Several days ago I came across a commentary on a Health.com
article citing the "27 mistakes Healthy People Make" (a title which
already has me annoyed. Let's come up with even more ways for guilt
prone people to feel even guiltier about their lifestyle!). The very
first fallacy of these idiot healthy people is buying organic food all
the time.
It got me thinking, I'm seeing a lot of this kind of backlash against organic lately. Recently, a large study came out claiming that conventional food is just as nutritious as organic food. I think a lot of people read that and rejoiced at being off the hook of the more expensive organic lifestyle. Or at least feeling more righteous for not jumping on that bandwagon in the first place. Then, the illustrious Dr. Oz put an article in Time Magazine crowning organic food the diet of the 1%. Now, Health Magazine wants to be another Yes Man to the conventional food industry.
What bothers me about the downplay of the importance of eating organic is that the sellers of optimal health want it to be all about you. It's about your body, your wallet, your time. The social and environmental impacts of conventional food are largely ignored, as if they are somehow a separate issue. Health.com doesn't want you to know about the severe damage to marine life from chemical fertilizers, the depletion of groundwater in the Midwest, the choke hold that Monsanto has over the American farmer, or the toxicity of pesticides. What I don't understand is why. Why wouldn't Health care about whether or not you are poisoned? Is that not part of being healthy? Even Clean Eating, a defender of organic, posted a piece in their issue last month saying "Well, at least avoid the dirty dozen".
Granted, the Health article does say they are specifically talking about the fallacy that Organic junk food is not healthier then regular junk food. They are totally right. Junk food is junk food. But that statement is casually slipped into the second paragraph, as if leaving some fine print they can use an excuse for the inevitable backlash they knew they would receive from organic advocates.
As for Dr. Oz's comments that organic food is snooty and too expensive, it's all about priorities. If you don't care about animal welfare, the state of our soil, the increasingly less profitable model of our agricultural economy, dead zones, children's IQ or the shameless burning of fossil fuels, by all means chow down on your GMO cornflakes.
Organic food is more expensive, but do not mistake: the reason is not because organic farmers are full of themselves, it's because we have made many policy decisions that have led to corn and soy based foods (including meat) extremely cheap. I personally spend about 30% of my income on my high quality, elitist diet. I make less than the average American household income, but the average spending on food is about 6% of income.
You spend 6% of your money on something you have to do three times a day, and then still complain that it's too expensive. In the meantime, we are eating over 500 more calories than we were 40 years ago. So, why not divert some of that spending on junk food into real food that is better for our economy and our environment?
It got me thinking, I'm seeing a lot of this kind of backlash against organic lately. Recently, a large study came out claiming that conventional food is just as nutritious as organic food. I think a lot of people read that and rejoiced at being off the hook of the more expensive organic lifestyle. Or at least feeling more righteous for not jumping on that bandwagon in the first place. Then, the illustrious Dr. Oz put an article in Time Magazine crowning organic food the diet of the 1%. Now, Health Magazine wants to be another Yes Man to the conventional food industry.
What bothers me about the downplay of the importance of eating organic is that the sellers of optimal health want it to be all about you. It's about your body, your wallet, your time. The social and environmental impacts of conventional food are largely ignored, as if they are somehow a separate issue. Health.com doesn't want you to know about the severe damage to marine life from chemical fertilizers, the depletion of groundwater in the Midwest, the choke hold that Monsanto has over the American farmer, or the toxicity of pesticides. What I don't understand is why. Why wouldn't Health care about whether or not you are poisoned? Is that not part of being healthy? Even Clean Eating, a defender of organic, posted a piece in their issue last month saying "Well, at least avoid the dirty dozen".
Granted, the Health article does say they are specifically talking about the fallacy that Organic junk food is not healthier then regular junk food. They are totally right. Junk food is junk food. But that statement is casually slipped into the second paragraph, as if leaving some fine print they can use an excuse for the inevitable backlash they knew they would receive from organic advocates.
As for Dr. Oz's comments that organic food is snooty and too expensive, it's all about priorities. If you don't care about animal welfare, the state of our soil, the increasingly less profitable model of our agricultural economy, dead zones, children's IQ or the shameless burning of fossil fuels, by all means chow down on your GMO cornflakes.
Organic food is more expensive, but do not mistake: the reason is not because organic farmers are full of themselves, it's because we have made many policy decisions that have led to corn and soy based foods (including meat) extremely cheap. I personally spend about 30% of my income on my high quality, elitist diet. I make less than the average American household income, but the average spending on food is about 6% of income.
You spend 6% of your money on something you have to do three times a day, and then still complain that it's too expensive. In the meantime, we are eating over 500 more calories than we were 40 years ago. So, why not divert some of that spending on junk food into real food that is better for our economy and our environment?
Find the links to my sources here: http://consumingconsciously.net/blog/2013/1/27/the-war-on-organic
Article Source:
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kali_E_Orkin
No comments:
Post a Comment