Month: October 2016

I can still tell you exactly where I sat 25 plus years ago in my junior high swim period when the pool teacher humiliated a student. He explained, ‘though this was pool, it was an opportunity to learn about science.’ He pointed out that Mike was full of muscle which is more dense than water and Ross was very fat, which was less dense than water, thus if both were in the water while Mike would sink, Ross would easily float. To make sure that the moment was really nailed in our heads, he then had them get in the pool for a demonstration. While we watched, I felt terribly embarrassed for Ross and powerless.  I remember nervously looking around the class to see if there was a female version of this demonstration, if I was the girl with the most fat. (At the time I weighed 80 lbs, but suddenly I had become very aware that I still carried some baby weight).

Shaming students is not new. The impact of shaming a student can resonate not only with the targeted student, but with the entire class – for years.

All this runs through my head every time healthy foods as the only choice for students comes into conversation. When I read stories of schools, like this one that ran last week in the Toronto Star, banning even a piece of homemade banana bread with chocolate chips, I am infuriated. If the worse thing to happen to a child is goldfish crackers, I think we should all agree their life is pretty amazing.

Though a part of me wonders how we let it get this far, another part of me understands. Perhaps it was because we never thought it would get so extreme or perhaps it’s because we are tired and busy. Too busy to get involved in what seemed like a hypothetical battle, while some of the people with time on their hands enough to make fruit roll ups from scratch pushed a pure healthy (no choice) agenda. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not judging your food choices, I make an amazing banana oat cookie sometimes with hemp seeds. But what people feed their kids should be their choice within reasonable limits and I think we’ve crossed the line of what is reasonable. Schools are banning the school friendly nut-free granola bars with mini chocolate chips, when in my day those would be barely tradable.

Do we want an entire generation to grow up feeling guilty every time they eat a chocolate chip?
Do we want to ensure that we more evenly distribute eating disorders to all genders?
Do we feel like there are not enough insecure people?
Do we feel that people’s relationship with food is too simple?

While a part of me thinks, I’d dare my child’s teacher to do this, the truth is that if my child was humiliated in front of her class then the damage is already done. Even if Ross received an apology from our teacher (which I doubt he did) the damage was done. Actions and words once spoken cannot be taken back, especially when an entire class is involved.

My biggest fear for sending my child to school was that she might encounter a bully. Imagine my shock and disappointment when I realized that the biggest bully of all might be the one person we parents were counting on to be our ally. Kids don’t pack their own lunches. It’s parents, thus if there’s an issue with my kid’s lunch then I should be called. A student should never be embarrassed, shamed and/or lose access to the food they brought.

I am no nutrition expert but I am the one who typically makes grocery shops as well as makes lunches and I will no longer give up my spot at the table for this discussion. No food eaten on it’s own would be a considered balanced diet – if I gave a gigantic bag of very healthy carrots for my daughter to eat all day, the diet wouldn’t be nutritious. I also think that healthy food shaming is classist, but that’s a whole other story. I’m all for a school where balanced lunches are provided for students, maybe even one where children work to help prepare these lunches (I once read this was a thing, maybe in Japan). For most people it’s after a full day at work, when parents are supposed to make their kids’ lunches. With so much on our plates we should be high fiving each other. Is it too much to ask that we please stop pointing fingers and using the kids as pawns. A child should be able to open their lunch, eat whatever was packed and feel good about it, without having to wonder if it is ‘healthy’ enough. While a part of me wonders if anybody reading this will say this just the ramblings of somebody who wants to have her cake and eat it too, truthfully, I don’t see the point of having cake if it can’t be eaten.

(As a side note I want to say that I did have a conversation with my daughter’s teacher and we were on the same page about moderation and the importance of a balanced diet. My concerns were based more on my personal experience as a kid, the Toronto Star article and conversations with friends. My daughter’s school and teacher are great).