Government rules are making our kids fat

Should parents lose custody of obese kids?

Of course! These children should be sent to farms where they can eat vegetables that they grow themselves and work all day. Wait, that was Mao's China. Is that what we want?

“The state” is already responsible for obesity. Strict regulation of farming, small and large, has come to mean genetically altered food. Milk and meat are full of growth hormones - all “safe” by government standards. Vegetables are full of pesticides and herbicides. Again, at “safe” levels. Processed foods are full of high-fructose corn syrup. Cheese, margarine, “low fat” foods - all damaged fat that can't be digested. Homogenized milk, also difficult to digest. Refined sugar, refined flour, refined salt - all pretend foods, but that's what we eat.

Besides all this, children are required by “the state” to sit in school most of the time. Physical education, if it is available, is offered maybe one hour per week. Breakfast and lunch are offered at most schools, but the “food” is more of the same pretend stuff: bad fat, salt, sugar, refined stuff.

Children are fat, lazy and uneducated because “the state” has been in charge too long. Let the parents be in charge for a while. Let the small farmers grow real food and sell it in a free market. Let the kids go out to play.

Turn off the television, video games, computers. Let the Harvard doctor stick to his research, but leave the social engineering alone.

Julia A. Bickel

Cedar Rapids