obesity

Obesity has played a huge role in today’s society. A lot of people are becoming more obese each day and no one around is trying to do anything to stop if. No one is seriously taking actions/matters into their own hands and worrying about this problem. More people are becoming obese because of how large corporations are out there who are marketing little kids. Engler’s essay “Obesity: Much of the Responsibility Lies with Corporations” from the reading TSIS, Engler argues this because he feels as if it’s in the hand of all the corporations and how they’re out there to make money off of us. He makes a good argument that marketing companies with large corporations has become a serious problem all over the world. Research into the topic on childhood obesity and fast food helps us to see the strengths in Engler’s argument, especially in regard to local access to fast food, advertising/media, daily physical activity in schooling, and food relationship in poor areas. In order to understand Engler, we must examine the local access to fast food carefully. In some states or even different countries you can find many fast food restaurants near any 1 and a half mile radius of a school. To me this is giving kids the opportunity to take advantage of it and go there for lunch every single day. Not only is fast food cheap, but it tastes exceptionally good. By this occurring you’re not solving the problem of obesity; you’re just making matters worse and making kids become more obese. Brennan Davis argues this in his article. He argues that more obese people are linked to kids who go to school and have a fast food joint located right next to them. Kids are eating less healthier now a days and a good example of this is “ We found that students with fast-food restaurants near (within one half mile of) their schools (1) Consumed fewer servings of fruits and vegetables, (2) consumed more servings of soda and, (3) were more likely to be overweight” (Brennan, 1). As you can see here a lot of kids are eating less of what they should be and more of what they shouldn’t which is causing a huge scenario in the U.S. Furthermore, the amount of calories we intake from soda and the local access to fast food/soda helps me to understand Engler because of the access to soda in schools. Kids in school are getting trapped in by all these ads from soda commercials fast food commercials and all they want to do when they get out is go get it. There’s nothing better than seducing young teenage or young children into buying their products. Corporations don’t care how fat they will get or what’s going to go wrong with them. All they care about is they make enough money to keep their business running. In schools you’re going to see vending machines all over the place because kids love soda and what other way to make quick money then inserting a vending machine into school. An example of this is “In Texas, the food giants give $54 million a year to schools to sell their wares in vending machines” (Engler, 176). As a result of this kids are gaining more sugar into their body everyday which is causing them to become obese. In addition to the local access to fast food, the issue of advertising/media can also help us to understand Engler’s argument. Food advertising is a big issue in the U.S. or anywhere in the country with billboards and local T.V. It’s pretty much one of the best ways to make money of kids in today’s society. I mean hey take a look around and see for yourself. You walk up and down the streets or even drive and always find a sign saying something about any type of fast food. Aiming for a local newspaper article ad would put it over the top and win it if kids were to see. The media plays an important role as well in informing the public to childhood obesity. The aim for some of these guys is to restrict television food advertising as one conclusion to solving the obesity epidemic problem. An example of what they would do is “The main areas presented as solutions of childhood obesity were: policy changes to food advertising, supportive environments for physical activity, supportive environments for healthy eating and healthy eating policies” (Udell, Mehta, 1). From seeing this happening there trying to reduce the amount of obesity by examining all of these things. Moving on, Englers argument about the media and advertising begin to fall into place with talking about how targeting young kids is easy. Advertising and media is a great and easy way to make money if you have the money to do it. By targeting little kids you need ads, you need television commercials for every time they watch their favorite shows. You need it all. Large corporations who put their ads out there are the ones who are going to have all the profit. Fast food joints do commercials with cartoon characters, toys, etc. They lure kids into making their mommy and daddy buy them what they want if they see it on television. Say for instance if you see a Ronald McDonald on T.V. rather than a health guy, you’re obviously going to go with Ronald McDonald. What I’m saying is these large companies are out to get you and they are doing a heck of a job of it. An example of media/advertising taking its course is “When targeting young kids, companies use cartoon characters, toys, and other items that have a powerful influence over children” (Engler, 175). This is exactly why kids are becoming obese. Moreover, another way to understand Engler’s essay is the amount of physical activity schools get now a days. Not every school has PE, but most of them do and aren’t doing anything to save these kids from becoming obese. By doing a little exercise everyday wouldn’t hurt you, it would only help you in the long run for what you eat throughout you’re day. Many schools have teachers who teach PE who have basically no idea what they’re doing. This is giving kids the disadvantage to actually become active and stay healthy. A prime example of this showing is “In Government elementary (primary) schools in Australia, however, PE is usually conducted by generalist classroom teachers, many of whom have little PE teacher training, thereby diminishing its potential impact” (Telford, 1). By this occurring kids in a different country are not getting the proper teaching skills they should be. More into Engler, his argument helps me to understand because in his essay he begins talking about the amount of daily exercise in certain schools. Kids pretty much choose whether or not they want to be involved in physical activity. Major cutbacks on schools budgets are a huge factor in why kids don’t get enough daily exercise as well. Not many people like to exercise and it shows with the amount of kids who are obese and go to school. By not having PE in schools you’re giving kids the risk of becoming more obese each and every day. An example of this is “Cutbacks to physical education budgets have not helped. The often-elitist nature of school and community sports dissuades many kids from participating (Engler, 178). By not having a PE in school you’re giving them the opportunity to become obese from the factor they don’t do any daily physical activity in school. Finally, besides physical activity, another key issue to examine is the food relationship in poor areas. It’s all over the U.S. and more certainly in countries that are very poor that they can’t afford to eat healthy. It’s come to say that you can find more obese children or young adults in countries with low population density. An example of this is “Poor dietary patterns and obesity, established risk factors for chronic disease, have been linked to neighborhood deprivation, neighborhood minority composition, and low area population density” (Larson, 74). From looking at this you can see that much of the low density areas are becoming more obese because of the lack of money they bring in.
In addition, the food relationship in poor areas helps me to understand Engler’s argument because of the way he argues about poor areas. Engler argues that in poor areas you are going to find nothing but unhealthy food because that’s all mainly black neighborhoods. An example of this is “Poor areas often have an even higher exposure to fast-food restaurants and fewer supermarkets, four times less in black neighborhoods than white neighborhoods, where healthier products can be found” (Engler, 174). As a result of this you can tell which kinds of neighborhoods are going to become more obese.