Yes, there is a crisis of hunger on the planet, but hunger is not caused by a scarcity of food but a scarcity of democracy.

When people hear about legal restrictions on marketing and advertising, often the response is: Aren't you just being a food nanny? Isn't that government playing too much of a role in our lives? When people have that response, they're forgetting the extent to which what kids are eating and drinking is having as much of an impact on their lives as, say, if they were starting to smoke cigarettes as teenagers. Diet-related illnesses are causing nearly as many deaths as tobacco-related illnesses.

Every time you spend money, you're casting a vote for the kind of world you want.

People don't realize how much the food industry has infiltrated all aspects of our children's lived experience, including their experience at school. There are sponsored curricula by food companies, they're also in our schools with logos sponsoring sports teams.

Even very progressive, informed people still get tongue-tied responding to the question, can organic and sustainably raised food still feed the world? A corollary to that question, and one we certainly hear a lot these days, is that genetically modified foods are better for the environment because they use fewer chemicals, which has been thoroughly debunked.

Those of us who think about what we eat, how it's grown, those of us who care about the environmental impact of food - we've been educated by fabulous books, like Fast Food Nation and documentaries like Food Inc. But despite these and other great projects that shine a critical light on the topic, every year the food industry spends literally tens of millions of dollars to shape the public conversation about our food system.

The food industry is spending almost $2 billion a year marketing directly to children and teens. We know that those ads lead to children demanding certain brands, and we know that food and drink marketing gets all of us to consume more calories. If we're going to address diet-related illnesses, talking about marketing to kids is a key step. There should be places like schools that are protected sanctuaries from commercialization and from advertising, especially when it comes to kids' health.