I happened upon this article in the blogs section of the NY times:

Into the Mouths of Babes: Childhood Obesity

The article is about that 200 pound 8 year old boy in Britain whose mother may be charged with child abuse.

The comments section of the article is more interesting than the article. It basically explodes into a shit storm of arguments with one side accusing the “feminists” of corrupting the wage structure and mandating the entrance of women into the work place. (I touched on this topic in an earlier post) The end result being a whole generation of mothers who are too exhausted to prepare healthy meals for their children.

For starters, I think that argument is bullshit and implies that the typical role of the father in the modern family is that of an absentee parent. It takes two parents to turn a child into a disgusting tub of lard that will eventually mature into a diabetic mess of an adult. All that the “feminist” movement has done is fundamentally alter the division of responsibilities in the home. When it was more typical for women to stay home it would fall to them to plan and prepare meals. These days there are far fewer women staying home full time but for some reason we assume that it’s automatically their job to be a full time nutritionalist for the kids.

The solution to this problem is simple communication and solidarity between both parents  (in other words, it won’t work if Dad is sneaking the kids to FatBurger three nights a week.) No parent should be afraid to tell their family “we’re getting too fat and this is a problem.” The resulting complaints, tantrums, and tears will be a short term nuisance but on the bright side they’re probably good exercise.

Oh, and on the subject of the fat British kid’s mom. I think she should be charged with child abuse. I think the father should be charged too, if he’s around. It should be both parents or neither.