Jamie Oliver was so correct when he attacked the diets of school children, he should have attacked the lazy habits of parents who stuff their offspring with fast ,easy slap dash food instead of making sure that at home, food was nutritious and tasty.
There is nothing more satisfying ,comforting than a chip sandwich also there is very little goodness for building bone, muscle and brain power in the same sandwich.
I grew up in an age where there was virtually no take away food and no money to buy it had it been available. We had stews, soups, roast mutton and vegetables were a cheap filler.We were not fat nor were we shut up in rooms with electronic gizmos. So we played outside, walked miles and were pretty healthy. I wish today's generation could have the fun we did and the good tucker to go with it.

What a sanctimonious load of claptrap this thread has turned into. For example. "lazy habits of parent", " we can test for fat addiction, and we can test for stupid". "greedy kids in tow", topped off nicely with "We could test foetuses and abort any baby that carried 'fat genes"". What next, prison camps for fat people, or the final solution for the overweight?

How about we test for the gene that enables dopey comments on blog threads?

Less TV, less sitting in front of the computer typing is what we need. I'm off for a walk.

My feeling is that the sanctimonious one here might just be the same person who fails to recognize tongue-in-cheek when he sees it.

We are perfectly entitled to be concerned about the growing numbers of people who for whatever reason choose to overeat and live on processed and junk food. The future epidemic of chronic disease and mental health problems that will result from this is going to completely swamp the capacity of our health system. We will all end up paying for this greed and ignorance one way or the other.

I agree, education is the key. But we also need a government who is not afraid to start regulating the multinational conglomerates and supermarket monopolies responsible for foisting all this junk onto consumers. I agree, ban all junk food advertising. Eliminate junk food from school tuckshop menus and get school kids involved in growing their own food.

It's a pity also that we're stuck with John Howard's undiscriminating GST. A differential tax system could have been used to encourage better purchasing choices, with natural and unprocessed food given tax free status and all junk food (including alcohol and cigarettes) highly taxed. The revenue collected could have been channelled into offsetting the inevitable collapse of our health system.

"My feeling is that the sanctimonious one here might just be the same person who fails to recognize tongue-in-cheek when he sees it." Granted Bronwyn, this is a possiblity.

However, having examined threads on OLO for some time, the instances of humor are somewhat rarer than instances of stupidity. Perhaps those responsible for the pearls of wisdom I quoted might care to enlighten us on exactly what they meant?

Browyn I agree with your comment that the government should subsidise healthy food like grapes and bananas etc. They talked about putting a tax on fast food but they never mentioned making good food cheaper. In other words we dont mind punishing the fat ones by making them pay more as long as WE dont have to fork over any of our profits or taxes to make foods that are basic healthy staples cheaper.

I'm all for exercise at school but I'm not for overzealous teachers pushing children to run when they are not fit enough. As in building up your fitness slowly and not dangerously quickly. Also a child may have gone to shcool that day just on the verge of going down with the flu and not feeling well. Children should be encouraged to go for a brisk walk and run if they wish but only if they wish to.

God protect us from the food police, and the exercise police, people who want to peer into other peoples shopping trolleys and be judgemental. People who think they are qualified exercise experts forcing people to run before they are capable of brisk walking.

Judge not or you will be judged on your own imperfections.

Hopefully, one of these days, people politicians and social engineers will rediscover the fact that people, not governments, must take responsibility for their own lives