There's a new documentary film out about industrial agriculture called Food, Inc. If you have the opportunity to see it, I urge you to do so. Thanks to my roommate who works at the Pesticide Action Network of North America (PANNA), I attended an advance screening of it in San Francisco.Yes, it's another one of those make-your-stomach-turn documentaries that relies on shock and awe. But it conveys its message beautifully, and we might as well be shocked. What I appreciate most about Food, Inc. is that it addresses the social justice side of food (never mind that the audience in my screening was, in the words of Van Jones, "lily white"). It doesn't blame low-income consumers who can't buy their way out of the ugly web of industrial agriculture or even on farmers who are so often beholden to corporate headquarters.
The question that remains in my heart is what we do now. We know that our present food system is hopelessly broken. Without a doubt, the highest burden is on those who hold the least power in society: immigrants, small farmers, and low-income urban communities. Yet these are the same people who have the least clout in the halls of power. They certainly aren't the ones paying full-time lobbyists to protect their interests. I suspect they'd do a better job than our current leaders in paving a more humane path from the crop to the kitchen table.
Sigh. Power to the people. Love, too.
6 comments:
interesting. i'll definitely have to check this out.
i do think though that all americans, even "low income" americans have the ability to eat well. i'm sick of hearing excuses. bullshit, you CAN afford good food in this country pretty much no matter who you are, long's you have a job at all. yes of course, it's a matter of prioritizing your expenses. people need to go to the library and get educated about the shit they're putting in their mouths, it might illuminate some of the reasons why more than 50% of the people I see when i go to the mall are fatasses.
the fact of the matter is, and i am reminded of this every time one of my relatives comes to visit from russia, food costs next to nothing in this country - even organic fresh food. case in point, say a pound of organic cucumbers costs $3 (although it's usually less than that). in russia you'd pay about 100 roubles for a similar amount. now that makes the prices about the same ($1 = 32 roubles). minimum wage in america = $800/month. minimum wage in russia = $50/month.
can't afford medical insurance? try not putting shit in your body and looking both when crossing the road. works better than the real thing and it costs less.
sorry for ranting, lol. one of my trigger topics!
Wow. It was pretty hard for me to read what you wrote. To me, it reeks of hatefulness and prejudice. I work at an organization that serves seniors and preschool children in a broken, low-income neighborhood, and I hurt for the people I work with. I find it difficult to understand how it's productive to rant on a theme of, "Oh, those poor, uneducated, fat idiots." However, you do bring up some interesting points, and I appreciate the perspective you bring to the issue. So let's talk about it.
"bullshit, you CAN afford good food in this country pretty much no matter who you are, long's you have a job at all."
So then the question is why so many Americans aren't eating good food, especially those living in low-income communities. Let's remember that these are fellow human beings whose very lives are at stake. Why would they make choices that are ultimately self-destructive?
You pointed to many of the related issues yourself.
"can't afford medical insurance? try not putting shit in your body and looking both when crossing the road. works better than the real thing and it costs less." Wonderful. We should talk about health from the prevention angle much, much more often in this country. And again, why do people trash their bodies?
"people need to go to the library and get educated about the shit they're putting in their mouths, it might illuminate some of the reasons why more than 50% of the people I see when i go to the mall are fatasses." Great. Education is an important issue, and we could talk for hours about why that's a problem in communities like the one I work in. But your point - that the information is available - is a good one. The question, again, is why people don't act on it.
My own sense is that we often underestimate the power of culture - especially mainstream U.S. culture. Maybe that's the level at which we need to see some seismic changes.
Anyway, it's clear that this is an important enough issue to you that you felt the need to rant about it at length. I'll bet that there are more productive ways to channel that energy that are less mean-spirited and actually help to solve the problem at hand. As you well know, poverty isn't a pretty place to be. Let's not add insult to injury.
i'm not being mean-spirited, i'm being real. sometimes being nice about everything impedes facing certain unpleasant and harsh facts. it's difficult for me to work up patience and understanding when we're dealing with a problem which shouldn't even be there. this is a wealthy society. wealthy in information, wealthy in resources, wealthy in functional support organizations - when compared to others. i'm not about to feel sorry for members of a majorly spoiled public (yes i said it) whose laziness, ignorance, and addiction to processed carbs perpetuates the problem. the fact that the school system, for example, is an extension of a government which gives protection to the fucked up meat industry is on excuse people like to use here. poor uneducated masses. not a proper excuse for me. point blank, if you are not a dumbass, you should naturally care about what you send down your throat. the library is free and it has internet. go look that shit up. are there exceptions to the rule, cases where people do truly lack access to proper nutritional/educational resources? you bet. for the most part though? spoiled, lazy, ignorant complainers. really. and i'm also not gonna waste my personal time trying to enlighten those people while being nice about it. you seem willing though, so america's in luck.
"i'm not being mean-spirited, i'm being real."
Terrific. I agree, let's be real. This is a wealthy society; you're absolutely right about that. This is also a society with gross iniquities, and I want to make sure we're real about that, too. It seems like you get that: "are there exceptions to the rule, cases where people do truly lack access to proper nutritional/educational resources? you bet."
While we're "being real," I invite you to experience what inner-city America is "really" like. Live and/or work in the U.S. inner-city for a year or two. Get to know your neighbors. Imagine what it might be like to be a kid growing up in those areas. Truly immerse yourself in the culture you find so despicable in an effort to understand it and to dismantle what is destructive about it. Then get back to me.
thing is, i wouldn't be so self-assured about this if i didn't know exactly what it's like to be "inner city" - strange term. i grew up in one of the poorest provinces in russia, tiny soviet apartment, stiarcase landings smelled like piss, 4 year olds in my kindergarten swore like sailors and joked about rape, scheduled water, could afford butter maybe once a week, second-hand clothes, you name it. the only time my people went "shopping" was for a new pair of winter boots every couple of years, which is about how long it took to save up to buy something other than food and public transit fare. the difference between here and back home is, there's access to free internet, soup kitchens, support groups, people like yourself - you name it. and food is about 500% less expensive compared to income. which is why i got 0 sympathy. it's not an attitude problem, it's just a matter of perspective.
You do have perspective on growing up poor in Russia, and I respect that. Your childhood sounds rough, and it reminds me of what I hear from some of my clients and their families about growing up in the midst of drugs, violence, and fragmented communities. I would simply point out that your perspective is not an insider's view of low-income communities in the United States.
My own experience of working in these kinds of communities has made it painfully clear to me that soup kitchens and support groups aren't enough to reverse the tide of poverty in this country. My supervisors would tell you the same thing. The social safety net is thin, precarious, and utterly demoralizing for people who are daily bombarded with messages of their failure and worthlessness. I doubt I'd last long under the circumstances my clients face, and I certainly can't imagine having the time or the emotional wherewithal to become a nutritionally educated consumer of organic produce. I've seen firsthand the disparities in access to healthy food, and my own eating habits have deteriorated since starting to work in this neighborhood.
Regardless, I just don't have it in my heart to hear my clients being called "fatasses," even though many of them are overweight. Sorry, it still sounds mean-spirited to me, not like a great attitude. The people I work with are hurting - from diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart problems, not to mention the plethora of other stresses in their lives. Sure, they have choices, but it's a hell of a lot cushier when I make a mistake. Even in the community you grew up in, people had choices, and - correct me if I'm wrong - people probably didn't always make those that were in their best interest with regard to health, safety, and education. As humans, we're profoundly affected by the dominant culture of those surrounding us.
I guess I wonder whether you'd still have zero sympathy if you truly got to know my clients, who are the very people you're talking about. Maybe it wouldn't change your tenor a bit. But if so, I don't envy you. Zero sympathy just doesn't make sense in my heart. Not after the kinds of choices I've seen them have to make. They might be marginally better off in some ways than their counterparts in Russia, but in other ways, their suffering, material and nonmaterial, is still plenty horrific. The more I've gotten to know them, the more I've come to admire their strength of spirit just to make it through another day.
I'm trying to imagine what it would be like to feel zero sympathy. It's a hardness I don't aspire to. It breeds a failure to recognize others as members of the human family. And if there's any hope for peace or restoration of our communities, I imagine that's the failure we need to heal.
Post a Comment