First They Came For the Fat Kids...
This charming bit of news from The Atlantic is entitled "Harvard Researchers Want Fat Kids Taken from Their Homes". It refers to a medical ethics editorial published in the JAMA on Wednesday (viewable at the bottom of this link -- sorry for the automatic newsclip that plays along with it).
To be fair to the Harvard Researchers in question, Drs Murtagh and Ludwig, they don't intend to take away all fat kids from their parents, just the super-obese -- those with a body-mass index well above the 99th percentile.
For such children, they recommend a foster-care environment as (in their opinion) a more ethically-sound alternative to bariatric surgery. They note child protective services have long had the power to declare severely undernourished children abused and remove them from their homes, and that a few states (California, Indiana, Iowa, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas) already have a precedent of declaring severely overnourishment of children a form of abuse warranting the removal of children from their homes. The doctors write, "State intervention may serve the best interests of many children with life-threatening obesity, comprising the only realistic way to control harmful behaviors."
The researchers note that "the possibility of an unrecognized genetic disease has made these removals especially controversial" but, on the other hand, "identifying a genetic cause of obesity [generally] offers no new therapeutic options, requiring instead an intensification of the home-based behavioral interventions that have proven unsuccessful in these families." So, they conclude, even if it's not your fault that Junior's dangerously lardy, the best thing for him is to take him away from you anyhow.
This news hits close to home for me, as my own mother, despite a strict upbringing (in diet as in everything else: Grandma was also a health-food nut), really did have a glandular problem, and so remained phenomenally obese no matter how little her parents gave her to eat (though they never starved her -- her diet was always doctor-approved) until she discovered her problem (on her own) and demanded treatment.
Obviously, it's easy to hate on studies like this. What I'm most curious about, Ricocheteerians, is if anyone can make a case for the study's recommendations. Anyone want to try?
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Mar '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
"Ricocheteerians"? Was that the eventual consensus? I demand a recount.
I'm curious why you wish to have someone make a case for these recommendations midg.
Oct '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
There is no case to be made.
Aug '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
Roberto:
I'm curious why you wish to have someone make a case for these recommendations midg.
Well, precisely because I can't.
Usually, even among conservatives, there are those that feel that sufficiently bad parenting should be punished by losing the privilege of rearing the children. I wondered if there are any among us who would feel that overfeeding a child constituted abuse that could, in some circumstances, warrant the removal of the child from the home.
Dec '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
This is an interesting test case for our values. The world is on its head now that obesity is a sign of poverty and poor raising rather than a sign wealth and accomplishment.
Jul '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
I completely disagree with interfering in anyone's private lives; however, here is the twisted logic for why they feel child theft is warranted.
Obese people utilize vastly higher percentages of medical resources than non-obese. In our future single payer world where social responsibility trumps individual rights, those who tax the medical system more need state sponsored intervention.
Appalling as this sounds there are facets of this that will involve me that will make me sick. Will it be my job to report BMI data to the government during routine medical visits. Do I lie to the government to save a child from being ripped from their mothers arms and sent to a concentration camp. The answer is of course I'll lie.
I'd like to tell these Harvard overpaid liberal snobs that when the guillotines start falling at their discretion it won't always last through their vision and sooner or later they shall wind up as Marat or Robespierre themselves. Stupid liberal morons with a degree....oof.
Dec '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
From a devil's advocate perspective...
Being overweight is emotionally difficult. It put me out of the navy within sight of retirement. It's never been a conscious choice to be fat so much as a conscious (and lazy) choice to not do anything about it. For a child that knows nothing other than overeating, sloth, and obesity life will be very difficult without some sort of intervention. Either the government can intervene early and get the child help the family is either unwilling or unable to provide, or the government will intervene later to coddle the emotionally damaged person. Perhaps an ounce of prevention might truly be worth a pound of cure in this situation.
Jul '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
How about nutrition and real phys ed classes in our schools instead of teaching them that any orifice is as worthy as the next.
Dec '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
Conservative autoresponse generator: 3 R's in school and nothing more. Nutrition is the responsibility of the family, not the state. We're back to family failure/state intervention.
Jun '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
Q. What's the difference between a pit bull and a social worker?
A. You will eventually get your kid back from a pit bull.
May '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
The latest theory in the causation of obesity finds evidence that it may be due to chemicals in shampoo and also leeched from some bottled water. Probably nonsense but it is also nonsense to think that we know enough about the recent epidemic to turn the solution over to social workers.
Jul '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
I'm always first and foremost the One stating that other people's kids are not My responsibility, regardless.
But when I read " [l]ast year, at age 12, she weighed 400 pounds....," that triggers something in Me.
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
Ok, I'll sacrifice myself up as the RINO squish on this issue. I think that in cases of extreme obesity, there is something akin to child abuse or at least neglect going on. A parent who allows their child to reach an extreme state of morbid obesity is really putting that child at severe risk for a host of health complications.
Do those who object to state intervention in these cases also object to intervention in the case of conventional physical or sexual abuse? Because I surely don't object to intervention in those cases. And I really can't identify anything that differentiates allowing a 10 year old to reach 250 pounds from giving a kid a black eye once in a while.
Jul '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
The King Prawn
Conservative autoresponse generator: 3 R's in school and nothing more. Nutrition is the responsibility of the family, not the state. We're back to family failure/state intervention. · Jul 15 at 1:04pm
Here in Nevada that is reading, writing, and reloading.
May '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
What makes this discussion frightening is that there is valid precedent for this preemptive action by the state. I think bariactric surgery (along with the counseling usually included with that) for the kid and his or her parents would actually be more humane and probably more effective than turning the problem over to our judicial/social engineering system.
Apr '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
I like to argue, so her is my pro view on this.
Certain parents are in fact highly negligent, and uncaring about their child's health. Children cannot be expected to either understand the health risks of obesity, or properly manage their diets in the manner that an adult is expected to. If the parents of a child allow, or worse encourage eating habits that have lead the child to fall so far outside the normal weight, that they are now at risk of serious medical problems, such as type II diabetes (yes children can develop it), have problems moving, or other medical problems because of their weight, the parents are guilty of negligence. Their negligence for their child's diet in this case would be the equivalent of allowing their children to knowingly be exposed to toxic chemicals that cause health risks. Imagine if instead of food the parents made the child paint the family car in an in closed space using paints containing dangerous chemicals with out proper safety precautions. Would that be abuse?
Feb '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
I really don't think this rises to the level of abuse. Abuse is direct and immediate (the punishable kind, anyway). But certainly we need more than lifestyle choices in order to override parental authority, right?
Edited on Jul 15, 2011 at 5:51pmDec '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
I can see this almost making sense in very extreme cases such as the 400 pound 12 year old. However, can we trust the state with such power even in extreme cases? Has not history proven the camel's nose under the tent analogy too often? Today they come for the extremely obese kids, tomorrow they come for mine because there's a cookie in the lunchbox next to the banana. Thanks to the 14th a law that is written for the extreme cases automatically becomes a factor in benign situations that are the same in kind, if not in degree, as the outliers. I don't know what the right answer is, but my instincts exclaim loudly that it is not the state.
Aug '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
I would tend to agree.
But what about the wrinkle that bariatric surgery is not, so far as I know, done on children under the age of 14, and is usually postponed to the late teens if at all possible? Could that be too late for some kids?
And what about the risk of malnutrition in a teen with bariatric surgery?
Dec '10
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
This, is a load of crap. Not to put too fine a point on it.
I am a quite wide fellow, as is my father, and between the two of us, we have been to the doctor/hospital/clinic less than five times in the last decade.
I don't get sick very often, and when I do, I tell my immune system to man-up and kill the invaders (like they're supposed to).
The last time I saw a healthcare worker of any sort was nearly five years ago, when I got into a particularly nasty argument with one of my milling machines.
After all was said and done, I needed 15 stitches across my gullet. I drove 30 miles to the hospital (with a shop towel duct taped across my belly) and a very nice nurse named Richard stitched me back together (fascinating to watch) after washing me like a Buick with iodine.
I thanked him, went home, and paid the hospital in cash when the bill came (at the end of that week).
Hypochondriacs use most of the medical resources, fat or otherwise.
May '11
Re: First They Came For the Fat Kids...
Midget Faded Rattlesnake
I would tend to agree.
But what about the wrinkle that bariatric surgery is not, so far as I know, done on children under the age of 14, and is usually postponed to the late teens if at all possible? Could that be too late for some kids?
And what about the risk of malnutrition in a teen with bariatric surgery? · Jul 15 at 5:23pm
The fact that bariatric surgery is not recommended for children under 14 is due more to our litigious legal system than to any inherent aspects of children's physiology. Surgery should always be the last option but having social workers involved in any significant medical decision is almost always going to turn out badly.