Less is More?

The other morning, someone on the radio was talking about Michelle Obama's initiative to reduce or eliminate the amount of junk-food advertising in schools. This radio personality seemed cautiously supportive of the measures she wants to propose, but then brought up the point that he "favors less government in most cases" and then waffled a little bit in his support.

I have been thinking a lot about this issue since I heard about it, and I can't even stretch my imagination far enough to begin to understand why anyone would oppose this measure, or even just have any shred of doubt about it in any way, shape, or form. While I generally try to avoid starting sentences with "as a parent", I'm going to do a little of that now.

As a parent, I want my kid to be healthy. It is my number one priority. I want her little mind and body and spirit to be as healthy as possible. Big corporations who produce junk food do not care at all if she is healthy. They care about making money. If my kid gets fat and sick spending money on and then eating their processed crap, they have done their job. And while this may not be the ultimate goal spelled out in their mission statements, making as much money as possible is the bottom line for any company in a capitalist society. That's why I read every ingredient on every single morsel of food that goes into my kid's mouth--the assumption that anyone but me is looking out for her health is just plain wrong. Assuming that a company is going to only put safe ingredients into foods aimed at kids is laughable. What I can assume is that these companies want to produce cheap, sweet foods with a mouth-feel that my kid will become addicted to and want to buy over and over and over again.

As a parent, I want school to be a place of safety and learning, not somewhere that provides advertising about junk food. I mean, what? Do I even have to say that? I went to school from about 1988-2001 and I can honestly say that, other than the soda machines and the posters for concessions at basketball games, I don't recall any signage about food or drinks. Is this something that has become so pervasive in such a relatively short amount of time that it requires legislation? Apparently so.

As with anything that the government tries to do, there is backlash coming from one side of our polarized country. I read about "less government" and "less interference", but no one seems to be acknowledging that, if left unchecked, corporations will bleed into more and more facets of our lives and the environments that used to be safe havens, such as schools. So, where is the public backlash against the corporations that try to get our kids to eat their junk? Where is the widespread worry that we are leaving too much power to large companies that see our kids as faceless consumers? Where, as a society, do we draw the line between these corporate giants and our soft, sponge-brained children?

I have also heard the reasoning behind advertising in schools. Apparently, many schools depend on the money they get from allowing advertising to meet their yearly budgets. Without the money they receive from corporate sponsors, they would have to increase class sizes, reduce extracurricular programming, decrease teacher pay, or would be otherwise unable to meet the needs of the students. Because of the way our schools are funded (based on the property taxes of the surrounding neighborhoods), advertising dollars are even more important to kids who attend schools in low-income neighborhoods.

Sigh. I just...I just can't. I could go on and on about why it's scary and frustrating to be a parent now, and how even a generation ago parents didn't have to think about many of the same things, but I won't. I'll just end here.

So, thank you, Michelle Obama. When my child starts school in a few years and can walk her hallways without being bombarded by signs for Coke or Dorito tacos or Pizza Hut's new cheese-filled double pizza or whatever other junk they've thought up in the time between now and then, I'll be thinking of you.