Society and Children Obesity

There is widespread agreement that obesity is an epidemic, especially among young people.  That is the tragedy.  Obesity at a young age is a struggle that you never outgrow it.  Of course, along with obesity comes those most deadly adult afflictions--heart disease and diabetes not to mention low self esteem-- that you have to deal with everyday.It seems that we are dealing with obesity as action/reaction problem.  We insist on dealing with the symptoms not the cause.  AS a result all the diet bills, diet books and now even surgery for the young adult.I believe that we are as a society is setting up our children for failure.  To start; we need only watch television for an evening to see what'shappening.  Most of our children's role models are either anorexic teenage actresses or the heroic muscle men.  Our children are pressured to be like these so called perfect human beings, who are liberally used by advertisers to sell products to our kids.  In between the commercials where perfect human beings are hawking beauty products, children are bombarded with fast food commercials that do nothing more than encourage the sort of diet that dooms healthy eating.  We, as parents, fill our pantry with sugary snacks and sodas then preach will-power.  It's all too much to ask from a child.  I admit I have no will-power when it comes to ice cream.  My solution for that is I simply don't leave any in the house.What is even more dangerous is the sedentary life style that television encourages.  Instead of encouraging our children to participate in real life healthy sports activities, we buy electronic games that simulate sports which requires that no one get up off the couch.  Schools, finding themselves short on money, are cutting physical training activities, and even altering the kind of play that once encouraged children to simply run to use up their energy.We should't wait until obesity sets in, afflicting our children.  We, as parents, need to start cooking healthy, and encourage our children to be active as children should be.  That requires both will power and discipline from us parents.