As children grow into adults they begin to have more freedom of what is put into their body, but is freedom always positive? Freedom often correlates with responsibility because freedom allows for the transfer of decision making from a separate entity to an individual self. There is a great deal of power that goes into nutritional decisions. The way a body functions, grows, reproduces, appears, and reacts is all affected by what it consumes. Maintaining a diet that takes all these factors into account is not only tedious, but also impossible in many countries. It is important for the world to be educated on what they consume and how it affects their body; therefore, they can understand the complex relationship between the two, which is …show more content…
As stated previously, dietary freedoms come with responsibility and often the choices we make come laden with consequences. Many of the chronic diseases that exist within today’s society result from “overconsumption combined with underexpediture of energy (Wiley & Allen, p.92).” Food shortages can also result in growth stunting for children, but deficiencies in specific “micronutrients such as iron…are going to manifest in a myriad of ways beyond stunting (Yip et al., 1992, as cited in Wiley & Allen, p.132-133).” In the article “Power Steer,” Pollan describes how synthetic estrogen pellets are injected into a cow’s ear prior to slaughter, and often the hormone makes its way into the human body via dissection of the cow. Pollan goes on to state that many scientists believe this can manifest into reduced sperm counts in men and premature puberty within girls (Pollan, 2002).
Family background plays an important role when referring to genetics. One of the few things individuals can’t control about their diet is their bodies intolerance to certain foods. Often this is a genetic reaction and is due to the family’s lineage and plasticity. An example of this would be lactose intolerance.
Culture can influence diet based upon what makes up social norms.For example, “in Samoa, where obesity rates are very high, it was found that weight was positively associated with social status (Wiley & Allen, p 102).” There is also some irony within cultural diets; for example, the
In this article “The Deadly Noodle “Michael Hasting, Stefan Thiel and Thomas show American cultural imperialism as relates to diet, food preparation and lifestyles is making the world fat. The authors point out that diet and exercise habit is complex such as increasing number overweight. On other hand, they provide that using different sources to increase calories in the body such as grains and cooking traditional.
In these circumstances, when parents attempt to limit children’s ingestion of these foods, they may be inadvertently be reinforcing the children’s desire to consume these unhealthy nutriments (Birch & Fisher, 1998). Other investigators have concluded that when parents leave food selection to the preference of the child, the children often choose a sizable quantity of food of meager nutritional value (Klesges, Stein, Eck, Isbell, & Klesges, 1991).
Parents and guardians are partially to blame because “parents can make an informed decision about the foods they feed their children” (Source E); parents are the ones who choose and buy the food for their children. It is simple for a grown adult to refuse their child’s guilt and make the executive decision: “to reduce kids’ waistlines” (Source E). Along with the everlasting goal to have a striving world, is to have a healthy world, and parents need to take the initiative in order to create a healthy environment for the world’s most important future - the children. An adult has the ability to see past the persuasive advertising techniques which cater so well to young children, so it is their responsibility to protect the younger generations from harmful and unhealthy
Farmers are using growth hormones in cattle to increase growth on beef cattle and to increase the milk production of dairy cows. The Federal Drug Administration (FDA), is showing utilitarianism, they say the use of these growth hormones is safe and it helps to provide enough food and milk for today’s society, even though, it poses certain health risks to our families and children around the globe (U.S. Food and Drug Administration, n.d.). Due to the hormones being passed through the milk, the risks consists of early puberty in our children and cancer (prostrate, breast, ovarian, and uterine) due to the fast growth of cells. The FDA is showing an extreme form of duty, Kantian, to the people by allowing this to happen. Not only do these hormones affect humans they also affect the cow. These cows are having their right to live a happy and healthy life invaded. Many cows tend to develop mastitis due to the aggressive milk production and then have to be treated with antibiotics, which also tend to pass through milk, this increases the tolerance towards drugs in consumers which could definitely be another health risk. A study in 2010 was conducted in Japan and found when men started to drink milk that had come from a cow that had used growth hormones, their testosterone levels had decreased due to the increase of estrogen levels in the milk. The they took a look at people in
Initially, children were malnourished during the post-World War II era. Now children are stuck trying to wedge themselves in between the door to a long, healthy life, which may be brutally cut short simply due to the way they ate in school. Eating habits and diets aren’t questioned by the children until they are faced with the decision of choosing the best nutrient filled option. Multiple choices, abundant in carbohydrates, proteins and good, natural fats surround a child, yet the child is an environment laced with advertising, thus alluring a child into picking fries instead of the mixed steam vegetables. Soon, children realize the chocolate taste better than the fruit, yet no child knows at the age of five that fruit doesn’t give its victims
Many individuals do not realize it, but obesity has become a huge epidemic in today’s society. Individuals tend to ignore the growing unhealthy products around them; instead of questioning why people are gaining weight so rapidly, they enjoy the unhealthy and unsuitable substances that they are putting in their body. Some eat whatever they can find, and since they are in a certain predicaments, they have no choice but, end up doing the same thing to their children. Many have not seen it yet, but parents are feeding their children unhealthy substances. The nutrients that they are feeding them are unhealthy, and since children do not know any better, they cannot disagree with what is being provided to them, nor can they tell whether they have had enough or not. In an article “Too Much of a Good Thing” by Greg Critser. He explains how parents are partially to blame for their children 's obesity and also their children 's environments. Critser uses statistic, biological experiments, and comparisons show how child obesity has become a great problem in today’s society and that parents have much to do with it.
There is an evident difference in a variety of cultures and traditions throughout the world. According to Dr. Lucy Long, food culture “refers to the practices, attitudes, and beliefs as well as the networks and institutions surrounding the production, distribution, and consumption of food. It encompasses the concepts of foodways, cuisine, and food system and includes the fundamental understandings a group has about food, historical and current conditions shaping that group’s relationship to food, and the ways in which the group uses food to express identity, community, values, status, power, artistry, and creativity.” (Dr. Lucy Long, lexiconoffood.com). Four cultures and foods related to heath and obesity that are very different are the Chinese,
Children now in days are being provided foods that are horrible and disgusting for their health. They are seeing foods that are not healthy and causing them to become obese. In which the leading cause of the unhealthy source comes from schools everywhere. It is wrong for children. In which it should help them understand and become questionable to their eating habits.
Most people wouldn’t deny that food is vital to everyday life, but perhaps it has more importance than just simply nourishing our bodies. According to Carole M. Counihan, a doctor of anthropology, food is so important that society has constructed rules regarding its consumption. Counihan emphasizes in her 1992 Anthropology Quarterly article, “Food Rules in the United States: Individualism, Control and Hierarchy,” that these rules serve as the “means through which human beings construct reality” (Counihan, 1992, p. 55). Counihan advocates for the importance of studying food rules by explaining that knowledge about how food is viewed in our culture can do three things: improve understanding of other culture’s food rules, allow nutrition
The existence of several different cultures can make it challenging for dietitians in practice. Accordingly, culture is imperative when it comes to health and nutrition counselling. Culture determines what people eat, when they eat it and why. It impacts the food choices and beliefs that they have. Moreover, aside from food, culture also influences how one understands health, and how they pursue treatment (Goody & Drago, 2009). Evidence demonstrates
Opponents of regulating children’s diets may say that it is allowable to have children eat all kinds of foods since eating certain unhealthy foods like sweets are a part of enjoying life as a kid. Although a good point is brought up, there are many other healthy alternatives that are enjoyable for children and can satisfy one’s sugary cravings. As an illustration, many fruits such as strawberries, blueberries, and bananas can be made into delicious fruit smoothies that are healthy and enjoyable. Some may also argue that kids are able to control their choices, and they know which choices are healthy and unhealthy. Still studies have shown that unhealthy foods like sugar are more addicting than cocaine. In fact, in the documentary Fed Up, scientists showed that 43 cocaine addicted rats were given the choice between cocaine water and sugar water. 40 out of the 43 chose the sugar water and showed signs of addiction. This justifies that having children choose between sweets and healthy foods would be an extremely difficult task for candy crazed kids. So, children would be better off with healthy foods in their diets. In conclusion, regulating children’s diets is very beneficial to children in many
In this study, researchers generated data to determine if social class foreshadowed diet quality.2 Researchers wanted to discover if limited economic resources correlated with low quality diets. Researchers believed a strong correlation would prove that the current strategies of health promotion are ineffective.2
The first reason Hastings et al., mention is the weight gain as a result of eating food with insufficient calories. Hastings et al., stresses that almost 50 % of the population from Samoa has been diagnosed with obesity when compared to 30 years ago. In other words, the number of obesity has increased due to the people choices of consuming canned corned beef, popular in England. However, the authors do not detail if this source of obesity is only related to the canned beef consumption, presumably there might be some unclear evidences that played roles in gaining weight. By the same token, the authors also remark that a similar case had been noted in Fiji due to the swap from the production of their own fresh fruits and vegetables practices to canned soda and sheep fat
The age old saying, “You are what you eat” still rings true today. Fresh fruit and vegetables have been replaced by french-fries and hamburgers. Children today do not know how to eat healthy. We, as a nation, spend hours and hours bombarding children with fast food commercials, sugary cereal commercials and cavity causing drink commercials. We than spend a fraction of that time telling kids these things are healthy only in moderation.
In this age of globalization, people are moving from their birth countries to other countries to improve their lives. In the case of the US, we have immigrants from almost any corner of the world thus leading to food diversity. While the diversity is a good thing, people often do not change their eating habits despite knowing that the lifestyle in their new home country is completely different from their previous country. In addition, they do not change food habits to preserve their culture and identity. However, if they do not modify their diet as per the new living conditions, they might