The Omnivore's Dilemma

Michael Pollan's argument of "The Omnivore's Dilemma" is that as Americans, we have a selective number of foods to choose from which results in a dilemma. His question of "What should we have for dinner?" is centered on the idea that Americans' eating habits and how AMerican food industries have drastically changed our way of life. What we should eat and how we should eat are binary oppositions that pull us into the unhealthy direction and push us into the dilemmas of the consequences that follow from our eating sources/habits.

In the Industrial section of the book, Pollan begins with the origins of corn. Awesome lol! He argues that everything we eat is made of corn and therefore we are walking corn with legs. However, the healthiness of corn has shifted as its processing rituals have been manipulated by humans and made/processed into foods that are unhealthy to eat. Pollan's arguments remind me of the speaker who talked about the "horrors" of McDonalds. Coincidentally, corn is in every McNugget and Big Mac because it is fed to the animals that eventually become dinner. I feel that both men have a point that our society has turned against the health benefits of eating to a more cheaper and fulfilling treat. However, eating out a couple times a week is not going to make you fat or unhealthy. Honestly, I eat out just about 5 times a week and I'm pretty healthy.

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

Of the readings from week six, Wendell Berry’s poem “Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front” seemed to raise some interesting questions in class that I would like to expand on a bit for my blog. The narrator begins the poem with an attack on capitalism and society as a whole, saying, “Want more / of everything ready made. Be afraid / to know your neighbors and to die” (505). The breaks in these lines are set up to end with commanding the reader to “Want more” and “Be afraid.” The first command is a more obvious critique on capitalism; the second is more subtle and complex from a psychological standpoint as it shows how desire is driven by fear to a certain extent. Berry also points out that we are afraid to move outside the capitalist system because all we know is capitalism and that which we do not know we fear, just as we fear death. The alternative to the repugnance of capitalism that the narrator prescribes is to, “do something / that won’t compute. Love the Lord. / Love the world” (505). The narrator subsequent recommendations are reminiscent of the teachings of Jesus, such as “Take all you have and be poor” and “Love someone who does not deserve it” (505). This is a rather unexpected turn for the poem as one would expect it to go into a glorification of nature or something along those lines. Although I did find some of these prescriptions to be an interesting and innovative way to undermine capitalism, the line “Love the Lord” was a pretty significant turn off for me. While I appreciate where he goes with the rest of the poem, the overt religiousness of that line alienates me as a reader and I imagine it has a similar effect on other readers as well. It makes the poem seem like it has a specific agenda that is being forced on the reader a little too aggressively. Overall the poem is successful in offering insight into both capitalism and its effect on our society, but the prescribed solution seems to be thrust upon the reader (which, for me, made me resistant to it). Whether or not Berry intends for his reader to have this reaction, I am not sure. Nevertheless, I think the poem would have a significantly different effect if that line were to be altered.

Video: M. Pollan on The Daily Show with Jon Stuart

His advice: eat food, not "edible foodlike substances."

Raj Patel, The Value of Nothing

Short video featuring Patel.  He calculated that the real cost of a fast food hamburger is $200.00.  He uses economics to steer us toward a more humane and sustainable system.  

Cell phones and The Inability to Focus

Ever since the American Industrial Revolution, Americans have felt compelled to have the most luxurious cars, houses, and clothes. We unconsciously felt that our self-worth was directly connected to our bank accounts, and that our image was better or worse depending on how fancy our cars and clothes were. As one Wall Street banker bluntly said, “Net worth equals self-worth.” Many new happiness studies have suggested that Americans have built this false notion that happiness is created by consuming more than your neighbors. This is still true today. However, there is an attention addiction that is replacing the consumption addiction.

Many Americans from all age brackets believe that their self-worth is directly dependent on how much attention they receive through the cyber world. Presently, Americans have become more addicted to being online than any other nation. Blackberries, I phones, Androids, and Nokias, have become our drug that always allows us to exit the reality we are in now, to enter into the cyber world. These smart phones keep people connected to the news, social networks, friends, and work twenty four hours a day, every day. Nowadays, you can’t even take a quite walk on a beautiful summer day without feeling your pants vibrating to alert you that someone five seconds ago posted a funny comment on last weekend’s parties. I see everyday people who can’t even think if they forget their cell phone at home. They typically say “my whole life is on that thing, I need to be connected.” It's a sad shame that Americans cannot live in the moment. We not only cannot focus in reality, but we feel as if we don’t get constant stimulation through the web, that we are nobody, that nobody cares about us.

Smart phones have created a sense of insecurity in virtually everybody that has one. Personally, if I don’t receive a text message at least once a hour, I feel as if nobody cares about me, and that nobody is thinking about me. I am not alone. In fact, if you just watch people around you, you will see that anyone with a smart phone is constantly checking it, regardless if they have a new message. If you are sitting in a class, or eating at a restaurant, just watch people. People will slyly pull their phone out from their pants just to see if they have a new message. The unfortunate thing is that many people check their phones to see if they have a message even if they know they don’t have one. They stare at the screen waiting for it to vibrate. They wait for it to let them know that someone is thinking about them. This insecurity is unfolding a variety of problems that we may not know the deep side affects until more studying has been done. But from simple observation of addicted cell phone people, we can see one major problem that is affecting the foundation of society.

The largest problem that is due to cell phone and internet addiction is the inability to focus. When I am at the library, I see students who try to read a book, but after every few pages, they check their cell phone and fire a text. How can one truly become involved in a book, follow its arguments, and create one’s own analysis if their train of thought is consistently broken by an incoming text? There have been many studies that suggest that addiction to text messaging is creating focusing disorders in children in young ages that are lasting all throughout their life. The inability to focus can pervade all aspects of our life. When people drive, they text. When they are at dinner, they text. And when they are just relaxing, they text.

Even the most ancient and spontaneous art we call conversation is slowly eroding because of cell phone and internet addiction. Before the day of cell phones, people would all sit around a delicious meal, a fire, or under the moon to discuss anything on their mind. Conversations would take turns, and interesting antidotes would fill the air. Everyone participating in the conversation was focused on the words flowing from the speaker. And everyone was thinking hard to put in their insightful input. But now, if a group of people are in a conversation, you can almost be guaranteed that people will come in and out of the conversation depending on when and who they get text from.

Sometimes you may be telling a story that people would typically find interest in, but while you are telling it, you see them reaching down towards their pants or purse to take out their phone to quickly check an unnecessary message. Then after they check it, they attempt to rejoin the conversation as if they never left. But you can tell that they missed important parts, and your feelings are also probably hurt because they felt that their little text message was more important than your personal story. My grandfather recently confessed “conversations used to be lucid memories like a movie with no commercials and advertisements, but now they are broken and fragmented like a short sitcom with plenty of commercials and advertisements.”

Michael Clayton

The film Michael Clayton tells the story of a huge corporation's attempts to win a case in which they have been accused of using toxic chemicals to fertilize crops that have led to major health problems in surrounding communities. The corporation is a client of an enormous law firm whose key lawyer, Arthur Edens, on the case has a nervous breakdown and switches sides after a realizing the corporation's guilt. The protagonist of the film, Michael Clayton, is an attorney who is charged with dealing with Edens' mess and reassuring UNorth that everything is fine. Once UNorth becomes aware of the real situation, the film quickens its pace and mainly focuses on UNorth chasing Edens and eventually Clayton around the city.
As I mentioned in class the other day, the film seems to be in the same vein as Erin Brockovich but focuses on the other side of the law suit. Not to say that Michael Clayton does not offer an interesting perspective on such a case (I actually think MC's viewpoint is a little more interesting), but it seems that environmental lawsuits are becoming something of their own genre. This can be seen as a positive thing as these films make audiences think about pollution. It also is an indication that people are becoming more and more concerned with environmental issues.
Another subject we discussed a bit in yesterday's class that I would like to expand on is Karen Crowder's character. The director's or screenwriter's (or whoever it is) choice to make “the bad guy” a woman was a very smart choice. This is because it makes the audience less able to put her character into the category of the corrupt and powerful businessman and thus makes her harder to dismiss as wholly evil and separate from ourselves. Corporations after all are made up of normal people. The question is how and why do people who make it to the top become so obsessed and desperate to save their company that they are willing to commit such atrocious acts? Understanding this psychology behind this process would probably help us fight against it and bring us a step closer to solving the environmental crisis. Maybe the next Michael Clayton or Erin Brockovich will be about Karen Crowder.

Wendell Berry reading a poem