Posted on 07/31/2009 12:35:56 PM PDT by Gabz
Alfred Hitchcock, the master of dramatized horror-suspense, once told me that the greatest scares came in broad daylight, not in the dark. So it might be with "Food, Inc.," a documentary that opens our eyes to what we have been conditioned to feel was a "safe place" in life.
We still go to grocery stores that feature pictures of rustic farms that suggest Americana. We notice that a double cheeseburger is cheaper than broccoli. We are in a rush. We buy cheap and save time. We may be fooling ourselves.
"Food, Inc." shows the over-controlled world of food production, a stomach-churning expose of an America that has turned from farms to food-factories.
Directed by Robert Kenner, the much-discussed documentary has finally reached the local scene with its alarm bells ringing loudly. It indicates that we're eating dangerous, disgusting stuff while four major companies are eating the profits. Just four, according to this treatise.
In the '70s, some 70 companies controlled beef in this country. Today, four control more than 80 percent.
It's good business, but are there hidden costs?
A Virginia farmer, incidentally the most levelheaded and credible of the many talking heads in the film, states it most succinctly: "We have allowed ourselves to be so disconnected and disinterested about something so intimate as what we eat."
Shouldn't we be safe in our disconnectedness? While we're busy making a living, and living, shouldn't the government take care of this for us? Why should we even have to spend 90 minutes looking at a documentary on this subject? We pay our taxes.
The breakdown of very basic governmental controls of food regulations seems to be, or should be, at the center of "Food, Inc."
We're up against the big boys here in criticizing, or fighting if you choose, an industry that is enormously successful at what it does - feed the world. With "Food, Inc." coming out in the middle of a lingering recession, it has its work cut out for it, more than even before, in combating successful business.
The meat industry even took on Oprah Winfrey, suing her for her comments against hamburgers. Winfrey won the case, but only after a year and costs of more than $1 million.
At least in this film, there are some pointed suggestions of what we can do: Buy local, plant gardens and, most importantly of all, vote and be heard in favor of a government that will take care of this for us.
Kenner's treatment is straightforward. It admittedly is biased but out of necessity. The big four rejected offers to be interviewed.
Their defense, we guess, would be that of efficiency. However, efficiency at every turn creates problems. Someone claims that "we are hitting the bull's-eye at the wrong target."
Smithfield hog processing plant in Tar Heel, N.C., identified as the largest slaughterhouse in the world, slaughters 32,000 pigs a day. Fifty years ago, it took 70 days to raise a chicken to become a fr yer. Today, it takes 48. Clearly, the companies see this as progress.
The poor chickens are engineered to, most of all, have fatter breasts and to grow fat quicker than their bodies can sustain, which means they, at times, can't stand up.
We need to turn away as we see a still-alive cow being scooped up in a forklift.
The American farmer is pictured as the most intelligent and successful food producer in the history of the world, and yet he is also pictured as presently under the control of his contractors. Farmers who try to save their own organic seed for planting, as opposed to those patented by Monsanto, are "investigated" by company men and arrested.
One, who fought back, spent $400,000, never getting to court. Faced with an additional $1 million in costs to pursue the case, he settled out of court. In shadows of the McCarthy era, another is forced to read the names of his customers who use the seeds that are not chemically treated. They, too, will ostensibly be arrested. "The list" means they are ruined. This is when the film becomes a good deal more than a food warning. It deals with control.
Corn becomes a major villain because we have been so successful in producing it and, subsequently, so busy in finding new ways to use it. One hundred years ago, the average farmer could produce 20 bushels of corn an acre. Today, he can produce 200 bushels on the same acre, we are told. Thirty percent of the land base in the country, according to the film, is planted in corn or soy beans. Overproduction is encouraged.
Most alarmingly, according to the film, cows, which evolved to eat grass, are fed corn, and E. coli disease is said to come as a result. We are shown a young boy named Kevin, who dies 12 days after eating three hamburgers. His mother campaigns to pass what is called Kevin's Law to regulate food processing, but she is afraid to speak on camera for fear of being sued for libel as a result of what she claims are "special" libel laws that protect the meat industry. Oprah Winfrey also knows about such laws.
It this film cause for alarm? At least it is cause for viewing. The emphasis in "Food, Inc." is on the "Inc."
Mal Vincent, (757) 446-2347, mal.vincent@pilotonline.com
And corn IS a grass, as is wheat, rye, barley, and other cereal GRASSES. Look it up. Here's a bit of help.
Before calling someone an idiot, get the facts straight; just because you disagree with them, doesn't make you right, and them an idiot.
How DARE you call AR an idiot. Pssst ... corn is a grass and FReepers don't condone the mistreatment of animals. Welcome to FR -- at the rate you're going your stay will be brief and painful. We do condone the mistreatment of newbie nuts. LOL!
Damn I had just clicked the abuse button on him to report him as a possible troll and when I clicked back he was gone! I must be getting slow in my old age.
Glad I didn’t take any longer than I did with my corn-is-grass links post, or I would have missed him completely.
ping
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