Today Suzie and I watched Food Inc. It was an amazing movie. I was expecting a horror flick about slaughter houses and was hesitant to watch it. Ignorance really is bliss. This movie barely touched on the horrible conditions of the animals, but did not dwell on that, the way I had expected it to. This film is about one man's journey to discover what really is that thing we are calling food and putting in our bodies. The majority of our nation's food supply is dictated by a handful of corporations that often put money ahead of the consumer's health. Okay that was really no surprise. But the degree that these companies go to was a shocking surprise to me. The fact that one hamburger comes from 1000 different cows was a surprise; that vegetables are so genetically modified that the food value is gone was a surprise; and that chickens have been mutated into Frankenchickens was a surprise. The consumer's demand for white meat is so strong that the birds have been modified to have huge breasts and so they can't support the weight of their body with their own legs! That was a huge surprise. The theme of the film was how our food really isn't food anymore. What we take to be a soybean, is a genetically modified plant that is resistant to RoundUp. Even the vegetarians aren't safe anymore. More and more of our vegetables are covered with salmonella. It was a horror flick, but not in the way I had expected.
The movie talked about Stoneyfield Yogurt and the fact you can buy it at Walmart. They interviewed a hancho at the company. His friends thinks he has turned traitor. He thinks he has finally delivered the message. The people deserve good food. The people demand good food. If you buy his organic product, hundreds of thousands of gallons of pesticide are not polluting the farms or the food. People are demanding good clean food, so much so that companies like Walmart can't ignore the demand and are starting to supply organic choices. So the lesson I learned, is this: Don't protest by not buying. Buy food. Buy good, safe food.Choose better products and better products will start to appear. Let your money vote. It seems to be the only thing that gets heard.
It is hard this new knowledge. It was easier to just not know. It was easier to think food came from farms with green pastures, and chickens looked like chickens. And now I'm going to ask you to do something hard. Watch this movie. Get it from your library, or watch it now on Netflix (http://www.netflix.com/WiMovie/Food_Inc./). It will change your life. Which in turn will change my life and the lives of everyone you know, for the better.
Click on the image below to enlarge it:
No comments:
Post a Comment
We welcome your comments, but they will be reviewed, and possibly rejected, prior to being posted to the site.