I agree with much of what is being said here . This is also why I really disliked the original TIME article--I think a cursory reading (which is all most people will do--usually sitting in a hair salon or doctor's office) will give those who are not moving enough or at all a psuedo justification for continuing to remain physically inert, since it "won't make you thin" to exercise.
We need to also fully acknowledge the role the media and corporate interests play in all of this, though. We complain that it is "bad parenting" to let kids eat badly etc. But lets look at cost--try shoppng here in the US at a Whole Foods or Trader Joe's and only buying the best groceries. Tell me what the bill is for a week's worth of groceries. Then calculate the amount for happy meals and the like every day of the week. The fast food crap is WAY cheaper. Now--let's factor in work realities. Say we have a single mom, with 2 jobs and just enough time to get to her kids , get them fed and off to job 2. Does she have time to cook? Take a look at most of the marketing for fast food chains--who's being targeted? Upper middle class suburban families? I don't think so.
There is a have/have not aspect to all of this and, at the risk of sounding like some sort of socialist, which I am not at all, I think it is short sighted for anyone to assume that the entire problem lies solely with the individual. Once you make healthy, organic food available at a price tag the average family can afford,put limits on fast food advertising (hell, they can't show anyone actually consuming alcohol on TV anymore and cigarette ads not at all) since they pose a tremendous health risk, you will have half the battle won.
Another part of this is education. I teach high school and have for 27 years. The health curriculum in NY State has an entire unit on nutrition. Kids ARE getting the info. But mom and dad need to be educated as well. The sugary drink and candy machines that athletic teams in many cases use as fund raisers (how ironic is that?) need to be banned. Finally, Phys ed programs have to stop being about trying to find another running back for the football program or pitcher for the softball team and become all about personal fitness, something even the athletes could use. Not everyone is going to play a team sport--in fact, most NEVER will and have no interest. But everyone owns a body and needs to know how to take care of it.
Maybe, on a national level, we need to re-emphasize the old President's Council on Physical Fitness and put a high profile person in charge of it. I remember when I was in high school, we had to take and pass the President's Council Physical Fitness test (pullups, pushups, situps,shuttle run, 600 yard run). We actually established clubs and teams and there was a huge competition officiated by members of the Marine Corps in Washington DC. We don't see much, if any, of that in our Phys Ed classes any more.
I saw a political ad the other day on TV. It said, in effect "In these tough economic times, the last thing we need is for the government to tax our little remaining pleasures like fruit juices and soft drinks".This was in response to the idea of taxing these as a disincentive, much the same as cigarettes. What's the message? Yes, it's a counter to government "sin" tax politically,and we can probably all get behind a "no more taxes" message, but the psychological subtext is "hey--you're depressed,times are hard have some sugary crap to make you feel better". If I substituted "have a few beers" or "have a smoke or two" or "light up a joint" for "sugary crap", I don't think it would be aired.
There are many players involved here who need to be held to account and step to to the plate. The "individual" is but one of these. We've been a nation of overconsumers since the end of WWII, and the only reason we didn't overconsume from 1929-1950 was because the Great Depression stopped us for the first half of that and the government ,through enforced rationing, stopped us during the second, to fuel the war effort. If you look at the period right before the crash,the "Roaring 20s" it was overconsumption as well which,in fact, in may ways, that lead to the crash and the Depression.
Culturally, we have never been a country of "as much as I need" we have been, unfortunately"as much as I can get". The same holds with our food. Why eat enough when I can actually get "supersized".
If anyone is interested, Andrew Bacevic's The Limits of Power is a very compelling read on the entire cultural aspect of this in the US. He is a Catholic conservative who graduated from West Point and served in Vietnam and the Persian Gulf and is currently a professor of international relations at B.U. He is to the point, succinct, and , I feel, accurately holds everyone who should be held accountable for much of our long held notions on this front. Our current diet/health/obesity issues are, I think, just an outward, physical manifestation of a far greater cultural mindset that needs to be addressed. We have confused our historical insistence on personal freedom, which has made this country great, with some sort of entitlement to overdo it despite the consequences--for us and our kids. That whole mindset is in severe need of re-orientation, I think.