I’ve been watching this go by in the stream for a couple of weeks now.  Stark black and white photographs of  ”fat kids” with polarizing one liners talking about diabetes and bullying.  I write frequently about childhood obesity here and I’m a strong advocate of working with families to help decrease the rate of childhood obesity.

Fat kids face real issues, increased bullying, lower sense of self-esteem and very real medical issues such as diabetes, hypertension and shortened life spans.

So does a billboard with a fat kid (ok, I hate typing that phrase and I never use it, but it seems to be the vernacular for this discussion) exploit the kid and increase bullying or does it open up discussion and raise awareness and maybe really help some kids.

I honestly don’t know, so I turned to my almost 10 year old and showed him the health initiative’s main site, Strong 4 Life.  I pointed to the picture of Bobby and said, “what do you see?”  He said, “a fat kid.”  I said would you tease him?  He said, “Yes, he looks teasable.”

I hang my head in parental shame, but I kept prodding.

Me:  Does he look happy to you?

Son:  No, he looks sad

Me:  Why do you think he’s sad?

Son:  Because he’s heavy

Me: So would you tease him because you know he’s sad because of his weight?

Son:  No, that would be mean  (score one point for parental intervention!)

Me:  Do you have heavy kids in school?

Son:  Yes

Me:  Do they get teased because they’re fat?

Son:  No, the teachers wouldn’t let that happen

Me:  So do you think this campaign is helpful or hurtful?

Son:  I think it helps

My son then said we could tell the kids in Georgia to move up to our school system so they wouldn’t feel sad.   We also watched the videos that the kids had between 15 and 30 seconds.   My son realized how painful it can be to be overweight and struggling with it.  Back to the original question does this campaign help or hurt kids?  In this little corner of a Boston suburb it helped.  I was able to show my son why teasing because of how someone looks is bad and he understood and now knows it’s not ok to do that.  I also have to preface that we go to a public school where there is very little obesity.  In my son’s grade there is literally one kid out of about 90 with a weight problem.

Our school system also has an incredibly strong anti-bullying stance and my son has unfortunately been the target of bullies and I was amazed at how quickly everything was handled.  After a playground attack I was standing at the Principal’s office the next day and people were moving within minutes.  The kids who bullied my son were immediately addressed (as were their parents) and anti-bullying curriculum was brought into the classroom.  It was pretty impressive.

There’s another side to this, however.  Not everyone has anti-bullying campaigns in their school.  Not everyone has parents who know they can intervene for their kids.  So, do I believe some kids have taken this exposure as an opportunity for bullying?  Sadly, yes I’m sure that’s happened.  I’m sure the kids on the billboards have caught some flack and their parents too for “abusing” them.

I recently talked about childhood obesity and how it’s not fair to entirely blame the parents.  It’s an easy cop out.  The obesity epidemic is far more complex than angrily pointing a finger at two hapless people trying to raise their kids.  Pediatricians, the local community and the local schools all need to be involved.  Don’t get me started on USDA sanctified school lunches …

Is the education my son got today worth it if another kid gets bullied somewhere else?

So I turn the question to you.  My readers are smart, measured and opinionated.  What do you think of these Georgia billboards?  Is this promoting bullying?  Is this helping to find a solution?  At the very least it’s achieved the first objective, it’s gotten people talking.

Cheers,

Lisa