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What Now: The junk food diet
Boxes of Kellogg's brand cereal are seen on the shelf at a grocery store. More than 40 breakfast cereals have more sugar in one cup than three Chips Ahoy cookies, says Mark Bittman.
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Tess Vigeland: This week we're featuring a series of commentaries exploring some of the ideas you might find yourself discussing in 2012. Today, commentator Mark Bittman would like to direct your attention to that plate in front of you and your kids.
Mark Bittman: One major cause of what might be called the food crisis thanks is the prevalence of hyperprocessed food. Or what we might as well more honestly call junk food. And when it comes to the marketing of those foods, especially to children, we're going backwards. Take that old bugaboo: breakfast cereal.
The importance of eating real food in the morning can't be overstated, and neither can the reluctance of kids bombarded by the marketing of sweets and junk to adopt that practice. My was grandmother one of those desperate caregivers who resorted to the tactic of offering me milk and cookies in the morning, an offer I not only took her up on but forced my parents to continue.
It turns out, though, that many breakfast cereals contain more sugar than cookies, according to a recent report from the Environmental Working Group. In fact, more than 40 cereals contain more sugar in a cup than three Chips Ahoy cookies. A cup of the most sugary cereal, Kellogg's Honey Smacks has more sugar than a Hostess Twinkie.
We suspected as much, but it's still a cold slap in the face. Child obsesity rates are three times what they were a generation or so ago. But it appears that there is no government agency that can duke it out with Big Food and win.
Last year, a federal interagency group created voluntary guidelines for marketing junk food. And, guess what? The junk food industry spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying against them. Their argument: those guidelines would kill jobs. Even if that were true -- which it isn't -- would you rather kill jobs, or children?
Lobbying works so well that the United States is falling behind nearly every other developed country in restricting the marketing of junk to children. No federal agency has enough teeth to regulate junk food pushers. Which means we'll fall father behind, and our kids will get fatter and fatter. Pass the cookies, please.
Vigeland: Mark Bittman is a columnist for the New York Times and the author of "How to Cook Everything." You can pass the plate -- and your comments.
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Personally I think those of you speaking to personal responsibility are missing the point of what he was saying. I think what he was saying that the marketing to CHILDREN is what is reprehensible. Of course parents are supposed to be regulating the food intake of their children. However, there's only so many times a parent can hear "mummy or daddy, I want this, I want this, I want this". And they're unlikely to hear your logical explanation for why it's not good for you. And the second your back is turned, they're in the Sugar Crisp. At a friend's house, at school, wherever they can get the junk food. While everything should be in moderation, with federal funding cutting physical education out of school, and many children being so burdened by their parents putting them in forty thousand after school programs, there isn't a lot of time for healthy food, eaten at a table, like days of old. I DO think it's a crime that there is so much sugar in cereal. I DO think it should be better regulated. I DO think that Big Food has a responsibility. Remember, it takes a village, or a nation, to properly raise a child, and frankly, I think we need all the help we can get. I"m a working mother, which, statistically, means my children are more likely to be overweight. So yeah, I could use some help. And my kids are skinny.
Mark Bittman again reflects his bias that the government should rule our lives. We have to understand that he believes it is the government’s job to control obesity. He compares the US to other "industrialized nations". What he does not say is that the majority of those nations are more deeply socialistic than we are and that is desirable. He says there is no government agency that can go up against big food. His implicit assumption is that government is good and private industry is bad. Mark Bittman, the New York Times and Public Radio reflect a point of view that is an anathema to a free people with free choice.
Thank you, Mr. Bittman! I appreciate that there are many parents commenting on this post that are concerned with what their children eat and want to regulate it themselves (and have the money to do so). To those parents who can read labels, understand sugar content, make educated choices about their children's food, and also be able to pay for healthier food items, kudos to you. Unfortunately, where I live, that type of parenting and choice in supermarkets is sorely lacking. We don't have the luxury of having access to a Whole Foods or Trader Joe's - we don't even have a farmer's market or 'organic' section in the grocery store.
I am the director of a community kitchen in a poor part of Louisiana. We provide meals to hungry children and families Monday - Friday, and also provide classes for parents at local schools to help them learn to cook healthfully and make the right food decisions for their children on a very strict budget - or worse, with what they receive at the mobile food pantry. The obesity epidemic among children here is rampant - especially among poor families. And, it is not because they eat too much food. The only things they can afford are the cheap, over proceessed, salt-laden, sugar-filled crap that our society calls food now.
Mr. Bittman is not on a rampage against cereal - his concern is over the ingredients that are in what makes up 90% of our grocery stores. I share his concern that companies should take more responsibility as to what is in the food items they sell - but they won't. So what are we to do? There has to be some consumer protection somewhere - especially for the children I know who must do their own grocery shopping because their parents will not. When left to fend for themselves, do you think a child will pick Honey Smacks or the ingredients for the granola they read about in Food and Wine? Or, when a parent has to choose between 1 pound of meat (1 meal with no sides) or 3 boxes of Homestyle Bakes...which has an ungodly amount of sodium, amongst other things... (3 nights of casserole meals for a family at $3 a pop), which will they do?
The lack of education about these things and lack of access to healthy affordable foods is scary - and these companies are taking full advantage. It's a severe problem that needs to be fixed and in this case, I believe it must start with better regulation.
Yet another example of the growing epidemic of ignoring personal responsibility in America. Thank you for bringing this to center stage with such a one-sided editorial. Since when are the dietary choices of families a government agency's responsibility? Yes, this is a sad trend. Yes, this is slowly increasing insurance premiums for those of us that eat a healthy diet. If parents choose to be lazy in feeding their children pre-packaged junk that is their choice. I don't want my tax dollars funding an agency to police companies that are making money off the poor decisions of others. The solution is not to put a bandaid on the symptom, but to look at the root cause. Perhaps the fact that our educational system is so completely broken has something to do with this? I doubt there is any single solution. In a society where people believe anything can be fixed with a magic pill or surgery, is it any surprise that people ignore making healthy diet choices? -Even for their own children.
Having eaten cold ceral nearly every morning of my life, and in my last health checkup had the nurse worried that I needed more body fat, I don't think that morning cerals are hardly a contributing factor to obesity in the US. Perhaps if that's all the person ate all day (I've never eaten ceral after breakfast), but I just don't find them being that bad. Actually the opposite. I've noticed a change in a bunch of cerals the last few years where they changed to a whole wheat recipie (or something like that), are healthier, but I notice thay they're not as tasty. Pisses me off.
I was instantly put off by this piece. Now that I've read some of the critical commentary, I feel much better.
1. There is nothing insightful, no new information or anything interesting in this article. I've been listening and reading Marketplace for years, and feel the content has been more recently dumbed down to the lowest common denominator. This piece is case and point.
2. Mr. Bittman wrongly presents many false premises as plain fact or common knowledge here:
i. People cannot or should not be allowed to make dietary choices for themselves
ii. People need to be protected by a government agency
iii. The cereal lobby should be more intensely controlled by regulations
iv. Opposition to increased regulations and an empowered government agency is equivalent to favoring the death of children (this one is the most shameful)
3. Mr. Bittman ignores the many cereal options which are lower in sugar and can be a healthy part of people's diets
4. Mr. Bittman ignores the many studies that show ready to eat cereals are one of the healthiest choices for breakfast
This article was just silly and a waste of time.
Thank you, Mr. Bittman, for your common sense approach to diet. The idea that we "want the government to raise our children" because we object to the unhealthy products that are marketed unceasingly to young children and families (many of whom lack the education, time and resources to devote to healthy eating) is insulting and simplistic. The fact is we incur (as a country) an average of $45 billion a year in health care costs related to obesity. Regulation in product labeling and advertising can help and encourage people to make healthier choices which will benefit all of us. Food regulation in this country is so heavily weighted in favor of producers, that we need consumer protection just to level the field. The typical low-income family doesn't stand a chance against the sugar industry.
Mr. Bittman misses the fact that no matter how much marketing the junk food companies do, we don't have to listen. Accept personal responsibility and don't buy or allow junk food in your house. Turn off your TV and read to your children. Teenagers may be tempted by junk, but much less so if they've had 12 years of healthy food choices.
As a public school teacher I have seen the job our local, state, and federal governments have done to ensure that our public school students receive "nutritious" school lunches. The stuff children are forced to consume, often on our public dime, sickens me and should sicken your readers and the listeners of this program. That being said, it should give us all pause when considering any additional government intervention into what our children are eating. Parents must be the one's making the decision as to what their children should and shouldn't eat, not any type of government agency.
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