Blog Four: From Farm to Fridge

In the short video "From Farm to Fridge", it's incredibly inhumane the way that they slaughter the animals that become the food that we eat on daily basis. The video is frankly disturbing as they do ask you to be 18 and over and warn the viewer of the graphic images that are shown. Behind closed doors, the animals in these factory farms hatcheries and slaughterhouses suffer from birth to the end of their sad lives just so the average consumer that follows the American diet can be satisfied.
Chickens and turkeys live in dirty sheds and denied their most basic ways of living like fresh air and movement. They are crowded by the thousands and hurt chickens get their necks broken while conscious. Others are plucked to death, treated roughly in their last minutes of living and then they are boiled alive hanging by their fragile legs have their necks sliced. For our eggs, the poor chicks are useless to these corporations and killed within hours of being born. It's horrible to see them thrown into a grinding machine alive or dumped into garbage bags left to smother and suffocate. While male chicks' lives are short lived, the female chicks have it worse by being confined in extremely small wire cages where they will spend most of their lives. The video shows the female chicks having their beaks seared off; beaks full of nerve endings. I can't even begin to imagine the unbearable pain they go through.
Then, there's the milk we drink. The majority of our dairy comes from cows that live in the most filthiest diseased conditions in factory farms. A lot of cows get sick or are injured and are left to die. The term that are used for these cows are called 'downers'. They brand the cows, cut their tails, slit their throats with no anesthetics and you can see the cow going frantic. It's very hard to watch.
Our meat and pork have just as much a cruel lifestyle as the other animals. Factory cattle live in the same disgusting conditions as cows. Mother sows are also confined during their four month pregnancy. They, too are also restricted of their natural needs. The piglets, oh my god. You can see the piglet being handled by a worker as if it was an object of no emotions while you clearly here it squealing as his testicles are ripped out and his tail is cut off. I am honestly turned off by any kind of pork meat after this video.
This video helps the project for the group work in LIB110 because the information in it is exactly what we are trying to share with the workers and the consumer. There are alternative choices for your everyday meals. We can survive without meat but do we have the willpower? Speaking of it helps but visually watching the slaughtering of the true cost of our cheap meat brings those words to life. Having knowledge of where your food really comes from can make a sufficient enough impact to make changes in your diet. That is the purpose of our group project and being one less that doesn't know what is truly going on in the food system is a start. It is a start to change that will come soon but most importantly in your lifestyle.

Blog 3

Previously this week in class, we read a few chapters off the book "The End of Over Eating", written by David A. Kessler.  The author explains the eating habits that have changed over the last couple of decades and what has caused a dramatic weight gain in our world today. The simple reason being we are overeating. Not only are we overeating past our caloric needs but exactly like the title of Chapter 3 in Kessler's book, sugar, fat, and salt make us eat more sugar, fast, and salt.  Far worse, a combination of these ingredients makes the food "hyperpalatable". The body system that is supposed to mantain our energy balance now is faulty due to the easy access and preference we have to all the variety of foods that are high in sugar and fat.

For example, Kessler states, "Sugar and fat are reinforcing, and cues, quantity, concentration and variety all increase that reinforcement value" (34, Kessler).   The definiton for reinforce in the text is basically what keeps us coming back for more sweet and fatty foods. Our palettes get used to these contents intesifying the taste and signals sent to the reward system in our brain. Cues are the location, setting, where we'd find these foods most likely triggering our want for it more. The fact that there are so many competitve fast food chains, and advertisement on what is cheap and high in these ingredients does not help. That is why in America, it is very easy to reinforce the desire to continue over eating sugar and fat.

There is however a bliss point to each individual. A bliss point is the point in which we get the greatest pleasure from sugar, fat, and salt. People do suffer from low intakes of these main ingredients in our diet. Too much intake has a similar effect but instead makes the meal or drink less palatable. Either way you go, it is fatal food. It is undeniable this country has gone through big changes literally since the 1980's. The lack of self control for what we eat has overpowered this country and one has become quite settled being the average American. 

Blog 2

In the book Fast Food Nation written by Eric Schlosser writes of contradictions throughout the book unveiling the corporations' hidden unsafe and inhumane work. A specific example in the book is when McDonald's introduces the chicken McNugget to the country in 1983. Schlosser writes, "McNuggets tasted good, they were easy to chew, and they appeared healthier than other items on the menu at McDonald's. After all they were made out of chicken. But, their health benefits were illusory"( Schlosser,140). What Schlosser is trying to say is that the chicken was just as unhealthy if not more than the hamburgers the restaurant was serving. It is a contradiction because the oil the chicken McNuggets were being cooked in was of beef tallow and even so after the restaurant changed to vegetable oil, they were still being adding beef extract to maintain the same flavor. The consumer assumes that because it is poultry and it's of much smaller size, it'd be likely for it to be healthier. Yet, that fact is unrealistic because although the chicken McNugget became extremely popular, especially for children, it contains twice as much fat per ounce as a hamburger.