SHIRKING A RESPONSIBILITY-PARENTS ON THE DOCK!

The latest move in the world capital of obesity, the US, to launch a social movement to curb the voracious food habits of its younger population has involved the family of the President of that country. How far such a strategy will be effective in reversing the current trend of eating disorders remains to be seen. But the high decibel publicity such a campaign received, has been able to re-focus the attention of that nation on the necessity to tackle the problem.

"Perhaps one thing "mom-in-chief" Obama should keep in mind is the root problem of childhood obesity. The problem is neither what foods are available, nor how much physical education a student experiences. No, the biggest problem is the parent. It is the parent who neglects to teach, the parent who can buy junk food and not healthy alternatives, the parent who allows their child to sit inside all day. Society offers those who exhibit this neglect the scapegoats of fast foods and video games, but the true blame falls entirely on the parents raising the next generation. If we want to combat obesity, we must combat laziness. If we want to combat laziness, we must make being lazy a liability and that goes for both children and parents".

Lot can be said about the modern "parenting" practices where the child does not get adequate time to be spent with its parents leading to straying into activities not considered helpful in educating or molding the character. While feminine urge for equality is a genuine phenomenon, responsibility for conceiving and upbringing of children rests more on the shoulders of the female partner. Increasing involvement of father by taking over more responsibility for good parenting, as is happening in many India homes, may yet see reversal of the present trend. Whether distortion of this system in the modern society, due to economic and other compulsions, can ever be reversed is a point for consideration by sociologists.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com