The Gourmet Baby
Nine-month old Eric is typical of a phenomenon that has come to be known in the popular media as the "gourmet baby." He has two educated, professional parents who have delayed childbearing until their early thirties. He has all the best baby equipment that money can buy - the right furniture, the right stroller and a genuine shearling cover for his car seat. Eric has swimming lessons, looks at flash cards of famous paintings and simple words, plays with the best "developmentally engineered" toys and will begin the study of the violin in a year or two. He also has enough stimulation in the course of a day to make even a college student want to take a nap and shut it all out - which is just what Eric does.
The gourmet baby will grow in a few short years into David Elkind's "hurried child." The gourmet baby's parents are already investigating the "right" nursery school, the best grammar school, the most prestigious college. If the parents both work, they are desperately trying to pack what they think of as "quality time" into evenings and weekends. If the mother does not work outside the home, she has made a deliberate decision to stay home to be a "professional parent."
Although some observers have labeled the gourmet baby as a "yuppie" invention, others have noted that, like their designer clothes, gourmet babies can be found in families at all economic and social levels. It is particularly tragic that among the most susceptible to the trappings of consumerism are the parents of at-risk infants, such as teenage parents. The gap between what they see promoted as the best products for children and what they can actually buy tends to increase the alienation from the rest of society that they already feel.
The proliferation of gourmet babies
What has caused the proliferation of gourmet babies? First, societal changes such as new family work patterns, delayed child-bearing, and smaller families have contributed. Because of economic and social pressure, both working mothers and their stay-at-home counterparts are vulnerable to different kinds of guilt: the guilt of not contributing more to the family finances or the guilt of spending too much time away from children. That guilt, added to parents' natural pride in their children and desire to give them the best, materially, intellectually and emotionally, has resulted in an intense concentration on the infant as both evidence of and justification for the parents' lifestyle.
... Nestle’s quote, Bittman makes his editorial plea to ethos, by proposing proof that a woman of reliable mental power of this issue come to an agreement with Bittman's thesis statement. Bittman also develops pathos in this article because he grabs a widely held matter that to many individuals is elaborate with: "...giving them the gift of appreciating the pleasures of nourishing one another and enjoying that nourishment together.” (Mark Bittman) Bittman gives the reader the actions to think about the last time they had a family dinner and further imposes how these family dinners are altogether important for family time. Therefore, Bittman did a magnificent job in pointing into the morals of his targeted audience and developing a critical point of view about fast food to his intended audience leaving them with a thought on less fast food and more home prepared meals.
Pollan’s article provides a solid base to the conversation, defining what to do in order to eat healthy. Holding this concept of eating healthy, Joe Pinsker in “Why So Many Rich Kids Come to Enjoy the Taste of Healthier Foods” enters into the conversation and questions the connection of difference in families’ income and how healthy children eat (129-132). He argues that how much families earn largely affect how healthy children eat — income is one of the most important factors preventing people from eating healthy (129-132). In his article, Pinsker utilizes a study done by Caitlin Daniel to illustrate that level of income does affect children’s diet (130). In Daniel’s research, among 75 Boston-area parents, those rich families value children’s healthy diet more than food wasted when children refused to accept those healthier but
Marketers become rich by selling the idea of happiness to children; that life is all about buying and getting, and money is happiness. This ill treatment of children, by marketers, negatively affects social aspects of children. In more recent years, marketers have started to push more expensive, “branded” products to children. As Velmha La.Point states, “There’s a mantra in American society you are what you have, you are what you buy, you are what you own. The corollary of that, is and if you don’t have it, then you are a nobody”(Consuming Kids). This then leads to things such as depression or low self-esteem if ...
Hype words like ‘epidemic’ have been used to stress the relevance of obesity in today’s generation. The situation has been mainly accredited to poor parenting as well as the accessibility of high sugar and low quality food in developmental stages. However, this issue is not limited to cost and upbringing. It is crucial for parents to be aware of the media that exists encouraging children to partake in challenges similar to what is seen on Man v. Food.
With the advent of neoliberalism, the practice of mothering in Western society arguably shifted from a manner that simply ensures the growth of a child into one that maximizes the child’s growth (O’Reilly: Intensive Mothering, Oct 16). One representation of this shift is identified by Sharon Hays as intensive mothering in which the mother prioritizes the rearing of her child over the advancement of her professional career by investing most of her energy, time, and financial resources into her child (Hays 414). The novel I Don’t Know How She Does It by Allison Pearson can be analyzed through the perspective of intensive mothering. The protagonist, Kate Reddy, is a successful employee of a top investment managing firm in London who spends her
Instant gratification is extremely evident in the poverty stricken population of the United States. Because of this, poverty has turned into a vicious cycle. How a parent acts influences how his or her child will act. The cycle continues. Although an individual makes the choice of instant gratification, society, through the actions ...
Planck, Nina. "I Am Nursed on the Perfect Food." Real Food: What to Eat and Why. New York, NY: Bloomsbury, 2007. 39-44. Print.
Some people fail to see the true impact childhood obesity can have on a child's life. Children tending to overeat; they don’t understand that something that tastes so yummy could actually be bad for them. And with the cheaper pre-processed food usually being unhealthier calorie choices, people are unwilling to buy the more expensive fruits or vegetables that are required to build a good nutritional foundation. Plus, every generation has something that rubs off on the next generation; obesity is something that repeats through multiple generations, making the problems worse. “Parental attitudes to food, along with the kind of eating and leisure activities engaged in as a family and the level of support, are prim...
Swimme, Brian. “How Do Our Kids Get So Caught Up in Consumerism”. The Human Experience: Who Am I?. 8th ed. Winthrop University: Rock Hill SC, 2012. 155-157. Print.
Sandra Steingraber wrote the essay titled, “My Children: The Food Experiment” about her experience as a mother of two children who have never been exposed to any type of advertisements or propaganda regarding commercialized food products. Steingraber and her family moved to a cabin in the woods near Ithaca, New York and when the family arrived at their new home the discovered their television had been stolen. They decided not to replace the television, which did not seem like a conscious decision to not expose their children to advertisement as much as it related to it not being a central part of their current life or lack of finances to replace it. Not replacing the television provided a context clue that this experiment was not planned,
As early as the nineteen fifties women were identified and targeted as a market. In a consumer culture the most important things are consumers. Advertisers convinced homemakers that in order to be a “good” wife and mother you must have their products and appliances to keep a clean and perfect home. The irony of this ploy is that consumers must have money to buy, and so trying to improve their quality as homemakers, off into the workforce women went. This paradox left women ...
Initially published in 1845 by Dr. Benjamin Spock, The Common Sense Guide to Baby and Child Care revolutionized parenting, and thus, the upbringing of an entire generation and those following. As society changed, new editions of the original handbook emerged to fit the lifestyle of the current population. Dr. Spock wrote seven editions of The Common Sense Guide to Baby and Child Care alongside a prestigious pediatrician, Steven Parker, before his death in 1998. I read the ninth addition of the manual, revised by pediatrician Dr. Robert Needleman, which includes modern-day ideas such as eating disorders in teenagers and applying to college.
Consumer culture among children has transitioned from a secondary role to a primary role during the past few decades. Children are becoming more aware of their consumer power. Everywhere one looks today, there is marketing strategy geared towards minors, and really doesn’t matter what the age. The purchasing power given to children rests with their family’s financial situation; it can be assumed the higher economic class the more money there is to spend for the child’s needs. However, this is not always the case. Some parent’s restrict child spending, because of the life lessons than can be taught from regulated spending. This essay will examine the increasing childhood consumer marketplace, and the parenting approaches of families. Exploring this topic will give a greater understanding of how children have an ever increasing share in the household politics.
Nowadays children’s share in the family expenditure occupies a significant place. It is also believed that this share is spent by the elders to buy necessary things for the children but now the scenario is changing. The children have the major say in deciding what things they want and what they don’t. According to one of the researcher, spending power of children or young consumers is expected to be over £200m in the UK alone (Nicole Weiner, 2004). So now it can be estimated that how much it would have been risen over the last 7 years. Markets are also influenced by this kind of behaviour and mould themselves accordingly. We can see a large variety of child centric things in the markets, which are making huge profits despite being not much of necessity.
...on that our children would put things like companions or hardware before their work. In all actuality, most children are inspired, however not by what we think ought to rouse them. Take a gander at it along these lines: your youngster is presumably exceptionally energetic and not in the slightest degree lethargic with regards to things that energize him, similar to computer games, music, Facebook and what cool new pants to purchase. One thing for certain is that on the off chance that you weight your kid keeping in mind the end goal to inspire him, it quite often exacerbates the situation.