Moving Towards a Healthier America

I found an issue analysis communicating the risks of obesity similar to mine.  This issue analysis, Overweight, Obesity and Weight Management , gave the same information about obesity and had the same organizational flow as mine.  The main difference was the solution that this issue gave to the obesity epidemic.  The solution focused more on individual actions to change being overweight or obese.  Excersice, surgery, and dieting were the solutions given.  This would have been a good resource to have used in my issue analysis.  I could have included these other ideas for solutions to the problem of obesity.   Since my solution centered around the government taking action to solve the problem, including solutions for individuals to make a difference would have been a good idea.

An article in the New York Times, Skipping Cereal and Eggs, and Packing on the Pounds says a recent study confirms that those who eat breakfast consistently weight less than those who eat it sporadically or never.  However, the reason for this is still unclear.  The study also found that those who ate breakfast were also more active and exercised more.  The relationship between eating breakfast and weighing less even persisted over time.  This is just another tip to help Americans loose weight and become a healthier nation.

In his An Inconvenient Truth presentation, Al Gore used a great deal of visuals to both enhance his presentation and also to better explain his points.  One of the ways visuals enhanced his presentation was by showing the audience exactly what global warming is doing to our planet.  He used comparative images of glaciers to show the extent of the melting.  Similarly, he used comparative images of lakes and rivers to show the extent to which they are being dried up.  I think that these images make a bigger impact on the audience, rather than just telling them that glaciers are melting and rivers and lakes are drying up.  Another example of his use of visuals to enhance his presentation was his use of animation clips.  One clip that appealed to pathos was of a polar bear swimming in the middle of the ocean, unable to find a place to rest and ultimately drowning because the ice chunks that would normally be available to rest on had melted.  One other clip that added humor to Gore’s presentation was a Matt Groening animation which Gore used to explain global warming in a basic manner.  All of these visuals I think were used to better show Gore’s points and to make a bigger impact on the audience.  These visuals supplemented Gore’s presentation and allowed him to reach a wider audience.

Gore also used a lot of graphs and charts to convey the information to his audience, rather than just reading the numbers and statistics to them.  I think this was much more effective because by both seeing and hearing the statistics, the audience will probably be more likely to remember what Gore was trying to tell them.  In one instance Gore enhanced his use of graphs even more by using a scissor-lift.  This was used to demonstrate how much higher the earth’s temperatures are now than they have ever been before. 

Gore also made a point to mention his family and the farm he grew up on.  He described how his family grew tobacco and continued to do so even after it was found that smoking was bad for you and how they only stopped after his sister died of lung cancer due to smoking.  This was done to parallel global warming.  In the older generation, people grew up smoking and when it was found that smoking was dangerous, it was already ingrained in people, so no one really made a move to change and faced the consequences of that.  Similarly, our generation has recently found out that global warming is an issue and is causing problems for the planet.  Now is when we can either be like the previous generation with smoking and not do anything and face the consequences or we can step up and do something to make a change.  The visuals Gore used during this section of the film were pictures from his youth that included his sister and current shots of the farm he grew up on.  These visuals offered the audience a different side of Gore.  It showed the audience that Gore is a regular person, not just a politician.  This allows Gore to appeal to the audience as a person who is concerned about the environment and who is making a difference, which in turn shows that audience that they too can make a difference as a person.  

The article, Gap in Life Expectancy Widens for the Nation, found in the New York Times talks about how the gap of life expectancy for rich and poor Americans has grown over the years instead of decreased.  The article gives a number of reasons for this, one of them being the fact that there is a gap in ”health literacy” between middle and upper classes and the lower classes.  The lower classes are less likely to know about proper diet, exercise, and healthy lifestyles.  This goes along with the information I found while doing my project that said those of lower incomes are more likely to be overweight or obese.  I think that this group is one of the main groups that needs to be targeted with education and a means to change their lifestyle.  While there is obesity in the upper and middle classes, as this article states, they are more likely to be educated and informed about living in a healthy manner.  Those classes have the information and means to eat right and exercise.  They have the Internet to access information on obesity, where the lower class does not have this ability.   I think in order to make a difference in the rate of obesity in America, those who are most at risk for being or becoming obese should be targeted first and with the most intensity.

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The film/documentary An Inconvenient Truth was an amazing and informative piece.  Al Gore gave an extremely thorough and complete presentation of the facts about global warming.  He was able to anticipate the doubts the audience would have, some of which I had, and dissprove them.  For example, I was taught that the world goes through cyclical warming and cooling periods and that the world was simply in a warming part of the cycle.  The presentation was able to forsee this and displayed a graph showing that, yes the earth does go through a cycle, but currently the earth is at a temperature well above what it has ever been before, even while in a warming cycle.  Many of my preconceptions about global warming were proved wrong in this documentary and I now have more of a sense of the true dangers of global warming. 

This a documentary that I think everyone should watch.  It opened my eyes to a lot of things.  I did not realize all of the consequences that are occuring because of global warming and all of the problems that it could cause in the near future.  The images that had the greatest impact on me were the map of how much land would be under water if parts of Greenland and/or Antarctica melted and the animated clip of the polar bear not being able to find a piece of ice to rest on and it was forced to continue swimming in the vast ocean, with no land or ice in sight.  These are only some of the results of global warming. 

I liked how the documentary did not leave you totally overwhelmed with a sense that the problem was too big for one person to make a difference.  Gore gave a list of actions that individuals could take and he showed how big of an impact that this would make on the problem.  He gave conceivable and possible solutions that would be easy to follow.   

One of the leading causes of why American’s are so overweight is the fact that we eat out so much.  When we eat out we have no idea of how many calories or fat we are eating.  People can try to pick the healthier looking options, but they are not always that much healthier.  Something that would help to end this problem would be to have a nutrition label next to the meal option on a menu in a restaurant, which is what the New York City Department of Health and other groups are strongly encouraging.  An article in a recent Washington Post issue offers other ways in order to make eating out a healthier event.  A highly visible nutrition label would hopefully help to decrease the overwhelming number of obese individuals in the United States by showing people exaclty how much they are eating.

Recently for class I was assigned to read a chapter out of the book Disaster.  I found this incredibly interesting.  The chapter went through the actions of the government leading up to Hurricane Katrina.  I myself was not familiar with any of the preceedings before reading this.  It was a very easy read, that kept my attention the whole way through, while still being able to convey the facts around the event.  While this was very interesting to read, it was also kind of unnerving because it gives a look into how our government handles dangerous and possibly devestating events.  There seemed to be a disconnect in the government between the people who seemed to know exactly how bad the storm was going to be and the people who had the authority to take action.  There never seemed to be any sense of real urgency among the majority of people helping to prepare New Orleans and the surrounding areas.  It gave me the impression that the government tried to hold off moving people out of the dangerous area until the last possible minute, but by then it was too late.  I guess that this is just an example of how important risk communication is and how it can go terribly wrong.  This chapter made it seem as if no one communicated to the groups being evacuated just how serious the hurricane was going to be, even though all of the reports coming from the National Weather Service indicated that it was going to be really bad. 

For my risk communication project on obesity I am to create five press releases.  We read How to Create Powerful Press Releases, by Judith Welsh in order to gain some insight on the ways to create a good press release.  Three situations in which I could respond to or address with my press release are as follows:

1.)  To inform the public:  This would be used to address the audience and inform them of the dangers of obesity, who is most at risk, and what more should be done to prevent obesity.

2.)  To keep the name of your product in the news:  This approach would keep enforcing the dangers of obesity and what can be done to reverse/prevent it.  Simply by keep reminding the audience of the problem and keeping it fresh in their minds, hopefully it will make some sort of impact.

3.)  To Attract An Audience:  Research shows that certain groups are more likely to become obese, so by attracting the attention of this audience hopefully could help prevent obesity in those groups.

In Having Your Say, chapter 10 describes an “A but B” problem statement as a clash between what you want and what you have.  The “A but B” statement is a two part statement in which your goal, value, or expectation is given followed by an obstacle, value, or observation which prevents your goal, value, or expectation from occurring or being reached.  This can be used to describe some of the problems in my risk communication project with obesity.

1.)  With all the information and awareness about the risks of obesity it would be expected that the rate of obesity among Americans would start to decrease, however, in reality, the rate of obesity has continued to remain excessively high over the past few years. 

2.)  The government has made attempts and steps towards decreasing the rate of obesity in America by funding programs in state health departments, communities, and schools, but the programs have not yet had a significant affect on the nation’s problem with obesity.