Ronald, Ronald, bo Bonald,

Bonna fanna, fo Fonald,

Fee fy mo Monald,

McDonalds!

It’s the blame game, and haven’t we all had just about enough of it?

Last week there must have been some sort of cosmic collision in the World of Blame. There was the release of Chew on This: Everything You Don’t Want to Know about Fast Food, another book blaming the fast-food industry for turning the children of the baby boomer generation into the obese generation. It was also Sigmund Freud’s 150^th birthday and of course, mother’s day. Let’s just lay all that deep-seated guilt and repressed anger at our own childhood out on the table.

Or perhaps we should once and for all take responsibility for the fact that our kids and grandkids tend to be fatter and more dependent on fast-fix food than we ever were. Blame is not going to remedy that.

I am sure that we all have regrets. I regret that I had to be a working mom, and that my kids were in daycare from the time they were one year old. My husband was self-employed and while starting a new business, someone had to be making a steady wage, have regular hours, and a health plan. By the time I was able to stop working, the kids were in school full-time, and didn’t need me at home.

In those days, I depended on McDonalds and other fast-food chains. After a long day at work and picking the kids up from day care, McDonalds was a way to get home, get the kids fed and bathed and still have time for myself. McDonalds worked as a bribe and a reward. I know few moms or dads who at one time haven’t said, “If you just behave and let me get this (whatever) done, we’ll go to McDonalds.”

After a triumphant baseball game or a dismal loss, McDonalds was always the place to head. Jordan and I have a photo of Paddy’s first McDonald’s hamburger in our family album.

We also ate well-balanced meals, especially on weekends. An article in today’s paper says that there is now some pretty conclusive evidence (in rats) that what we eat as a child will affect how addicted we become to food, especially sugar, in later life. If we are the type who eats excessively under stress, we probably were fed junk food at an early age.

I’m not totally sure it is that simple. I watched one son, the more athletic one who naturally ate a diet containing less fat and more fruit, maintain a good physique, while the older son, who tended toward rich sauces and butter had issues with his weight and the accompanying loss of self-confidence. It was disheartening, but there was little I could say that wouldn’t make matters worse. So I tried to bite my tongue, not always successfully, and lost sleep at the thought that I was to blame for his unhappiness.

But then I got over it. I had done the best I could with both boys, and I could only hope that with maturity and acceptance of responsibility for his own health, he would one day get control over his body. And he has. He looks great now, works out regularly, plays floor hockey, and watches his diet. I would like to think that in some small way, his parents were responsible for that, but it may just be a combination of adulthood, good friends, and his own inner strength.

I do take some responsibility for what happened in school cafeterias. I should have been more concerned when I saw the amount of fried foods and the number of vending machines in the hallways.  I admit that I kept my head in the sand, busy trying to make a living and pretending that everything was going OK as long as I didn’t get phone calls from the principal and the parent/teacher interview went well. We all should have been more vigilant, but it was easier to just give the kids money and avoid that early morning rush to find anything—although apparently not cold meatloaf—that could be slapped between two pieces of bread and called a sandwich. Besides, we consoled ourselves that money raised was going to the library or new gym equipment.

I haven’t actually read this latest diatribe against the fast food giants; I have only read a review. I don’t like to encourage this latest growth industry based upon our supposed Pavlovian behaviour. The book is meant to gross us out enough that we would never eat another McDonald’s hamburger in our life, sort of the old hotdog approach. But we still eat hotdogs, knowing what may be in them, and sane people still eat fast food hamburgers and fries. Perhaps the best we might hope for are signs in fast food chains: “No one under the age of 12 without a responsible adult.”

McDonalds has always been accommodating: lo-fat; no-fat; better fats. They have also given a lot to charities and children’s hospitals. The cynics would say that they were just trying to make money…well, of course! That is what business is all about; making a profit.

If junk food is the real issue, why don’t we boycott grocery stores with aisles full of chips and pop and candy? Because they are there for our convenience, and if it is an issue, and you are shopping with small children, you can always skip that aisle.

There are many factors that have added to the girth of the next generation. Certainly the fact that in many cities it is unsafe to allow kids to walk anywhere on their own, added to that the draw of television (Remember when cartoons were only on Saturday morning?) and computers.

If you set good ground work while your children are young, all you can hope for is that in adulthood, they will take responsibility for their own health. The blame game is a waste of everyone’s time and breath.