Friday, August 24, 2012

childhood obesity through the eyes of a child

I have to write a 12 page research paper for one of my classes this semester, and I'm considering childhood obesity as the topic of choice.  Jeremy suggested taking a different angle on the subject rather than writing a basic causes and treatments type paper. I considered writing a paper about childhood obesity from the perspective of children. I was trying to explain this to Bella, and thought I'd ask her thoughts on the subject. You know how people say a child can be brutally honest? Yeah, that's pretty much what I got from Bella on the subject. Here is how the conversation went:

ME: What do you think when you see fat kids?

Bella: It's sad.

Me: Why is it sad? There is no right or wrong answer here, I just want to know your thoughts.

Bella: Because they can't fit through doors, and then you'll have to butter them up, and then they won't have any butter left for toast, and that would be sad.......... and it's sad that they are not healthy and they'll probably get a disease like number 2 diabetes.


(we've had a discussion about type 1 vs. type 2 diabetes, because there is a girl at gymnastics with type 1 diabetes)

Wow. (I did warn you it'd be brutally honest!) Now, I KNOW Bella would not say this to a child, but the fact that she thought it makes me wonder what other "normal weight" children think about obese kids.

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