Conclusion to Health

This week we discussed the very broad and controversial topic of health specifically obesity and being thin.  The conversation included reasons for the increased weight in children, being healthy, and social media’s impact on how we look at ourselves.  We had mentioned that other than lack of exercise and the countless number of hours spent in front of the TV or computer, stress was also a major factor. Stress limits the amount of effort and labor we put into our work and thus we are more likely to pick up the fast food for comfort or for a quick easy meal.  School foods were also a consideration since many people come to school to get a second breakfast for free.  There are also problems making good, nutritious food accessible and affordable, especially for lower income families.   It was contemplated different ways to help reduce obesity, such as increasing the price of junk foods with taxes and decreasing the price of healthy foods like apples so they are more affordable than Doritos.

We also talked about being too skinny, such as models and “thinspiration” bloggers, who are influencing young adults like us.  Although many of us thought that a simply calculation of the BMI and consultation of a doctor was suitable to determine our health, we can to the realization that there can be a person who is healthy and overweight and a person who is unhealthy and skinny.

Hopefully this week’s discussion made it more clear and opened up your minds on problems with health, not just problems alone with being too skinny or too fat, but problems with controlling intake and controlling social influences.  Maybe someday we will be able to find a medium between healthy and skinny, where weight and appearance does not matter but rather how fit we are.  

introduction to inner city problems

      The inner-city has a lot of problems from poverty, various social issues, and high crime rates. The worldbank.org tells us that, "Urban poverty is a multidimensional phenomenon", they suffer from "limited access to employment opportunities and income, inadequate and insecure housing and services, violent and unhealthy environments, little or no social protection mechanisms, and limited access to adequate health and education opportunities" (Urban Poverty and Slum Upgrading). These problems are not new to us. As New Yorkers, we are close to the very rich and the very poor. We are able to know of two very differing roads of life. We understand that in Manhattan there can be someone who has never owned a home and one that doesn't know what a welfare check is. Thus we are open to understanding how a situation that one is placed in affects their opportunities.

       Focusing on educational opportunities, the New York times recently released an article titled, "Live near a Great School? It's costing you". The article argues that due to the second study done "identifying a relationship between where a child lives and his or her ability to attend a high-performing school." The study found and confirmed that the wider the gap of economic segregation, the wider the gap between the test scores. The performance of the children was based on where they lived and the quality of life in these areas. It's expensive to try to enroll your children in a high performing school because the annual price for a house in one of these areas is $16,000 above "low performing areas." (Mary Ann Giordano). If you can't afford to even feed your children, then how is one supposed to afford enrolling their children in high performing schools? Thus the cycle is perpetuated since inadequate schooling leads to mediocre if not low paying jobs, and that leads to lower class pay and more public housing so that the next generation is born into the same cycle.

      The cycle of inner-city poverty in schools is likened unto a 600 pound gorilla in the classroom in an article by University of Michigan. The presence of the poverty in schools adds to factors that make these inner-city schools worse. They already face decreased funding because of the No Child Left Behind act which gives them a disadvantage to start off with. http://sitemaker.umich.edu/mitchellyellin.356/poverty

      However, the problems have increased and expanded to the suburbs due to the recession. "A 53% Surge in Poverty Rate is Reshaping Suburbs", an article from the New York Times, tells us how there is a growth of people who are struggling with poverty in the well-off suburbs. The poor people population in these areas has increased significantly so that now, "more than half of the metropolitan poor live in suburban areas" (Elizabeth Kneebone). The people in these areas are faced with news challenges that they did not have to think about prior to this time, "Poverty is new in Parma Heights, a quiet suburb of cul-de-sacs and clipped lawns, and asking for help can be hard." One of the pastors of a food pantry said "he had to post an employee in the driveway the day the church’s food bank was open to coax people inside, they were so ashamed to ask for help." http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/25/us/suburban-poverty-surge-challenges-communities.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

        Overall, the entire situation is depressing and hopefully, through perusal, we will be able to come up with ways to rectify the situations and find ways to stop the cycle of poverty that plague many inner-city families.

Introduction to Urban Problems in America

      The inner-city has a lot of problems from poverty, various social issues, and high crime rates. The worldbank.org tells us that, "Urban poverty is a multidimensional phenomenon", they suffer from "limited access to employment opportunities and income, inadequate and insecure housing and services, violent and unhealthy environments, little or no social protection mechanisms, and limited access to adequate health and education opportunities" (Urban Poverty and Slum Upgrading). These problems are not new to us. As New Yorkers, we are close to the very rich and the very poor. We are able to know of two very differing roads of life. We understand that in Manhattan there can be someone who has never owned a home and one that doesn't know what a welfare check is. Thus we are open to understanding how a situation that one is placed in affects their opportunities. 
       Focusing on educational opportunities, the New York times recently released an article titled, "Live near a Great School? It's costing you". The article argues that due to the second study done  "identifying a relationship between where a child lives and his or her ability to attend a high-performing school." The study found and confirmed that the wider the gap of economic segregation, the wider the gap between the test scores. The performance of the children was based on where they lived and the quality of life in these areas. its expensive to try to enroll your children in a high performing school because the annual price for a house in one of these areas is $16,000 above "low performing areas." (Mary Ann Giordano). If you can't afford to even feed your children, then how is one supposed to afford enrolling their children in high performing schools? Thus the cycle is perpetuated since inadequate schooling leads to mediocre if not low paying jobs, and that leads to lower class pay and more public housing so that the next generation is born into the same cycle.
    The cycle of inner-city poverty in schools is likened unto a 600 pound gorilla in the classroom in an article by University of Michigan. The presence of the poverty in schools adds to factors that make these inner-city schools worse. They already face decreased funding because of the No Child Left Behind act which gives them a disadvantage to start off with.  http://sitemaker.umich.edu/mitchellyellin.356/poverty
             However, the problems have increased and expanded to the suburbs due to the recession. "A 53% Surge in Poverty Rate is Reshaping Suburbs", an article from the New York Times, tells us how there is a growth of people who are struggling with poverty in the well-off suburbs. The poor people population in these areas has increased significantly so that now more than half of the metropolitan http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/25/us/suburban-poverty-surge-challenges-communities.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

Taxing Obesity

In America, 38% of the population think that a fat tax is in order, with only 15% of those believing that there should be adjustments made for genetics and height (http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidmaris/2012/04/19/is-a-tax-on-obesity-in-americas-future/). You might call those who desire a fat tax depraved and corrupt - however, it's not only the thin who believe that a fat tax should be a reality. In a nation where 75% are overweight, at least some of those 38% must be overweight themselves. What is particularly surprising is that taxing the overweight is most popular among the rich, those reaching retirement, and those in the South and Midwest. To be sure, it is because they pay the most in taxes but Southerners have the highest obesity rates in the country. Willing to turn against their neighbors, they show that fat is increasingly becoming a growing social and health problem.

However, the tax is unfair, especially when you consider that research has shown that losing weight and keeping it off is nearly impossible. Motivated as they may be, the weight always creeps back. In the study, 50 obese men and women were forced to maintain an extremely low calorie diet for ten weeks. On average, they lost thirty pounds. Over the course of the next year after, they were called by nutritionists who reminded them to exercise and eat right. Nevertheless, they had regained 11 pounds in a year. What was proven was a new study that revealed that those who dieted had remarkably higher "hunger hormones" and inhibited hunger suppressing hormones than those who had never dieted. Though these studies are not conclusive, it adds to the unconventional idea that perhaps obesity is not about constant vigilance. Those who do maintain their weight loss are always aware of food. A common thread was that they had to eat less than the average person and exercise more to maintain their weight loss. Every calorie is accounted for in a notebook. There are no breaks (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/magazine/tara-parker-pope-fat-trap.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all).

The fat may be thin on the inside, if "thin" means "dedicated and motivated to exercise" in the general populace. While the weight may never be gone, that doesn't mean that you can't work on your fitness. Those who were overweight but maintained the basic tenets of fitness experienced a 28% less risk of developing high blood pressure and other such health problems (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/07/getting-fat-but-staying-fit/?ref=nutrition#). So, perhaps, not all is lost.

Obesity: The Fine Line Between Helping and Hurting

        Health in America has been highlighted in current years for the startling number of people, in particular children, becoming obese. However, the lengths at which the government goes to protect people from becoming obese, and even the fact that they are trying to protect people the way they are has drawn a lot of criticism. With this criticism the government has had  to try and walk a fine line between criticism of doing either "Too much," or "Too little."

          In my opinion, while it is important to try and get the word out there that one should be eating foods like McDonald's and Doritos in moderation at least, you can only do so much before your just going overboard. For instance, a recent ad campaign in Georgia shows an image of a little girl and under her it reads, "It's hard to be a little girl when your not."I think it's safe to that this takes fighting obesity to a whole other extreme because now, instead of just telling people the exact reasons why the food is bad and what it can do, this ad makes an example of a little girl who really doesn't know that much better about what she eats yet. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/georgias-shocking-anti-obesity-ad-campaign/2012/01/03/gIQAZB8HYP_blog.html). In addition to this, kids in her school could now make fun of her for being fat, and if they are questioned about it they would have government-authorized proof that she is indeed fat. In addition to this, their ad campaign seem to be more like little insulting remarks people would make if they saw an obese person. With this, I look at the other poster on the same link saying, "Fat prevention begins at home, and at the buffet line." This draws my mind to remarks like, "I bet that guy knows a good place to eat," and the like. Now, I can see that this may hurt their feelings and drive them to stop, but at what cost? A loss of self esteem and a lowering of one's public image? I just don't see how can be worth that much.

          In addition to this, I was watching "Dr. Drew," a couple of months ago and they were talking to a very obese woman (http://www.radaronline.com/exclusives/2011/09/worlds-heaviest-woman-i-need-help). When Dr. Drew asked her how she had reached her current point of obesity, she responded that it was do to bad managing and scheduling and that she had been trying to call TV personalities like Oprah, Dr. Phil, and Dr. Oz to help her lose weight, but none had responded to help her. At first, I had no problem with this story, but after a few minutes I started really wondering, "Couldn't she have done something herself to try and alleviate the situation?" For instance, if she had known that she had these habits, could she have tried to stop herself when she saw herself acting on these habits instead of waiting until one of these shows came along? What disturbed me most was that she had a child who seemed perfectly normal who was stuck having to care for her because she had made the decisions she did and turned out obese. So overall, my feelings are very mixed on this issue and though the consequences of obesity can be big, there are certain lines you cannot cross in combating this problem.

Will The Real Green Giant Please Stand Up?

Mountain Dew: the red-handed, or in this case green-handed, innocent, bubbly malefactor behind the rotting teeth of Appalachia’s forgotten mountaineers. It’s unrealistic, quite frankly bizarre, to privileged city dwellers such as us to consider Mountain Dew of all things a culprit behind the expeditiously decaying health of the Appalachian people, a region renowned for its grandiose beauty and picturesque setting. Yet to say that this particular region in America is disadvantaged would be a serious understatement. According to a two year investigation conducted by correspondent Barbara Walters of ABC News, Central Appalachia has up to three times the national poverty rate, an epidemic of prescription drug abuse, the shortest life span in the nation, toothlessness, cancer and chronic depression. Read More: http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=6865077#.T49Z2qtSTEc. Another article details the gross mortality rate of the Appalachian people, and goes into depth the spectrum of health concerns that continuously hold steady their health statuses as some of the worst in the entire country. Read more: https://sites.google.com/a/cypanthers.org/appalachia-america-s-forgotten-people/Home/health. As discussed in class, it is unwise to blame the big name companies that export these nutritionally malign goods, this capitalist ideal exemplified by the Latin saying “Caveat Emptor,” or let the buyer beware. We tend to believe that it’s the parents’ or school systems’ responsibility for the growing obesity problem our current generation is facing, and although there is merit behind this commonly shared belief, it is certainly not without fault.

               As Herbert Hoover once spoke of the rugged individual, so too did this notion echo with other pro-business, pro-capitalist presidents that came after him, who focused more on productivity and less on what seemingly is considered to this day socialist intervention, straying from the laissez-faire, and leaving the mountain people to face their own predisposed, penniless states in the dark. It wasn’t until President John F. Kennedy showcased this crisis on a national stage in 1960, along with the help of his brother, Bobby, eight years later. Four years before Bobby would travel the oldest purple mountains of America, Lyndon B Johnson would declare a "War on Poverty" in the Appalachians in ‘64. Despite the efforts of many government officials, as well as poets, writers, and artists who famously depicted the stress and worry forever imprinted on the faces of the children of Appalachia, the Appalachian Mountains is still quietly regarded as the poorest region of the country, comparative to that of third world countries, the underlying irony in that these countries receive more international attention and assistance as opposed to this region which lies smack dab in the most powerful country in the world.

               Similar to Barbara Walter’s parting with this two year investigation, there’s an ever-present entity that embodies the hope and fighting spirit of these guarded yet proud mountaineers. Watch more: http://abcnews.go.com/2020/video/history-appalachia-6885766?tab=12841679. Although there’s no lucid solution to this debilitating problem, it’s important to spread the word and re-bring this forgotten region to national awareness, that there are people out there in poverty who can no longer be blamed for their problems when there’s no help in sight, Appalachia the region with the most deaths occurring from men and women fighting overseas in the war as a means to make a living and provide insurance for their families back up in the mountains. Welfare can only go so far for these Appalachian families, one little girl in this investigation even reported that there was only butter and ranch left in her family’s fridge when her mother’s food stamps ran out. These government programs are designed to assist these families in survival, but the birthing of drug-use is beginning to counter-act whatever productivity is established in that region. Vegetables, such as the brand name Green Giant, are a rare and luxurious commodity, once again a re-enforced alien ideal to urban citizens. If the availability of fruits and vegetables could be gradually increased for these heavily emaciated mountain families without the argument of incapacitating the market, then perhaps these health concerns and early aged deaths would come to a steady decline. If time permits, this green, sudsy liquid that miners and babies down heavily alike will be replaced by a more solidified green pertaining to a more solidified and hopeful future. 

Genetics Make It Messy, But It Is Plausible to Fix

The idea that I raised in class that we must make other, healthier items like fruit and vegetables favorable over junk food I still stand by in somewhat solid ground. Although I am sticking with my original thesis, I would like to acknowledge the esteemed food critic and New York Times op-ed writer Frank Bruni’s column and response column on the 16 and 17 of April respectively. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/17/opinion/bruni-and-love-handles-for-all.html?_r=1&ref=frankbruni He wrote on the soon to be released documentary, which will be featured on HBO, “The Weight of the Nation” which talks about how obesity is not at the fault of the one overweight as it might seem. Here Bruni delves into that it is our biological makeup as human beings, the increase in overproduction-relative to what our human race has been used to in the large scheme of things- and America’s culture.
Bruni wrote that we as humans are used to eating as much as we can. Worst case scenario, we would store that extra food in the form of fat to use later when we are not able to eat as much food. In today’s society, for most, there is not a day that we do not have excess. Especially Bruni writes, now that we have perfected agricultural production to make foods fast, easy, cheep, and salty and sugary. This is what is going to cause obesity Bruni as does the documentary he writes about argues.
“This is probably summed up best by Michael L. Power and Jay Schulkin in their book ‘The Evolution of Obesity.’ ‘We evolved on the savannahs of Africa,’ they write. ‘We now live in Candyland.’” Frank Bruni said this to draw the comparison to today’s America in which humans live. It is a place full of sweets that comes at every turn and with every role of the dice. Almost unavoidable it seems.
In a response article the following day Mr. Bruni wrote addressing responses from his post that why is obesity not as bad in Europe then, if everything you are saying is true. http://bruni.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/17/the-girth-of-the-globe/ He first acknowledged that Europe has in fact had a rise in obesity but not to the point of America’s rise in obesity. This he blames on the culture of America, a place of super-sizing versus the more moderate European approach to eating. This is the one point that strengthens and keeps alive my argument. It seems from the years of research put in for this documentary that humans if they have an excess of food at all times, until they adapt as a race, they will continue to eat it at will with a result in obesity. On the other hand, culture impacts what you eat and if the culture can promote fruits and vegetables over junk food then there should be no reason why Americans, and humans worldwide cannot start to prevent obesity. It will not be easy, nor are any of the suggested ways, but if culture does have an effect and we do not have significant control over how long it takes us to adapt then we should control what we can. We should use culture to promote a healthier life style that makes the demand of junk food decrease and demand for fruits and vegetables to increase so that we can start to a healthier lifestyle.

Body image for young women

        There are many reasons that young girls struggle with self esteem and body image problems. When describing the factors that influence them nowadays, WebMD divides them into about three categories of Media's impact, parent involvement, and sports as a good or bad influence. The article posted is titled "Girls and Body Image: Media's effect, How Parent's can help", the directness of the article is very helpful because it not only addresses what the media does wrong in society, but also what we as parents can do (figuratively speaking of course). 
            The author is not afraid of being very direct and I appreciate her bluntness in identifying the causes for the rise in focus on self appearance. Yes we can continue to just blame the media and "Barbie" dolls that make girls feel like this is what they should aspire to, but we must also acknowledge that it comes from the people in our families. Moms, the article suggests, "too often openly obsess about their own weight", this is misleading to girls  who probably may only hear their mothers complain about real things, or things of relative significance. If the maternal figure is merely making small talk or being over critical of her own body, then the point is misconstrued and these values are over emphasized in the mind of the young woman. Also important, if not more so, is the role of the father or older brother whom, when the girl sees that they "make clear their preference for thinner women" may feel inferior because they may not fit the model. Speaking of models, the models of happy, successful, beautiful women in America are always thin. For an impressionable girl, this can be very compelling for reasons to have that body. For you to be smart, successful, put-together, happy, and beautiful, one need to simply have unrealistic proportions and eat like a bird.
          One statistic that really shocked me was that "the average teen girl gets about 150 minutes of media exposure daily and only about 10 minutes of parental interaction" (Renee Hobbs). So shouldn't that conflict with the above assertion that a lot of self image comes from parents? However, the point of the article is that instead of parents banning all the barbies and hiding magazines from girls, they can talk about the means of physical representation. Girls will feel less dissatisfied with their bodies if their parents engage them in discussions and learn where the thought process of their daughters resides. If they can discern how their daughter views a celebrity, then they can understand where it is that the girl needs the most positive encouragement and assurance that she is beautiful and healthy is more enviable than starvation.
http://www.webmd.com/healthy-beauty/features/helping-girls-with-body-image

Leisure Time

Bjorn Lomborg wrote a book, titled the Skeptical environmentalist Measuring the Real State of the World, discussing the major topic of climate change. He takes an economic point of view to climate change; he ways the pros and cons of many arguments made by other scientists in order to show how others arguments may be flawed. Along those lines Lomborg discusses how human kind is better due to an increased amount of “leisure time.” Bjorn Lomborg writes,

“Owing to lack of data we will here only look at leisure trends for the Western world, and the conclusion is quite clear. Despte what we may think (or feel), we have more and more free time at our disposal. Yearly working hours in the Western world have fallen drastically since the end of the nineteenth century, as can be seen from Figure 43. In most countries we only work about half as much today as we did 122 years ago.”

(I was unable to get figure 43 onto the blog, but I will bring it into class on Friday)

Bjorn Lomborg shows us the information that people have more time to spend. The question now becomes, what are people doing with that extra time? Not so long ago living was a 24 hour a day, seven days a week job. Now we work nine to five work days, five days a week. The world has changed and so have the habits. People don’t need to walk too far to the nearest school, post office, or grocery store. Even if someone lives in an area where the store is not around the corner, cars are more common than ever. Given the choice between a long walk and a short drive, I believe it is safe to say an American will choose the short drive nine times out of ten. Currently, scheduling time for exercise is not an uncommon thing. The people, however, who are able to spend time exercising are the people who are either motivated to stay fit or the people who are comfortable enough with their financial situation to spend time exercising and not working. And who is to say someone in a comfortable financial situation doesn’t sit at home all night playing video games and watching television. We live in a world of increasing stimuli, most of which you don’t need to move to get stimulated, making putting exercise time aside all that much harder even though as a society we have more and more leisure time.

Factor linked to Childhood Obesity: "Food Deserts"?

In class today, one of the issues we discussed were factors that contributed to childhood obesity and how these factors may potentially be eliminated or changed into healthier outlets. I read an interesting NYTimes article related to this that presented studies that attempted to find a correlation between "Food Deserts" and obesity. ( http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/health/research/pairing-of-food-deserts-and-obesity-challenged-in-studies.html?_r=1# ) Food deserts are low income neighborhoods with abundant fast food chains and less places where you can find fresh produce. In general, it's harder to access healthy food stores in these areas. Michelle Obama stated that not only are families going to eat at places like McDonald's because it's cheaper- healthier stores are farther away. You would have to take the bus or car to get to the closest Pathmark. One of the studies presented in this article supported Obama's claim: Helen Lee of the Public Policy Institute of California obtained the federal census of 8,000 kids- specifically their weight and where they lived. Then she took a separate census of the nearby fast food chains of one of each of the kids' neighborhoods and found that poorer neighborhoods had twice as many fast food places and convenience stores as opposed to wealthier neighborhoods.

However, Lee's study also showed that these low income neighborhoods had twice as many supermarkets with plenty of healthy food as well. Another similar study presented in the article showed a nationwide census (that was done twice) that saw very little or no connection between food deserts and obese children.

Personally, I think it's great that Mrs.Obama is advocating for more supermarkets and playgrounds at schools, but I don't think that having easier access to healthy foods would help much. You still have the economic problem- healthier foods are more expensive and eating junk is better than starving. Like we said today, sometimes it's all a person needs to survive. 

The government has been trying to fight it with programs like "Let's Move" and the advocating of exercise in media (Wii Fit Clubs), but the reality is that obesity rates have not changed much over the past decade.

Change really does start with the individual. 

Low Income Leads to High Obesity Rates

     In a society where children can outweigh their parents, staggering rates of childhood death, diabetes, and other deadly diseases have been linked to obesity in America. Today, obesity is becoming a trend that many cannot prevent from spreading. Obesity is linked to more complex factors nowadays; it’s not just limited to eating unhealthy and lack of exercise. The economy, stress, income, and other issues have huge impacts on the eating habits and lifestyle of many individuals and their families. In particular, families with lower incomes seem to be the target audience for obesity. Lower income neighborhoods lack the necessary resources to provide local low-income residents with a variety of healthy foods at an affordable price. You won’t see a Whole Foods store in a neighborhood that barely has any middle class people living in it. What you will find is a local grocery with cheap snacks, limited options, and nutritionally compromised food. Individuals who have lower incomes have greater exposure to the marketing of obesity promoting products. Healthy food is often expensive; so many low-income families will limit themselves to one local grocery store that provides inexpensive unhealthy food, but still food nonetheless. Low-income homes may also be located in neighborhoods, which do not provide enough access to attractive physical activity resources. Higher income homes may have residential parks where people can walk, a local swimming pool where people can swim, and bike paths for people to ride their bikes, but a low income neighborhood will have less outlets to help advocate a healthy lifestyle. Low-income neighborhoods tend to be unsafe and the safety issue tends to make people in those regions engage in sedentary activities (i.e. watching television for 8 hours and being safe as opposed to running outside for 30 minutes and risk being involved in an altercation). Low-income families, including children, may also face high levels of stress resulting from the financial and emotional pressures of food insecurity, low-wage work, lack of access to health care, inadequate and long-distance transportation, poor housing, and potential neighborhood violence. Obesity, like many difficult issues in our current times, will not go away on it’s own. We need to integrate the lower-income end of the economic spectrum into a new realm of healthy living and the only way to do this is by giving them more affordable and accessible options.

http://www.science20.com/news_releases/study_low_income_equals_high_obesity

Conclusion to Sports and Role Models

The discussion of for what reason athletes are role models in today’s society and to what extent we should look to athletes and sports figures as the ideal covered many facets of the sports field. The conversation included phenomenon like Jeremy Lin and Tim Tebow as well as coaching break downs with sexual scandals at Penn State and Syracuse University. It was debated whether it is right to worship an athlete and if so, why? Further on the front of role models, it was questioned how much respect and devotion should be poured into these coaches of well respected schools.
These questions discussed brings to light why do we, as a culture, have the back-page of our newspapers covering sports? Plus, with a depleting use of newspapers as our central medium of news, will sports take a greater or lesser role in the impact in our culture? Although newspapers are seen less often in the public scene today, sports and the illustrious water cooler talk is as prominent as ever. The increase in media, as talked about in class, has created a sports world that can go viral. The latest tebowing touchdown or game winning shot by Jeremy Lin can be viewed by millions, instead of the local viewing audience. This has most likely caused the sweeping sensations to take a greater hold than in years prior. Before Tim Tebow made it to the front cover of magazines like GQ, he already became a household name and a household idol. Youtube, Twitter, Facebook and other forms of social media have allowed this to happen. It is no wonder why water cooler talk has heated up regarding these now celebrities. It is more probable for someone to tweet about an electrifying dunk than telling the world that their dad just drove him home from school. Clearly what is valued in our society, and what is worth talking (or tweeting) about is not in line with traditional views in many ways.
If the Ancient Greeks had Facebook, would they have posted about gladiators more often than about family? They seemed to have a fairly rigid social structure which might have favored the ladder. The social fluidity in our current society, or at least the “American dream” idea of social mobility in America allows for common people to worship sports figures freely, and praise them for their accolades, in hope of achieving similar accomplishments. We worked with the idea in class that athletes and coaches going from a normal person to the very top of the fame and fortune pyramid of success based off of their talents is something that we value. As free people who can communicate at will, we hope that we can be like these people because we too have talents that we think can bring us to the top. At least, that seems to be the case. Why else would people idolize sports figures and teams other than for a reason to believe.
This want to believe, along with an allegiance factor, such as commitment to your favorite team even when they are losing as a display of faith, tie into why sports figures take such big falls. They are not perfect human beings, but rather they are human. This is why a situation like the scandal involving Tiger Woods was a story that captivated the country, especially during a time like Thanksgiving, when the story unwound. Furthermore, this is why cases like Jerry Sandusky or Bernie Fine and the sex scandals of which they were allegedly apart bring down a country of believers. When one falters in a position of power, especially in America, they will be under high scrutiny for failing their constituents. This scrutiny as we have learned will not only come from the headline on the back of your local paper, but also from twitter accounts worldwide, bringing their own take to why this person failed you so much. It seems in today’s age of social media, the first amendment is allowing sports figures and celebrities as a whole to rise to fame in a mouse-click instant and then crumble under America’s infrastructure even faster.

Introduction to Health: An Epidemic

The USA also has problem concerning weight and health: too many people becoming overly obese. Too many Americans, including young children, struggle with weight management and loss. The CDC reported the obesity rate is 20 percent or higher in all 50states. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/judy-farah/why-are-we-getting-fatter_b_1403974.html) Judy Farah, a writer for the Huffington Post, states that we have become too lazy and sedentary. We live such busy lives and are fixated on our TVs or computers when we get home that we have not time to work out or get a good meal. She also proposes that people like sweets and eating, which is habitual. Dieting is not, so even if we do go on a diet, we quickly revert. Farah also found that companies are “looking at state, city and country obesity rates before deciding whether to move or relocate” because obesity often entails more sick days, high insurance costs, and loss of productivity. Farah concludes her article by suggesting diet and exercise.

But to what extremes do we go to in order to become thin? There are so many diets out there that are “proven” to work that is becomes impossible to find the best one, or try them all. Then there are fad diets, which come and go like seasons, such as a detox diet. (http://www.usustatesman.com/fad-diets-may-cause-weight-loss-but-are-they-safe-1.2729360#.T4rPRmbgJQY) Loaded with water, lemon juice, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper, this concoction is supposed to rid the body of toxins at a faster rate than the liver already does. However, after drinking only this for four days, participates felt sick and disgusting. How is a cleanser supposed to finish the diet if he or she becomes groggy and nauseous?

Recently I found another article about a mother who put her then six-year-old child on a diet. Dara-Lynn Weiss decided to put her daughter, Bea, on a modified Weight Watchers program. She documented Bea’s weight loss and published the article in March’s Vogue magazine (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/lifestyle/2012/03/moms-diet-for-7-year-old- daughter-in-vogue-sparks-backlash/). What was most disappointing in this article was Weiss’ method of dieting her daughter, which were to starve and humiliate Bea, and later of course 2 cupcakes herself. It was also noted in this article from a few doctors and specialists that pressuring a child can spark even more problems such as emotional feelings towards good foods and bad foods which can cause eating disorders. Yoni Freedhoff M.D, agrees and asks if adults have problems with weight management and diet, how can we expect young children to handle it? His solution: parents. By showing and teaching parents to maintain a healthy lifestyle, the children will follow (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-freedhoff/childhood-obesity_b_1399203.html).

But there are repercussions to constant pressuring the skinny image; there are also plenty of people out there that are underweight. What do we say to them? Apparently, according to some designers, we say nothing. In the article When Is Thin Too Thin from 2006, “designers…seem to prize an even thinner frame to display their clothes.” But they also acknowledge that their frail look is harmful and life threatening (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/21/fashion/21MODELS.html?pagewanted=all). I never knew that gaunt and boney was the new beautiful.

Yet, I also thought that the new look is not just to be slim, but to also be healthy and fit. With this, I suggest another reason why we look the way we do: the media. If we are not sitting around watching their every move and idolizing them, we are criticizing their weight. For example, Lady Gaga is currently under fire for her tweet with the hash tag “#PopSingersDontEat” about dreaming about a cheeseburger while eating a salad. In this article, (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/11/popstarsdonteat-lady-gaga_n_1418722.html) the author notes that Gaga has “publicly opened up about her struggle with bulimia and urged young women to cultivate healthy body image.” But it seems like she is now promotion eating disorders? How are young people suppose to interpret this confusion? To add to the mix, take a look at this one article about Jennifer Lawrence, who plays Katniss in the popular movie The Hunger Games. Contrary to other articles that criticize people for their slim figures, this article says that Lawrence was “too heavy” and had too much baby fat. These criticisms are “toxic” and “dangerous” to girls. Mind you that Lawrence was jumping and running around on set and to prepare for the role (http://abcnews.go.comand/blogs/entertainment/2012/03/jennifer-lawrences-body-criticism-toxic-psychologists-say/)

So, who do we believe is right and what do we do?

How does the chemistry in team relationships play out?

Each sports team has their own chemistry, they have a certain way of making things work. Their dynamic, strategies, set-up is all determined by their chemistry. The chemistry between the players is very important as if say the point guard were to be out of some very important games for knee surgery, then that team might suffer considerably without their leader or play-maker. Now that Jeremy Lin is out for his surgery, the Knicks seem to be suffering and back where they were before the craze, "a jumbled, banged-up mess" (Knicks have returned to point of disarray) http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/02/sports/basketball/without-lin-knicks-back-at-point-of-disarray.html?ref=sports). Although this does not have to be true, the set up that teams have is very important and determines their success. The longer a team is together their success seems to go up if they are growing as a team and making each other better as the days go by. Almost everywhere you go, you hear phrases like "are you a team player?", "take one for the team" or even "there is no I in team". All these allusions to teams in workplaces or various walks of life insinuate that there is something about a team that has positive results. The working together helps everyone achieve more so the delicate balance that one may see in a very seasoned team is very important. As a team grows, they can even be considered a family.

This chemistry must stretch across the bounds of teammates to also coaches and mentors. In the case of Sandusky, the care and love of the "family" team was there but to a level that was not appropriate for a school team. Sometimes parents don't know the things they could or should look for in trying to gauge whether their child's coach is safe for them to be around or whether the team the child is being put on has compromising situations. Dr. Chris Stankovich of the Sports Doc Chalk Talk, (http://blog.drstankovich.com/blog/tag/sandusky/) offers some seemingly obvious but very helpful questions that a parent should ask before allowing their child to join any team. He tells parents to ask whether the coaches have had a criminal background check before being hired, whether the Athletic Director or League Operator requires ongoing professional training and development in psychosocial issues, and whether the school coaching staff is more than 50% teaching-coaches and not just coaches who have no college degree, to name a few. While these may not weed out all the shady teams you don't want your children to be on, the point is that if no one is taking an active role in the protection of the children who may be too embarrassed or scared to speak up for themselves, we will perpetuate the cycle and more people will be harmed in the long run. While it is important for teams to have that close knit feel, there are certain boundaries that must stay in place to continue to keep the sport fun and safe for everyone.