No Health For You: A ‘Food, Inc.’ Film Review
As Americans, not many of us have spent a lot of time on an actual farm. Most of us live in urban cities and have absolutely no idea where our food comes from.
I have had the privilege of spending some time on an organic farm, and I must say that naturally, a chicken’s breasts are not the monstrously huge breasts you see in the frozen food section. When did our chickens start getting breast implants!? And chickens aren’t cloned: They come in various sizes. Why are most chicken breasts sold at our local supermarkets all the same size? When did we accomplish the massive production of identical chickens with jumbo breasts? What are we really eating?
If you want to know the ugly truth about what you’re putting into your body, you MUST go see “Food, Inc.”, now playing at the Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar or at the Regal Arbor Cinema 8 Great Hills
The movie chronicles the rise of corporate commercial food products and the demise of the American farmer at the expense of the consumer’s health. It’s definitely a film that you can’t ignore. I couldn’t believe how little control we, the consumers, have over what we eat.
Here’s the dilemma: American farmers cannot afford to produce real, wholesome foods because doing so would go up against the food corporations and their products. At the same time, American families cannot afford to buy whole foods, because Burger King sells a whopper for the same price as a head of broccoli.
In addition to interviews with acclaimed food authors like Michael Pollan
and Fast Food Nation’s Eric Schlosser, the film features a family whose outrageous medical bills keep them from eating well. Ironically, they never realized that the food they were consuming had actually sent them to financial and medical hell. At one point in the film, the mother even says: “We thought EVERYTHING was healthy.” My friends and I giggled at first-I mean, that’s silly, right?
To find out for myself, I paid a visit to the good ole Rio Grande Valley to cook my family an organic meal. Because the food industry has completely monopolized the entire market in a small town like Weslaco, I couldn’t find ANY whole food in the HEB or Wal-Mart down there. The options are so severely limited that most people don’t have to choice of healthy food.
So what can we do? The movie suggests you make your dollar count as your vote. Try to always buy organic food when you shop. Also, fill out comment cards and demand good foods from your local grocery stores and restaurants.
Did you see the movie? What did you think? Let us know in the comments! Also, if you’ve been a part of a campaign to get organic foods in your store, tell us!
Here’s the trailer. Kinda reminds me of a horror movie!
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I haven’t seen the movie yet, but if Pollan is involved I would be surprised if the takeaway message is “Try to always buy organic food when you shop.”
He frequently makes the case that a non-organic local tomato is far better for you than an organic tomato shipped from far away. The two things at play here are agricultural additives (bad) and beneficial compounds (good). The local one will presumably still have beneficial compounds since it is fresher, and those compounds are helpful in mitigating any effects of whatever trace agricultural additives the farmer used. The tomato from far away was probably picked green and ripened on a truck. It’s closer to being merely fiber and sugars, even if it is devoid of pesticides and such.
It’s ironic that we are one of the fattest nations on earth, and yet (well, I have a hunch) we are also one of the most malnourished and sickest.