Jamie & Jimmy's Holiday Hunger

foolofbeans

So I watched the Jamie & Jimmy food show tonight and they have started a campaign called 'Holiday Hunger'. Apparently many children go hungry in school holidays as there are no free school meals so the plan is to open schools up during holidays to feed all these hungry children.
Why aren't the parents, who are not feeding their children, being targeted for some instruction?
Am I wrong to be annoyed at this campaign? I have teacher friends who tell me there are certain children they know don't have breakfast or maybe any other meal at home but I don't feel we should tiptoe around and surreptitiously feed the children, we should shame the parents into providing the most basic of needs.

sooty&sweep

I didn't watch the programme but I don't disagree with you as I also think more pressure should be put on parents to ensure their children receive a decent diet.

However the issue is those children are hungry & need food now.

Jen

tightasagnats

The idea that shame would work is sadly rather naive. It's about neglect and lack of resources at all sorts of levels.

Do you ever eat junk that you know is no good for you? Do you drink too much? Smoke? Any of these self-destructive things we push out of consciousness because there's some need for something else (like feeling rewarded or not so stressed) that feels greater. Our whole nation is in a mental and physical health crisis. Shaming is a rather primitive way of dealing with something - it doesn't work in religion or in society generally.

Unless we tackle mental ill health and emotional impoverishment we will get nowhere. People who are well resourced emotionally, and have the financial means to manage, and work and interests that give meaning to their lives, do not eat and drink to dangerous excess, gamble, put their well-being at great risk, nor do their kids go hungry. This is a complex, pernicious problem, and in the meantime the kids must be fed.

Remember the parents pushing burgers through the gates of the school? People feel ashamed already, and telling them what to do puts defences up even further and will cause the opposite of what is needed. The sad reality is that it's more cost effective and efficient to get the kids fed at school than tackle the gnarly issue of neglect and impoverishment and lack of meaning and self-worth in many people's lives.

For what it's worth, I work with these sorts of families in the NHS. It's often soul destroying, but with the right resources people can turn their lives around, but it takes years. Cuts to services will continue to add to the problem. I welcome these programmes that highlight the difficulties - people certainly need to take responsibility for the damage and neglect they do to themselves and their families, but you'll only ever get that through compassionate - but serious means in my experience.

Better_Days

I agree that the issue is complex and that shaming parents is likely to be counterproductive. Not only that, for some there is simply not enough money to provide adequate and regular meals. Shaming will not magic the money out of the air.

In the short term feeding hungry children is the compassionate thing to do. There may well be associated benefits for health, learning, behaviour and self esteem.

In the longer term changing the behaviour of parents can, I have no doubt, be very difficult indeed. And for various reasons, some may simply not have the capacity to change. In the meantime I think it is important to do what can be done to improve the life chances of their children, and hopefully reducing the likelihood of history repeating itself.

Kim_kim

I was quite shocked at the headmaster who said the kids revolted after gettting a sandwich for lunch as they had been off for a week & were looking forward to a hot meal.
How sad is that

DigForVictory

Shame is the wrong tool.

Education, a better benefits system & being able to rewrite the parents childhoods would help.

Some of these parents do not know better, some are dreadful cooks & unsafe with cash & there will be a few who are frankly cared for by their children & a good dose of shame will cause suicide.

Unless you're utterly certain that the current care system will sort that (& I'm not), I'd leave shame as a 'tool' in it's box.

Person_one

foolofbeans wrote: »

Why aren't the parents, who are not feeding their children, being targeted for some instruction?

Because we have a government that doesn't really care if poor, neglected kids starve or not. They aren't going to grow up to vote Tory so they don't matter.

Simple as that really.

barbiedoll

I think that everyone has this misguided idea that it's only benefit recepients or "trashy" single mothers who don't feed their children properly. I can tell you of several children that I've known over the years, who have had working, comfotably-off parents, who simply haven't bothered to even try to feed their kids with decent food.

One of my son's friends (who incidentally is adopted), was always coming round our house to play. I used to feed him lunch or dinner (or both) depending on what time he was here. He starting coming every day and one time, waltzed in and said "Can we have sausages for dinner today?"

His mum came to collect him one evening as they were going out somewhere. She came in and thanked me for feeding him already. She said that he had told her that he had eaten something at our house and congratulated me on getting him to try something "different" (I think it was spaghetti bolognase or similar, nothing too fancy, I'm not much of a cook myself!) It transpired that as he was a "fussy" eater (aren't they all?) she used to give him pizza or burger and chips almost every day as she said that was what he liked. At our house, he'd eaten pasta, roast dinners, eggs in all shapes and forms and so on. This family earned good money, she worked part-time and they lived in a lovely house, had several holidays each year and the kid had every expensive gadget on the market. It was just laziness on her part if you ask me.

Even now, my son (18) goes to college each morning after having a bit of breakfast, although he won't eat much in the mornings, like many people. He has a decent packed lunch every day and a hot meal at night. Yet lots of his fellow students eat no breakfast and very little during the day. They'll go to the takeaway after college and that will be their main meal for the day, no-one cooks for them at home, nor do they cook for themselves, they will fill up on biscuits and crisps etc.

A whole generation are suffering from poor nutrition, it's not purely down to income levels.

Kim_kim

Person_one wrote: »

Because we have a government that doesn't really care if poor, neglected kids starve or not. They aren't going to grow up to vote Tory so they don't matter.

Simple as that really.

As bad as the cuts to our social, health & educational services are, I don't believe that.
We are better than that.

Person_one

Kim_kim wrote: »

As bad as the cuts to our social, health & educational services are, I don't believe that.
We are better than that.

Most of us are, I agree, but about a quarter of the country voted for these people.

Auntie-Dolly

Is this the same Tory government that has introduced free school meals for all KS1 children and free milk for under 5's?