I found David Wallinga’s article “'Lets Move' our Thinking on Childhood Obesity” from "The Huffington Post" to be rather misguided. The piece focuses on the one-year anniversary of the inception of Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign to help fight the cliché titled “Childhood Obeisity Epidemic” currently affecting America. While he means well, Wallinga gives little if any statistical evidence of what the campaign has accomplished. He claims

“Let's Move!" has galvanized moms, doctors, school officials, Wal-Mart and soda companies to start acting as part of a community-wide effort to make our kids' environments healthier.”

Not once does Wallinga mention any data on how American’s childhood obesity rates have fluctuated this past year, but insists that the program is working. He slips a highly political (and rather unnecessary) anti-Sarah Palin message into a health article that is supposed to address how we think about our children’s environment, and then name drops his own program that he’s “been working on.”

If you want to write an article that people will care about, call them out on their faults (gently of course). Instead of blaming the environment that America’s children are growing up in, blame the people who shape our children; parents. Now I know that the people without children are always the one’s giving parenting advice to others, and I don’t claim to be an expert, but I feel these are the real problems. We live in a society that promotes instant gratification. I see it everyday in my own generation as well as in my own life. The Internet gives us whatever we want whenever we want it (unless Comcast sucks that day). We’re constantly looking for things quick. “My phone took like 5 years to load my Facebook page today!” No it didn’t, it took 3 seconds. Give it just a little bit of time, it has to go to space and back.

Advertising sells us pills that make “fat melt off your body” in just two weeks. Weight management takes time. Time that many parents don’t take (to be fair, we also live in a society that gives parents little time to take it). If you’re home alone all day while your parents are working, are you going to eat asparagus or Cheetos? Cheetos, hands down, because they’re delicious and they don’t make your pee smell. What’s easier to make, PF Chang’s Frozen Shanghai Beef (480 calories per serving) or grilled chicken breast, whole grain rolls, and leafy greens (500 calories, half the fat, a quarter the sugar, and 3 times the protein)? If parents don’t instill good eating habits into their children early, children aren’t going to develop them. If they are taught that McDonalds or KFC counts as dinner instead of a home cooked properly portioned meal, they’ll carry those habits into their teen and adults years.

While we need to address the issues of the environment in which our children reside, we can’t take the blame off ourselves. That environment didn’t just happen, we created it. And while saying that we need to change it is all fine and dandy, unless parent’s take it upon themselves to teach children what’s good to eat and what’s not (and what tastes good too), to make that food readily available, and to facilitate physical activity, we’re not going to see any results.