Wait...while I'm ranting and raving and thinking about this....someone had also posted about the advertising slant. Hmmm....I think this is a very two sided coin. As a matter of being, advertising is specifically trying to talk consumers into buying their product. So.....food commercials often run at late night (ever notice that?), cereal commercials and toys run in the mornings, after school and during Saturday morning cartoons...diaper ads run all afternoon...as well as diet and cleaning supply ads, beer ads during whatever sport is on, etc. ad nauseum...all aimed at a very direct audience. Ok...so here we have the food issue and concerns about children overeating and becoming unhealthy...a very legitimate concern IMHO. HOWEVER.....let's not forget all the young girls who are ashamed of their bodies at 8 and 9 years old....the teens who aren't pencil thin but are starving themselves in every way imaginable to look like what they see on television and in the magazines. Does this concern anyone? I have an 11 year old at home who believes herself to be fat. She is not fat, the fact is, she is HEALTHY (took her to the Dr and everything!). I attend Weight Watchers and she wants to go with me.....I feel badly for her because already, at this young age, she feels that her body is not what it should be due to media images that surround her. Her television time is limited to about an hour a day..if that...but I can't stop her from seeing signs in store windows of sickly thin women, or on magazine covers at the grocery store, etc. My girlfriend's daughter is the same way!!!!!

So is there a happy medium to any of it? I think as far as the advertising world goes, it's FAR too late.....in ALL directions. Wouldn't it be a wonderful world if people would be content to deal with themselves in aiming for and mangaging a HEALTHY body?

I dunno..and I'm ranting still..LOL!

Michelle