Controlling Food Consumption: Why Now?

A McDonald's billboard

       The American culture is constantly changing. The typical ways of life the elderly lived are different in many aspects to the way life is now. Nowadays a typical Saturday morning for an American child generally may consist of watching cartoons. During those cartoons, commercials are played throughout the duration of the program. Food is the most commonly advertised product during children’s television shows. Therefore the rest is economics; the child then considers these foods wants and will nag at parents until they get what they want. It is important to recognize that advertisements of food are seen everywhere though, not just on the television. Dr. T. Boyce of the Cardiff School of Journalism states in his article, “The Media and Obesity,” that “Removing advertising from television might onlydisplace it to other areas such as radio, magazines, supermarkets, billboards,direct-to consumer and the Internet – all of which are more difficult toregulate than television.” To further go off of that statement, all of those realms of media, along with television, is too difficult for the government to regulate Therefore, instead of trying to regulate the advertisement of food products, it is essential for the government to go directly to the source and regulate food supply.

There are weight standards in order to be in the U.S. armed forces

In considering this issue, it affects not only the individual’s life, but other lives as well. 75% of young adults do not meet the requirements to joined our country’s armed forces, one of the biggest reasons being that some young adults ages 17 to 24 are too overweight. This being the case is detrimental to our country as a whole, and its future.

Another main reason why we need the government to start regulating food consumption is because we as citizens sometimes just can’t help ourselves and get carried away. Think of the last time you went out to get food to satisfy your craving, and then you felt like you wanted more so you just kept eating? It probably wasn’t too long ago since we all have these cravings. However, these cravings can lead to health problems, if indulged in too often, causing for one to have to go to the doctor for treatments and prescriptions more often. In fact, obesity accounts for about 147 billion dollars annually in just the United states alone.

These are problems not only affecting the individual, but the American population as a whole. In order for our country to continue being a strong force that it is known to be, this problem needs to be dealt with by the government, so it does not get even further out of control.