Fast food for kids.

[Andyvon]

I'm 48 and I've never had children but I'm astonished at the rubbish I see advertised on the TV aimed directly at children.There are 'deals' from KFC, McDonalds, Burger King etc - and they look horrendous! To see growing children consuming 'meals' of fried chicken, chips, baked beans, 'sides' and Coca-cola, or cheeseburgers, chips, 'sides', Coca-cola amazes me. Everything is full of fats, sugars, starch and carbohydrate. There's no healthy balance of fruit, vegetables, vitamins or minerals. Do people really allow their children to eat such cr_p?

Like everything else ruining our society, most of it seems to have originated across the Atlantic. Perhaps the US accepts it's adults and children being of huge proportions, but do we really want to go the same way? When we were children the only takeaway food you could buy in the UK was fish and chips.That was a treat we had once or twice a month, other than that we had good home cooking from Mum. I tasted my first burger when I was 17 (when McDonalds opened their first foreign restaurant in Leicester Square). I was so unimpressed with the thin little 'fries' I've never touched McDonalds since. I had my first pizza when I was 22 and my first kebab when I was 24 after I had married. Yet how many 6 year olds today have never eaten a burger, pizza or kebab?

Despite promoting healthy eating, recent governments continue to allow the growth of US-style fast food outlets and adverts. New Labour announced a few years ago that this generation of children is the first not expected to live as long as their parents as a result of lack of exercise and poor diet. That's a terrible failure by this generation of parents. I really think that to feed growing children this fatty, sugary, fast food diet constitutes a very real child abuse. The children are becoming obese, unhealthy and won't live long. Let's encourage a healthy diet and send this fast food rubbish back to the USA.

[ummmm]

Mine walk to school...about 2 miles each way.

[ubasses]

Like you I do not have any children and the last time I went to a McDonalds was 20 odd years ago when my Goddaughter was young, it was awful. Next time I visited was about 10 years ago when desperate for a cup of coffee again awful, never been back. how parents can allow their children to eat all this rubbish is beyond me. I am 10 years older than you and was brought up on fresh home cooked food which I still eat today. The thought of all this high fat processed food being fed to the next generation worries me to death.

[Andyvon]

I quite agree ubasses. I must say that McDonald's are good for coffee, especially abroad, but I'm always astonished when I see what young children on the next tables are eating. McDonald's are also handy if you want to pop in for the loo! I know if I had children I just wouldn't allow them to eat the rubbish I see in there as I wouldn't dream of eating it myself.

Hi Eddie. It was my mate I walked to school with who was occasionally dropped off by his Dad and I occasionally jumped in the car too. When we got out the car at school all the other kids' eyes were popping. I then went home that night and told my parents I went to school in a car that day! We were the only ones. When I asked my Dad to take me in the car I was always told to walk for the exercise. I never did get driven to school. That was in the mid-70s.

One point I have is that it's just as bad for children to have no regukar exercise and a bad diet as it is to encourage them to smoke. They develop illnesses later in life and their life expectancy is significantly reduced by years. It's wrong to argue the choice is a personal one and market-led. It's the same choices with smoking. It's now been realised that the long term damage from smoking is not worth the initial revenue and advertising has a powerful affect on peoples' choices. People are therefore discouraged from smoking by banning tobacco advertising. Why not junk food advertising then? Tony Blair just seemed to lose interest in his campaign for healthy eating with Jamie Oliver (who's still going it seems because he's made a lot of money from the idea).

Thanks for the answers everyone.

[ummmm]

It's about moderation. There's nothing wrong with having the odd MacDonalds here and there. With a healthy diet and exercise a maccy D's is hardly going to do any harm.

[annie0000]

As has been said - nothing wrong with the odd treat of junk food together with an otherwise balanced diet. I can tell when my kids come home from school (they walk, but it is only about 300 yards) whether they have had indoor or outdoor playtimes or if they haven't had gym.

They are then full of pent up energy and end up fighting etc. Indoor playtimes can't be prevented sometimes when the weather is really bad, but I get really annoyed when they cancel gym for something else - I have taken the school to task about this on several occasions.

Whilst my two do have computer games, they are limited in how much they are allowed to play on them and are shunted outside if weather permits to "earn" screen time. If they have to be indoors, they have to do something active on the wii for a while before they are allowed to choose a less active game. I think the lifestyle we have now is vastly different now, most parents work and it becomes more difficult to always produce a home cooked meal - but not impossible and there are many healthier alternatives. We do home made pizzas as well - I make the bases with homemeal flour and they don't even notice. Some of it is lazy parenting.

[horseshoes]

I seem to remember that when schools introduced their "healthy food" lunches there were the usual idiot parents shoving chips and burgers through the school railings to their children. That highlights another problem of parents not respecting the headmaster/mistress's rules.

[pastafreak]

Horseshoes-that was when Jamie Oliver was promoting his healthy eating campaign in schools here. He has recently done it in the States-and not had an easy time of it. He was up against children who cannot identify a potato,and who will choose 'chicken' nuggets made from extruded by products rather than real fresh chicken.
As a child-my daughter-now almost 25-has fast food as a treat....but she also saw me cook evey night-even when I was working 8-10 hour days. She developed a love for good food-tho she WILL have a doner if she has drunk enough... ;-0
I grew up in a quiet area about 30 milkes from NYC-grade school was very close-yet we werenall bussed to the upper schools-about 3 miles away. Even then-45 years ago-parents had the need to regulate how we got from A to B....while my equals here in the UK were walking. But by the time my daughter was in primary school here in the UK...parents were driving their kids 500 metres....we'd get asked if we wanted a lift all that distance!That was the beginning of the change in this country...so the whole lack of exercise/fast food problem is not new here...it has been slowly becoming the norm. The schools have contributed by reducing both PE time,and cookery/healthy eating as required subjects.Kids love to eat,and they also love exercise....but we are missing out on giving them knowledge when they are most likely to take it on board.