Food Inc.
Food is a necessity for life; all organisms must produce or consume food to survive. Humans have been finding various ways of gathering the food that they need, some of these methods even resulting in environmental damage. Ishmael, the main character in Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit, would view the way humans gather and distribute their food today as unnatural and as another “Taker” method.
Mass production is one way that humans make sure that they have a surplus of food. When this process is used in foods, it makes sure that all newly produced food tastes the same, looks the same, and smells the same. Companies add in artificial flavors and preservatives to make sure this is consistent with all of their products, which takes the usage of many factories to do. (How Fast Food Works) Considering Ishmael’s views on the ways humanity does certain things, he would say that by doing this, humans are not thinking about the other species and how the pollution from mass production would affect their way of life.
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Pesticides are, as defined by the US Government, “agricultural chemical products.” (Chemicals and Pesticides) These pesticides are meant to kill any organisms that are attacking crops. In the process, the pesticides do end up interfering with the pest’s life cycles. Ismael would say that it’s not fair that humans are so freely messing with another organism’s way of life just so that they could get their own food, and that this is another way humans are able to distinguish themselves as Takers. This can be derived from the fact that Ishmael has said, “Any species that exempts itself from the rules of competition ends up destroying the community in order to support its own