Mumsnetters quoted in the Indie today in article about childhood obesity.

[franke]

news.independent.co.uk/health/article2790964.ece

Working mums get it in the neck again.

interesting article!

Yes, it is an interesting article but I find general tone of total acceptance of traditional gender roles utterly depressing.

Women, Know Your Place!

i still believe that obeseity is down to what you eat/lifestyle rather than external factors. if you read enough into it you can find links with pretty much anything.

Well, I've worked for much of my sons' childhood and I've got one son (7) who has never been overweight, and another (13) who's always been heavier. They both have the same meals and similar eating habits. Thee 7 year old will eat almost as much as the 13 year old if left to his own devices. In fact, the older(larger)son does more hard exercise than his younger (slimmer) brother.

So, how to explain that?

I think the reason as to why some children are more overwieght than others is complex.

And are working mothers to blame for the individual metabolic rates of their children

And aren't poor people less likely to have cars? And more likely to walk? And aren't the kids more likely to be told to play out, because the houses are smaller and there's no internet to mess about with? So more running around outside.

I live on a council estate, it's over run with kids for roughly 14 hours a day, they run round like maniacs and they're all like whippets. I walk through a posh estate to get to the park - deserted. Big family houses, not a soul to be seen.

PMSL at carole smilie making the huge financial sacrifice of not working at weekends. Some people living a little closer to the breadline can't do that.

Interesting article. So there was a relationship between hours worked by mums & family income and obesity, but no such relationship between hours worked by fathers and obesity. So it must be something to do with mums. Get the dads to teach children how to make a healthy sandwich and cook the evening meal! Marital harmony, problem solved.

damned if you do, damned if you don't. And I see MN has now become the place for journos to get their 'proving' comment...and of course, MN being so diverse you could find a comment to prove pretty much both sides of ANY argument....

Thanks goodnss for Carol Smillie

showing us all the way

Anyone else find it creepy knowing that they are always lurking ready to quote at a moment's notice?

(well, not ready to quote me... I never say anything quotable enough...)

From what I can see the quotes came from here even more creepy was that it doesnt seem to have been a media request for opinions...
did Meeely2 & HedTwigg kow they were going to appear in a national newspaper ?????

justine appraoched by a journo

I try not to condtirubte to those kinod of thread tbh

me too Enid ! I only come out with uninteresting quotes

where does it say on the mumsnet site that we agree to let some journo use our quotes?

I can only find this:

Visitors and members' contributions to the website
Thanks for your contributions to Mumsnet. Please bear in mind that Mumsnet is international and is accessible throughout the world and that by contributing in any way to the website, as above, you are consenting to the publication of your contribution on Mumsnet and to linked Mumsnet sites. Mumsnet Limited reserves the right to edit or remove any contributions where necessary.

so we agree to have our stuff published on mumsnet not the indie?

I can just imagine tomorrows article :

Headline "Why so many mums are boring".....a quote by a Mumsnet member known as Whizzz says "I only come out with uninteresting quotes"

I do hope the mumsnet SAHMs as quoted in the article don't actually have overweight children - did the journo check out family pictures in their profiles (assuming there were any)?

"Yes, it is an interesting article but I find general tone of total acceptance of traditional gender roles utterly depressing."

Yes, just part of the unusal conspiracy to keep women down.

In fact I find it quite hard to believe. Families where both parents work tend to have more money. The more money a family has in the UK the less likely the children are obese - compare Scotland (fried mars bars) with Ken and Chelsea (slimmest borough in England).

On the question of quoting I suspect most quotes taken are too short to amount to a separate copyright work and therefore it doesn't breach your rights to have them reproduced. If you write a lot (as I sometimes do) though that might be different. If the quote from the terms above is right they really ought to change that wording to allow journalists to use the material too so it's clear.

It is an interesting article, but like with most things lumps everyone together rather than being "some working mothers" etc.

Hmmmm, well perhaps I should just jack in my job then. But then, my DD wouldn't be able to do her week of tennis & another week of swimming during the summer as I'd have nothing to pay for it with!

The bigger children I know do have SAHMs so it is just a complete generalisation, as usual.

jUST READ THE FINAL kidscape quote. The most sensible thing of the whole article.

lol @ carol smillie refusing to work weekends

"If women are going back to work early after having children they are unlikely to be breast-feeding up to the recommended six months and the babies will go on to formula milk."

what a load of tosh!

middle class / better educated women are more likely to bf, more likely to bf for longer and more likely to take longer time of work.

obviously they don't know that the majority of women who give up bf before 6 mo. also give it up before 6 wks!

i don't know if it's the journos that are crap or its the research. i suspect it's both.

Bizarre. How exactly does this correlation work?

And at lazy journo just using quotes from MN. What about an assumption that all mums are doing their best, sometimes in difficult circumstances?

I don't care about quotes being used, especially if someone approached Justine, as as the case here.

What I do mind is working mothers being blamed for all society's ills, yet again. And working men, as always, get off scot free.

What a load of old toss.

It doesn't realy bother me as I know most children with working parents feed them well and it's families where no one works who sit around eating chips and hardly leave the chair except to buy more chips etc. Also the less well educated you are in many regions the less likely your mother will work and the more likely you're fat.

But it's yet more propaganda which makes assumptions that women care for children rather than men.

SOmeone not sure what topic to do for a PhD should do some research into the number of articles which are antiworking mother and those that are pro. I do feel we need about 500% more articles in the press about who working benefits children and stay at home parents might even damage them. You rarely see that portrayed.

Despite all that most women with under 5s do choose to work and they also do in much of the world so the propoganda isn't working which is great.