To have found this blog about childhood obesity intensely smug and annoying?

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

agirlcalledjack.com/2013/06/13/dont-blame-poverty-for-your-childs-obesity/

Is it just me ... what kind of la la land does she live in, where everyone who is struggling for money lives in a nice house with a cooker and has plenty of time from not working two jobs to bake bread?

What she is describing is the sort of sensible cost-cutting I would expect most people who're struggling for money but not absolutely on the bones of their arses could do. I get what she's saying, I do, but the smug tone coupled with the failure to realize that quite a lot of very poor people don't actually have good enough cooking facilities to do what she describes is getting me down.

Am I being mean?

Plus the 'chicken to feed a family for a week' makes me slightly suspect her of embroidered truth.

Whilst I broadly agree that the state hasn't got a lot going for it at the moment, I really want to weep at the state of what used to be called home economics in schools.

Every child should be being given some tools to leave school, be able to do some basic non-processed-food shopping and budgeting, and make a few meals which are genuinely nourishing and cheap. School is an ideal place to teach this, it's just that the standard of such teaching has been either really varied or pretty fucking horrendous (in my own case).

I must say I find her lack of compassion for the poor a little odd.

She says she knows what it's like to be so poor that you have turn off your electricity, even your fridge...

She says she knows what it's like to feel so despairing you consider throwing yourself from a fly over...

Yet she's angry with people for buying dirt cheap filling food that takes seconds to cook?

Exactly, wordfactory.

There are two things that most people are going to do in life:

• be in a relationship/have kids
• have to manage money/feed their family

And yet our education system is woeful in teaching them. I'm a strong believer that state education should give you tools for life, not just tools to pass exams. They are as important in getting on in life as basic literacy skills.

And what are parents for then?

Is the state should be responsible for pretty much teaching your child everything

'Sorry, expat, who has said that benefits need to be higher?'

The councils not providing bursaries for cookers - this is reliant on council, as they still do in Renfrewshire, the posts about people not being able to afford to turn on the cooker, etc etc.

By the same token, where does she say poor people are stupid?

Sadly, the vast majority of posts on here are about barriers, negativities and obstacles rather than what might or can be done.

This person made a blog about how she handled it, she is far from alone in that, but she is labelled smug and not in touch for having access to a cooker and gas/power.

This costs the country huge amounts of money so rather than blaming people for making crappy choices, you need to look at why they make those choices.

But like everything, the government throw money at fixing the outcome rather than the source. It's all about quick fixes that make the current government look good. Education is a longterm solution and the benefits will only be felt years down the line - long after whoever is in power is long gone. So despite all the evidence from other countries that, for example, decent sex education actually reduces teenage pregnancy, we stick with the status quo.

'I'm a strong believer that state education should give you tools for life, not just tools to pass exams.'

One person's definition of tools for life may be different from someone else's as well has how those things should be taught. Some people feel that is their responsibility and their job as parents and don't want that dictated by the government.

No, she's labelled unpleasant for being unpleasant about something which, in the end, wasn't actually an achievement or a demonstration of skill.

And yet, if the government does interfere with those who are not being taught these basic skills, they get the blame for not being supportive enough.

They are only one part of the problem, however, because part of it is the parents. Each party has responsibility, but because some don't take it up, for whatever reason, doesn't mean everyone else should be subjected to it.

'wasn't actually an achievement or a demonstration of skill.'

Where did she claim it was? It's a blog with the career goal of all blogs - to get as much traffic through as possible - and she's far from alone in that, I just linked a book from another lone parent who also got a book deal from her similar blog.

She's damned if she did and damned if she didn't, but hey, she'll wind up making a living out of it so I can't deny that's resourceful.

She says in her blog post: I could show you how to do it.

And yet, she wasn't able to do it, because she needed the help of a food bank.

I am not denigrating her for having had no money, but it was false to assert that she could feed herself and her child healthily and well on £10 a week, when she was using a food bank!

I agree, I don't think she did it for a tenner. But how is that calling poor people stupid?

I suppose you can use a chicken to feed a family for a week if it's a) a large one b) a family of one.

I agree with the op actually. The trouble is she is pointedly criticising other people based on her choices/abilities/lifestyle without thinking about other people's personal circumstances. "Well if I can do it so can you" kind of a thing which is short sighted and unkind.

There are a lot of factors involved in childhood obesity and I think to be fair she has one very young child, if he really does eat as much as her and she only spends £10 per week then she must be quite underweight/lying. Also 15 mins to cook an evening meal? I always cook from scratch, granted there are six of us but it takes me a minimum of 1-2 hours every evening, sometimes cooking will take me most of the day, so I wonder what the "cooking from scratch" is, she must not be counting preparation times or be using pre-made ingredients. When I cook for just my husband and I it takes between 45mins to an hour normally.

Also bread? Bread takes many hours to make so she must have a bread machine, how many really poor people can invest in bulk buying and bread machines? I don't think she's being entirely truthful or fair.

And yes I agree she is good for showing 'another side to single mums' but only because single mums are being unacceptably dehumanised but I think she undoes everything by portraying herself as a 'better' single mum and by undermining and attacking other people.

Education is a longterm solution and the benefits will only be felt years down the line and ONE of them is the parents

Absolutely. I went to school in a very poor country. We had three hours of home economics a week and everyone's mother had already taught them the basics of cooking and baking (stews, scones).

We learnt how to budget and stretch our money using fresh food from the market. There was no such thing as convenience food. Hardly anyone had a freezer and not that many had a fridge. Ovens were also scarce but most houses had an electric ring.

It wasn't seen as smug or interfering. No navel gazing or class warfare. Just sensible acceptance that a cheap healthy diet keeps you and your family alive.

Imademarion- was that by coincidence also the time when mothers were basically not allowed to work and expected to spend all day cooking?

That to me is the crucial thing, people by ready meals because they are the cheapest, most calorific quickest food they can provide in the limited time they have... I mean have you ever made a stew? It takes the whole day!

It's the 'fair' bit that really tips the balance for me.

A really helpful blog post wouldn't have taken the carping tone she did - although how truly helpful it would have been is moot, since she isn't straight about things in the first place.

Oh well, money in the bank for her. I would personally doubt any book she writes though, after learning about this.

Thing is very very many people are getting their writings into the public eye who wouldn't have got near a magazine or newspaper a few years ago. And keeping up a weekly/monthly blog must be very hard after the first 6 months or so. The upshot is you get twaddle being written by self-proclaimed 'experts' which isn't worth reading half the time.

you can't feed a family of 2 on £10 a week (and buy a chicken?!!)
it's just not possible

the link from the BBC shows that children are overweight and obese at all income levels and this only increases slightly as income decreases.

therefore this weight problem cannot be mainly due to low household incomes.

so why is this thread about any people/children on low incomes being fat due to their low income?

the blogger is correct, overweight children is not because on the price of healthy food - because people who can or could afford healthy food (if they wanted to) can still have overweight children at almost the same rate as those who cannot.

so once more Low household income does not cause weight problems in children as high income households are also affected to almost the same level

She didn't use foodbanks in the beginning she was referred to one and they gave her nappies and 5 items of food - hardly a feast....

The blog is about poor people because, as it says in the blogpost, it is a response to someone who went on daytime tv claiming their child was obese because she could only afford unhealthy food.

As I said, I think it is more about time. More families with both parents in work and workplaces increasingly far from people's homes...

Faster the thread is about the blog which is about eating for a tenner a week. Rich people presumably don't have to survive on a tenner a week.

My point about lack of education stands though. imademarian's post is really enlightening.