Too much TV leads to child obesity, smoking, alcohol, pregnancy and poor school performance

Lots of TV and Web harms kids' health
Reuters
Dec 2, 2008

Spending a lot of time watching TV, playing video games and surfing the Web makes children more prone to a range of health problems including obesity and smoking, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

U.S. National Institutes of Health, Yale University and the California Pacific Medical Center experts analyzed 173 studies done since 1980 in one of the most comprehensive assessments to date on how exposure to media sources impacts the physical health of children and adolescents...

The studies offered strong evidence that children who get more media exposure are more likely to become obese, start smoking and begin earlier sexual activity than those who spend less time in front of a screen, the researchers said.

Studies also indicated more media exposure also was linked to drug and alcohol use and poorer school performance, while the evidence was less clear about an association with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, they added.

"I think we were pretty surprised by how overwhelming the number of studies was that showed this negative health impact," NIH bioethicist Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, one of the researchers in the report released by the advocacy group Common Sense Media, said in a telephone interview.

...One study cited in the report found that children who spent more than eight hours watching TV per week at age 3 were more likely to be obese at 7. And research shows that many U.S. children, even toddlers, watch far more.

Dr. Cary Gross of Yale University.. said TV and other media content can have a profound impact on children's attitudes and beliefs, most notably among teens.

He cited a U.S. study by the RAND research organization published in November that showed that adolescents who watched more programing with sexual themes had a higher risk of becoming pregnant or causing a pregnancy.

Thirteen of 14 studies that evaluated sexual behavior found an association between media exposure and earlier initiation of sexual behavior, the researchers said.

VP choice Sarah Palin and Britney Spears' mom: what's the difference?

The basic difference between Sarah Palin and Britney Spears' mom (both have been in the news recently as a result of their underage daughters becoming pregnant) seems to be political. Spears accepted silently all the discussion of the problem of pregnant unmarried teenagers.

Sarah Palin is suddenly trying to stop the discussion of family values.

It's quite clear that abstinence-only sex education doesn't work for many teenagers. Sarah Palin needs to discuss that subject.

Then there's the subject of communication with teenagers. I simply don't believe that Palin informed John McCain of her daughter's pregnancy. I don't think Palin covered it up, either. I think she didn't know.

How could she not know her daughter is 5 months pregnant? I suspect that the pregnancy is not that far advanced.

I think Bristol Palin was afraid to tell her mother because her mother is unable to deal with reality. Not surprisingly, Palin wants to silence discussion of the matter, not open up to the American people about any realization that she might have been wrong when she opposed sex education that teaches about birth control and cut food and shelter programs for pregnant teens in Alaska.

Sarah Palin's fuzzy thinking about pregnant teenagers

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin wrote in her line-item veto (note the initials "SP" in the above document) in this copy of a 2008 spending bill obtained by The Washington Post.

People who make harsh judgments of others are vulnerable when their own shortcomings are exposed. Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin is now one of those people.

Palin cut back on help for other people's pregnant teenage daughters, apparently because she found those girls undeserving of society's support. She also opposed teaching teenagers about contraception. I imagine she's more surprised than I am that her seventeen-year-old daughter is pregnant.

Washington Post
By Paul Kane
Sept. 2, 2008
...Palin reduced funding for Covenant House Alaska by more than 20 percent, cutting funds from $5 million to $3.9 million.

...According to Passage House's web site, its purpose is to provide "young mothers a place to live with their babies for up to eighteen months while they gain the necessary skills and resources to change their lives" and help teen moms "become productive, successful, independent adults who create and provide a stable environment for themselves and their families."

Palin's own daughter, Bristol, is five months pregnant and has plans to wed...

Earlier today the Associated Press reported that Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, opposed funding to prevent teen pregnancies, a position that Palin also took as governor. "The explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support," she wrote in a 2006 questionnaire distributed among gubernatorial candidates.

Reporters asked McCain in November 2007 whether he supported grants for sex education in the United States, whether such programs should include directions for using contraceptives and whether he supports President Bush's policy of promoting abstinence.

"Ahhh, I think I support the president's policy," McCain said.