Cupcakes

     Michelle Obama's big push to make children more healthy involves trying to make the right choices when it comes to what foods to eat, especially in our schools. (ABCNews.com).  But how far will this go?  And what is really the goal?
     It's my nephews first time in elementary school (kindergarten to be exact), and his parents would like to send cupcakes for his birthday.  The teacher was opposed to this, stating that only cupcakes without frosting were allowed.  Furthermore, the school, as a whole does not allow unhealthy snacks, and that parents should only send healthy snacks with lunch.  This outraged many of the parents at school.  So the questions arise: Should the school have the ability to control what our children eat?  Why can't parents chose what foods their children are exposed to?
     This is systematic of a larger issue, and a "nudge" toward healthy eating (there is a reason for the quotes, stay with me).  Bake sales, a staple of fund raising programs for school activities, is now banned in New York City. (NYTimes.com).  Mayor Bloomberg made this move to combat childhood obesity, saying that bake sales promote the wrong eating choices.  But this is not limited to the City of New York.  According to CNSNews.com, a proposed bill in Congress, backed by the White House, would give the federal government control over bake sales in schools (full article here).  In the article, Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, an advocate for the bill states that, "Most parents don't want their kids to use their lunch money to buy junk food. They expect they'll use their lunch money to buy a balanced school meal."  I don't believe parents think that junk food or bake sales don't exist and don't expect their children to partake.  Plus, who is she to presume what a parent wants for their child?  That is up to the parent to decide. 
     Let's also not forget the story of the shutdown lemonade stand, and the little girl who got a $500 fine for it (CBSNews.com).
     Now, remember I asked what is the real purpose here, and placed the word nudge in quotes.  Here is why.  Glenn Beck exposed a White House appointed Czar, Cass Susstein, who wrote a book, Nudge, on how to properly control people.  Basically the book describes how to force choices onto people by making the other choices hard to choose (details here).  The first page of the book talks about school cafeterias, and how to force the "right" choices onto children.  This is just like the bake sale ban, where bake sales are still allowed, just at odd times or with restriction (details in articles above).  It's hard for me to imagine that there is not an alterior motive here when there are people tied to the White House writing books about controlling what people do.
     There has been protest over this from students and parents. Students have sent out a petition against the bake sale ban (PIX11), and parents are angered over it (TheVillager.com).  Even outrage in the lemonade stand case caused the government to back off somewhat (details in the above article).  That gives me hope that people are not allowing their liberties to be infringed upon.  I've encouraged my nephew's parents to complain to the school board and organize against this, and I encourage others in similar situations to do the same.