How much processed food can we really consume without being accountable. According to Michael Pollan, and his wonderful books such as The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food, our food has become something produced by the industrial/military complex. You may doubt me and the Carbon Trust, but read any of Pollan's books and you will jump on board.
After realizing that Americans had supplanted the Mexicans as the real "Corn People", I have a hard time cutting into a steak without wondering what horrid life that poor animal lived. Here's a tiny synopsis of how that steer ended up on my plate:
1. Our government decided that paying subsidies to farmers to keep small farms in business was counter-productive politically. They created policies that paid farmers to produce more food by paying them less. The farmers, to make their personal livelihoods possible, planted more food.
2. Excess petroleum products, equipment, and chemicals left over from wars were used for fertilizers, making the need to have animals fertilize the croplands unnecessary and eliminating the need for overwintering crops.
3. Mono-planting depleted the soil, wind took over depleting the top soil, and more chemical fertilzer was needed.
4. Excess corn was produced, so this was used to make biofuel (ethanol, etc.), feed ruminants like cattle (who get sick from eating this mess as their two stomachs are meant to process grasses), feed other animals this same feed, and get made into high frustose corn syrup which is in everything possible in the processed food category from sodas to packaged casseroles.
5. The chicken McNugget or the Hamburger? Not only does it have corn in it, all the flavorings are corn. The liter of soda? That probably has more calories in it than most of us should consumer in two of our three meals.
6. And as we omnivore's evolve and become consumers of corn in such huge quantities it is hard to fathom, we again disrupt the ecology of everything around us.
I was sickened thinking about the poor animals needing antibiotics and other medicines just to tolerate the non-grass meals they are force fed in pens littered with their own manure. I imagine that they are terrified, miss their mothers, spend their last months of a shortened life while their fat becomes 'marbled', confused and abused.
And now potato chips are righteously under attack. Luckily I gave them up years ago, but my point is this. We may be omnivores, but our bodies are rebelling against the massive amounts of grass (corn is a giant grass after all) we are eating. Not only have our body masses ballooned, our hearts and other organs are not able to evolve quickly enough to compensate.
Natural foods, foods you grow and preserve yourself, foods from urban farms, community gardens, farmers' markets and local farms. Support them before it is too late and they are all farming corn.
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