Food, Inc.

[cbush]

Have not seen the movie so can't comment on the Monsanto conspiracy, but how is the negative impact of processed foods a suprise to anyone? I suppose if you are really poor you would have limited choices, but one would have to be really dumb not to understand a moderate diet with fresh fruits and vegtables, beans for protiens, and limited meat is healthy and mass amounts of high fat processed food isn't. It is all about choices- not a conspiracy by the fast food industry. There may be a lot of fat people in the US, but the rest of the world is catching up just as fast as they can. Modern food production affords them the opportunity. They make the choice and when it comes to recognizing the consequences of your actions humans are pretty stupid (health, environment, $$). Can't blame that on Monsanto

[vash]

Originally Posted by cbush

Have not seen the movie so can't comment on the Monsanto conspiracy, but how is the negative impact of processed foods a suprise to anyone? I suppose if you are really poor you would have limited choices, but one would have to be really dumb not to understand a moderate diet with fresh fruits and vegtables, beans for protiens, and limited meat is healthy and mass amounts of high fat processed food isn't. It is all about choices- not a conspiracy by the fast food industry. There may be a lot of fat people in the US, but the rest of the world is catching up just as fast as they can. Modern food production affords them the opportunity. They make the choice and when it comes to recognizing the consequences of your actions humans are pretty stupid (health, environment, $$). Can't blame that on Monsanto

watch the movie. one point they interview a family. low income, daddy is a truck driver, diabetic truck driver. the point of this family was to illustrate that it is easier, cheaper, and more convienent to eat unhealthy. monsanto is part of the machine.

(my weeds hate them effers )

[HardDrive]

My wife is a Michael Pollan groupie.

We are lucky enough to live in Seattle. Oceans of options for locally grown food. All our eggs and meat come from local farms.

You don't have to be a food nazi, but it really does change how you look at food if one consider where it came from. When you look at the ingredients list on a package of food, take a guess at how many of those ingredients came from China. Its more than you think.

[svandamme]

Originally Posted by Dottore

This is incorrect for all kinds of reasons—and Food Inc. tries to debunk some of these myths.

One of the subtexts of the films is to promote eating fresh and seasonal foods raised or farmed in the region where you live. Or at least you should aim to do this most of the time.

Instead today your food industry is dominated by four or five conglomerates. You sit in say New York and buy a burger. The meat came from a cow in a feed lot in, say, Nebraska. The cow was fed on feed grown in Texas and shipped to Nebraska. Then it was sent god knows where for slaughtering and processing, before the beef patty was shipped to New York.

Never mind the hormone use when raising cattle in the US.
Growth hormones are illegal in the EU, that's at least one thing i'm happy about.
Some farmers do still use em, but if caught they go to jail, and quite often another one is busted, and it makes the news..

Nobody in Europe is starving so far... still plenty of beef and pork around...
Hormones are not needed to feed the population.

The US and Canada tried to shove it down our throat's, but the EU kept the ban in place... So the US raised import tarrifs on imports from the US. 100+ million a year...

Why does the US/Canada try to bully the EU citizens into eating hormone meat?
Right, because the Monsanto lobbiests...
They want to make money, and they don't care about public health, it's not their #1 priority, i doubt it's their #2, or #3 priority...

US congress once started an investigation about hormones in milk... for some reason, they never finished it... why would that be?? They are connected in every layer of policy making... The FDA is full of ex Monsanto, or Monsanto related people.... conflict of interest?? who cares, right?

[island911]

I got about halfway thru the propaganda flick

Originally Posted by Dottore

...

There is far too much rubbish sold as food in the US. That is a simple fact. And this doesn't need to be so.

PS: And this doesn't even begin to consider the negative health consequences on consumers of eating heavily processed food full of toxins from hormones to stabilizers and preservatives etc.

Oh PUHLEase ...

This elitist BS of "It's not good enough FOR ME ...it's not good enough for you!" is Soooo pathetic. --Life is dangerous, and NO ONE gets out alive. Deal with it.

While I certainly avoid mainstream food, it's not as if anyone is going to grow little toe, on their neck, if they eat a non-certified-organic apple.

The elitist argument, as usual, misses the fact that there will ALWAYS be quality differences of food. --Dot, what type of goo does your Certified organic Apple company use for the Certified organic sticker stuck to the apple? ...MY Certified organic Apple company only uses shade-grown free-trade bee-barf as sticker goo.

[The Gaijin]

Originally Posted by legion

Do research. LOTS of people died of starvation or malnutrition-related conditions in the U.S. prior to WWII. People were not healthier. They were shorter (a sign of insufficient calorie intake) and died earlier.

And yes, what is not a big price increase to some of you would mean mass starvation at the bottom of the economic scale. The poor in this country are often obese because the cheap foods have high caloric content. Force the agriculture industry to use certain methods to make you feel better about yourself, and those foods will dissapear. All that will be left is relatively low-calorie foods at high prices. It will be a double-whammy for the poor.

Prior to WWII there was the Great Depression and you still had plenty of poor people sharecropping or subsistence farming. Not healthy options. Try and find a class picture from your parents elementary school, compare that to one of your own - and find one from today. You will be amazed.

Good food is cheaper than it has ever been in human history. That is relative to income or hourly wage or whatever. Folks spend more on cigarettes, lottery and booze than they do on feeding themselves. Allow for welfare and food stamps and how cheap does it need to be??

I feel good about myself and what I eat - and don't want to force an lifestyle on anybody. But man alive - if you are in the same insurance pool or I am paying your Medicaid, please stay within 100lb of your ideal weight.

[island911]

Originally Posted by HardDrive

...

You don't have to be a food nazi, but it really does change how you look at food if one consider where it came from. When you look at the ingredients list on a package of food, take a guess at how many of those ingredients came from China. Its more than you think.

Dot, take note of the above reasonable words. ('cuz you're looking rather food nazi-ish)

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by island911

This elitist BS of "It's not good enough FOR ME ...it's not good enough for you!" is Soooo pathetic. --Life is dangerous, and NO ONE gets out alive. Deal with it.

You're missing my point—and the point of the film. "Big Food" in the US has led to many, many products of questionable nutrition—and bad eating habits, and this in turn has had an obvious adverse impact on the health and fitness of a significant percentage of the population.

Big Food, with eg. its entirely mechanized approach to raising and processing livestock—is a model that has not served its consumers well.

Much better to have an emphasis on regionally grown, sustainable non-toxic food—but this requires a complete sea change in attitudes in the US—and a lot of education. The film "Food Inc" is part of that effort and I applaud it.

[island911]

Where are you going to find the farmers for all of these "regionally grown, sustainable non-toxic food" farms?

You do realize that just saying it ought to be doesn't make it actually happen? Furthermore, just saying the status quo isn't good enough, doesn't make it happen either.
... Scaring people about food doesn't help either

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by island911

Where are you going to find the farmers for all of these "regionally grown, sustainable non-toxic food" farms?

You do realize that just saying it ought to be doesn't make it actually happen? Furthermore, just saying the status quo isn't good enough, doesn't make it happen either.
... Scaring people about food doesn't help either

You live in the Pacific North West. Small scale farming is a growth area here. Has been for years. We have locally grown products available here on a scale that was unthinkable 20 years ago.

As for the rest, it's a question of education. Only consumer demand will drive a change in the industry. I do my bit. I'm a card carrying member of SlowFood.

As for scaring people about food: that's the best thing that could happen. "Food Inc." is pretty scary. It woke my wife up to a lot of these issues for example. And that is good.

[island911]

Well, I'm not down with the 'end justifies the means' ... Food Inc could have been much more accurate. ...rather than contorting reality for a scare.

That is, perhaps it scared your wife into a new behavior, but it didn't educate her to a new conclusion. There is a big difference between education and indoctrination.

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by island911

That is, perhaps it scared your wife into a new behavior, but it didn't educate her to a new conclusion. There is a big difference between education and indoctrination.

...you say tomato, I say organic tomato...

I thought the film was educational. I of course have also given my wife The Omnivores Dilemma, and regularly pass her my SlowFood literature etc. It's a process.

I can't see how you can possibly argue with the notion that people should give some greater thought to how the food they ingest is raised and produced. That seems a fairly simple proposition.

For example, I can think of very few people who would ever eat another Chicken McNugget if they were once to see the manner in which these things are produced.

[Tim Walsh]

Eating locally/organic isn't exactly easy here in usualtown, USA. Since my wife's food allergies we've been extremely sensitive on how much food costs and what's in it. It would NOT be easy to feed a family on organic/non-processed foods. As it is I'm cooking 6+ dinners a week on average + all of her lunches.(granted I eat pretty crapily for breakfast and lunch, she has just a glass of milk for breakfast). If I had to switch over to local/organic our food bill would quadruple which doesn't even count the increased prep time . As it is when we cut out corn, soy and wheat our food bill doubled.

Take this test: Go to your local supermarket(publix, food lion, etc) and price out a dozen eggs, a gallon of milk, a lb of butter, half a dozen peppers and a loaf of bread. Now go to your local organic market(fresh market, whole paycheck.. I mean whole foods, etc) for the same items. Doubled in price, easily. I work at a university, and if I wasn't a DINK(dual income, no kids) with a good job it would be completely impossible to eat that way, completely.

I know that organic/local is the ideal, but for the majority of america, it's just not possible.

[island911]

Dot, actually, I prefer heirloom tomatoes grown in our garden.

I'm NOT arguing that people should not give greater thought to how the food they ingest is raised and produced. But rather just that Food inc is not balanced view on those thoughts.

As for McNuggets; while I don't seek them out, I certainly could eat some chicken McNuggets w/o freaking out. ....esp if I'm hungry.

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by Tim Walsh

Eating locally/organic isn't exactly easy here in usualtown, USA. Since my wife's food allergies we've been extremely sensitive on how much food costs and what's in it. It would NOT be easy to feed a family on organic/non-processed foods. As it is I'm cooking 6+ dinners a week on average + all of her lunches.(granted I eat pretty crapily for breakfast and lunch, she has just a glass of milk for breakfast). If I had to switch over to local/organic our food bill would quadruple which doesn't even count the increased prep time . As it is when we cut out corn, soy and wheat our food bill doubled.

Take this test: Go to your local supermarket(publix, food lion, etc) and price out a dozen eggs, a gallon of milk, a lb of butter, half a dozen peppers and a loaf of bread. Now go to your local organic market(fresh market, whole paycheck.. I mean whole foods, etc) for the same items. Doubled in price, easily. I work at a university, and if I wasn't a DINK(dual income, no kids) with a good job it would be completely impossible to eat that way, completely.

I know that organic/local is the ideal, but for the majority of america, it's just not possible.

You are making my point. Why is it possible for someone living in eg. France on a comparable income, to eat entirely fresh and organic food bought daily at their local market?

The entire "Big Food" system in the US needs to be turned on its head. Big Food doesn't make food cheaper. It just redistributes food costs to transporters, advertisers, shareholders, CEO bonuses etc etc—instead of paying it to the farmer.

And this won't change until consumers start insisting on change. Education is part of such change—or should be. That's why "Food Inc" and books and films like it are so important.

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by island911

As for McNuggets; while I don't seek them out, I certainly could eat some chicken McNuggets w/o freaking out. ....esp if I'm hungry.

You wouldn't if you saw them made. Trust me. Entire chicken heads and feet ground into a paste and mixed with chicken fats etc etc.

[island911]

Originally Posted by Dottore

...That's why "Food Inc" and books and films like it are so important.

Yay for propaganda

So, a cow is injected with a hormone, and that's bad, but a bunch of women have their faces injected with toxins, and that's okay?

Actually I expect that we have more threat from run-away Prius's than from our food supply. Just as there are differences in quality for cars, there are quality dif's for food. --figure out how much you want to pay. YMMV.

[island911]

Originally Posted by Dottore

You wouldn't if you saw them made. Trust me. Entire chicken heads and feet ground into a paste and mixed with chicken fats etc etc.

Have you ever eaten at one of the Chinese places up in Vancouver? Pigeon head? ...duck feet?

Who are you to say that's bad for anyone?

[svandamme]

Over here, supermarkets have bio products on stock, they aren't that much more expensive then the normal brands.
Ok , i'll admit, it's not going to be the same as buying everything in a true bio store, but frankly , many of those bio stores are run by people who would have
been running a small fashion boutique if you turn the clock back 20 years... There's plenty of hype there as well..

What guarantees do you even have that the products in the bio store, are bio?
Is there any labeling that's certified by any kind of governmental organization for such bio products??
Is there anything that prevents a bio store, from putting Gen-Mod procuts or hormone meat in their shops??


What you guys need to do, is write to your politicians... and demand that food is labeled properly ..
if there's Genetic modification , it should be on the label. Hormone meat.. labeled.
That's the basis... the ability to choose for non modified food.
The law should be such, that failure to document the actual content of food, should be fined with possibility for jailtime if there are repeat offenders.

For true bio food, it needs to be even more then non modified... it would also have to be food that ain't grown with pesticides and what not..

But it won't happen, because the likes of Monsanto, are inside your government.
And the folks that are worried about that... are far and few in between.
I've heard al sorts of Big Brother fears in all sorts of threads on PPOT..
fear of gun regulation, immigrants,black helicopters, zombies , Canadians and Terrorism.

Y'all should be afraid of how a Bio tech Company controls your US FDA, your Government.
How they got your government to sign a law, that permits em to tinker with basic food components, without even require testing whenever they bring out a new genetic modification...

in the EU, there's
A mandatory labeling if there is even just .5% genetically modified content
B ban on hormones in meat
C pesticides are banned from use in greenhouse fruit growing

There are more things like it.. but those 3 give you a good idea what the difference is... those 3 things, are probably impossible to even think off right now in the US...

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by svandamme

O

What you guys need to do, is write to your politicians... and demand that food is labeled properly ..
if there's Genetic modification , it should be on the label. Hormone meat.. labeled.
That's the basis... the ability to choose for non modified food.
The law should be such, that failure to document the actual content of food, should be fined with possibility for jailtime if there are repeat offenders.

For true bio food, it needs to be even more then non modified... it would also have to be food that ain't grown with pesticides and what not..

But it won't happen, because the likes of Monsanto, are inside your government.
And the folks that are worried about that... are far and few in between.
I've heard al sorts of Big Brother fears in all sorts of threads on PPOT..
fear of gun regulation, immigrants,black helicopters, zombies , Canadians and Terrorism.

Y'all should be afraid of how a Bio tech Company controls your US FDA, your Government.
How they got your government to sign a law, that permits em to tinker with basic food components, without even require testing whenever they bring out a new genetic modification...

Amen, brother.

I mean what is more important than the food you put inside your body for fecks sake?