She argues that the poor, despite their limited economic resources, try to follow dominant American cultural practices, in order to express their membership in society, and food is seen as a tool to "eat oneself into the middle class". On he other hand, there are strong cultural beliefs that the poor "should eat differently because they are different." She shows how the poor try to overcome deprivation by buying popular and heavily advertized junk food, which however damages them more than the affluent who are able to afford both junk food and nutritious food and thus balance its negative effects. Similarly, the poor families she has studied regard food and drink as important to social interaction, as others do. Thus, visits are always accompanied by gestures of offering food, and additionally many families depend on informal reciprocal networks of food sharing. Fitchen explains attitudes toward poor in the context of the American ideology that the individual shapes its destiny, and that poverty hence is the condition of individuals, not of society. Thus, a common myth, which also impacts government policy, is that hunger is the fault of the poor, who are regarded being lazy and feeding themselves wrongly. Being poor and eating a steak is considered culturally "inappropriate" behavior, because it violates the statement of how things
ought to be, it transgresses the definition of being poor, and is interpreted as the proof that the poor are living in luxury. Fitchen’s study reveals how a poor buying a steak with a food stamp mocks our sense of social order that demands separation of rich and poor. Since this book comprises 28 papers, covering a range of regions and periods, it is a remarkable collection of different approaches to food. If one might find some of them less appealing, they can be skipped by the reader since there are still enough left. Even one who is not particularly interested in food could find the book useful, since it deals in general with cultural meaning, symbolism, political economy, gender, and consumption. I liked especially the papers that dealt with the roots of thinness, since it is such a prevailing paradigm today in many parts of the world, and so heavily promoted by the media as an almost ahistorical and essential ideal. The book shows how bodily dysfunctions can be approached with cultural terms and further examines how access to food is a marker of power and how food can be used as a tool for manipulation and social control. It also provides a broad range of methodology: from fieldwork to historical approaches. Most grocery stores now sell food products labeled organic due to the increase of demand. Organic food became popular in the 1990’s and has since remained a trend. Although there are more and more supermarkets stocking organic food products on their shelves, non-organic food products seem to outnumber the amount of organic food products. Organic food products are labeled with a green and brown
sticker that says USDA ORGANIC. When most Americans see this label they think that what they are buying is better than the average product. But do they have any proof that organic is better? For some reason all a product needs is a little sticker that says organic, and people automatically believe that it is healthier. No one ever stops to ask what this sticker means. Instead they just trust that organic is healthier than the produce that is being sprayed with chemicals. The rise of organic food has created an illusion that organic food is healthier and has nutritional benefits that exceed those of conventional food products. What is organic food? To understand this illusion that the government creates, the definition of organic must be addressed. According to Robert Paarlberg, the author of Food Politics, organic foods are produced without any human-made (i.e., synthetic) fertilizers or pesticides instead organic farmers use composted animal manure and plant cover crops they can later turn into soil (Paarlberg, 139). This definition suggests that organic farming is not necessarily free of toxic chemicals, but that the chemicals used on organic farms are natural chemicals, or in other words, chemicals that appear in nature. Another definition of organic food is that it is produced by farmers who emphasize the use of renewable resources and the conservation of soil and water to enhance environmental quality for future generations (Preface, 1). Most people who grow or buy organic products link it to being green and environmentally friendly. If organic farmers are not using fertilizers or pesticides then less toxic fumes are going into the air. Therefore, by buying organic products they are doing their part in creating a better place to live. Others, however, buy organic food because they think that organic is more nutritious. Healthier or Not? There is no evidence that organic food products are healthier than conventionally grown food. According to Samuel Fromartz, the author of Organic, Inc., ninety percent of ‘frequent’ organic buyers think that they’re buying better ‘health and nutrition’ (Organic, 1). Ninety percent of people believe this because this is what they are told from others around them. Like most
things organic food has its limitations as well. In the book Controversies in Food and Nutrition, the authors state that organic foods are not necessarily healthful or safe. A high-fat food that is made form organic products remains high in fat (Goldstein &ump; Goldstein, 197). Being organic does not make a difference in how much fat a product contains. Although organic might mean that there are no non-natural chemicals used in the production it does not mean that it is healthy. Goldstein quotes Galleghar, the author of a magazine article in Kiplinger’s Personal Finance Magazine, you can buy organic chocolate bars, ice cream and cookies-all made with ingredients that are pesticide-, chemical-, antibiotic- and hormone-free- but they’ll be laden with fat, sugar and calories (Galleghar, 81-82). Galleghar argues a strong point, because organic defines how the ingredient was grown or produced, not the amount of fat, sugar, or calories it has. Thus, organic food is not healthier than non-organic food. Organic food does not provide any remarkable nutritional benefit when compared to non-organic food. In the opinion of Dr. Alan Dangour, a doctor interviewed by Karen McVeigh, ‘there’s no good evidence that consumption of organic food is beneficial to health based on the nutrient content’, he also states that while small differences were found between organic and conventionally produced food, they were ‘unlikely to be of any public health relevance’ (McVeigh, 7). These quotations suggest that although there may be a slight difference between organic and conventional food products, it is not of any importance to society, therefore the government does not publish this information. The United States Department of Agriculture claims organic produce will contain much lower levels of agrochemical residues than conventionally produced food . Lower
levels of agrochemical residue sounds like a good thing. However, how much of a difference do these lower levels make? The website also states that measured residues on most products, both organic and non-organic, do not exceed government-defined thresholds for safe consumption. Despite the fact that the residue on organic food may be less than the residue on nonorganic food neither of them exceed government regulations. However, the USDA might be conservative in their estimates of how much is safe due to pressures from the pesticide industry. The USDA seems to say that the only important aspect about the food we eat is that it has passed government regulations, therefore, we should not worry about the issue of safety any more. Local Farms? Another effect organic food has on society is the belief that organic food comes from small, local farms. In the article Paradise Sold: What Are You Buying When You Buy Organic? published in The New Yorker, Steven Shapin a Professor of science at Harvard states that, much of the organic produce on the market comes from large farms turning a huge profit from the organic label (Shapin, 1). Because of the increase in demand for organic food, big farming corporations grow organic produce in order to create more capital for themselves. It is important to know that organic does not mean local, and local food does not mean organic. For example, supermarkets like Whole Foods, or Trader Joe’s are very big businesses. In order to stock the shelves of a place like Whole foods a small local farm would not be able to carry out the job, instead big organic retailers need big organic suppliers such as Earthbound Farm. Earthbound is one of the nation’s largest growers of organic produce. Their greens
are produced on giant farms in six different counties in California, two in Arizona, on in Colorado, and in three Mexican states (Organic, 1). When a company produce comes from more than one place the piece of produce can no longer be considered local. Thus, the illusion that organic food comes from neighborhood farms is entirely false. Escherichia coli Much like conventional food, organically grown foods can carry bacteria. Author Robert Paarlberg writes, in 2006, bagged fresh spinach from a California farm in its final year of converting to organic certification was the source of E. coli infections in the United States that killed at least three and sickened hundreds (Paarlberg, 145). Although organic food may have a special sticker, which makes consumers think that the product is safer to eat, there are examples of organic food not being safe to consume. Myrna and Mark Goldstein, the authors of Controversies in Food and Nutrition seem to agree with the above claim because they state that, the manure that organic farmers may use could contain bacteria. ‘The only real difference between organic and nonorganic food is in the growing- and that’s not a big enough difference to protect your health from bacteria’ (Goldstein, 198). Due to the fact that the growing process is the only difference between organic and nonorganic foods, the risk for E. coli is not any different between the two products. Knowing the truth about where our food comes from is important because the food that goes into our bodies affects our health and well-being. The illusion created by the organic sticker only creates false hope that organic food is healthier and has nutritional benefits that exceed those of conventional food products. While many people continue to assume that the organic seal means that the produce is healthier and safer, one should remember that the seal only indicates how the product was produced.
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