You are what you eat

B and I finally watched the documentary Food, Inc. last night. It doesn't really compete with other blockbusters films as being equally exciting or mindlessly entertaining, but we felt like we needed to see it. And I'm glad we did. We were planning on having burgers tonight, but I decided I didn't want to do that anymore. Did you know that up a burger patty is made up of up to 1000 different cows? Cows that are being fed corn (get fatter faster), pumped full of antibiotics, and stand all day in their own manure? And their hides eventually get plastered with manure, and are skinned when slaughtered, but the whole process is so fast that they aren't all cleaned off properly? Sick. Yes, this is the meat we buy at the supermarket, and why it is so cheap. It also scares me that so much of our food is made of GMOs now, and that the food industry is not required to label items as such. I'm not going to go into all the details about this movie, since other reviews summarize it much better. But by the time I finished the doc, I had sworn off meat, vegetables, all grocery stores, processed foods, and America. Again, it all boils down to more profit and complete power. Funny how that works, since the people in control are eating the same food we are.. Idiots. But the ones who suffer the most under this system? As always, the poor. Cheap food is awful for you. Why is a fast food hamburger cheaper than a head of lettuce? The film states that 1 in 3 Americans born after the year 2000 will develop diabetes in their lifetime. That is insane. Corn and soybean, which are both heavily subsidized by the government, is found in 90% of our food products. The food industry is slowly killing us all. Another desperately timely reason to champion economic equality, à la Sweden and Japan. Are we living in dire enough times?? Everything is not OK.

I hope we're not all mutated, disabled, or dying horrible deaths in the next few decades because of the "food" we have been fed. I'm starting to think that the only people who can come of out this unscathed are the ones living off the land, growing their own vegetables, raising their own animals, and rejecting all industrial food and products. (The Amish..?)

As always, you cannot rest on your laurels by only buying food with the "right" labels. They are intentionally mindboggling and misleading to conscious consumers. Example. Also, aside from false labeling, organic food isn't necessarily better for you, and it's quite bad for the environment, due to all the transport costs and emissions. Buy produce in season! In all, B and I were thoroughly disgusted, and we will try hard to not fall back on old convenient ways of getting food. We're going to check out the Austin Farmers Market and the Sunset Valley Farmers Market this weekend. (Tips on how to save money at farmers markets.)

Oh yea, and maybe watch out for BPA in canned foods. Consumer Reports did the test.. odd that the cans weren't initially tested by the manufacturers, huh? Oh wait- no surprise there.

If you are not familiar with the industrial food battle, please watch this film!