You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy.™
Maggie goes on a diet.
It’s a children’s picture book featuring a girl who is overweight and unhappy.
The book describes Maggie dreaming of a thinner self. It shows children teasing her, calling her fatty and chubby.
The book has pictures of a chunky Maggie opening up the refrigerator and eating to make herself feel better.
The book then transitions to a healthier Maggie who eats right, loses weight and becomes a soccer star. She has friends and becomes a more socially adjusted young person.
The message would seem to be: Fat = unhappy. Thin = happy.
Now the author and the book are under fire for sending what some experts say is a bad message to young girls.
Some have said the author presents a terrible message and the book should be boycotted.
Some have said it takes so little to trigger eating disorders in kids that the book could initiate a title wave of fat kids with eating psychosis.
Logan Levkoff PhD said; “To suggest popularity comes with being thin is the wrong message.”
Blah blah blah.
Honestly, the guy wrote a book and his message was eat healthy and exercise.
Was his message unconventional? Maybe. Was it accurate? You bet.
Children of this millennium watch 24 hour drek on TV while inhaling sodas and scarffing down pop tarts.
Kids are sedentary and lazy. If they can’t punch it up on their smart phones, they aren’t interested.
GMA reports that eating disorders are up 119 percent in the last decade. Well that’s not because a guy wrote a book. It’s because kids are fat and lazy and eat too much and parents allow it.
I’m not saying it’s ok to insult children. I’m not saying I condone pulling up a fat kid’s shirt and patting their gelatin like bellies. What I am saying is maybe the message the author is selling is a viable one, one that has to be heard.
I mean what’s so wrong with eat right, exercise, life is good.
It’s about setting goals and working to fulfill those goals.
The problem with this generation is we shelter our kids. We are afraid to give it to them straight.
Oh no, we might hurt Little Johnny’s feelings. We talk to our kids like they are fine china that might break by simply touching it.
Enough. Get Tough! Life rewards those who take it on.
The author of Maggie goes on a diet, Paul Kramer, says he wrote the book to let kids know they are not alone in their struggles.
Good for you Paul Kramer. We should support children, let them know we love them. But I’m sick of sugar coating everything for kids.
I know it’s a cliche, “When I was a kid….”
But when I WAS a kid, I walked to the bus stop and waited in the elements to go to school. When it rained, we got wet. When it was hot, we sweated. When it snowed, we threw ice balls at each other.
When I was a kid, we played tackle football on the street. We used street lights as end zones. We got cut, we bled, we kept playing.
When I was a kid, our mother’s made us go out in the dead of winter to play. Then momma hollered for us to come home for dinner, but we didn’t because we were still playing.
Now kids ride to school in their mom’s leather clad SUVs with the drop down dvr screens. Now kids play sports on manicured fields of dreams that cost parents exorbitant entry fees funded by booster clubs and fat cat donations. Now a days, kids exercise their thumbs on Play Station and say they are working out on the Wi.
It’s a joke.
If America is going to rise from mediocrity and kick the world’s ass, it starts with the kids.
If we baby them constantly and hold their hands and tell them everything is sunshine and rainbows, they are going to be ill equipped to handle reality when some 7 year old Japanese kid who aced AP Calculus kicks them squarely in the family jewels.
So before you start getting your panties in a wad, facebooking your friends to boycott a children’s book, stop and put that energy into talking to your child. Use that morning show angst to develop a healthy life style choice. Pull the donut out of your kid’s facial orifice and tell them to go outside and shoot some baskets.
The author is only documenting what everyone else is tip toeing around.
Our kids are fat and out of shape and if we don’t do something about it, we’re going to be the most sedentary generation ever.
So pull the biscuit out of your pie hole and start jogging jr. The life you save might be your own!
And that is crazy.™