In an explosive Reddit thread, users of the social news aggregation site were quick to weigh in.
As the thread got more and more traction, responses ranged from straight up calling childhood obesity as “Abuse” to disagreeing with the claim, stating, “The law doesn’t require people to be perfect parents”.
However, no matter which side you stand on, this isn’t the first time the childhood obesity-child abuse argument has been talked about. Here on Australian soil just last year, The Age revealed that Victorian welfare authorities were using “extreme obesity” as a means of removing kids from the care of their parents.
Their investigation refers to two children separated from their parents by the Department of Human Services, citing obesity within each of their child protection cases.
And experts – like Tim Gill, who is the associate professor of Sydney University’s Boden Institute of Obesity, Nutrition, Exercise and Eating – predict that we are likely to see more and more of the cases crop up.
”We are going to see more children in that [extreme] weight category and in some ways, yes, it’s a failure of parents,” Mr Gill told The Age.
“But it also reflects a failure of society – that we could create a circumstance that would allow and encourage kids to overeat and under-exercise to such an extent that they get to that weight.”
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