The War On Lunch

One of the most depressing shows on television is TLC's Honey We're Killing the Kids. The premise is simple enough. Each week an overweight, unhealthy family is asked to change their habits for the benefit of the children. Fresh fruit replaces Frito Lay, and salsa dancing takes the place of cigarettes for the Mom and Dad, whose dumpling-like appearance forebodes the destiny of the kids.

And there's the crux of it: The gimmick of the show involves a sequence that uses computer augmentation to morph the kid's current appearance from doe-eyed youngsters into balding, sunken middle-aged tubs of goo. The idea is to shock the parents into cleaning up the family act.

The depressing part is that it so rarely works. After a few days of salads and steamed fish the kids inevitably revolt. Chocolate bars and cheese puffs are hidden around the house - and any attempt to get them back on the wagon is met with the braying, angry tantrums that is the inevitable side-product of spineless, permissive parenting. So Mom feels stressed, and she's back behind the house with her Benson and Hedges. Week after week, after an early an abortive attempt at health, nature very soundly beats nurture's ass.

Now news out of the UK that some parents are in open revolt against the forces of health. At a school that has been the subject of Jamie Oliver's attempts to upscale the cafeteria menu, Moms are lining up outside of the fence with the high-fat, high-sugar lunches their children really want:

Mrs Critchlow said: "The reason we have done this is because our kids are being served up disgusting, overpriced rubbish by the school and are not allowed out at lunchtimes to buy something they can enjoy. Food is cheaper and better at the local takeaways. We don't make a penny on it. We just want to make sure the kids are properly fed. They don't enjoy the school food and the end result is that they are starving."

Schools have been told to serve healthier menus including at least two servings of fruit and vegetables per day, and no more than two portions of deep-fried food each week.

On one level, this is refreshing. God bless the stubborn British tendency to resist any busybody outsiders. There is probably some class angle that can't quite reckon to Americans, but it's really no different from the TLC families eventually sweeping the steamed veggies into the trash in favor of Wendy's. There's also the matter of simple pride - don't tell a child's mother that you know better when it comes to her children.

It's a tricky line when it comes to government rules. Obviously serving children fast food each day is incredibly short-sighted and willfully ignorant of the basic science of nutrition. From a public health perspective these kids are headed for a lifetime of medical expense - with cardiovascular disease, diabetes, etc. - a large portion of which will be shared with the rest of us via taxation or private health care expenses. But how far are we willing to get in people's business, and tell them we know better?