Greg Critser Too Much Of A Good Thing Summary

“At least 25% of all Americans under age nineteen are overweight or obese” (161). In Greg Critser’s “Too Much of a Good Thing”, Critser, a published author of a book about the epidemic of obesity, explains how America has become obese. Critser published his piece in the Los Angeles Times in 2001 after the United Nations came to New York to discuss the rising issue of obesity. Critser moves on to listing facts and past studies to convince the audience of concerned parents that there is a problem. In Greg Critser’s article, the language of his argument embodies the threat of obesity by challenging emotions, providing logic, and giving examples from credible sources. The increase of obesity caused the United Nations to meet in New York to discuss the circumstance.

Greg Critser thinks that obesity is awful and nothing about it should be accepted. He starts his argument by listing facts about childhood obesity. He states that obesity didn’t used to be an epidemic, and he said, “our ancestors knew simply as avoiding gluttony” (161). This implies that overeating used to be classified as sinful, but overeating is still as bad now as it was when it was titled gluttony. Critser suggests that overeating is still on the gluttony level of bad. Critser frightens the audience with statistics of childhood obesity. He states that 25% of Americans under the age of nineteen are overweight and that number has doubled since the eighties. Rising rate of obesity in children is what Critser focuses on. He then compares this obesity epidemic with other conditions of the