It's Thursday—the day when the New York Times Style section constructs tenuous trend stories designed to infuriate us about largely illusory issues! Woo hoo! Today's trend: crazy parents turn their kids into health food zombies!

Sure, you want to teach your kids to eat healthy food. But some parents have little Johnny and Suzy running around scared of trans fats and sodium and who knows what else, to the point that they can't enjoy cookies etc. like a little kid should! Some parents are even starving their kids to death:

[A dietitian] recalled a mother who brought in her preteen, apparently bulimic daughter. As Ms. Setnick discovered, the girl was not trying to lose weight. "Her mother only served brown rice, but she didn't like it," Ms. Setnick said. "She did like white rice. And while I'm not going to tell anyone what they can bring into their own home, we discussed that when the family went out, it would be O.K. to get white rice."

When the girl told her mother what Ms. Setnick said, the mother was furious, according to Ms. Setnick. "She said, ‘Don't you know white rice is just like sugar?' "

Outrageous! Round up the pitchforks, handcuffs, feeding tubes, and bags of Cheetos—we're off to save some kids from nutty health food! Christ, it sounds like this is everywhere. I mean the Times didn't even have that compulsory graf buried somewhere halfway down in a trend story that slyly reveals the whole premise of the piece is made-up for maximum shock effect...oh, wait:

But even without firm numbers, anecdotal reports from specialists suggest that a preoccupation with avoiding "bad" foods is an issue for many young people who seek help.

Still, punch any granola-bearing parents just in case. [NYT. Pic via]