Thread 1: In The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan describes what the omnivore’s dilemma actually is. He begins his book as a naturalist in a supermarket trying to decide “what to eat?”. This question is harder to answer without asking where the food originates. Knowing where food comes from is very difficult, unless it is locally grown or clearly states it on the package. Processed food is more complicated to understand where it comes from.
When I first read Chapter Ten of “After the Fact”, by James West Davidson and Mark Hamilton Lytle, I was shocked at the methods meat factories use in preparing their products. I was especially shocked seeing as now; we have so many food regulations that most people don’t think twice about the food that is going in their bodies. I am now thinking, do these things still appear in our lives today? It was nice to know that Theodore Roosevelt took action in an attempt to fix these major problems. He became aware of the poor conditions of the meat industry through the book “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair.
Is eating meat a detrimental threat to the environment? This debate over meat’s involvement in the global warming crisis was what inspired Nicolette Hahn Niman to write, “The Carnivore’s Dilemma.” Niman hoped writing, “The Carnivore’s Dilemma,” would cause her audience to understand that eating meat, raised on traditional farms, was a superior alternative to vegetarianism. Niman supported her claim by explaining how industrialized farms and vegetarians produce more of the three greenhouse gases that caused global warming, than that produced by traditional farms. Niman’s article fell short of being effective due to flaws in her supporting evidence and conclusion.
Relevance between Food and Humans with Rhetorical Analysis In the modern industrial society, being aware of what the food we eat come from is an essential step of preventing the “national eating disorder”. In Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma, he identifies the humans as omnivores who eat almost everything, which has been developed into a dominant part of mainstream unhealthiness, gradually causing the severe eating disorder consequences among people. Pollan offers his opinion that throughout the process of the natural history of foods, deciding “what should we have for dinner” can stir the anxiety for people based on considering foods’ quality, taste, price, nutrition, and so on.
Upton Sinclair’s, The Jungle is a novel, which affected the food industry in 1900’s but also in America today. People have learned over the years the truths about the food industry, revealed through Sinclair’s detailed evidence. Sinclair meant to aim at the public’s heart but instead he shot straight at their stomachs. One would easily be convinced to never again buy or eat meat again. Fortunately, people have seen changes from 1906 and have been currently trying to repair the Food Industry.
Jane and Akiko: Fertility and DES In the novel, My Year of Meats! Ozeki portrays Jane Takagi Little and Akiko Ueno personal hardships of conceiving a child. The passage taken from chapter 11 describes Akiko being hospitalized after being “battered and bruised” by her husband and later became convinced that she was pregnant and “it was a miracle of sorts” (Ozeki 305-06). In the entry of the passage, Akiko’s states, “I feel wonderful…” gives the allusion of her almost mythical description of her conception. Akiko portrays herself looking at her “cleavages and shiftings.”
Eating Towards Global Warming Global warming has been a topic of debate for many years now. A more recent argument is that food production is a key contributing factor to the global warming epidemic. In the article “A Carnivore’s Dilemma”, Nicolette Niman provides an insight to the logistics being said in these statements.
Ambar Delacruz Essay 1: The Omnivore’s Dilemma. Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma addresses a variety of concerns about food production and consumption. One might ask what exactly is the omnivore’s dilemma? And the basic answer to this question is “what should we eat for dinner”?
According to Norcross’s reports: “In 1998, almost 8 billion chickens were slaughtered in the US, almost all of them raised on factory farms” (290). Based on the quote, people can see a huge number of chickens getting killed every day. When one read to this part of the article, they may have a heavy feeling, and a silent moment to think about the meat that they are eating every day. There are not only huge amounts of chickens that are being killed every day. Besides that, pigs, sheep, cows, birds, and more than that are being killed almost every hour around the world.
Also, in the article, "The Globalization of Animal Welfare”, it explains that, “the average person in an industrialized country still consumes far more animal products each year: 181 pounds of meat, 459 pounds of dairy, and 29 pounds of eggs, as compared with 68 pounds of meat, 110 pounds of dairy, and 18 pounds of eggs for each person in the developing world” (Park). An abundance of animals have to be slaughtered because people are “dependent” on meat. Farmers are not doing there job to their full potential. Farmers only care about quantity, if they are producing enough, rather than quality, if the
I woke up this morning nervous and sweating, today I thought, was going to be a nerve racking day. Today is the day in which I was going to be chosen to be an apprentice of a master of a certain craft or be cast away to work as a farmhand. I want to be accepted into battle school so that I could follow in my father's footsteps, who I couldn't meet since he died in battle and everyone tells me that he was a great warrior. I walked into a large grand room and suddenly I was very jittery and timorous of thinking that I might have to work as a farm hand for the rest of my life. During the choosing my friend Horace, who was the tallest chose first and not surprisingly, he requested for battle school which he talked about joining every day.
Contrary to that, there are a plethora of supporters of the non-vegetarian movement, people such as Lierre Keith, who wrote the Vegetarian Myth. In this book, Keith discusses the negative effects of taking part in this vegetarian lifestyle. As a compromise, the public must be educated on the pros and cons of eating meat or of being a vegetarian, as well as being educated on what exactly is being put into their meat. In a world where food production is rapidly changing the choice to eat meat or not is one to be considered based off of which the consumer provides better nutrients. Many may assert that a vegetarian lifestyle is not healthy for the human body because it will deprive it of vital nutrients such as protein, iron, zinc, and so forth.
Imagine walking through a building that is crammed from wall to wall with thousands of chickens, making so much noise because of how little room they have to move around. “Corpses that have been in the cages for so long that their bodies have become mummified” (Humane Society of the United States). Walking on a floor that is caked with so many flies. Seeing the unsanitary location where the food you serve your family is coming from. You have just walked through a factory farm.
In today’s world, there is a division among the people in the world regarding whether or not it is ethical to eat meat. After researching about eating meat and vegetarianism, I have come to the conclusion that it is indeed ethical to eat meat in today’s society. Sure, eating meat might have its drawbacks, but I have found that the benefits of eating meat far outweigh the negatives of eating it. Eating meat not only helps improve people’s health, but it also helps strengthen our economy and it has little difference in the environmental impact that involves in the farming of vegetables. Eating too much of anything usually results in a negative outcome.
Documentary Reflection #1 – Food, Inc. Food, Inc. is an incredible account of what really occurs in our food system in the United States. This documentary takes a closer look at the farming industry and unveils a very dark side. It is amazing to think that chickens have been re-engineered to produce more white meat and grow to their full size in 49 days compared to the usual three months. These chickens can barely stand since they cannot hold their own weight and are pumped with antibiotics due to their horrendous living conditions. It just doesn’t seem right.