Why don’t Americans give a f*** about what they eat?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

French food uses a ton of butter/cream etc. It’s not particularly healthy.

The myth that fat is bad for you has been disproven for some time now. French use a variety of veggies and meats/seafood. Their bread is of amazing quality. They don’t add sugar to everything.

They add sugar to their bread. The yeast needs sugar. That's how bread works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, I made bad choices. When I moved here I didn’t know that the food could be “bad”. In my country you gained weight if you ate too many sweets. I didn’t know that restaurant food could be processed junk filled with chemicals. They didn’t put chemicals in food in my country. I didn’t know food in USA was a minefield and you have to watch every step.

My friend’s daughter, 11, almost died last summer from undiagnosed diabetes. No one even considered it, the girl is thin as a model and ate a normal American kid diet.

Most of pre diabetics don’t even know they have it unless you check for it specifically.

You wrote almost the same story in the previous thread. So you still don't even know the difference between Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes despite me trying to educate you a little?! Wow.

Your friend's daughter definitely has Type 1, previously aka juvenile diabetes. It is VERY different from Type 2, is not caused by eating too much food or eating wrong food, or not moving enough. In fact, the cause (or, probably, causes) are still unknown. Unlike T1, T2 is not reversible. Please don't ever bring up your daughter's Type 1 diabetes into any similar discussion.

Signed,

Mom of T2 child.

Gosh, I messed up, another correction - should have been 'Unlike T2, T1 is not reversible.'

I just hate that when some people hear a child had T1, they think parents fed her/him too many sweets. Those two types of diabetes should have been named completely different. Because they are fundamentally different.

DP. Mostly people don't know anything about diabetes, unless they know someone or have diabetes themselves. But yes, fundamentally T1 and T2 are related.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

DP. I see that the Americans you criticize are in the same boat as you, and I'm not sure how this translates into other individuals here being worse than you. You found yourself in the same boat as them, and you ended up at the same place.

That seems like it should lead to a criticism of corporate interests, etc., not individual people. I mean, I presume you can vote and do whatever advocacy you feel is warranted, just as much as those individuals can, and that it has just the same odds of success.

That’s the point. We should be advocating for healthy school lunches and regulating food industry, setting standards for restaurant and store bought food and their marketing campaigns.

But no one cares. Like this thread people think it’s about personal choice and don’t hold the system accountable.

Do parents care? They can pack their own child a lunch. Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Your friend's daughter definitely has Type 1, previously aka juvenile diabetes. It is VERY different from Type 2, is not caused by eating too much food or eating wrong food, or not moving enough. In fact, the cause (or, probably, causes) are still unknown.

Riiight. That’s what you are led to believe.

I wonder then why T1 diabetes rates have been steadily rising at the same time with T2 diabetes? Maybe, and I’m just throwing it out there, maybe diseases of endocrine system as well as other diseases do have something to do with what you eat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you are truly surrounded by unhealthy foods with no healthy options within driving distance then you really should move. None of my friends or acquaintances in the dmv area have these problems. We know how to find healthy food whether we are eating out or at home. This is a problem with a solution.

Have you been outside dmv? Have you been South or Midwest?

This is a weird stereotype that there’s just no healthy food in the south or Midwest.

Have you been to small towns in the Midwest or South? Healthy living is not an option

+1

Not an option in small towns and not easy in big cities.

There are some provincial posters on this thread who have never ventured out of the DMV.

This just is not true. There are plenty of small towns with plenty of healthy food options. And “not easy” in big cities?

Look you can blame others all you want, but the reality is that you can make good food choices, you’re choosing not to.

The concept of “food desert” is a real thing and it has devastating effects on communities. My cousins live in small Midwestern town. I was shocked at the inability to source healthy foods for kids and family, and I’m someone who is very rigid about diet. Plus, the food prep culture is terrible

If PP had been talking specifically about food deserts, then fine. Instead she generalized the “south” and all “small towns” and even “big cities”. That’s simply not true that all small towns make it just impossible to make healthy choices.

No, not talking about food deserts. Talking about small towns and big cities. Statistically and anecdotally, that's the case.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

DP. I see that the Americans you criticize are in the same boat as you, and I'm not sure how this translates into other individuals here being worse than you. You found yourself in the same boat as them, and you ended up at the same place.

That seems like it should lead to a criticism of corporate interests, etc., not individual people. I mean, I presume you can vote and do whatever advocacy you feel is warranted, just as much as those individuals can, and that it has just the same odds of success.

That’s the point. We should be advocating for healthy school lunches and regulating food industry, setting standards for restaurant and store bought food and their marketing campaigns.

But no one cares. Like this thread people think it’s about personal choice and don’t hold the system accountable.

Stop generalising. We ALL care. Just because we do not agree with your conclusions re: the cause of the problem does not mean we don't care.

I live in one of the countries people on the thread like to believe is full of slim, healthy people. In truth, that was true in the recent past, when it was harder to get junk food: people ate healthier because that was what everyone around them was doing and what was available, not because they chose healthy food over junk. Now that the junk is available easily here, suddenly there are many more overweight people. Clearly there is a component of education and choice here: you aren't going to get governments to ban junk, but you can educate people about what healthy food choices look like and how to choose and prepare them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

+10000

How can it not fall on the school? Why would anyone think it wouldn't?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

Well, "hmm", no one is requiring kids to eat school food. Plenty of parents send healthy lunches to school with their kids. Why don't you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

+10000

How can it not fall on the school? Why would anyone think it wouldn't?

Because they don't need to be. Parents can send their children with a lunch. School can keep a few provisions on hand like apples, bananas, white milk. Other than that, schools shouldn't need to provide you kid with breakfast and lunch. Come on.

In fact, if schools STOPPED providing meals, we would all be a lot heartier. No lunch, no breakfast, no pizza, candy, cupcakes, etc..that schools are constantly dishing out. Just the few above things for the kids that forgot to bring a lunch or can't bring one. Better to have an apple and some whole milk than the turkey gravy slop

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

+10000

How can it not fall on the school? Why would anyone think it wouldn't?

My kids have all been enrolled in public schools. They have never once eaten a meal there because I have always, every damn day, packed lunch for my three kids. All parents can pack a lunch. I’d never let the school feed them

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

French food uses a ton of butter/cream etc. It’s not particularly healthy.

The myth that fat is bad for you has been disproven for some time now. French use a variety of veggies and meats/seafood. Their bread is of amazing quality. They don’t add sugar to everything.

They add sugar to their bread. The yeast needs sugar. That's how bread works.

I live just across the border from France and we have a lot of French friends and often shop or holiday in France. You people are crazy for believing that French people eat all meals the same as what you see in restaurants. Go outside of the tourist trap areas of Paris and see plenty of chubby French people who make bad food decisions.

[Anonymous]

The “Nutrition” service from school systems is the best example of “I don’t care”. If you raise the issue to the school adm they will crucify you for the rest of the academic years. They do not care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

+10000

How can it not fall on the school? Why would anyone think it wouldn't?

Because they don't need to be. Parents can send their children with a lunch. School can keep a few provisions on hand like apples, bananas, white milk. Other than that, schools shouldn't need to provide you kid with breakfast and lunch. Come on.

In fact, if schools STOPPED providing meals, we would all be a lot heartier. No lunch, no breakfast, no pizza, candy, cupcakes, etc..that schools are constantly dishing out. Just the few above things for the kids that forgot to bring a lunch or can't bring one. Better to have an apple and some whole milk than the turkey gravy slop

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Why does making sure your child eats heathy fall on the school?

Hmm… because they’re cooking and serving food to our children?

Well, "hmm", no one is requiring kids to eat school food. Plenty of parents send healthy lunches to school with their kids. Why don't you?

That’s it, that’s the problem. That’s the American absurdity.

Schools make and serve lunches to our kids, but you are not willing to hold them responsible to provide quality food and have standards.
Instead, you put that burden on individual family.

How many families do you think we fo this extra mile? Do you know that other countries manage to have schools serve healthy food?