A diet fueled by food stamps is making South Texans obese but leaving them hungry

[haele]

56. Yup, they apparently do.

The issue is this woman and her children are making choices that feel right to them.
The article is superficial because it was written to skew the reader's attitudes, throwing up a picture of a significant problem to judge without really addressing the problem itself.

Is the problem food assistance?
Is the problem the woman's attitude?
Is the problem that too many people can live off junk food while on food stamps?
Or is the problem a subtle dig at "them" - the stereotype of the lazy, ignorant, chronically poor who are heading to an early grave on the taxpayer dollar?

Not -
Is this woman living in a food desert?
Why she is making the food choices she is? Is it because these foods are "comfort foods", marketed to maximize effects on salivary and endorphin release?
Would she make better choices if she had more individualized assistance - better education, more concern and interest with including her and her children in the community at large? If she were part of an organization or co-op that provided mutual day care and community service, would she be less stressed and healthier?
Would she and her children eat healthy food if given the opportunity? This last is particularly tricky - some people are f'n picky eaters who will only eat the limited variety of food they were fed regularly as kids - they will refuse to eat food of "the wrong texture" or "tastes funny".

From personal example, the kidlet's boyfriend has an extremely limited food palate and is a right horror to cook for - will only eat fast or quick foods, grilled foods, fried foods, "Seafood" - pretty much only shrimp, lobster, and we got him to like catfish nuggets, "Mexican&quot Taco Bell, quesadillas, tacos and burritos), "Italian" (i.e., anything with cheese, salty oregano and garlic tomato sauce, pasta and ground beef), catsup only cheeseburger and fries, and generic Asian (Sweet and sour, teriyaki and egg rolls). He puts catsup on everything. Anything with an unexpected texture, or doesn't hit the basic sweet, fat, or salt sensors on his tongue will actually cause him to gag and work himself into a violent episode of nausea and headaches. He hates mustard or pickle. The boy will "eat around" onions, zucchini, or mushrooms in a home-made marinara sauce, and spit out hand-made sausage from our farmer's market butcher, because it had "too much in it and tastes weird". Surprise, surprise, he grew up on junk food and "eat out". And he didn't grow up on assistance, he grew up in a typical urban California "middle class" household with a parent (okay, personal judgment here) that was busy trying to keep hold of his/her own "glory days" well into middle age.
I suspect some of the children of the woman in the article will exhibit the same the same reaction if given "healthier" foods - they already associate quick, sweet, salt, and fat with comfort.

But, like dealing with other "excesses" that have various public health implications - alcohol, smoking, drugs, relationships - how does one support and educate healthy eating? And how far should public interest interfere with personal choices?

Haele