My Opinion: Who's fault is childhood obesity? Part one- Children

Often an argument with my friends, who is the person responsible for childhood obesity? For one thing the idea of placing the blame on someone is a hard task, in this case it's almost impossible.

Should we hold the obvious target responsible, the child? The one who eats the food, the person who either pressures their parents into giving them food, or eats the food purely because their parent is giving it to them. In my opinion, in the early stages of the child's life it is the parents fault, they are the ones feeding the child, the feeding them junk.

However as the child grows older, surely they should be able to resist their parents trying to feed them junk food. Surely the child should be able to do exercise them selves. Surely the child should be able to break away from the influence that their parents had on them earlier in their lives. Can it be argued that as the child grows up we can shift the blame onto the child?

When the child turns to a teenager are we able to blame them? Teenagers can go out by themselves, thus they are able to do exercise and try to loose weight. Teenagers often earn money or have an allowance making them able to buy healthy snacks, or buy exercise equipment/ go to a gym. Most teenagers are also in control of what they eat at lunch, meaning they have control, when faced with a burger and a wrap, which option they would like.


Many children do not know the dangers of eating the wrong foods and not doing enough exercise., is it our fault for not educating them enough. Maybe another problem is the idea of exercise being bad. Maybe if in primary school, teachers made an effort to not embarrass children, and to cater to all children's interests. If children are given the opportunity to try all sports, they are more likely to find a sport that they enjoy, and so they are more likely to peruse it.

Could it be argued that even in the early stages of life child hood obesity is the child's fault? Should we blame children, for not knowing what is good and bad from birth? To me that sounds ridiculous.

Personally I do not think the blame should be placed on children, at least not until they are in secondary school. When they are a child they will follow authority figures blindly, however as the child grows up a decision needs to be made to decide if responsibility is placed on the teenager to keep healthy and eat the right food. Adults can't blame their parents for themselves being overweight. In my opinion as soon as someone has the opportunity to be healthy, not being so is their fault.

Next part discusses the issue parents have in childhood obesity.