, a more terse message to parents -- like get your fat butt off the couch and get active with your kids -- would probably have more impact. At least it would be reality.
Phys. Ed. is a good idea.
Kids should be introduced to a number of activities in school, in the hope that one or two will strike their fancy and keep them active even after they leave. Like the author, I don't like the mindset that says, the kids are fat so the government should do something about it. The first line of responsibility is in the home. But schools can play a part.
The movement to get rid of vending machines is also one that I support. They were brought into B.C. schools when I was a teenager, so that we could have things like scoreboards in the gym. Kind of a deal with the devil, don't you think? Why don't we just put cigarette vending machines in the schools in order to fund our no smoking campaign? Finally, we all have to just say "No!" when we are asked if we want to supersize a meal, and complain loudly about how large serving sizes have become. Have you seen a "regular" drink in a movie theatre recently?
The picture above is almost certainly photoshopped, but it's cute, isn't it?
Rebecca and I have watched a few episodes of a new reality show in which spouses get "swapped" into different families for a week and one of the ways that the producers of the show attempt to shake things up is by making one family well-to-do, and the other lower middle class or poor. The results are not as lopsided as you might think.
The rich families are prone to pathologies too, it's just that some of them are easily hidden, and not always recognized as pathological. A patronizing arrogance and greed are very common flaws in the rich families. Generally, however, they are not lazy. They work very hard, and most are in pretty good shape (but not all).
The poorer families, however, eat amazingly badly. That is probably one of the most striking things we've seen. Their food is fat and it's fried, all the time. Veggies are described as "nasty." Portion sizes are huge and Physical activity is lacking. Laziness is a often factor too.
The Phys. Ed. Manitoba is doing will almost certainly benefit poorer families most, especially if combined with nutrional information. Kids don't cook, but they can try to share information with parents. It's hard to argue with the policy, just don't even think that a government program alone can have any real impact. The biggest influence is the home, not the school, an no amount of programs will change that.
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