Concrete Angel

I just read this story on cnn.com. It really disturbed me on several levels.

The detail about the boy's tiny black, lime, and grey Skechers upset me because that's a perfect description of my own son's sneakers.

But that's not the thing that upset me the most. What bothered me was wondering where this so-called community that has poured out its heart and emptied its collective pocketbook in an effort to bury the child and buy new lighting for their park was while he was being murdered and probably abused beforehand.

Maybe if they had offered that same sense of reaching out and providing support to his family before he was murdered, he would still be alive.

How many kids today would have avoided being murdered if a neighbor, cousin, friend, teacher, or colleague or government agency gave an over-stressed parent an outlet for venting his or her anger or offered a parenting class, or took the baby for an afternoon so the mother could sleep?

I am not excusing or dismissing the fact that anyone who murders a child is acting in a monstrous manner.

I just fail to see the purpose in expressing outrage and collecting donations after a baby boy has been senselessly murdered. It seems that energy and those resources would have been put to better use trying to figure out some way to ensure that something like that never happens.

Fat-Bottomed Girls

"Parents want to feed their children healthy meals, but America's chain restaurants are setting parents up to fail," CSPI nutrition policy director Margo G. Wootan said in a statement. "McDonald's, Burger King, KFC, and other chains are conditioning kids to expect burgers, fried chicken, pizza, french fries, macaroni and cheese, and soda in various combination at almost every lunch and dinner."

I'm sorry? I must have misunderstood you, Ms. Wootan. Are you implying that as a parent, I have no control over or responsibility for what my child eats?

For God's sake, people. This is exactly what is wrong with this country. Trust me. I hate on corporate America as much as the next card-carrying liberal. But blaming fast food companies because of the crap our kids eat and their entitled little whining attitudes about what they want to eat goes entirely too far for this mom. And I say all of this as the parent of a child who begs to eat at Mickey D's every chance he gets, who is picky, and whose picky eating habits are a constant worry on me.

I pester, prod, and push my child to eat healthier. And I do indulge him in a trip to McDonald's or Burger King, knowing it's more about the toy than anything else, every once in a while. What I don't do is blame any one else for the way he eats or doesn't eat. I don't blame Kraft or Kellogg's or General Mills or RJR/Nabisco or ConAgra or any of the makers of convenience foods and snacks. If my child doesn't eat well it's because I as his mother and provider of nourishment have in some way failed to bring good foods to him or convince him to eat those good foods.

It's bullshit to say that "...America's chain restaurants have set parents up to fail." God that attitude sickens me.

Anyone who sat through a fourth grade health class or has watched a fucking PSA knows how to feed a child or how to eat healthfully themselves. To blame fast food outlets because people eat there is nuts. There's plenty you can blame them for in terms of the quality of food they provide, but they do what they do and we all know what they do when we choose to walk through their doors or drive up to their drive-thru windows.

No one is to blame for an obese America except Americans themselves who choose to eat poorly, sit on their fat, lazy asses and then blame someone else.