November 9th
Sternheimer Ch. 8 Media Health Hazards
This chapter was more upsetting rather than surprising. Learning about obesity and eating disorders is never a cheery subject, however it is a very important one. This chapter started out talking about the “inactivity and overeating with ads of junk food creating a child obesity machine.” The media creates many things along with this obesity machine such as impossible standards of beauty, low self-esteem, social rejections, overall body dissatisfaction, damaging habits and so on. The chapter explains that the link between obesity and the media/TV is weaker than we are told. (Shocking something is dramatized to the public yet again) Adults are more likely to be overweight then kids and minority children are more likely to be overweight than white children. Pointing fingers and blaming the media however will not solve these health and social issues it just causes further tension and frustration. As I have always said the media isn’t going anywhere education from others is really the only option. You can’t hide everything away from the youth. When the article talked about eating disorders and how rare yet serious they are I thought it was interesting that several countries had created a minimum BMI for models that they had to follow. The U.S cannot officially created a minimum BMI but individual companies can decide what models they want based off a relative BMI. I also thought it was interesting that TV doesn’t really affect eating disorders as it does for the obesity epidemic. I think it is important to take note that they issues aren’t just for women and children. Men and adults everywhere deal with these issues and many people are unaware of the fact. They think eating disorders is a “women thing”.
PDF article The Relationship between TV viewing and unhealthy eating implications
This article at the start bothered me a bit because right away is started with the blame game, which I cannot stand because that won’t accomplish much for this issue. But then the article went into various statistics and solutions that were different than the reading in the book. The fact that “98% of advertised foods are of low nutrients” bothers me incredibly but at the same time it is also not that surprising. The three solution that this article had were 1-messages to show children how important heathy foods are, 2- parent child communication and media education, and 3- reductions in overall exposure. These are rather good solutions that need to be easily broken apart so that adults can not only gain this knowledge but pass it on to the youth. If the parents struggle themselves then there needs to be options for children to learn about healthy eating on their own. No part of this issue is easy to overcome but it can be overcome one step at a time with balance, interaction, and doing more than just figuring out who should take all the blame.
