I saw a real fat girl once, slowly walking down the middle of an empty street in a “poor” neighborhood. She was eating from a bag of Cheetos. I was in my car at a stop light, watching her. I thought maybe no one told her that Cheetos make you fat, or maybe her life is so sad that that bag of Cheetos is the highlight of her day. Sometimes, Cheetos is the highlight of my day. I said a little prayer for her. Then, she dropped the empty bag in the middle of the street.
My empathy dissipated.
Statistics confirm the fact that most “poor” people have no fathers. My father told me that Cheetos makes you fat. He also built a gym in our backyard. We lived in a very “poor” neighborhood. Our house cost $10,000 when he bought it in the 50’s. The neighborhood then got worse. All of our neighbors’ houses began to look dirty and have five broken cars and beer cans in their front yards. Our house was always immaculate and our front yard always had freshly mown grass. My father took us to church 3 times a week. He read the Bible out loud to Grandma and Grandpa every Sunday night, at Grandma’s house, because Grandpa was an agnostic and wouldn’t go to church. My father taught me how to read when I was 5, so that when I started first grade I was the best reader. I skipped second grade. My father played the piano every night and taught us show tunes, and how to harmonize. My father taught us how to water ski. My father was a gymnastics coach, so he taught me a “flip flop” and I was the only cheerleader who could do that. My father protected us. He bought a bee bee gun that looked like a real gun, to scare burglars away. We were robbed four times. He said, “I could never kill anyone.” My father made us feel safe. He gave us confidence and a history and a future.
That Cheetos girl probably doesn’t have a father. And, no amount of government assistance, housing, food stamps, free college, or ObamaCare can give her that. She needs a father.
I wholeheartedly believe that there is much truth to what the author is saying that the problems existing in our society stem mostly from the lack of real authoritative role models in a child's upbringing. My posed question on this topic is who is to blame for what has happened to our lower class society and why is the Father figure missing?
3 comments:
I blame television. And Frito-Lay for making such delicious salty snacks. Wait we're talking about "why Americans are fat", right? Oh...my bad.
So am I to surmise epowers22 that you are placing blame for the Missing Father Figure on television for acting as a babysitter as well as corporate greed for developing high fructose corn syrup and other corn derivatives knowing full well that they alter hormonal patterns to favor additional body fat and increased appetite.
This obesity due to massive HFCS intake leads people to be much lazier, resulting in less ability to keep after their kids, who are kids and are therefore hyperactive. So they put them in front of the TV with some HFCS laden food (maybe a ritalin chaser) and resume their HFCS intake thus completing the cycle.
I find it mindboggling that you were able to convey such complexity of thought in 4 wonderfully simplistic sentences.
yes, the lack of a proper father figure is a huge problem, but it is only a symptom- one of many social ills that stems from a lack of financial stability in the lower class community. it's pretty hard to parent your children well when you are working three jobs. I am _not_ making excuses for poor parenting, but asking you to consider the impact of living in an environment in which there is little opportunity for encouragement, education and employment. most people in majority culture (read: white people) seem to believe that if they were born into poverty that they would "pull themselves up by their bootstraps." I challenge that notion. if I were told by teachers that i wouldn't amount to anything, watched by mother scrape by to make a living and if the most successful people I knew were drug dealers and pimps,well then, that's what I would aspire to as well.
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