Food Politics

Firstly, thank you for writing “What To Eat”. I am in the midst of reading it and am finding it both enlightening and frightening. I so appreciate the thoroughness of your research and am somewhat comforted by the fact that someone such as yourself, who would be more knowledgeable about food facts and issues, often finds the marketplace confusing and contradictory. I certainly do! Your book does help me feel less helpless, and I am slowly coming around to the idea that a “USDA Organic” label might actually mean something good. I had operated under the impression that it might not mean much in the way of integrity or quality.

I wanted to comment on your very wise advice to “eat less, move more”. I have been following the yearlong experiment of one of your fellow New Yorkers, Colin Beavan, or No Impact Man (noimpactman.com). His blog explains what he and his family are attempting to do in the heart of NYC, but I wanted to mention that he has lost around 15-20 lbs. just by abstaining use of the elevator. This is truly a serious personal commitment in a city of skyscrapers.

Again, thank you for this excellent book!

Thanks, Marion, for a wonderful book! I’ve enjoyed it immensely. I’ve taught introductory nutrition to prenursing students for many years, and will add this book to our “must read” list.
The Eat Less, Move More mantra is a great one. My own children are now in their late teens and as I reflect back on my parenting decisions with regards to their food and diet, the ol’ “turn off the TV and go outside and play” seems to be one of my best nags. There was a time when they were in their preschool years that I got very tired of fighting with the TV for their attention. The battle of “mom, can’t we finish this TV show before dinner/bath/bed” was endless. Add to that the “can’t we eat in front of the TV” or “can we buy that cereal, pleeeaasse, mom” . My solution was simple but dramatic. We cut our subscription to TV. One Christmas, I said, “We’re going to put the tree here, and move the TV there”, and the TV never went back. Mind you, we watch videos/DVD’s, but that gave me control over what and when they were watching. They were cranky for a bit, but slowly the change I was after took shape. They developed hobbies, played outside more, got more active, and our battles lessened. And most significantly, they also were no longer influenced by TV advertising. So, no, our family doesn’t know the Seinfeld or Friends characters, and so what? Are we deprived? Not one bit. Every now and then when I travel and stay in a hotel, and turn on a TV to see if I’m missing anything, I’m absolutely amazed at the advertising that is now overrunning the TV shows. How can people watch this? When my newspaper arrives in the morning, I’m amazed at the print advertising? Do we really need all this stuff? Nope. Eliminating all the advertising out of my life has saved me lots of money and headache over the years. It seems advertising industry wants us to feel deprived if we don’t have their product, and I refuse to buy into that tactic.
The other parenting thing I’ve done well is to teach my kids how to read labels and make their own food choices, with my guidance. For instance, I’ll let them pick their own cereal, as long as it has less than 5 gm of sugar per serving. Teaching them advertising tricks has made them savvy eaters. I’ve kept it very simple, with informaiton about fat, saturated fat, sugar, and ingredient list know-how. At 17 and 19, they are lean, fit, healthy kids, with lots of interests, and are rarely inside, unless our Oregon rain is too much to handle.
One of the most helpful and influential books to help me help my kids develop good food relationships is Ellyn Satter’s How to Get Your Kid to Eat, But Not Too Much. I like the way she discusses food relationships and responsibilities. The developmental approach to good food habits is especially helpful. I give this book to anyone pregnant as a shower/birth gift.
Keep up the good work.

Thank you for writing your wonderful book “What to Eat”. I must disagree with your comment in this blog to “ask your Docotr” about anything diet related. They are poorly informed, unless you are lucky, and really offer no help. They will refer you to a RD and maybe you luck out there.
Unfortunately, we have a culture of “diets” and not a food culture, which I sense is changing. Buy many are swayed by the diet of the day.

I have been a Personal trainer for 28 years, I have noticed over the years how body shapes have changed over the past 20 years, people are getting fatter and at a younger age. I always make my new clients do a food diary/ daily activity diary for me so I have an idea of what is going on in thier life. Usally the problem is lack of activity so to many calories going in and to little going out. So I design a program that they can do all day long, it’s all about movement and expending calories. As a culture now things are to easy for us we drive to the grocery store we push buttons, our lives are to easy. Where as our ancestors had to work every second of the day to get anything and everything just to eat and used stored bodyfat as something to live off of in hard times , no cars, no push buttons, no fast food, no TV… that is the problem. Diet pills, diet books, and all the other worthless exercise devices are not going to work if people don’t have to do them.
Comment by Jolie Steen Exercise Physiologist Certified personal Trainer Nov 2007