'Food Nazi' or Responsible Foreperson?

Several weeks ago, I led a conversation at my son's school about healthy eating. Parents, teachers, and administrators participated. After I made a case for better nutrition, one father voiced concern about becoming a "Food Nazi." Should he deny his child the package of Oreos and bag of chips with lunch? -- a lunch that might also include yogurt cup, juice box, and jelly sandwich (peanut butter forbidden in the nut-free school). Regarding the cookies, I thought, when did dessert become an everyday (indeed, every meal) expectation? Regarding the remaining items, I thought, when did dessert become the main course, the side, the snack, and the beverage? The described lunch was a sugar feast. The sandwich bread (white as it turned out) would have been essentially refined starch -- i.e., long chains of sugar. The chips would have added more starch (i.e., more sugar), and the jelly, even more sugar. Obscene additional amounts of sugar would have come from the cookies, juice, and yogurt (together, these three items alone could provide 2 -- or even as much as 4 -- times more sugar than the World Health Organization would recommend even a moderately active 8-year-old consume in an entire day). This is to say nothing of the artificial colors, flavors, fillers, stabilizers, and other additives the processed products would contribute (nutritional concerns in their own right). The multi-course "dessert lunch" provided from home also would not account for any school-provid...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news