From Mayor Bloomberg’s large-sized soda ban andΒ a myriad of other culinary commandments, to burgeoning student protestsΒ about their school lunch fare, there appears to be a food fightΒ brewing that couldΒ rival John Belushi in National Lampoon’s Animal House.
The ever-changing controversy about what is and is not healthy for us to consume is not unusual.Β What is disturbing here, is that some people whom I refer to as FYOGs (For Your Own Gooders, pronounced Fahye-Ogs) have appointed themselves lord and master over the rest of us and over our appetites.
Who gave them this jurisdiction some of us would like to know?Β Was it written in the Constitution?Β “Thou shalt have the right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness and control over what other people eat ?”Β Or was it when the hysteria over the “obesity epidemic” caused some to take leave of their senses and tolerate intrusion into their lives andΒ stomachs, the likes of which we’ve never seen?
Either way, kids seem to understand the fundamental boundary that has been crossed whenΒ FYOGsΒ mess with their munchees.Β In Wisconsin, students staged a strikeΒ out ofΒ hunger and frustration, as seen in JS Online.Β Wallace County High School in Sharon Springs, Kansas, created a YouTube video, βWe Are Hungry,βΒ pointing out the absurdity of grossly applied calorie guidelines.Β In New Bedford, Massachusetts there’s aΒ new appetite and aΒ black marketΒ for chocolate syrup.
This troubling trend puts some very serious issues on the menu. If anyone, whetherΒ fat or thin, young or old, is willing toΒ tolerate dictums fromΒ self-appointed food dictators, will they everΒ learn to be in command of their own appetites?Β And even if they don’t make the choices weΒ might make, are we willing to cross the line that may well lead toΒ a nationwide FATLASH?
I am all for the 850 limit on school lunches. Children can and should eat what they need over that at home, the school should provide a healthy reasonable lunch and no one is seriously hungry at 850 calories. It is actually a lot of food, let me give you an example.
This is an 845 calorie meal.
1 cup of pasta with pesto sauce
1 roast chicken thigh
1.5 cups of cooked broccoli
1 apple
1 cup of milk
It is loaded with nutrition and I doubt a student would be ‘hungry’ after eating it. It contains protein and olive oil both of which satiate, an apple with pectin that also satisfies hunger…
I am unable to post the nutrition chart here but it caps out Vitamin C among other nutrients.
Hungry…no.
The point isn’t how many calories are acceptable for others to eat–and by the way; Does anyone think this is ever the same for everyone? Has anyone ever agreed on it? Is this acceptable for a high school linebacker who burns 3000 calories before lunch?
The point is this: Who gets to decide? You? A mayor? A city councilman? (A 320 pound city councilman from Queens proposed to ban McDonald’s from offering a toy with a “happy meal” if it didn’t comport with his idea of the right number of calories and grams of fat.)
Call me crazy, but I believe that whether good or bad, each person ought to decide.