Americas Obesity Crisis - Essay Example

?America’s Obesity Crisis Obesity has been a growing problem in America for many years. Plenty of speculation has been considered and researched in hopes to determine the causes or factors connected with the development of obesity. Lisa Takeuchi Cullen, in her article “America’s Obesity Crisis: Not Too Rich or Too Thin,” makes the claim that obese people are more likely to be poor, while the thinner people are more likely to be rich. According to Cullen, this has to do with the fact that the cheaper, more affordable foods that poor people are able to buy are greasy, fattening, and high in sugars and starches, while middle to higher class people are able to buy foods that are healthier but are more costly. It has been proven that obesity is connected with how easily affordable unhealthy foods are in comparison to fruits, vegetables, and healthier meats. However, there is nothing to suggest that only poor people are the ones buying the foods that are bad for the human body. Most people, regardless of their economic status, enjoy the tastes of many of these fattening snacks, such as chips and candy, and obtaining these has nothing to do with cost. If anything, if a person is rich or poor will only determine how many bags of chips or other unhealthy foods they will buy; a rich person is more liable to buy more since they can afford it. Since poor people can afford less, more of their money would go towards proper foods, like meats, instead of junk foods that cannot make meals. Cullen brings up the point that there are more convenience stores and gas stations than there are grocery stores. Convenience stores and gas stations carry only a small variety of food, “Chef Boyardee but not baby carrots (Cullen).” In lower-income neighborhoods, these places might be more common than a grocery store, but that does not mean that poor people are unwilling to drive a few extra miles to shop at a grocery store. When most people go shopping for food, regardless of the money they have, they go where they need to so that they may get what they want. If poor people want steaks, they will go and buy steaks; if rich people want hotdogs, they will buy hotdogs. Being rich or poor has nothing to do with the type of food people are willing to eat, and therefore cannot be considered a cause of obesity. Regardless of how much money a person is making, obesity is everywhere, and I find it hard to believe that every one of these obese people is poor. Each person, taking away the factor of money, will have similar eating habits as someone else. Poor people may prefer the cheaper food, but rich people can still afford more, especially of the cheap, unhealthy food. Though Cullen makes many good points, a lot of them seem to be assumptions or opinions. Her argument could be strengthened if she used citable facts and statistics to prove her points. When Is Thin Too Thin? The fashion industry is an important one, designing and displaying the fashion that will one day grace the presence of our outlet malls and fashion boutiques. Fashion models are used to present those clothes in the way that their designers intended them to be worn. As Eric Wilson points out in his article “When Is Thin Too Thin?,” part of the vision of these designers involves ghastly underweight women as the models to display these fashions. The designers of these fashions, as well as many of the agents that hire the models, claim that there is nothing wrong with the weight or health of these women. This is despite the fact that prospectors at fashion shows have the ability of counting every rib on many of the models. Beauty has blurred the line between healthy and unhealthy, and this perception needs to change. “Underweight models [and] fashion shows perpetuate an unhealthy image of beauty, encouraging eating disorders among young women (Wilson).” Women are staving themselves for their work and they are being praised for it, receiving positive feedback and proclamations of beauty. Unfortunately, this is not even the worst part. Shockingly enough, many people in this industry do not even acknowledge that there is a problem with the weight of the models. Agents, designers, and even the models claim that the models do not have eating disorders, even though their physical appearances suggests otherwise. The models are thin and pale, and while they may be considered beauty, there is nothing about the unhealthy state of their bodies that propose beauty. As Wilson claims, these women are being idolized, as well as many of the more common celebrities that have been excused of being too thin. This is giving young girls the wrong impression, prompting many of them to develop eating disorders themselves as they try to look like their favorites models and female celebrities. The few modeling agents and designers that have acknowledged the seriousness of the weight problems in models have started to require certain weight minimums for their models, which will hopefully curb the health of not only the models but of the young girls being influenced by them. These implemented weight minimums will require models to be within five or ten pounds of the average weight for women of their age and height. “There need to be more rules and regulations within the modeling agency. A lot of problems that are very gray areas need to be put in black and white (Wilson).” The horrid thinness of these women is a concern that is being ignored for the sake of a twisted perception of beauty. Perhaps the weight minimum will prompt others in the fashion industry to realize that beauty does not correlate with thinness and that the health of the models is more important than the appearance of the fashions being worn, which most normal people would not be able to fit into anyway. This issue needs to be brought more to light and solutions need to be implemented before it costs one of the models their life. Read More