(EC) Food, Inc.
What do you know about the "food" you are consuming? In his documentary, Food, Inc., Robert Kenner forces his audience to ask themselves to ask this question.
Most of our food comes from industrial/factory farming. Today, the top four beef packers control 80% of our entire food system. These industrial and factory type farms produce a lot of food, on a small amount of land, for a very affordable price. Here animals are being abused. Chickens are being raised in half the time they were in the 1950's (49 days vs. 3 months), but even in half the time, they are ending up twice as big ( thanks to antibiotics, among other things). Scientists have managed to redesign the chicken to have bigger breasts because people like white meat. These chickens never see sunlight. Since chickens are growing in half the time, some can't handle the weight that they are carrying so they fall down after only taking a few steps. They also feed them corn which helps make the chickens fat very quickly. It is also very cheap.
Cows were made to eat grass, not corn, so when you start feeding corn to cows, E. Coil evolves. Cows at factory farms stand ankle deep in their own manure all day long so if one cow has E. Coil they pretty much all have it. These cows are then taken to slaughterhouses where 400 cows are being slaughtered an hour. How do you prevent it from spreading? Experts also estimate that nearly 90% of our food supply contains either corn or soy and most contain both.
The American government also plays a huge role in this issue. Food industries are hiring illegal immigrants to work in their farming factories and paying them the lowest wages possible. They even drive to Mexico and get them across the border. Eventually, they are arrested (15 at a time so that they still have workers in the factories) and sent back but these industries aren't getting blamed for anything and are getting away with it and still making a profit. Even after repeated contamination inside a food plant, the USDA does not have the power to shut it down. This just disgusted me, to say the least.
It made me mad seeing how they treated the animals in those factories. They would kick the chickens and force the animals into tiny pins.
When you go to the supermarket, candy, chips, soda, etc are all cheaper than produce. A cheeseburger from McDonald's for crying out loud is only 99 cents and you can't even get a head of broccoli for that price. So, consumers sometimes don't really have a choice when it comes to eating fast food which is what is wrong with our food system today. The reason these snacks are so cheap is because of crops like corn are heavily subsidized.
The food industry doesn't want you to know the truth about what you are eating because if you did you might not want to eat it. It is a world deliberately hidden from us. We have the right to know what's in our food which is why I encourage you to watch Food, Inc. and see for yourself.
Most of our food comes from industrial/factory farming. Today, the top four beef packers control 80% of our entire food system. These industrial and factory type farms produce a lot of food, on a small amount of land, for a very affordable price. Here animals are being abused. Chickens are being raised in half the time they were in the 1950's (49 days vs. 3 months), but even in half the time, they are ending up twice as big ( thanks to antibiotics, among other things). Scientists have managed to redesign the chicken to have bigger breasts because people like white meat. These chickens never see sunlight. Since chickens are growing in half the time, some can't handle the weight that they are carrying so they fall down after only taking a few steps. They also feed them corn which helps make the chickens fat very quickly. It is also very cheap.
The American government also plays a huge role in this issue. Food industries are hiring illegal immigrants to work in their farming factories and paying them the lowest wages possible. They even drive to Mexico and get them across the border. Eventually, they are arrested (15 at a time so that they still have workers in the factories) and sent back but these industries aren't getting blamed for anything and are getting away with it and still making a profit. Even after repeated contamination inside a food plant, the USDA does not have the power to shut it down. This just disgusted me, to say the least.
It made me mad seeing how they treated the animals in those factories. They would kick the chickens and force the animals into tiny pins.
When you go to the supermarket, candy, chips, soda, etc are all cheaper than produce. A cheeseburger from McDonald's for crying out loud is only 99 cents and you can't even get a head of broccoli for that price. So, consumers sometimes don't really have a choice when it comes to eating fast food which is what is wrong with our food system today. The reason these snacks are so cheap is because of crops like corn are heavily subsidized.
The food industry doesn't want you to know the truth about what you are eating because if you did you might not want to eat it. It is a world deliberately hidden from us. We have the right to know what's in our food which is why I encourage you to watch Food, Inc. and see for yourself.
I was just doing some reading for our last writing project. There was an entry that said chickens receive the most antibiotics of all factory farmed animals. In 1951 the antibiotics were approved to promote growth! It was not even being used to prevent illness! I thought it was crazy! I feel good knowing that I do not eat a lot of meat. I'm contemplating how I can eat even less, and change over to farm raised.
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