Peripatetic Praxis

We saw Food, Inc. yesterday at the Bryn Mawr Film Institute (one of our local treasures!).  Director Robert Kenner made this documentary not only informative but also beautiful…even though what it has to report is ugly and mean.  If you have read Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation or Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, you already know about the issues raised in this film, and both writers play a big role in the documentary.  Another important voice (of reason) is that of Joel Salatin, whose Polyface Farms happened to be featured last night on ABC news as being the supplier of “happy hogs” for the Chipotle restaurant chain.  Gary Hirshberg, Chairman and “CE-Yo” of Stoneyfield Farms made a very persuasive case in the film in favor of working with Wal-Mart (hardly the run-of-the-mill activist’s favorite company) on the distribution of non-GMO/organic foods.  He believes that Wal-Mart’s decision not to use rBST intheir milk may signal the demise of this growth hormone (due to the chain’s massive buying power).

But these are all the good guys.

There are plenty of bad guys, the baddest of whom is Monsanto, which, according to the film, bullies farmers into using their “patented” seeds (but they’ve offered rebuttal).  But did you know that in some states you are NOT ALLOWED TO SAY BAD THINGS about Monsanto and other food producers?  By LAW!  Did you know that?  Remember when Oprah bad-mouthed hamburger because she didn’t think it was safe to eat?  She was sued by the beef industry for the loss of business that her comments allegedly caused.  She won the case, in the end, but it cost money. Monsanto does that to people who don’t like their seeds.   (See here, here, and here for examples.)  So in this great land of ours, you can no longer say out loud that you don’t like something or that you don’t trust it.  I understand that spreading malicious misinformation about someone or some business can be ruinous to that person or business.  But on this reasoning, there’d be no restaurant, movie, or film critics.  There’d be no campaign debates (my pointing out the weaknesses of a candidate may cause him to lose an election, political power, and money).  And what is really troubling about this blatant assault on free speech is that the information being put forth about the agribusiness is frequently true.  Could the tobacco companies sue anti-smoking campaigners because they said that smoking will kill you?

Monsanto–the people who brought you Agent Orange (check this out)–is also lobbying your elected representatives to make sure they are not forced to label their products as being GM.  They are afraid we’ll all be too stupid about genetically modified foods and therefore “needlessly alarmed” by the label.  So we get either the nanny state or the nanny corporations.  Terrific.   Everybody’s looking out for us.  Readers of this blog should know that I don’t suffer junk science gladly.  Have GM foods been proven bad for us?  Do we really know what causes climate change?  My point is simply that in a democratic society we have the right to the facts, to the theories, to the worries, to the counterclaims, etc., and I object to government or corporate sponsored efforts to withhold information.

And then, in the film, there is the really bad stuff:  death, despair, despoliation, destruction.  I wouldn’t want to ruin that for you by going into detail.

You should check out Food, Inc.  Like Michael Moore’s Sicko, it’ll get you thinking about how way wrong things are.  And you can read up on this stuff.  This handy list should help.

Here’s another of Peter Maurin’s Easy Essays to get you started:

Regard For The Soil
1. Andrew Nelson Lytle says:
The escape from industrialism
is not in socialism
or in sovietism.
2. The answer lies
in a return to a society
where agriculture is practised
by most of the people.
3. It is in fact impossible
for any culture
to be sound and healthy
without a proper regard
for the soil,
no matter
how many urban dwellers
think that their food
comes from groceries
and delicatessens
or their milk from tin cans.
4. This ignorance
does not release them
from a final dependence
upon the farm.