Fast Food Essay: Starting Early, By Marion Nestle

In her chapter “Starting Early” in the book Food Politics, Marion Nestle, a nutritionist, and professor of food studies, insists that children are introduced to junk foods early in life due to obsessive commercials advertisements, trying to persuade them mainly. Dr. Nestle started writing her chapter on how concerned she is because there are more obese children than ever (175). Statistically, the author explained that there are more non-Caucasian kids that are obese than white children (Nestle 175). She says that the main reason children become obese is because they eat foods that are not nutritious for them because the society tells do so after watching advertisements on TV. The author believes that the changes in the demographics, economy, environment, and society are part of the cause for the increase of childhood obesity (Nestle 175). According to her research, children are fed with larger portions of junk food and very few young Americans eat the required foods in the food pyramid (Nestle, 175-176). Although, children usually eat one third of their meals in fast food places or school, most of them consume higher amounts of unhealthy items such as sodium chloride, fat, and calories (Nestle, 176). Nestle explained that companies do their job to market junk foods to kids (176).

The writer mentions a lot about how young Americans are being targeted early in life to buy junk foods (Nestle 176). Dr. Nestle says that the businessmen of junk food companies advertise