HMW 26

• 50 million Americans don't have healthcare (Sicko)
• In Haiti it costs $20,000 to treat a disease, whilst in America $6 million
• America spends the most on its healthcare (17% GDP), yet it has the lowest life expectancy (77.5) (Landmark reading)
• The new healthcare plan will FINE people for not having healthcare (Landmark reading)

Everything has been helpful in understanding what kind of a state America's healthcare system truely is in. Sicko, although terribly one sided put in into perspective for me. Seeing people who have lost everything really put it into perspective to me. How can a country that stands on being so civilised and 'free for all' stand for such injustice?

I think it would be interesting to explore how the healthcare system got in this situation initally and how it can get out of the mess. It would be nice to focus on something hopeful, as I find the subject of death everyday a bit depressing...

HW 25 - Response To Sicko

Investigating the corrupt healthcare system and the politicians that have allowed it to be this way was an enlightening and scary process.
We supposedly live in a country that is 'free for all' but yet the healthcare, is far from free. In one of the richest, capitalist countries in the world we still see 50 million Americans go without healthcare. In a privatised healthcare system where granting money for operations is seen as a 'loss' and the motto they work by is 'less care is more profit' how can we expect to get the care we deserve? Meanwhile a short step over the border into Canada it's a completely different story. Healthcare is free. Whilst in 'civilised' America you would have to decide which finger to keep after sawing them both off because you couldn't afford to keep them both, in Canada you would still have the priviledge of 5 fingers. Although America may be a leading superpower in the 21st century they operate under what seem quite frankly an outdated system. Step into a different country once again, Britain, and instead of having cigarettes sold in pharmacy, you actually have medicine sold. Although ignorantly we have not learnt that an industrialised system is for the better.

"$100 spent to defeat Hilarys health care plan"
"Like Canadians and Brits, the French live longer than we do."
"The life expectancy in the United States is 77.5 whilst the united Kingdom is 78.5, France 79.6 and Canada 80.2"

On one hand I completeley agree with what Moore is trying to argue, but as usual he does it in his one sided, persuasive, in your face way. Once again he has presented a very one sided argument that will persuade his mindless followers that everything is peachy and rosey when you have free healthcare. Although coming from a country with healthcare I will say that I think the American healthcare system is completley messed up, and quite frankly contradicts everything you stand for, I am not going to lie and say that everything works out when there is free healthcare. Moore convieniently left out that people were left dying on the table, waiting for surgery and the tedious waiting lists. But then I remind myself that Moore is a filmmaker, and at the end of the day, no one wants to see a boring film that agrees with both sides. People want to see action. And Moore wants to see money..

'Tuesdays with Morrie' by Mitch Albom (published by DoubleDay in 1997).

Tuesdays with Morrie follows the journey of a dying man,Morrie, and his student Mitch Albom. Through Morrie's unconventional approach to death Mitch gets fascinating insights, and wisdom from a man slowly sufferring a cripling disease.
In one of the initial chapters of the book Mitch rediscovers his old teacher as he's on the news. This was an important point for me as I feel the only comforting part in death is that it makes you realise how fragile life is, and thus appreciate everything that much more.

"And if you are ever going to have other people trust you, you must feel that you can trust them, too- even when you're in the dark. Even when you're falling." -pg 61
I loved this quote and brought it up many times in discussion. I found it so inspriational and inspiring that someone in a position such as this would still have so much wisdom and hope. Much like when your in a dark room you need to search for the light, you always need to have hope because if you don't have that, what do you have? I actually think this is one of my favourite quotes. This can be related to dying as if you do not have hope, the process will criple you not only physically, but mentally aswell.

"Mitch, I don't allow myself any more self-pity than that. A little each morning, a few tears, and that's all." pg 57
I think Morrie's approach to death is fascinating, and if everyone in the world thought like him we wouldn't have a stigma about death or dying, but embrace it. We might be scared deep down, but we would embrace the new experiences and insights that it had brought to our life.

"Love wins. Love always wins." pg 40
I just loved this quote, because to me, the true meaning of life is love.


Morrie's approach to dying does not demonstrate how the masses view death. He embraces it and does not wallow in self-pity like others. I found this so inspirational, and even though i'm not sure I would approach it the same way, I found it extremely interesting.

Comments

i had to print screen because apparently blogger doesnt like me...

HMW 21

1. The first thing that hit me was that the guest speaker had no insurance, as they were artists and self employed. Thus reslting in having to wait 11 months to gain the government health care that her family was entitled to. I found it enlightening though, that when her family eventually did gain the correct insurance, the nurses and medcine they recived could not have been better.

2. An aspect that made me sympathise with Ms Wood's story was that of time 'snowballing.' After my grandad was diagnosed two years seemed to fly by and you realise you can never have enough time with the ones you love.

3. As Wood told her story I sensed a medley of different emotion from denial of her husbands death and the nasty disease that took his like to shock of the diagnosis. I identified with everything she said, although I can't imagine the person I'd spent over two decades with not being there when I woke up everyday.

4. The 'honeymoon from death' which Wood talked about I was already familiar with me. You want to believe that your loved one will make a miraculous recovery and convince yourself that it will soon come. So you cling on to the slightest sign of recovery, and hope and pray with every inch of your body that it will go away and you will get better, but unfortunately, sometimes it's just another bump in the road.

5. Wood talked about seeking advice from a Buddhist monk about the afterlife and death. To me it seems like she was looking for an answer. I think it is simply human nature to want to understand and answer everything in life, and this is why people turn to religion. They want to believe that all their problems are part of some master plan, or that an all mighty being can simply fix them. I think this is where heaven comes into play. We don't want to believe the bleak, depressing reality of just laying 6 feet under when we die, as the idea of sitting a fluffy white cloud in heaven with everything we could ever want sounds so much better.
I believe in signs just like Wood, but I'm an agnostic. It would be lovely to believe that their is an idyllic place up in the sky where we all go when we die, but as my Grandma says, when something is too good to be true, it probably is. So I like to believe that my Grandad is still with me, he's still watching over me, and I still talk to him.

6. Wood described that she never used the word 'death' or 'dying' and although some may say that this is living in denial, others would argue that this is the way in which they wanted to deal with it. And rather than denying the truth, they rather put aside the depressing reality of death and decided rather to focus on the positive. Although I feel that we should face death and not be scared of it, I totally agree with embracing the positive in life and hoping for the best. Because at the end of the day if we don't have hope, what do we have?

After hearing the guest speakers story, a few questions came to mind.
- Is artificial life natural, and is it needed?
- Does religion help or hinder our ability to accept death?
- Is denial a bad thing, or does it keep hope alive?
- Why do we stick to the social norms because we agree with them or because its whats expected of us?

HMW 19

In retrospect to following in our families footsteps, I feel as though my family has moulded my view on 'Illness and Dying' and society has shaped theirs.

The first experience with death I have come across was my Grandfathers death last year. As far as I know the normal social practices were followed. One main differnece being that my Grandma asked everyone to wear blue, instead of black. Blue was special to my Grandad as since a teenager he was an avid Cardiff bluebirds supporter. Seeing everyone coming to his funeral in the team strip or just a simple blue top really meant alot to me, as I knew my Grandad would have loved it.

I think that whatever the social practices may be you need to find what is meaningful and appropriate for you,because what does following the rules really mean if they go against everything you believe in? I think because we focus so ridigly on fitting into the social norms that we do not even question them, as we believe them to be 'normal.' We shouldn't feel confined or trapped in certain rituals, but flourish in differences and new experiences.

HMW 18 Health, Illness & Feasting

Coming from a culture that doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving has given me the perspective that Thanksgiving is the same as Christmas, just without the presents.

It still has the tradition of family, stuffing yourself until you feel sick and fall asleep, usually some arguments, and your version of the Queens speech (the Macy's Thanksgiving day Parade.) A few weeks before Thanksgiving the super in building puts up hideous, tacky turkeys on our front door, and without that I probably wouldn't know Thanksgiving is around the corner.

Last year, my first year in America, my mum attemped to make a 'Turkducken.' She thought it would be fun and American, but in reality it's a vegetarians worst nightmare (see above) and yes, thats right, a duck inside a chicken inside a turkey. But this year my Mum went to Connecticut to eat a 40 pound turkey and I attemped to cook for my boyfriend and I. To me it was similar to a Sunday roast.

All in all as a non-religious, vegetarian Brit, turkey day is wasted on me...

Initial Thoughts

When I first head that we were going to be doing 'Illness and Dying' as a unit, I'll be the first to admit I wasn't looking forward to it.

My grandad died last year and the memories and the hurt is still fresh, so I wasn't too thrilled to have to be reminded of death constantly in school.

When I thought about it deeper, I did realise that similar to other 'social norms' there was already a set way to do things. You were to visit your family member in hospital if they were sick because thats where they would go. There was no question about it, it was just accepted. Not that I thought there was anything wrong with it, but then did I think that because I had just accepted it? Thinking deeper I started to question alot of things to do with the social norms surroundig illness and dying (as I do with everything ever since taking this class..) and saw things in a different way as I did before.
Why did we cremate people, when thats what they did in the plague when there was such a vast amount of bodies there was no room for graves, so they just used to burn the bodies? Why do we traditionally wear black to funerals, when in other cultures such as Indian, they wear bright colours?

A conversation arose in class about remembering someone. Andy asked whether someone would remember there Grandmother, and whether she remembered her Grandmother. This was a harsh reality to accept for me as I'm dealing with such a recent death that is constantly on my thoughts and the thought of this memory no longer being present is scary.

One thing I really noticed at my Grandads funeral was that hearing 'I know how you feel' or 'It'll all get better' really isn't comforting. I remember telling my Mum if I heard one more "I'm so sorry" I was going to go crazy. I understood people were only trying to give there condolences and be sympathetic, but to me they just seemed like a rehearsed, thoughtless words of nothingness.

HMW 10 Food Inc

Food inc's premise is to explore areas of the food industry that we would usually never know of. At the beginning of the film it states, "the food industry has changed more in the last 50 years than in the previous ten thousand" which reinforces the recurring factor that with the contrary to the introduction of new sciences to our food, we repeatedly are in a downward spiral that is the deterioration of our food. The Oscar-nominated film represents the notion that there is a curtain between our food and where its coming from because if we knew, we wouldn't want to eat it.

Food Inc. has the advantage over books of its kinds as it is able to state its case through images captured first hand. It can take us inside a modern chicken coop, with thousands of grotesquely plump birds crammed into a tiny space, or a mechanised slaughterhouse where carcasses are processed at such a speed that contamination seems inevitable. It has the pure shock factor, and reinforces the theory that one of the dominant discourses in the food industry, the media, only portray food as 'medicine or poison' (Andy). I would argue that less attention is given to the much bigger issue of how global eating habits will have to change in the next few decades. So far, it has just presented us with the argument, and not the direct solution. Some argue that "what we get on our screens is the PowerPoint version: the basic facts, the best quotes, and some snazzy animated graphs." Which although in part,may be true I don't really see much wrong with this as the condensed version is the cream of the crop (excuse the pun...) and what's wrong with wanting to know the best information?

Coming from a British audience, not much of this is shocking to me as a few years ago there was an epidemic where there were multiple documentaries and investigations such as these. It was actually a documentary similar to this that made me switch to vegetarianism. Watching the information so graphically reinforces that the factory system has been taken to the back of the kitchen. To learn that in 1970 the top 5 corporations associated with meat owned 25% of the market, compared to today with the top 4 owning an astonishing 80% it really shows the dominance that corporations hold on the industry. Farmers are no longer self employed, or have any say in the way their business is run. In one of the opening scenes,the camera sweeps over the aisles of one such brightly lighted, heavily stocked if nutritionally impoverished emporium. “There are no seasons in the American supermarket,” hearing the narrative, informative tone speak it made sense to me. Tomatoes in October? Strawberrys in January? Was this normal? I actually had no idea, as I'd never grown any of them myself, all I knew was that if i wanted any fruit in January I could have it.

Although none of this was supposedly new information for me, this in no way took away the shock factor. To learn that birds are now "raised in half the time, but are twice as big" shocked me. As the chickens grow substantially larger their bones and muscles cannot develop quick enough to keep up with the weight increase, and therefore they buckle under the sheer weight of themselves, meaning they can no longer walk.

Hearing about the deterioration of the industrial food industry from a first hand account was fascinating. One farmer, who agreed to talk but her hesitance and apprehension was apparent, explained that the corporations employ undocumented workers who cannot complain because they have no legal rights in the United States. She spoke of how the farmers are literally and metaphorically in debt to the company, as they constantly demand newer equipment and if you do not forfill their demands, your contract will be terminated. "A typical growers debt is $50,000 but on average only earns $18,000 a year."

HMW 7D

Chapter 17:

With the introduction of food currently being portrayed as either poison or medicine in the media it is no wonder that the worldview of food has started to change. We have become more socially aware and conscious of the ethics of eating animals. In order to fully comprehend this viewpoint, I read about the arguments that discussed the controversial subject and formed opinions and questions of my own. Descarte infamously said that "animals are machines" but conflicting opinions, such as modern food-philosopher Peter Singer, support the individuality and rights of animals, and argues that if humans are so focused on achieving equality, how can we still selfishly killing a breathing animals with thoughts and feelings. And although animals have varying intelligence, there is favouritism within them, they are all slaughtered regardless. Among others, after reader Peter Singer's Animal Liberation I was motivated to become a vegetarian. Eventually, I came to the consensus that eat meat is morally fine, depending on whether one is conscious and respectful about it; the animal must be raised in an environment like that of Polyface Farm, have lived without unnecessary suffering and killed humanely.

Gems:

"The industrial animal factory offers a nightmarish glimpse of what capitalism is capable of in the absence of any moral or regulatory constraint whatsoever." (Pg 318).

"The great advantage of being a 'reasonable creature,' Franklin remarks, is that you can find a reason for whatever you want to do" (pg 310).

Thoughts:

Although I see the slaughtering of innocent animals to be unnecessary, I had never viewed it from the side that Singer took it. I actually found it fascinating, and although I did try to think of an argument, I found I could not. Maybe because I am a little biased, but I agree with Singer. Also I thought it was a good choice of Pollan to really live on the other side of things, and having seen all he has seen I found it surprising that he chose to continue eating meat.

Chapter 18:

Initially, I was worried about hunting, similar to that of my apprehension to picking the wrong mushroom and killing myself. My preconceptions of hunting were that it was a pointless sport that rednecks took part in to add to their chauvinistic egos and have mindless fun. But once I was stood in a 7 eleven, with my blood stained jeans I felt proud. I felt part of an exclusive club, and I felt respected. After failing on my first attempt to shoot a pig, the second opportunity resulting in the death of a 190 pound sow. The practice called "Dressing" (which is actually undressing) the pig was vile, and even more disturbing than physically shooting the animal. It made me realise why so many people are disgusting by the sheer thought of hunting.

Gems:

"But this is not passive or aesthetic attention; it is a hungry attention" (pg 335)

"the greatest and most moral homage we can pay to certain animals on certain occasions is to kill them" (Gasset,337)

"In a sense, that's what Angelo was really hunting,not pigs so much as prosciutti." (Pg 339)

Thoughts:

I have always been against hunting,as I viewed it as a mindless sport. Thinking about it, has society formed that? Because naturally, my instinct should be in favour of this kind of practice, as this was the way we originally survived. My hesitance is similar to that of the gatherer state of mind, it feels unnatural and wrong. Although, with gathering you are not killing an animal with thoughts and feelings. Maybe Pollan is right, hunting may be different outside to inside, maybe I just simply do not understand it. Personally, I think it is the male ego/instinct trying to prove his masculinity as we are simply reverting back to roots.

Chapter 19:

During my research for the book, I found that mushroom hunters are very sacred about their 'spots.' I was informed that if someone told me their spot, they would have to kill me (half jokingly.) After my first experience with Angelo I discovered there was an art to mushroom hunting. So I felt extremely privileged to be invited to go with out Anthony, a friend of Jean Peirres. Eventually, I began to find some on my own, in fact I found 5, which sounds pretty unimpressive, but you should have been out there. Generally, we are still pretty ignorant towards fungi, as it is an area which is practically untouched in science. Generally, they are a hard species to understand as we don't have science sophisticated enough to measure fungis unusual powers.

Gems:

"....we like to think of ourselves as self reliant, even if only for a few hours at the weekend, even when growing the stuff winds up costing twice as much as it would to buy it at the store." (pg 365)

"Mexicans call mushroom carne de los muertos- "flesh of the dead"" (pge 376)

Thoughts:

Again I think this is a case of primal instincts taking place. I found it interesting when Pollan talked about the 'head omnivore' as this generally is the person we look to for guidance and to tell us what is 'good to eat.' Whether it be a parent, a friend or the media.

Chapter 20:

My Saturday was a accumulative meal of everything i had learnt for Angelo, Sue, Anthony, Richard, Judith, Isaac, and myself. It was made entirely out of ingredients that I or a friend had grown, foraged, caught, or hunted, and was representative of my experience throughout the book. It was a feast of Fava Bean Toasts, Sonoma Boar Pâté, , Egg Fettuccine, Power Fire Morels, braised leg and grilled loin of Wild Sonoma Pig, Wild East Bay Yeast Levain, Very Local Garden Salad, Fulton Street Bing Cherry Galette, Claremont Canyon Chamomile Tisane, and 2003 Angelo Garro Petite Syrah Wine. Serving for European tastebuds, it didn't quite meet the unnattainable standards, but to me it was perfect, as it was all me. Everythingwas made with passion and thought, and to me, that made it taste all the sweeter.

Gems:

What this means is the calories we'd be consuming represent energy captured by trees rather than, as is typical now, by annuals in fam fields or grasses in pastures" (pg 399)

"Its impossible to prepare and eat a meal quite so physically, intellectually, and emotionally costly without thinking about the incalculably larger debts we incur when we eat industrially" (pg 410)

Thoughts:

I love the way that Pollan signifies what he has learnt in a symbolic meal throughout the book. I think it is a visual way of representing it, rather than just telling the reader something. I think the way that the meal tastes alot better because it was personal to him and he had made i himself, reinforces an earlier point that I had made that we are constantly reverting back to our instincts. It gives you a sense of accomplishment when you make something from scratch and when you take this to the extreme just like Pollan did it gives your meal an extra sentimental edge.

HM7C

Chapter 11:

Joe Salatin's farm is the epitome of natural. He doesn't believe in interference with the crops, overcrowding his animals and simply going back to basics. His parents handed down the knowledge and way of life which allowed him to persevere with his idyllic way of life. One of the ideals he prides his farm on is that every animal can coexist and help each other to gain as much as possible from an ecosystem. Contrasting to industrial agriculture, Salatins farm consider the needs of everyone from the farmer to the animals.

Gems:

"The woods represented a whole order of complexity I didn't take into account. I realized that Joel didn't look at this land the same way I did" (Pollan pg 224)

"But in a biological system you can never do just one thing, and I couldn't add many more chickens without messing up something else" (page 213).

Thoughts:

I think the whole ethos of Satalin's farm; why he is working and his morals, reinforce the simple fact that we do get that pleasure when we create something from scratch. Maybe it is a instinct inside us that wants us to revert back to our roots of hunting and gathering. And because we are so deprived of this in our modern day world, at the slightest hint of us reverting back to our roots, we get a sense of pride? I think that we could revert back to this way of agriculture if we committed to it, as it wouldn't make that much of a difference to us. For instance the amount of food Satalin's 100 acre farm produces is far more than sufficient,

Chapter 12:

As a meat eater, I felt it was appropriate to witness the murder of an innocent animal for my pleasure. And of course, Satalin was more than happy to let me watch. Due to USDA regulations, they prevent Joe from slaughtering cows and pigs, so the only thing he is allowed to kill, chickens, he goes to town on. He explains that it broadens his worldview and that in this process, he can maintain the authenticity of his produce as he knows nothing out of the ordinary is going on out of sight.

Gems:

"For all the considerable beauty I'd witnessed following a food chain....there was one few would conisder beautiful: the open-air processing shed out behind the Satalin's house where, six times a month in the course of a long morning, several hundred chickens are killed, scalded, plucked and eviscerated."

Thoughts:

Whilst reading this chapter and learning that the USDA controlled how he killed his animals it came to mind that now they want to be humane? Now they want to have a little compassion and consideration for how the animals are killed? Bit ironic when they don't really care about what the nation is consuming. I find it astonishing that they could control someone like Satalin's farm when he actually cares about the way he produces his meat, when they need to reconsider some of their own values before judges others.

Chapter 13

According to Jo Salatin "non-barcode" people are a new breed of people in the world, who put effort into their food and actually care about the produce. Convinience has become key in this world, and no longer do we value quality, but aspects such a how cheap or how readily avalible something is has become far more important. Polyface Farms only supply to local consumers to save the worlds resources. Although it is slightly more expensive (a dollar a pound) it is well worth it in the long run.

Gems

"An Americans plate travels some fifteen hundred miles to get there, and is frequently better traveled and more worldly than its eater" (Pollan, pg 239)

Thoughts

I think that if it could be accepted as a norm in society, that pay more for better food that we could actually trace back it would be great. But until it is widely accepted i fear that society will carry on living the convenience oriented world that we do now. For some reason, we need something to shock us, and until something scares us into it, we will continue in the downward spiral we are heading towards.

Chapter 14

As my time at the farm came to a close i decided to see for myself what the fuss was about. Why did this farm put so much effort into their produce? What difference would the omega-3s and vitamin E that the chicken had gained by being raised in such a back to basics egosystem. Unbeknown to the consumer food that is raised in a grass centralised egosystem has benefits including supposedly preventing cancer to helping children do better in school. Onto the more obvious of differences- the taste. Everything tasted so wonderful. It smelt inviting, and looked sensational.

Gems

"When chickens get to live like chickens, they'll taste like chickens, too" (Pollan, pg 270).

-"I offered thanks first to my hosts-cum-guests, then to Joel Salatin and his family for growing the food before us (and for giving it to us), and then finally to the chickens, who in one way or another had provided just about everything we were about to eat." (Pollan, pg 270)

Thoughts

I think if everyone went through the experience that Pollan had, they maybe they would appreciate food more, and actually care about where it came from, what kind of life the animal had or how that will affect what they are eating. But of course it is unreasonable to ask this. I think the main problem with food like this is the issue of cost. Most people are just concerned with the price of things, and if food like this were cheaper then i'm sure the masses wouldn't have a problem with switching over to organic and better raised food.

Chapter 15

Having already explored most of the industrial side of food, i decided to truely go back to basics. I was going to return to our hunter gatherer roots and source an entire meal from scratch. Disturbingly, I began to worry about determining the poisonous things from the non poisonous. I hadn't grown up in the convenience orientated world we do now, but it was also a far cry from our original roots. Bur with the help of a hunter education course and my friend, Angelo, I will achieve my goal.

Gems

"...She made it sound like it wouldn't take much for a kid to get himself killed snacking in the woods" (page 278).

-"I realized that this had been the ultimate destination of the journey I'd been on since traveling to an Iowa cornfield: to look as far into the food chains that support us as I could look, and recover the fundamental biological realities that the complexities of modern industrialized eating keep from our view."

Thoughts

Contemplating this, I think I would extremely hesitant to go through this experience. I would be seriously worried I would end up killing myself. Maybe society has formed me to think like this, because to be truely honest I should look at manufactured food this way too. As there are far more horrifying things going on in the industrial world we live in.

Chapter 16

Both humans and rats share a common quality, we are both omnivores. And in this we share consequent eating habits. The food selection process presents itself with as many dangers as there are beneficials, and we, as omnivores, need to figure this out for ourselves. Everything from our jaws to our metabolisms are designed to accomidate a varied diet, not one of fast food all day everyday. Our bodies are able to adapt to varying conditions, and for this ablility to change our diet, we should be extremely thankful. Generally we decide if food is good enough for us by taste and familiarity.

Gems

"Curiously, the one bodily fluid of other people that doesn't disgust us is the one produced by the human alone: tears. Consider the sole type of used tissue you'd be willing to share" (292).

"The curse of the omnivore is that he can eat a great many different things in nature. The curse of the omnivore is that when it comes to figuring out which one those things are safe to eat, he's pretty much on his own." (page 286)

Thoughts

We can see that even by the way our bodies are made, that our diets are meant to be fruitful and varied. But yet we exist in a society where it is easier and cheaper to eat french fries everyday than to eat a varied, exotic diet. When we are simply denying something that nature encourages, surely we can interpret we are doing something a little wrong?

This was the poor attempt that was my sprouts. They don't look like sprouts. They didn't taste like sprouts. Actually the only aspect they shared with regular sprouts were the smell. The sickly, vile smell that reminds me of them being on the table every Christmas. I didn't attempt to eat them as they weren't that atheistically pleasing and to be perfectly honest, I hate sprouts.

However, contrary to the outcome, I did enjoy growing the sprouts. I'd never grown anything myself before and more than anything I actually felt proud and happy about what I was doing with my food. I really enjoy cooking and baking and I feel as though the process if half the fun. Whenever I create a meal or a dessert, it always tastes the sweeter knowing that I'd made it myself, that I'd took the time and compassion to create something from scratch. So growing the sprouts took this mentality to another level.

In the future I would 100% do this again. Just not with sprouts this time.....

HM7b

Chapter 6:

In comparison, the early nineteenth century society that revolved around alcoholic corn beverages. Corn whiskey in the 1820s had brought an obesity epidemic in the Alcoholic Republic similar to that of America's Republic of Fat. Corn whiskey was used to consume the corn surplus much like that of high fructose corn syrup currently used now.

Gems:

"Much as today, the astounding productivity of American farmers proved to be their own worst enemy, as well as a threat to public health...Sooner or later, clever marketers will figure out a way to induce the human omnivore to consume the surfeit of cheap calories" (Pollan pg 101).

-"Add fat or sugar to anything and it's going to taste better on the tongue of an animal that natural selection has wired to seek out energy-dense foods." (Pollan)

Thoughts:

The comparison between 18th century and modern day society scares me. Will we never learn that taking shortcuts doesn't benefit anyone in the long run? Will we continue making these mistakes until there is a more obvious impact? When will enough be enough? David Wallerstein, the main contributor in putting those extra large buckets of popcorn in the cinema and that extra large drink, seems to have shaped a lasting mentality that the bigger the better. Again, why do we never see when enough is enough?

Chapter 7:

The idea of fast food is appealing. Quick, effortless and cheap. But the execution is far from ideal. The realisation of the fast food industry is a vast contradiction. In theory its a cheap, easy, convenient treat for kids and adults alike, but unfortunately what we see are meals plumped with corn and synthetic ingredients including sodium aluminum phosphate, monocalcium phosphate, sodium acid pyrophosphate and many more components we can't pronounce.

Gems:

"When I asked Isaac if the new nuggets tasted more like chicken than the old ones, he seemed baffled by the question. 'No, they taste like what they are, which is nuggets...duh.'" (Pollan,pg 112).

"The marketers have a term for what a salad or a veggie burger does for a fast food chain: "denying the denier."" (Pollan pg 110)

Thoughts:

We live in a culture where convience is key, we want everything and we want it now. Convenience is key, we don't want to be seen as greedy but yet we do anything we can to get as much as we can as quickly and cheaply? It seems we will stop at nothing to use the surplus of corn to our advantage- or so it seems.

Chapter 8:

A lush pasture of pastoral beauty is sparsely found in America, even in organic farms. Nowadays, the term "organic" is very loosely defined, and thus farms can use the label of supposedly being 'organic' without making the necessary changes.

Gems:

"Because a healthy soil digests the dead to nourish the living, Salatin calls it the earth's stomach." (Pollan)

"That's all the Indians ever wanted - to keep their tepees, to give their kids herbs instead of patent medicines and leeches....the Western mind can't bear an opt-out option. We're going to have to refight the Battle of the Little Bighorn to preserve the right to opt out, or your grandchildren and mine will have no choice but to eat amalgamated, irradiated, genetically prostituted, barcoded, adulterated fecal spam from the centralized processing conglomerate" (Pollan pg 132).

Thoughts:

I think Joel Salatin, a farmer that tries to go beyond organic is a crucial part in this story. He chooses to live by his rules and does not accept anyone elses. In a way I think he is referring back to our hunter gatherer roots in that he sources his food himself, and is not persuaded to get certain foods by anyone else. Even though at time he can be a little over dramatic (i.e food is "fecal spam") I think we could all learn something from him. But to the contrary, because farmers like him refuse to use long distance shipping it means that food like his will be unattainable to the masses.

Chapter 9:

Originally, organic produce was introduced as a more cleansed produce when the decline of industrialised farming peaked. The supposedly 'organic lifestyle' unfortunately has undeniable parallels to the industrial food chain. Cruelty toward livestock is apparent in both industries, for the supposed need of the consumer.

Gems:

"The organic food industry finds itself in a most unexpected, uncomfortable, and, yes, unsustainable position: floating on a sinking sea of petroleum" (Pollan pg 184)

The organic movement, as it was once called, has come a remarkably long way in the last thirty years, to the point where it now looks considerably less like a movement than a big business" (Pollan pg 138).

Thoughts:

A question that keeps appearing for me is the concept of when will we be satisfied? When we will get what is healthy for our bodies and our minds, but at the same time benefits our bank balance? Is it possible? Will it ever happen? With the constant movement of science will will move backwards or forwards? Will our world knowledge help or hinder us? And who can answer these questions!!??

Chapter 10:

Joel Salatin, is a grass farmer. He uses his farm to do a variety of things from making hay to growing vegetables without using toxic substances. Going back to basics is key to extract as much as we can from our diet. The way to get the most nutrition from our food is to grow and pick it ourselves, without any interference of pesticides of chemicals.

Gems:

"How many other Christian conservatives were reading Mother Earth News. He lived out his beliefs" (Pollan pg 207)

"Dad rode his bicycle thirty-five miles back and fourth to work everyday because he refused to buy another drop of imported oil" (Pollan 207)

"Joel opened the gate between the two paddocks removed his straw hat and gestured it towards the salad bar." (Pollan 194)

Thoughts:

If I could live like this honestly, I'm not sure whether I would, which is worrying. The culture of easiness and convenience in this world has shaped by worldview in that that idea of growing my own food, albeit satisfying sounds like a lot of hard work.

HM7

Omnivores Dilemma by Micheal Pollan

Originally, the goals of agriculture were to simplify the process and for the good of the people. As often with a good idea, the execution has not been so successful. It's had the opposite effect and has made an already some what solid area one of dangers and shortcuts.

Gems:

"All three food chains are systems for doing more or less the same thing: linking us, through what we eat, to the fertility of the earth and the energy of the sun. It might be hard to see how, but even a Twinkie does this" (Pollan pg 7.)

"We've discovered that an abundance of food does not render the omnivore's dilemma obsolete. To the contrary, abundance seems only to deepen it, giving us all sorts of new problems and things to worry about." (Pollan pg. 7).

Thoughts:

In our modern day society it seems we have so much influence in our diets. Whether it be the media, or friends or even our family. Everybody has an opinion on what we should be eating. But hardly anyone knows what is truely happening with our food, where is it going? Where has it been? How was it made? Long gone are the days where we can track our food back to a rural family owned farm, and here are the days of mass produced, vile food. Maybe people don't want to think about a peasant worker that helped farm the animals for the burger they are demolishing. Because then would it taste as good?

Chapter One:

The industrial food chain somehow always reverts back to the roots of the American Corn Belt. Corn is such a versatile crop that it can be used for a vast variety of things. It

has the ability to grow in bulk, adapt to the varying environments easily

, and thus has found its way into our everyday diet.

Unbeknown to the uneducated eye, the vast majority of things we eat can be related back to processed corn, from the burgers to the twinkies.

Maize is a C-4 that is frequently being massed produced in America. Its a crop which contains more carbon than plants usually do which makes it sustainable to store more energy.

Gems:

“So that’s us: processed corn, walking.” (Pollan p.23)

"Corn is the hero of its own story, and though we humans played a crucial role in its rise to world domination, it would be wrong to suggest that we have been calling the shots, or acting always in our own best interests." (Pollan pg 23)

Thoughts:

Although I would never have thought it, its apparent that corn is an essential staple in our diets. Albeit not for the best reasons, it is such a vast majority of things we eat. Why wasn't corn considered one of the many food fads that have come under scrutiny in the past? Do the pros out way the cons? Although it may have some flaws is the overall use of corn in our interest?

Chapter 2:

Farmers are responsible for growing such an influential crop to society, and sometime this can be a burden. "Hybrid corn" has been invented to make industrial farming easier because the corn is stronger than average, which allows more of it to be harvested, and therefore more profit. George Naylor, a farmer owns a farm that solely relies on corn and soybeans.

Gems:

"The true socialist utopia turns out to be a field of F-1 hybrid plants." (Pollan p.37)

Thoughts:

Generally I think we need to start thinking a lot more about what we put in our bodies. We are supposedly all doing this for vanity, but the crucial factor of what is actually in the food, rather than the amount of calories rarely comes into play. The Hybrid corn may be stronger, but we need to ask ourselves, is the overall quality better and how does the growth of Hybrid corn effect the growth of regular corn? This food industrialisation makes me fear for the future, how far will things go? Will we never revert back to our modest farming roots?

Chapter Three:

Although there may be ludicrous things that go on in the food industry, corn has to be grown to certain standard before it is can be packaged and sold. Farmers who can produce the biggest bulk of corn (mass production at its best) do so for financial gain from the Farmers Cooperative and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Instead of farming for joy, or in the interest of the general public, all focus is on the profit.

Gems:

"In America before the 1850s a farmer owned his sacks of corn up to the moment when a buyer took delivery, and so bore the risk for anything that went wrong between farm and table or trough. For better or worse that burlap sack linked a corn buyer anywhere in America with a particular farmer cultivating a particular patch of earth" (Pollan pg 59).

Thoughts:

"When is enough,enough" comes to mind. When will this process stop? And how far will it go until then? Is there no stopping the corn industry, and is there nothing it cant be used for? No longer does the decision between quantity or quality come into play, as it will forever be quantity. Number 2 corn barricades any option of a farmer being known for their quality, but they have no choice as if they do not continue with the trend, someone else will and they will profit off it.

Chapter 4:

In recent years, more factory farms have utilized the surplus of corn through cattle feed. Cows, by nature are not corn eaters so farmers were forced to remove the animals from their once lush,grass filled pastures to teeming feedlots, confined in pens and taught to consume the convenient surplus. not only were they now being fed the foreign, mass produced corn, but with a side of drugs and other hormone enhancing proteins to beef the naive animals up for slaughter. Queue Mad Cow Disease.

Gems:

“(about 60 percent of it, or some fifty-four thousand kernels) goes to feeding livestock,…” (Pollan p.66)

Thoughts:

It seems that unfortunately we will continue in this vicious cycle for some time to come. The scary thing is that I cannot see what will stop it. The dominant discourses related to food are not willing to inform us about what is going on with our own food, so why would they do something that in the long run is going to be expensive and time consuming when supposedly, they seem to be profiting nicely from the current situation. It was our own greed that caused for the change in the industry, but when we are supplied with it, we aren't happy. If only there an easy way out...

Chapter 5:

Slowly we can see the basics of food deteriorating. No longer do we natural and real, but we are presented with modified and fake. Every part of a corn kernel is utilised. Its nutritional supplements are extracted and processed to become an vital part of nearly every Americans diet. For example, a fifth of the corn river at 'Iowa Farmers Cooperative's' elevator transports to wet mill plants and eventually becomes everyday products for the average person to consume. Enter: Corn Syrup. The cheapest, most domestic substitute for sugar in the world. Currently found in everything from juices to cereals. In the wake of wet mills in the 1840's it became more and more apparent.

Gems:

"The food industry has gazed upon nature and found it wanting - and has gotten to work improving it" (page 97).

Thoughts:

I feel conflicted, as science has done so many amazing things for our current world but I feel it is becoming apparent in areas it isn't needed. Rewind 60 years ago, there was no need for any genetically modified foods then. People were raised on a wholesome diet of natural foods. They could go to a butchers or a bakery and know where there food was coming from. I would be much happier to know who had contributed to my food,or how it had been made. But now, the food industry is based on secrecy and lies. Corporations feel the average consumer does not need to know the most basic things. I think it means alot that food is either portrayed "as medicine or disease in the media" (Andy) as we can no longer see the middle ground. We are constantly shocked by new information as we know nothing about where our food is coming from. Is ignorance really bliss?