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While I dont think the fed has any business in our school lunches, those kids are little ingrates.
Trashcans stuffed with food and then complaining they are hungry? Get real, spoiled little American brats. You parents these days suck.

Originally posted by smashdem
While I dont think the fed has any business in our school lunches, those kids are little ingrates.
Trashcans stuffed with food and then complaining they are hungry? Get real, spoiled little American brats. You parents these days suck.

edit on 25-8-2012 by smashdem because: (no reason given)

I was kind of thinking the same thing. And I am an American.

My kids were homeschooled until last/this year. So knowing all the school lunch threads here at ATS I was curious, and ate lunch with my daughter a couple of times last spring. It wasn't bad. I didn't think it was much different then when i went to school (80 to 92). Some things were fairly good, others not so much.

But I did notice a few things. The throw away factor was huge. And I think its because the kids eat junk at home, and they are given something relatively balanced they won't eat. When I grew up, mom cooked most days. So what I got at home (while much better tasting and variety) wasn't all that different from what I got at school. I wasn't allowed a ton of junk at home. But it seems the opposite is true. Many families eat out multiple times a week, and eat the same pre packaged stuff when they do eat at home. I think the American eating issues come from a variety of sources. Lack of education and making poor choices in what and how much they are eating, what they eat/learn at home, food and eating becoming an almost addictive pattern, eating for pleasure so to speak. Lack of exercise. Lack of nutriant food. The list goes on.

Couple of other things. Being in my upper thirties I am/was any where from 25 to 50 lbs overweight. Wanting to change that, I simply started with portion controls. It took a few days/weeks to get used to eating less, but it wasn't a big deal. Eat what you want, just don't eat 3 plates of it. I dropped about 10 lbs. Then I GREATLY reduced my intake of carbs, especially soda and potato. Dropped about another 10. Add some light to moderate exercise, I lost almost 10 more. I am now down about 25 to 30lbs. Prior to this I would kill myself with exercise, extreme diets. Nothing. Now being more sensable, I am loosing weight and it is relatively easy. All in about 3 months. I hope to lose about 20 more.

Now, what's even weirder about this....... I recently took an extra job to make some extra money to cover some increased expenses. Well the only close by thing that would really match a part time schedule to my "regular" corporate office job was................

McDonalds! So I kind of reluctantly went to work there. It's not so bad. The one I am at is very clean, and staffed mostly with part time college kids. Many are using McDonald's as a resume builder, and almost all are trying to get in to one of the various management programs that are offered. So it's not the "horror story fast food place" I worried about. It's also owned by a small franchise, and is not a "corporate" owned store. So it's been interesting. ANYWAYS now that I was going from one job to the other and not having time to eat, and being allowed a "crew meal" I kind of cringed at the thought of eating 2-4 times a week at McDonald's. But I started looking at the menu nutriant sheets, and making healthy choices, I haven't gained any weight back, I am still losing,(although not as quickly) Choices from Oatmeal to the grilled chicken sandwiches and wraps, actually make it quite simple. Oh on rare occasion I have a Big Mac or something. But most the time i eat one of the healthier options. I also don't normally eat the fries, (other than a couple individual to quality control them a few times a night!!!!) which are probably ounce for ounce the worst thing as far as calories/fat/carbs).

So again, it comes down to better choices, thinking and caring about yourself enough to be concerned with what you eat. I think that's where this starts. And while I am a small government get out of our lives type a person, we have a whole generation that is being raised by a generation that seems to know nothing about this. The programs that the government is trying isn't going to work, but I am not exactly sure what the answer is. But we better get one. Because it seems over half the population from about 35 down is overweight, out of shape. It's going to cost us in health care....which is going to hurt us in taxes....which is going to hurt our productivity as a nation, our ability to get out of debt, and our ability to defend the nation as it probably collapses. Its truly scary.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000


I'd also say Michelle has about as much business talking about healthy eating as Betty Ford had telling the nation to stop drinking. If one is going to preach it, they need to live it....and I've lost count how many candid shots the media have had now of Michelle with one piece of fatty, fried or just plain junk food crammed between her lips or on it's way up.

Heck...At least eat in private if eating crap is the order of the day WHILE telling the nation to do otherwise. Hypocrisy defined, IMO.

edit on 24-8-2012 by Wrabbit2000 because: (no reason given)

And she's not that slim herself. If you are going to set yourself up as the example of healthy eating and healthy lifestyle, then at least be in shape and stop eating junk in the public eye.

Originally posted by SpeachM1litant
God forbid that Americans start eating normal sized portions? All this complaining, and no exercise explains why there is an obesity epedemic. I turned on the TV yesterday to see fat Americans everywhere.

I would eat as soon as I came from home (a meal you call dinner) around 4. It's healthier than waiting till night fall, stuffing you face and going to sleep.

You know what is interesting about portions? I watched my grandmother and grandfather stay fit all their lives, yet they ate decent portions of food. They ate steak, hamburger, salads, greens and fruits from their garden, and my grandma cooked from scratch. They ate desserts and often, and they didn't eat fast food ever. They ate healthily and barely gained weight.

I know we need to control portions, but we don't need to starve either. We do need foods like our grandparents had.... that were not full of chemicals and aspartame.

As for waiting late to eat, a lot of people do not get home from work until late, and don't start cooking until 8 or so. Sometimes, that just cannot be helped. When I was growing up, dinner was at 7 - 8 pm. That's pretty typical.

School lunches aren't what is making more school aged children obese, it's lack of physical activity.

When I was growing up we played outside until classes started. We had outdoor recess twice per day. We had gym class every other day in elementary school, and every day in higher grades until the last 2 years of high school. After school most of us played team sports, and those who didn't played outside until supper time.

Now they don't have nearly as much physical activity in school, and outdoor recess is quickly becoming obsolete. After school they play on digital devices (video games, computers, smart phones, you name it) instead of actually going outside to physically play.

I understand it's "a different world" now and people feel safer being able to know that their kids are in the next room playing safely indoors on the Xbox, etc. But it's not only making them unhealthy, it's curbing their imaginations as well. We never had all these electronic gadgets growing up and were never bored, and yet kids today- even with all their gadgets- are always complaining that there's nothing else to do. Going outside to climb a tree not only gives them exercise, it stimulates their brains as they imagine themselves to be up on the mast of a pirate ship or pretend to be King Kong climbing the Empire State Building. Is it dangerous? Sure! Did the rest of us live through it? Indeed we did.

So basically this comes down to parents being lazy. They want to send their kids to school and not have to worry about getting them a lunch ready.

But OH NO, the lunches arent what we hoped for, so we may have to actually MAKE OUR OWN KIDS LUNCH?

seriously, this is a perfect example of how parents today want schools to RAISE their children, not teach them.

Originally posted by Komaratzi11
My son reported to me that the trash can was stuffed with uneaten food and kids were complaining to the teachers about being hungry very shortly after lunch.

Gee... I WONDER why the kids are hungry after lunch... I mean really...

If the kids aren't eating the food (which looks like it's a lot healthier than what was served when I was growing up) and throwing it away - it sounds like a issue of the kids not knowing what nutritional food is.

Wow smaller portions too? Maybe "healthy" is there way of cutting food cost for public schools. They were serving that pink slime beef recently to save money. They have forgotten the children that come to school to fill there hungry tummies because theres not much groceries at home. Children are obviously obese because of whats happening at home, not school lunch.

If there was one thing I think I would rather see the government do than anything else it does do, it would be to see more gubment cheese...I really liked that stuff...Hand that out at the school...that and the peanut butter...

Not that I'm a huge fan of the Obamas, but it seems that the chief complaint is that the meals are too healthy and smaller than the little piggies are used to stuffing their disgusting maws with. Alah forbid the state not contribute to having the students firmly in the 'obese' category by the time they graduate (the half of them that will graduate that is). No cheese on the burger??? OUTRAGEOUS!!!