If you're a parent who had fond memories of those uber- catchy commercial jingles that ran with your favorite cereal during your absolute fave TV show, those were the good old days. And I mean they were good.
In today's dizzying world of 24/7 connection for kids 5 and older, fast food, and fast tech got married. Then they used algorithms to figure out our child's food preferences, tracking them online, literally feeding’ them ads that they customized just for your child. The results speak for themselves. Forget the soaring numbers of simply overweight kids, the obesity rates have more than quadrupled.
We'll break down what "overweight" and "obese" are in my next blog post and promise to give you tips and tools to stop the effects on weight and health that lasts a lifetime.
As far back as I can remember, big food manufacturers were subliminally {and often not subtlety} glorifying unhealthy, fast food. Catchy 30 second television ads interspersed throughout the sitcoms we were watching had us salivating for sugary cereals, to frozen pizza. Add to that the plethora of sports and recovery drinks that will make you run faster, jump higher and score the winning run, touchdown or goal.
Fast forward to 2021 and shockingly, screen time usage by kids has exponentially increased in the last five years, and certainly through the pandemic. One example, an app called Roblox, whose audience is primarily between 9-12 [which had my kids addicted) increased users by over 82%. Roblox, free to download, is marketed as a seemingly ‘innocent’, app that touts creativity through building and designing, actually quite insidiously preys on our youngest children, collecting information on them, including demographics, location, credit card information, etc. I have spent countless hours arguing on the phone with Apple demanding and receiving tens of thousands of dollars in refunds for fraudulent charges.
When I challenged Apple insisting they had a responsibility to protect and safeguard our children from this (and other) dangerous apps, their response was ‘This isn’t our problem. If you have a problem with the apps your children are using, then discuss it with the app creators!! Really!!
Apple collects billions of dollars taking 30% from every app sale, yet they see no complicity in aiding and promoting the problem!! It is quite sad to see they addictive quality these apps have. Despite our best efforts as parents - encouraging, promoting and even rewarding our children to live healthy, balanced lives - movement, reading, writing and organized sports, it seems they we are fighting a never ending losing battle - We (parents) are David fighting Goliath (tech giants & fast food companies)
Now those of you that know me, know me as a fitness expert that promotes health, wellness and balance. What is about Starbucks, Chipotle, and Chick-fil-A that have our kids spellbound?
The reality is that in this crazy, fast paced world, where we are working multiple jobs, and often don’t have the time to prepare balanced healthy meals. But, there needs to be some regulatory supervision to the quality of the foods, including nutritional breakdown - calories saturated fats, and grams of sugar that these companies are subliminally and quite overtly ‘ramming down’ our kids throats.
Fast tech is hypnotically luring our kids to screens in exponential numbers and while keeping them there, algorithmically collecting personal data - what they like to eat, wear, the truly dangerous aspect of collecting their location data, and there's so much more.
THIS HAS GOT TO STOP! Fast Food, Fast Tech.. they need to be held accountable! We need to show policy makers that we want change. It's time for the U.S to create policies to protect our the health and well-being of our children.
(Research provided by the AAP, Democraticmedia.org and the CDC)
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