New York school drops Michelle Obama lunch standards: Kids too hungry

MarkScheppy

TKDRL
reply to post by Darkrunner

 

Good point. I have heard now that kids can get out of gym class pretty easy these days too, No first hand knowledge of the truthfulness of that, but if true, very alarming.

Michelle Obama should take lessons from Betty Crocker. The down in Texas group may have to substitute in. Decadent Who wants kids to starve? In my state they are stingy for cutting the budget for milk snacks. I like Tomato soup! Substitute youngkins would eat tomato soup for a lunch? Did you know that a can of campbells soup has sea salt in it. Sea Salt! yum.

Who the hell likes tomato soup??...yuck!!

Cuervo
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

This really sickens me. We have a nation of little fat future diabetes cases and we come out with a menu to make them not so fat and diabetic. They complain. "Waah... these aren't Twinkies and pizza! Waaaah this is enough to only feed one normal child!"

So what do we do? We give them back their pizza and soda. Freakin' disgusting. Any parent who can't get their kid to eat a carrot over a hot dog is not trying hard enough. It's their lives we are talking about.

I may not agree with what other parents choose to feed their children, but this is America and it should remain free for parents to decide what they feed their children, not the FLOTUS.

Taissa

Cuervo
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

This really sickens me. We have a nation of little fat future diabetes cases and we come out with a menu to make them not so fat and diabetic. They complain. "Waah... these aren't Twinkies and pizza! Waaaah this is enough to only feed one normal child!"

So what do we do? We give them back their pizza and soda. Freakin' disgusting. Any parent who can't get their kid to eat a carrot over a hot dog is not trying hard enough. It's their lives we are talking about.

I may not agree with what other parents choose to feed their children, but this is America and it should remain free for parents to decide what they feed their children, not the FLOTUS.

Yes, the government does in a public school.

I don't want them to serve pizza. Is that stepping on my rights any more than offering healthy food instead? I could say the same thing you are but about all of the non-foods they are giving the students. I don't want my daughter to be around poison-laden factory vomit anymore than Honey Booboo wants to look at a vegetable.

Cuervo
Yes, the government does in a public school.

I don't want them to serve pizza. Is that stepping on my rights any more than offering healthy food instead? I could say the same thing you are but about all of the non-foods they are giving the students. I don't want my daughter to be around poison-laden factory vomit anymore than Honey Booboo wants to look at a vegetable.

But the issue at stake is who forces what. You don't want your child forced to have only unhealthy stuff because you feel that would be wrong. You don't want that view forced down your kid's throat.

But on the reverse, others don't want that view forced on them. What makes it right for you to force your view on them?

You can argue that you're doing it for their own good all you want but "of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” C.S. Lewis

Attempting to claim the moral high ground doesn't make what you want any less of a tyranny for all that you are doing it for the good of the people. Michelle Obama also needs to learn this. People are best left to decide for themselves even if that means you are letting some of them make stupid decision. In the end, they should have only themselves to blame. This is what personal responsibility is all about. It's a lost art in this country.

Cuervo
I don't want them to serve pizza. Is that stepping on my rights any more than offering healthy food instead? I could say the same thing you are but about all of the non-foods they are giving the students. I don't want my daughter to be around poison-laden factory vomit anymore than Honey Booboo wants to look at a vegetable.

If you want them to have something different, send it with them.
Just make sure it meets the guidelines.

abecedarian

Cuervo
I don't want them to serve pizza. Is that stepping on my rights any more than offering healthy food instead? I could say the same thing you are but about all of the non-foods they are giving the students. I don't want my daughter to be around poison-laden factory vomit anymore than Honey Booboo wants to look at a vegetable.

If you want them to have something different, send it with them.
Just make sure it meets the guidelines.

edit on 10/19/2013 by abecedarian because: (no reason given)

"DIfferent"? Healthy food is only "different" because somebody makes a lot of money pushing meat, dairy, salt, sugar, and fat into our kids.

Do you not see the double standard? Why can't I just as easily say "If you want them to have pizza, send it with them". Why is my sensible and healthy preference the one that's not default. Why shouldn't the opt-in be with the poisons they normally serve?

ketsuko

Cuervo
Yes, the government does in a public school.

I don't want them to serve pizza. Is that stepping on my rights any more than offering healthy food instead? I could say the same thing you are but about all of the non-foods they are giving the students. I don't want my daughter to be around poison-laden factory vomit anymore than Honey Booboo wants to look at a vegetable.

But the issue at stake is who forces what. You don't want your child forced to have only unhealthy stuff because you feel that would be wrong. You don't want that view forced down your kid's throat.

But on the reverse, others don't want that view forced on them. What makes it right for you to force your view on them?

You can argue that you're doing it for their own good all you want but "of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” C.S. Lewis

Attempting to claim the moral high ground doesn't make what you want any less of a tyranny for all that you are doing it for the good of the people. Michelle Obama also needs to learn this. People are best left to decide for themselves even if that means you are letting some of them make stupid decision. In the end, they should have only themselves to blame. This is what personal responsibility is all about. It's a lost art in this country.

Oh my hell, really? Taking diabetes fuel off their plates and giving them healthy alternatives is not "tyranny". Tyranny is shoving that garbage in their faces, getting them addicted, and then profiting from it for the remainder of their sadly shortened lives.

There are ALREADY standards in place that "tyrannically" tell us what our kids eat in school. People aren't complaining about it because those standards include all of the crap that kids see during their commercial breaks on tv so parents don't have to deal with educating their children on nutrition. If the kids have healthy food at school and junk food at home, kids are going to ask mommy and daddy why they don't care about their health. Many parents are scared to death to confront that so they start claiming that the government is trying to rule their lives... even though they aren't doing anything different aside from finally making improvements of the standards that are already there.

It sounds like a lot of people on here are happy that this idea didn't quite work out simply because it was an Obama who was promoting it. Children are our most precious of all resources. We have to make sure that they and their families have access to affordable, healthy food so they grow up to be healthy adults. Its good both for the individual and for society as a whole.

Maybe we need to look at restricting the abilities of certain industries to market to children. I know a lot of people will cry that it is impeding on corporation's freedoms and ability to make profit, but much more important is a child's freedom from harm. Yes, it is ultimately a parents responsibility to ensure that their child is fed right, but society has a role in empowering parents to make right decisions.

Ultimately, this corporatism that we have allowed to take hold in our western world is very much the antithesis to family values.

Forgive me, I checked out this thread last night but it has grown exponentially since then. Is there a link that shows what is on her menu?

Its hard for me to pass judgement when I don't know anything about it. If its driven by corporate greed just to get one company's frozen junk instead of another's on the plate then it should be eliminated.

My 2 cents? Elimate school lunches and have the parents handle it. Lower the budget and taxes by the amount saved by not trucking in frozen junk to feed our kids.

I hear arguing over forcing healthly over not healthy but if a child has pasta with meat sauce, grapes, salad, and milk why do they get less of the pasta and milk but unlimited on everything else? Some kids need more protein and carbs. If their body is craving it they should not be denied because one person thinks its making kids unhealthy.

Also this isn't a matter of offering healthy versus unhealthy meals. In fact, her program has not taken the pizza or other foods off the menu. Rather it has said if kids want seconds they may only have two food groups to fullifll hunger (more fruits and veggies but smaller portions and no seconds on other food groups).

She has chosen which food groups should be called the best and forced our kids to fill up on them. My own child is athletic. He is not getting full on green beans and applesauce (which by the way are not that healthy). What I would like to see is healthier main dishes and then... It is ok to have seconds on any of it.

LadyGreenEyes

Originally posted by Philippines
Let them eat snails, mudfish they hunted, and anything else they can scavenge in the wild to eat (esp. wild plants), and then let's see how much they appreciate food when they have to forage / hunt for themselves. So spoiled...

Is that how you eat? Do you require that from your children? Wow......

Parents PAY for lunches for children that aren't given enough food in those lunches to not go hungry all day. What a thoughtless response.

Sometimes, I eat that, yes.. among other wildlife depending on the season. Do I require that from my children, well I have no children, but when my wife and I have children, then yes... it's a cultural thing. Do you have any culture where you're from?

Sounds like you depend on money for life, that's too bad =(

reply to post by babybunnies


For some body types this is true. Some kids have greater muscle skeleton mass and need more calories.

You think the small slight kid needs that same calories as the big kid with a large skeleton and muscle mass? WTH? People are so driven by the opinion of what is being fed the masses by what seems the fashion dejure.

I knew a guy in junior high that when he was 15 stood 6'5" weighed close to 300 lbs. without a lot of body fat. He was one big dude, naturally muscular with an extra big frame.

He should be eating the same as the kid next to him? Use common sense and not common opinion.

reply to post by Cuervo


I understand and sympathize with your rationale. But I think we're forgetting an important part of the process here... Good parenting. It behooves us all to teach our children to make the right choices. What's the point of teaching our children and imparting our particular value set to them if it becomes irrelevant the moment they set foot outside our homes? If they go to school and they are forced to eat nothing but Soylent Green because a transient resident of 1600 Penn. Ave deems it so for this particular political cycle, they aren't going to understand the concept of making choices when its nothing but theory and never put into practice. YOU don't want your child to eat certain things for certain reasons. I respect that. For what I pay in taxes to the school district though, I'd prefer to have a little more say in what my kids are fed than someone who will never set foot in this district. Teach your kids to avoid the processed frozen pizza if that's how you feel but kids being kids are grossed out by the most random things like texture or color so having additional options, to me, is not a terrible idea. It's one meal and I can make up for the negative aspects of that meal with a good breakfast and dinner. If I wanted my kids to be nannied I would send them to boarding school.

peter vlar
reply to post by Cuervo

 

I understand and sympathize with your rationale. But I think we're forgetting an important part of the process here... Good parenting. It behooves us all to teach our children to make the right choices. What's the point of teaching our children and imparting our particular value set to them if it becomes irrelevant the moment they set foot outside our homes? If they go to school and they are forced to eat nothing but Soylent Green because a transient resident of 1600 Penn. Ave deems it so for this particular political cycle, they aren't going to understand the concept of making choices when its nothing but theory and never put into practice. YOU don't want your child to eat certain things for certain reasons. I respect that. For what I pay in taxes to the school district though, I'd prefer to have a little more say in what my kids are fed than someone who will never set foot in this district. Teach your kids to avoid the processed frozen pizza if that's how you feel but kids being kids are grossed out by the most random things like texture or color so having additional options, to me, is not a terrible idea. It's one meal and I can make up for the negative aspects of that meal with a good breakfast and dinner. If I wanted my kids to be nannied I would send them to boarding school.

You are missing my point. They are already being told what they can or can't eat at school. Why would making those forced options healthy ones not be better? I look at my daughter's school menu and, half the days, there are no healthy options, even under what the first lady suggests. I don't think it goes far enough. These are public schools that are not owned by the junk food industries no matter how hard they try to lobby and make it so.

If anything, these sort of steps free our children from corporate indoctrination and protects them. Parents can still shovel garbage down their kids' throats at home but I don't want my tax dollars go towards something so obviously harmful. And yes, kids can eat light for one meal out of a day.

reply to post by Helious


Yeah....I remember I refused to eat spinach once. My dad sat at the table for three hours until I ate it.

I was being such an ass that I just sat there staring at the plate. It was summer and a bug flew onto the plate and died in the sauce.

My dad, cold eyed looked at me and said I still had to eat my spinach. I cried and bitched. He said it was my fault the bug made it onto the plate. That if I had eaten it from the start it would have been clean and in the cupboard.

He really was going to make me sit there until I finished. He just wasnt having it. SO

I ate the freaking spinach, bug and all.

To this day I can eat anything. I may not like it, but I eat anything prepared for me with love.

I thank him for being a psychopath then. He was being a real parent that cared and stuck his neck out for my education.

as far as food portions and what kids need...

That is as diverse as people are. Some kids burn so many calories being athletes or balls of nerves that they need to eat well in excess of the normal calorie intake of other kids.

Some dont need meat. Others really do.

To make any standard global and universal is just retarded. Ms obama is a dumbass for thinking like that. Shows their stupidity and amateur leadership skills.

I say give them proper food to eat like vegetables. Only cook them properly so they look nice and are tasty.
Don't give in to demands of burgers and chips and pizza all the time.
If they are hungry then they will eat it.

They need to be acclimatised back to healthy foods.

Cuervo

peter vlar
reply to post by Cuervo

 

I understand and sympathize with your rationale. But I think we're forgetting an important part of the process here... Good parenting. It behooves us all to teach our children to make the right choices. What's the point of teaching our children and imparting our particular value set to them if it becomes irrelevant the moment they set foot outside our homes? If they go to school and they are forced to eat nothing but Soylent Green because a transient resident of 1600 Penn. Ave deems it so for this particular political cycle, they aren't going to understand the concept of making choices when its nothing but theory and never put into practice. YOU don't want your child to eat certain things for certain reasons. I respect that. For what I pay in taxes to the school district though, I'd prefer to have a little more say in what my kids are fed than someone who will never set foot in this district. Teach your kids to avoid the processed frozen pizza if that's how you feel but kids being kids are grossed out by the most random things like texture or color so having additional options, to me, is not a terrible idea. It's one meal and I can make up for the negative aspects of that meal with a good breakfast and dinner. If I wanted my kids to be nannied I would send them to boarding school.

You are missing my point. They are already being told what they can or can't eat at school. Why would making those forced options healthy ones not be better? I look at my daughter's school menu and, half the days, there are no healthy options, even under what the first lady suggests. I don't think it goes far enough. These are public schools that are not owned by the junk food industries no matter how hard they try to lobby and make it so.

If anything, these sort of steps free our children from corporate indoctrination and protects them. Parents can still shovel garbage down their kids' throats at home but I don't want my tax dollars go towards something so obviously harmful. And yes, kids can eat light for one meal out of a day.

No, I think you're point was rather clear. You prefer your tax dollars be spent one way I prefer another. The most logical solution is to offer multiple choices and trust that we've imparted enough knowledge onto our children to make the right decision. Forcing one or the other on them is just allowing the state to parent for us and I for one am not keen on the idea. If I wanted someone else to teach my kids morals I'd send them to parochial school. If I wanted a full time babysitter is send them to a boarding school. I'm lucky enough to live in a district with a public school in the top 5% in my state so I'd prefer to keep them going there. If the kids aren't going to eat they get miserable and dont learn. Lets take responsibility for ourselves and children and not abdicate parenting over to the state.

reply to post by Cuervo


Yeah, well, you know what? I don't exactly approve of that stuff either, but the difference between you and me is that I'm not arrogant enough to think that my views should be forced into the diet for the entire school. I'll just make a lunch and send it with my son when the time comes like my mother did for me.

taoistguy
I say give them proper food to eat like vegetables. Only cook them properly so they look nice and are tasty.
Don't give in to demands of burgers and chips and pizza all the time.
If they are hungry then they will eat it.

They need to be acclimatised back to healthy foods.

That's difficult to do. For one thing, you are swimming upstream with one meal against two. For another, what makes a vegetable tasty to one kid isn't going to for another. My kiddo is a real challenge with his veggies so far although he loves fruit. I've found that he does edamame in the pod, raw spinach, and roasted carrots, sweet potatoes and asparagus ... and yeah. Now, imagine working with a school load of similarly finicky kids.

For many of the kids of the poor school lunch is the big meal of the day.

Many of these kids get less then 2000 calories a day and most of that at school .