Hungry kids make better Americans? That's hard to swallow [UPDATED]
By now you may have heard the tittering and seen the finger-pointing in the direction of Missouri. A Republican state representative named Cynthia Davis offered several news commentaries in her June newsletter – including one questioning the value of free or cheap summer meals for public school students in summer school.
Davis wrote that "bigger governmental programs take away our connectedness to the human family, our brotherhood and our need for one another." Why not "get a job during the summer by the time they are 16" to feed themselves? "Hunger can be a positive motivator." Such programs, she fretted, only increase government spending.
A positive motivator to what? For a 10-year-old to steal a candy bar because there’s nothing to eat at home?
Such programs, she fretted, only increase government spending.
Rep. Davis, you want to see what real increased government spending looks like? Take away the free lunches and breakfasts. Teachers find that hungry kids don't pay much attention in class over the rumble in their bellies. Their grades suffer. They get into fights. If they graduate, they may not go on to college. If they don't graduate, they float through lousy-paying jobs with little or no health insurance and maybe can't afford to feed their own kids properly. That's an expensive cycle to start when you might be able to stop it before it begins, with a banana and a peanut butter sandwich.
All this sounded familiar to me, in a California-flashback fashion, and sure enough, I found it:
In 1994, in a series on hunger, The Times wrote about some California school districts refusing, for politico-philosophical reasons, to serve free or discounted breakfast programs to their students – even though the money was already available, and not out of the districts’ pockets. Two-thirds of the money set aside for student breakfasts in California in 1993 didn’t get spent because not enough districts asked for it – and principals and superintendents like this one made it clear why: "The parents have some responsibility for these kids. It’s not the schools’ job to be all things to all people."
One Orange County principal asked, "What’s next? Are we going to provide housing for these people too?"
Mike Spence, a member of the West Covina school board member and future head of the conservative California Republican Assembly, said then, "The government is trying to usurp the responsibilities of the parent. There is a trend to take over aspects of what the family does." The one self-styled liberal on that board said his colleagues believed that "ultimately, God put parents on this Earth to take care of their children. By God, that is what they should be doing."
This sounded to me then as though parents chose not to feed their children: Oh honey, I thought about making you oatmeal and scrambled eggs this morning, but I just decided not to. Buh-bye, have a good day at school!
If kids don’t eat breakfast at home, it’s probably because there isn’t breakfast at home. Teachers and school nurses reported students fainting and crying from hunger. Some of them said they had only one meal a day, and sometimes two, if you counted the free school lunch. Teachers tried to keep snacks on hand, like peanut butter crackers, when kids couldn’t handle their hunger. And when they did eat, teachers saw the difference in attitude, performance – just about every metric they had.
Now Davis has revived the discussion – I won’t say debate because as far as I’m concerned, that’s like saying ‘’creationism’’ is worth debating vis-a-vis evolution. Just because someone poses a question doesn’t mean that question constitutes any basis in fact. Questioning the need for school meals doesn’t prove that there is no need for them – only that someone’s not paying attention, or chooses not to.
Comedian Stephen Colbert’s TV persona was so taken by Davis’ argument about hunger being a positive motivator that he suggested that Davis hadn’t climbed higher on the political ladder herself because of "the anti-motivating habit of eating." He implored the people of the Show-Me State to help: "If you see Representative Davis at a restaurant or a hot dog stand or even through the window of her own dining room, do the right thing and take her food away."
That goes especially as a motivator for all you hungry kids there in Missouri.
Updated at 3:49 p.m.: Rep. Davis responded with a statement explaining her stance, which you can download here. It's long, but the first paragraph provides an effective summary:
We all agree on the importance of feeding children, but we differ on who should do this. I believe this duty belongs to the parents. Instead of honoring this time honored jurisdiction of the family, the summer feeding program treats families like they do not exist.
Photo courtesy of Rep. Davis' website.
They would almost certainly be healthier than getting a job at McDonald's so they can eat for free there every day
Her McDonald's suggestion was a bit silly but was 'tip' not the main idea of her article. Most of her original statement dealt with eating good food instead of junk. But my point is that if you can afford enough food to get fat , to eat a lot of meals at McDs etc. then you can afford some lentils and brown rice, some eggs, maybe even some flour and yeast to learn to make your own bread.
If you really want the poor (or anybody) to learn to eat right the best way to make sure they learn to shop and prepare food. Providing free meals takes away one incentive to do this. Whether it is a relatively cheap, though calorie rich meal from McD's or Church's , or a government cheese laden prepared meal from the state, the art cooking and eating as a family is being lost.
And I don't think the free meals are 'donated' -- they are paid for by taxpayers involuntary contributions.
Posted by: Mitchell Young | July 09, 2009 at 05:39 AM
Mitchell, poor families often have higher rates of obesity and diabetes because the cheapest foods contain a lot of empty calories, not because they're buying and eating more quality food than they ought to be. I would assume that these donated lunches would be more nutritionally sound. They would almost certainly be healthier than getting a job at McDonald's so they can eat for free there every day, like this horrible woman suggests poor children do. It's not so radical for older children to get part-time jobs, but neither is it radical to think that we have a duty to do what we can to help those in our society who are truly in need, especially if they're children.
Posted by: Katie | July 08, 2009 at 07:12 PM
I don't know if you spend much time around the less fortunate in our society -- but one thing you notice, on average and not to stereotype-- is that these folks aren't missing a whole heck of a lot of meals. Or if they are they are snacking pretty heavily.
Matter of fact, this is pretty interesting
California, btw, has one of the highest rates of new type-II diabetes cases. It might just be that your school lunches and breakfasts and AFDC and foodstamps are killing the poor.
Seriously, time was within living memory when schools taught children and parents fed children. Time was when older kids did get jobs to help out the family finances. Is that really such a radical notion?
Posted by: Mitchell Young | July 08, 2009 at 02:06 PM
I would consider myself to be a little right leaning, but cutting school lunch is just not practical or ethical right now. If people become dependent on a program that provides such a necessary thing as food it would be wrong to stop providing in a time of need such as this. When Cynthia Davis starts having poor black kids at her dinner table every night then I think she can talk.
Posted by: Tanner | July 08, 2009 at 11:14 AM