Should parents be charged with cruelty to their children by allowing them to become obese?

Question

Brothers convicted for having a dog which was too fat.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/01/12/nfatdog112.xml

Answer 1

Only if they are contributing to the obesity, while knowing that the child should be losing weight.

Some parents think being fat is being healthy. Once they know that this is not true, the parents should make efforts to stop the actions that caused the obesity. Sometimes, it has to do with genes, and needs doctor's care as well as the parent's.

If the child is old enough to go and buy/get what he wants without the parent's knowledge, no, it's not the parent's fault.

But if your child is too fat and you know this, and you give him/her fattening or non-nutritious foods or give food whenever it's asked for instead of setting a schedule, you are killing your child. That is more than abuse, that's murder.

Answer 2

I don't think that they should be charged with cruelty, but i do think that something needs to be done to help parents understand the dangers of obesity. Jamie Oliver has tried to teach kids about healthy eating, which is great, and i really admire his efforts, but it's the parents that have the most input into their children. I think it would be a good idea to run classes for the parents of obese children, to teach them about healthy eating. With so many parents in full time employment, they are looking for quick easy meals when they come home from work, but why rely on convenience foods? A simple but healthy stir fry or Spag bol with lean mince, takes no time at all to cook and tastes lovely! I doubt that parents would poison their children with alcohol at an early age, and obesity is as bad, if not worse for their health than alcohol, and probably costs the NHS approximately the same amount of money to treat. Why are the government doing more to deal with this ever growing social problem????

Answer 3

I think it is a lack of knowledge in nutrition. Lots of people were not given great nutrition lessons when growing up! Plus, the healthier choices are more expensive...lean meat, fruit and vegetables. Some people do not have the budget to keep healthy snacks in the house. Plus, the schools do allow the kids to play everyday like in the past! So I think the blame can be spread around not only to the parents, but the government too!!! And, what about the fast food industry advertising their unhealthy foods to kids!!!??? WE CAN'T BLAME JUST THE PARENTS!!!!

Plus, some kids are obese due to medical reasons!

Answer 4

There are a couple of different issues in this question: 1) parents charged with cruelty - a legal issue 2) allowing them to become obese. By "allowing" do you mean feeding them excessively on unhealthy food, or is it not restricting their consumption of healthy food? 3) kids can be very badly fed and be thin (usually they are depressed, ocd, bipolar, anorexic, "emo", etc.) The vast majority of people in the U.S. eat and feed to their children the very unhealthy crap that fills the aisles of the grocery stores and are heavily promoted on TV. It is difficult for them to eat healthfully, even if they know better and can afford it. Time and convenience is important to mothers who work outside the home. Unfortunately, the whole family pays the price. And then shall we also charge our society as a whole (yes, we should but it is impossible) - a society that makes it dangerous for a child to go outside to play? Again, the working mother has a more difficult time - can she take her child to sports events, etc.? I know it is politically incorrect, but I think its about time people started to realize that there is more to motherhood than "quality time" - quantity counts too in many ways and if the truth be known, mothers should stay home and be mothers. But even if they admit it now, the economic of things preclude it. Or so they think. Could they imagine living the life their mother or grandmother lived - I mean the economic level. Would they be willing to make the sacrifice? I don't think so. For in reality, while lip service to paid to how much we care for our children, they seem to be the least of anyone's concern.

Answer 5

If there is no family history of obese in the family and the child is 'dramatically' overweight then yes a charge of cruelty or something similar should be enforced by the courts.
However if there is a history of just being big (fat) in the family then I cannot see how they (the courts) can enforce this.
This is a very delicate subject and some people may class this as being cruel to their children.
It can be like opening a can of worms.
That's the best way I can explain this

Answer 6

No they shouldn't, I think if a doctor see that a child is becoming overweight/obese they need to send the parent and child to a dietician to be educated about what is causing the problem and what food should be given and how to help, if in cases where the parents are not putting enough effort into helping the child MAYBE a charge but it has to be in extreme cases

Answer 7

When did poor parenting equal a crime. There is a vast difference between feeding a child one too many fritos vs beating them to death. Next we should jail parents if the kid does poorly on the SAT's or is unpopular - clearly they couldve done something to prevent this horrible tradegy!
Geez most the adult US population is overweight so big surprise the kids are too. We all sit (adults & chrn) for most of the day at work & school, schools are cutting out sports due to cost and it is alot cheaper to by "junkier foods" than fruits and veggies and if you are a family w cash issues that will make a big difference.

Answer 8

yes, everything else is considered abuse then why not overfeeding and feeding unhealthy. contrary to popular belief abuse comes in many forms.

it is funny, just earlier there was a post about smoking around children. everyone that posted thinks it is sooo wrong and the parent should be jailed because it is bad for the health of the child. yes i agree it is bad for you and your children and i do not condone it but come on people. loading your kid up with saturated fat, caffeine, and preservatives is in fact bad also. and completely in your control at least for a while it is. it is funny how society picks and chooses what is abusive or bad when statistics prove without a shadow of a doubt at the health complications from obesity and unhealthy eating and lack of exercise. yet most of the responses defend negligent parents unless it falls into a category that they are personally offended by.

Answer 9

it is not more expensive to feed children healthy food...it is in fact a lot cheaper to cook home made unprocessed food than buy takeaways and junk... parents should not be so uptight and should adopt an everything in m,oderation attitude and encourage kids to go out and play to burn energy off or takjke them on walks etc. i think it is abuse because in this day and age everybody knows about unhealthy diets and obesity and to say they dont is a cop out. i do feel for parents with a few children where one is overweight and the others including the parents are of a healthy weight. but overweight familes are terrible, just passing bad examples down to theri kids.

Answer 10

I think it should be considered as neglect but sadly, I don't think it is. My daughter had a friend once who was 9 years old and could hardly fit into a size 16. All this kid did was eat ALL the time. My daughter would go to her house and empty bags of junk food were lying all over the place. The mother did not cook so they ordered pizza everynight. This kid (I wear) can eat 7 slices easily.