An interesting topic I have found a paradigm shift is the progression of obesity in America.  In 2018, the Journal of the American Medical Association found that 32.2% of men were obese and the number was 35.5% for women.  In 1990 this number was only around 10% for both, it has been continually increasing every year.  Also, the national childhood obesity rate is currently 18.5%.  The root of obesity stems from two causes, the decrease in exercise throughout our culture, and the increase in unhealthy eating habits.  Many people believe the government needs to take action to stop this epidemic which can involve better nutrition labels and taxes on unhealthy food.  Others still hold the opinion that obese people are at fault for their own issue.  My opinion lies somewhere between both of these, that although most obese people do not put in the effort to stay active, the increase in unhealthy foods throughout our society is also to blame.

The first point I would like to discuss is the shift from America being an active society to only about 40% of adults being active on a regular basis.  Although the blame can be put on our laziness as a society, we must find out what causes this laziness.  First of all, the increase in motorized travel reduced walking everywhere which obviously was detrimental to the amount of activity Americans got every day.  A more modern cause would be the increase in home entertainment, be it movies, the”golden age” of television, or video games.  With all of these entertainment options available, going to the gym or out for a run seem like very bland choices.  Now, people not only have to motivate themselves to go exercise, but they also have to put down their phones and turn off their favorite TV show just to go do something less fun which requires more effort.  The choice becomes easy for people to stay at home and relax with a movie after a long day at work rather than getting back in their car to go sweat for an hour.  With the increase in home-based entertainment in today’s culture, people have much less will and incentive to go out an exercise.

The other part to the rise in American obesity is simply overeating and eating unhealthy foods.  Natural foods such as fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and high-quality meats are beginning to be entirely replaced by processed foods with more saturated fat, sugar, calories, and preservatives.  And what caused the rise of these foods when America is perfectly capable of producing enough natural foods to satisfy our population? The ease of ordering food.  Making food requires one to make frequent trips to the grocery store to buy fresh food, preparing it, and then cleaning up after.  Compare this whole process to simply ordering a pizza which is delivered right to your front door with no work.  Although America is beginning to see better options, most delivery foods are very fatty and unhealthy.  Also, people have the ability to order food online directly to their house.  This food travels for a while so it must be heavily processed and loaded with preservatives in order to be sustainable for long enough. McDonald’s, Dominoes, and Amazon are all culprits of making Americans lazy when it comes to food preparation.  The combination of an increase in calorically dense, unhealthy food and the ease of access to it through home delivery food services has led to the rise of obesity in America.