After watching the video of the interview I came to the conclusion that not even Pollan is able to "escape" from the temptation of purchasing delicious artificial food. During the interview on Pollan's book "defending food" it gave me the impression that Pollan did not have enough "evidence" to support his arguments against Colbert. I think it was quite simple to defend the American way of eating rather than the food that it is being corrupted by industries. Many people would easily argue the same Colbert did, which is -Artificial food tastes good therefore we don't want to care- This origins from going to the supermarket and purchasing the habitual groceries. I think it is inevitable to live our lives without consuming artificial food in our society. Purchasing our favorite cereal once a month or our frozen corn dogs is far too easy and economic to not even consider ignoring these. As the article of Industrial food isn't cheap suggests, not even the wealthiest people could afford the real price of industrial food in the market. Companies have conveniently set prices that would make the people buy their merchandise. And as we blindly go through the corridors of the supermarket looking at the different attracting brands we ignore how this food could damage our bodies.
Furthermore, as Pollan discussed, our bodies cannot handle the different artificial ingredients or chemicals in the contained food we might daily consume. However, as Colbert said "but it is delicious!" In other words it does not matter how much damage the food is causing to out bodies as long as it tastes good. Not only in America but in other countries people have became too focused on their own lives that the only reason why they would not buy that bag of Cheetos is because it has too many calories and it would ruin their diet.
Speaking of diet, in this video Pollan recommended that what a person should eat in order to be healthy is food with less than 5 ingredients and of course home made. Knowing that people would easily fall into the temptation of buying junk food in the supermarket he said it was "O.K" to consume these once a week. I do not think Colbert agreed with Pollan's argument because he kept on debating that the food he was bias against is delicious and fun. Colbert gave himself an image of the standard American who doesn't have the slightly idea of what he is consuming and he is not interested in finding out because he enjoys eating it.
Response to Animal Cruelty:
I have always been against animal cruelty, but it has never been beyond puppy mills. After watching this video more than realizing something I reconsidered my diet. I have always known that industries did not treat domesticated animals in the most comfortable way. I was not aware that there was this type of abuse included into raising the food I consume. I am feeling rather guilty for purchasing meat at the supermarket. I could easily say "the chicken or the pig is already dead, why not eat it anyways?", but I'd feel disgusted about myself, specially after watching this video. Even if the speaker in the video was clearly bias, the images were enough to
make me reconsider.
Furthermore, me not purchasing meat might not make any difference at all in these industries, but at least I am not contributing to it. By saying this I could easily release myself from guilt. However, I do not think it is enough. I am planning on making a project that would do something about this animal abuse. Many people cannot bear to watch the reality of where the food is coming from, but only because we are not watching or hearing it it does not mean its not happening. As for reconsidering my diet, before i argued being too young to become a vegetarian but now I do not really care about that any longer. I have already damaged my body enough by consuming industrialized food to even argue that becoming a vegetarian would conflict my development.
In conclusion, It is as discussed in Life doesn’t have to be Meaningless class, America cannot be stopped from industrializing at this point. America is a juggernaut and avoiding crucial consequences cannot be avoided. As seen in the videos Meatrix, not only the massive destruction of barns is occurring but also animal abuse and bacterial development due to lack of hygiene. These problems eventually will have a great impact on us consumers of meat. In the most predictable future, it is highly possible that there will be no more pigs or chicken to kill and process. If not a disease could begin originating from these places and stop the production of meat. As a solution to help the ecology, industrialization can slow down in production and give some time to recovery. However many companies would not even consider this alternative solution. This is because these are too focused on producing money that they ignore the damage they are causing. I do not think it is time to point fingers at one another, in other words blame those who are producing. Ultimately we all are at fault, because we consume what they produce.
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