Nutritional Profiling: The Government War on Sugar
by Angie Brennan
Here’s a little quiz: let’s say you were trying to encourage your kids to live a
more healthful lifestyle. Would you:
a) Take a family bike ride
b) Enjoy a "funny face" snack made with bagels, raisins, and apples
c) Send them to play a computer game
If you guessed "c," go to the head of the line and consider applying for a job
at the U.S. Department of Agriculture!
Introducing the new kids’ food pyramid, recently unveiled by the
aforementioned Department, along with its accompanying computer game—
all part of a balanced educational diet.
by Angie Brennan
Here’s a little quiz: let’s say you were trying to encourage your kids to live a
more healthful lifestyle. Would you:
a) Take a family bike ride
b) Enjoy a "funny face" snack made with bagels, raisins, and apples
c) Send them to play a computer game
If you guessed "c," go to the head of the line and consider applying for a job
at the U.S. Department of Agriculture!
Introducing the new kids’ food pyramid, recently unveiled by the
aforementioned Department, along with its accompanying computer game—
all part of a balanced educational diet.
This isn’t your mother’s food pyramid. No longer are food groups represented as horizontal blocks with bread and
cereals at the foundation. Now we have stripes representing each group running bottom to top (or top to bottom,
depending on your preference). We certainly wouldn’t want any food groups feeling like one was more important
than another.
Except sugar. After all, kids might get the wrong idea with the old food pyramid that placed sugar and fat up
top—as if they were king of the food groups. In fact, sugar is not even on the new pyramid, having been
grounded and sent to its room.
Some critics don’t think the punishment went far enough. "The materials don’t even have the guts to urge kids to
drink less soda pop, to eat less candy," said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Washington-based Center
for Science in the Public Interest. Apparently Mr. Jacobson would be happier if sugar were beaten and kept in a
dark closet.
He might like the government’s video game, however. In the "MyPyramid Blast Off" game, kids load a rocket
ship with the right combination of healthy foods: fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lowfat or fat-free milk and lean
meat. Load up with the wrong kind of fuel, or too much of it, and you can’t blast off to Planet Power.
Meet up with Darth Sugar, and the player is shoved, screaming, into an endless black void, while also being
attacked by the evil Caketroopers who blast away using their deadly bullets poisoned with trans fat.
Just kidding about that last part.
So should kids be encouraged to exercise and use moderation in their eating habits? Of course. Will the new
pyramid and its culinary computer game make a big difference in that endeavor? Let's hope we won't be taken in
by that pyramid scheme.
©2005
cereals at the foundation. Now we have stripes representing each group running bottom to top (or top to bottom,
depending on your preference). We certainly wouldn’t want any food groups feeling like one was more important
than another.
Except sugar. After all, kids might get the wrong idea with the old food pyramid that placed sugar and fat up
top—as if they were king of the food groups. In fact, sugar is not even on the new pyramid, having been
grounded and sent to its room.
Some critics don’t think the punishment went far enough. "The materials don’t even have the guts to urge kids to
drink less soda pop, to eat less candy," said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Washington-based Center
for Science in the Public Interest. Apparently Mr. Jacobson would be happier if sugar were beaten and kept in a
dark closet.
He might like the government’s video game, however. In the "MyPyramid Blast Off" game, kids load a rocket
ship with the right combination of healthy foods: fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lowfat or fat-free milk and lean
meat. Load up with the wrong kind of fuel, or too much of it, and you can’t blast off to Planet Power.
Meet up with Darth Sugar, and the player is shoved, screaming, into an endless black void, while also being
attacked by the evil Caketroopers who blast away using their deadly bullets poisoned with trans fat.
Just kidding about that last part.
So should kids be encouraged to exercise and use moderation in their eating habits? Of course. Will the new
pyramid and its culinary computer game make a big difference in that endeavor? Let's hope we won't be taken in
by that pyramid scheme.
©2005
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