HW 10 - Food, Inc. Response

1.
Precis-
Current food production is largely a response to the growth of the fast food industry. The production of food overall has changed more since the 1950's than the several thousand years before. Today the food production industry is controlled primarily by a handful of multinational corporations, whose goals are the production of large quantities of food at low direct costs (most often subsidized) resulting in enormous profits, which then gives these few companies a greater control over the global food supply. The health and safety of the food itself, of the animals, of the workers, and of the consumers are often overlooked by the companies, and are often overlooked by government in an effort to provide cheap food. The answer that the companies have come up with is to throw more science at the problems by pumping the animals with more and more chemicals. The Global food source is in danger but can be saved with more resposibility on behalf of the major companies like tyson that control this food.

2.
Although the movies was based on the book there was alot in the movie that you couldn't get from the book. The movie (obviously) had visuals which gave you more of a real feeling when seeing what was happening, it is similar to when someone tells you something, but you never really understand it until you see it with your own two eyes. An example of this was the chicken slaughter, in the book i did read about it and i understood it but when i saw that scene in the movie i had a much more intense feeling of sadness and remorse. The movie could show you the way that these large companies treated these workers and how the treated the animals that you and i eat. The book however offered a more depth idea of what is going on. The movie generalized a lot of what was happening and didn't touch upon many specifics while the book was more of a first person view on what is going on, an exmaple of this was the final chapter where michael pollan gave a very emotional evaluation of his experience.

3.
The thoughts that are still with me is why hasn't the government done anything about this. I feel like the men we put in office aren't as concerened with this as we are even thought they eat the same food that we do. I also want to know if those in charge of these large companies eat the food they produce and if not what do they eat. The feeling that dominates me is anger. I want to know how they can treat the animals and workers the way they do and how could i let them put all this disgusting food into me. I almost feel betrayed by this country, the fact that the governement can talk about serving us the people and keeping us safe than go right around and feed us such unhealthy produce. This country has cast an illusion on us, telling us that we are "land of the free", when sure we are free to vote for our president and choose where to live but not to choose who makes our food (don't get me wrong i love this country it just seems unfair that these companies are essentially poisoning us and there is nothing we can do about it).

Although i am upset, i have accpeted the fact that this is what is happening and realized that the only way to avoid eating this bad food is to change who grows it by either growing it myself or buying from a green market or whole foods. The truth is maybe it is our fault. We have chosen to be oblivious to this, we assumed that there was nothing wrong and that was wrong. We should have investigated this situation much earlier. Im not saying not to trust them i am simply saying why trust them when you can know for sure.