I finally watched Food, inc. One thing before I get to the review. If you have a weak stomach or eat chicken regularly, do not eat while watching this documentary. It will make you sick to your stomach.
POSITIVES: Brings up major issues with the way we eat. We tend to eat food like products (overly processed food stuff) instead of actual food. Everything we eat has some chemical laden product in it and even the fruits and vegetables we buy are pumped full of things to make them look better for the marketplace. (look at the segment on apples, it was pretty revealing)
We tend to ignore the ethical consequences of industrial meat production. I know that most of us eat meat, and kill the animals to get it, but we don't have to treat the animals like assembly line car parts while they are alive. We don't need to get into a philosophical debate about whether animals feel pain to decide that treating living things with respect is a good idea. Watching the chickens at the poultry processing plant was enough to get me to buy free range chicken.
We also ignore the microbial safety issues of eating industrially produced foods. Food safety is a huge issue. And realistically most food borne illness involves our food having contact with poop of one sort of another. Seriously, poop. Even if the poop did not give me an illness, I expect that the USDA and FDA are going to work on my behalf to keep poop out of our food supply.
The movie provided my take on buying products from so-called "evil firms". Companies sell what people buy and we are not going to overturn the food system in a week buy switching to food produced in gardens in our back yards. Buy organic from Walmart, buy the veggie burger from chili's and get the locally sourced fries from the fast food restaurant.
NEGATIVES: The film was very well, slanted. It was one sided and did not include any view points from people in the food industry. Because of its radical slant, the movie did not provide an opportunity for family farmers who make their living selling food to large multinationals to input their opinion. Many farmers depend on the current food system for their livelihoods and cannot afford to promote organic and local at the drop of a hat.
I know what I am doing when I purchase and eat fake food. I know what I am doing when I go to McDonald's. But that does not mean that I am going to stop going to McDonald's occasionally or that I am going to make it to the farmers market every Sunday. I like buying local, I like buying organic, I love my CSA and I love the farmer's market. But right now, for instance, I have a lot of stress and have decided to pick the convenience of pre-packaged meals over the stress of grocery shopping and the expense of restaurants.
As long as we make healthy food decisions most of the time and are aware of what we are doing when we make unhealthy decisions, I believe that there is a place for the Good, the Bad and the incredibly fake in our diets.
The movie also ignored, in my mind, the fundamental problem with sustainable farming on a large nationwide scale. How do we create economically viable and sustainable farming communities that produce food inexpensive enough for the poor to eat? If we go back to lower production levels of meat, grain and produce, how is it possible that the food would be cheap enough for a family to eat? And if there was enough competition in the marketplace to lower the cost, how would farmers make enough money to survive?
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