Food Stuff.

(From NPR):

Professor's Weight Loss Secret: Junk Food

San Francisco Orders Up An Angry Meal


As Beef Prices Stay Low, Small Ranchers Cry Foul

Now Who Wants A Salad With That School Lunch?

Amid Rising Demand, Price Of Coffee Beans Soars

Stories to Read.

NPR:

Switching Gears: Commuters Bike to Work

Whole Foods Cheddar Latest in String of Cheese Recall

Grocery Bag Lead Test Results Fluxxom Shoppers

No Arsenic in Pardoned Turkeys, But It Might Be In Yours

Alternet:

Ten Foods You Didn't Know Were Processed

Chemicals in Fast Food Wrappers Show Up in Human Blood

Eel, It Might Be in Your Salmon.

The November 22 issue of Time magazine took on the task of listing the 50 best inventions of 2010. A real-life Iron Man suit and a “fur” coat made of plastic were worthy, apparently, of my attention despite the fact that I didn’t know they had come into being (though, admittedly, the Iron Man suit does deserve, as Time put it, the “most awesomest” invention title). I also, somehow, managed to block out the most disconcerting invention of the year, if not of the decade: “Fasting Growing Salmon.”

Coming in at number 16 on the Times list, this invention (monstrosity?) by AquaBounty, “splice[s] in a gene from Chinook salmon with DNA from an eellike creature called an ocean pout” to create a salmon that “grows twice as fast” and, thus, “mak[es] them easier to farm “ (1).

According to a survey conducted by National Public Radio, 35 percent of Americans would try a genetically engineered fish (2). The other 65 percent? Well, their preference doesn’t really matter: The Food and Drug Administration is currently reviewing the salmon in question but, since they have stated that there is “no material difference between the flesh of the altered fish and the ubiquitous farm-raised Atlantic salmon in markets today,” the likelihood of a required special label for these engineered salmon is slim to none. Translation: It doesn’t matter if you would try a genetically modified fish because you might, one day, being doing so without even knowing it. This is especially troubling given the fact that the less educated an individual is, the less likely they are to know that genetically modified foods are already on the market (3).

Yet again, the government is proving to be not only reckless in their practices by skirting environmental issues in favor of keeping companies in business but also in their negligence in educating the masses on food production.

Salmon, who’s strife I cannot even think of summarizing in one simple blogpost (instead, I suggest reading Derrick Jensen’s Endgame to better understand their journey from wild animal to endangered meal), are like cows: the amount of feed it takes to grow one pound of them makes the process costly – both monetarily and environmentally. (It takes three pounds of feed for one pound of salmon; sixteen pounds for beef (4)). Therefore, just as corporations have done with cows, the way that we “grow” salmon has been altered in order to tip the cost scales in favor of companies as increasing production rates means increased profit margins. Though this process for a replenishment of farms serves producers well, it continues to ignore the issues of over-consumption, exhaustion of natural resources, and ecological damage.

Once this farming transition occurs, the government – whose corporate ties have already been talked about explicitly on Stay Free – simply has to keep the masses ignorant to the practices of unethical, anti-ecological companies, an easy feat for an institution setting the regulations and rules that keep us ignorant, unhealthy, and quiet. As former rancher turned vegan Howard F. Lyman once put it, “the disturbing truth is that the protection of the quality of our food is the mandate of foot-dragging bureaucrats at the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration who can generally be counted upon to behave not like public servants but like hired hands of the meat and dairy industries” (5).

Did you know that the majority of grains consumed by Americans are genetically modified? Did you know that growth hormones and antibiotics are still used in both beef and dairy cows and, therefore, are part of your diet if you consume these products? Did you know that part of the food being fed to factory farmed animals includes animals of the same species? If you didn’t, now you do. Tell your friends. If you did know, keep telling your friends.

Education breeds action. Action means change.

Live free, stay hungry.

1: Time Magazine; November 22, 2010 (73).
2-3: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2010/11/12/131270519/americans-are-wary-about-genetically-engineered-foods
4: Lyman, Howard F. with Glen Merzer: Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth From the Cattle Rancher Who Won’t Eat Meat; 1998: “It takes roughly sixteen pounds of grain to create one pound of beef […] Eighty percent of American grain production is currently destined for the gullets of animals” (125).
5: Lyman, Howard F. with Glen Merzer: Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth From the Cattle Rancher Who Won’t Eat Meat; 1998 (20).
Photo: http://www.scotch-whisky.org.uk/

It's On the Agenda (Dairy Conclusion)

I had originally intended to publish a strictly self-indulgent, op-ed style conclusion to the “Dairy, It’s What the Government Order” series this week. However, I stumbled upon something that left me relatively speechless: the International Dairy Foods Association Dairy Forum 2011 itinerary.

BACKGROUND: (Feel free to skip this section if you know anything about the IDFA and go straight to the ‘story.’)

For those of you who were unaware, the International Dairy Foods Association (IDFA) “represents the nation’s ($110-billion a year) dairy manufacturing and marketing industries and their suppliers” and has a membership of over 500 companies. However, if you look closely, its membership is dominated by companies who are owned by the Dean Foods corporation so often unknowingly championed by individuals attempting to alleviate their reliance on the dairy industry: Dean Foods owns not only Silk Milk, Horizon, and Morningstar – companies renowned for their meat and dairy alternatives.

The IDFA mission statement includes the following: “Seeking the elimination of unnecessary regulations that impede member sales” (i.e. “eliminate the regulation of how dairy is produced so that production can increase while quality can decline” i.e. “poor regulations for CAFOs”); “reducing government intervention in commercial markets” (I’ll come back to this one later)*; “supporting science-based policies that allow for technological advances while preserving the integrity of dairy products” (i.e. “supporting and creating technologies that forgo traditional dairy production in order to increase production” i.e. “supporting and creating and utilizing technologies that damage the environmental, consumer’s bodies, and the world as we know it”).

These are some of their priorities:
1. Push for continued reform and simplification of federal dairy policies.
2. Work toward elimination of unnecessary regulations that affect dairy and related industries.
3. Eliminate the impact of various proposed policies on dairy markets; use sound economic data to advocate policies that reduce government interference in the dairy marketplace.
4. Advocate science-based policies concerning product safety, labeling requirements, standards of identity, weights and measures, environmental issues, worker safety, food technology and nutrition.
5. Maintain strong relationship with such agencies as the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, as well as state regulatory agencies.
* Interestingly enough, if the IDFA wants to reduce government intervention in commercial markets, their “strong relationship” with the USDA seems either counterintuitive or contradictory as the USDA’s funding of Dairy Management would, seemingly, be beneficial to the dairy industry as it’s supporting the industry (at least, half of the time).

The IDFA also wishes to “promote and defend the image of dairy products. Serve as an authority on dairy foods issues. Defuse controversy and unwarranted (unwanted?) criticism of the industry and its products. Promote the industry’s positions and messages.” It would appear, though, that in order to simultaneously promote and defend itself, the dairy industry wants to remove all outside forms of criticism or regulation: they want to do it their way – the most profitable way.

STORY:

In order to make progress on their priorities, and continue to fulfill their mission, the IDFA’s Dairy Forum will be held in Miami, Florida from January 23rd to the 26th and provide discussions of policies with its members. Topic headings found within the itinerary appear harmless enough, including words such as “consumer trends,” “food policies,” and “market exchanges” – phrases that do not seem out of place for a industry conference that’s goals include profit increasing and lax regulation. However, if you take a closer look at the descriptions of these discussion, talks, and panels, things become even more unsettling and, in some cases, unbelievable.

“Why Is There a Decline in Fluid Milk Consumption and How Do We Turn It Around?” is the Breakfast Session offered on the Forum’s second day. Its description asks “Why has per capita consumption of milk declined over the past several decades? Where are the opportunities for growth? What consumer behaviors would need to change to take advantage of these opportunities?” During this session, Vivien Godfrey will be among the speakers who will, supposedly, be answering these questions. As Godfrey is the President and CEO of MilkPEP, the company behind Dairy Management’s influential National Milk Mustache “Got Milk?” campaign, you can only imagine the answers that will be provided will involve an increase in governmentally funded dairy advertising.

If that isn’t enough, Godfrey will also be speaking during the “Food Policies & Consumer Trends That Are Changing the Dairy Industry” session later that morning alongside Dan Roehl of the National Restaurant Association (1). These “industry leaders” will address inquires like “Is the Obama administration putting America on a diet? Will the Dietary Guidelines for Americans be successful in getting consumers to eat more fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low-fat/fat-free dairy products?”

These questions are ironic for two reasons: if you remember, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans was written by the USDA (who funds Dairy Management, who uses the Guidelines to support their campaigns) and the Obama administration approved the increase in cheese-smothered products in restaurants across the country (and these restaurants have sought out Dairy Management’s guidance for their efforts). It seems then that, rather than actually addressing the ‘attack’ on dairy, industry officials are simply setting up companies with even more options for advertisement bombardments and unnecessary contradictions as the government isn’t undercutting dairy, it’s supporting it.

However, the aforementioned alliances and inconsistencies are not new to this blog-series and, while shocking, were the least offensive things the itinerary included.

Offered concurrently with two other sessions (“Emerging Dairy Markets Around the World” and “The Obama Administration’s Trade Policy Agenda”) is a panel entitled “Marketing in the New Food Environment.” The description IDFA asks,” Can dairy products be positioned as part of the healthy diet that is needed to address America’s growing obesity problem?” and I’m inclined to cite the last two Stay Free entries as my personal answer. However, the second question posited drains every ounce of sarcasm out of my body: “Is the local food movement an untapped marketing opportunity?”

With a panel that includes Louie Gentine, President and CEO of Sargento Foods Inc., there are no viable arguments to be made about how a company as notoriously anti-environmental as Sargento could possibly “untap” the local food movement in a way that is anything other than exploitive and dangerous. (I won’t even bother breaking down the rest of the panel; this entry is already too long and the details are too complicated. However, if you’re looking for information on Sargento, please check out Scryve’s review of the company here http://scryve.com/sargento-foods-inc/).

As the local food movement was founded on the principles of sustainability, community, and consciousness, the dairy industry as it stands today has no place within it unless it intends to complete reform its farming, production, and transportation practices, a feat that is as improbable as it is impossible. Rather, the dairy industry will, undoubtedly, approach this as any other profit-increasing pursuit: shamelessly and tastelessly as such a pursuit would only hurt local farmers and swindle consumers. (Look at the “organic” farming that big businesses are promoting, for example.)

Two other sessions are offered concurrently that afternoon, perhaps in order to prevent attendees from hearing a session would could, quite possibly, shift their views on some aspect of the industry; consider their titles: “The U.S. Dairy Industry Commitment to Sustainability” and “Watch Out! Battles Are Brewing Locally.” Which of these two would you sit in on if you were the representative of a dairy company attending an industry conference?

Sadly, the former session seems equally beneficial and detrimental for those willing to attend; the first two sentences of the description read: “The U.S. dairy industry has been striving in unison to calculate its carbon footprint, complete lifecycle assessments and reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by the year 2020. There has been a great deal of progress and a lot has been learned, but there is still confusion as to why the industry is pursuing sustainability and where it will take us.”

While this appears as if it will inform attendees about the environmental benefits of shifting toward more sustainable practices, the description’s last two sentences undercut that notion: “Hear more about the win-win nature of the endeavor. Learn how to dispel notions that our activities will harm producers and businesses or generate more regulations.” That is, while the session will be informative in that it seems as if they’ll provide information to convince industry members that sustainability is not necessarily a bad thing, the manner in which the IDFA will be convincing these individuals is questionable, if not disreputable.

If the industry “experts” wish to “dispel notions that [their] activities [will] generate more regulations” they will not be practicing true “sustainability,” at least not on a large scale. Enforced sustainability would only insure more regulations for the dairy industry as the broad scope of their operations are not sustainable. (The details of this, while necessary, will not fit into this post, though, they will most likely be addressed in the near future.) Which is why I will simply name two panelists for this session and call it done (I trust my readers enough at this point that they’ll get the message without me repeating myself): Earl “Chip” Jones III, Senior VP of Dean Foods, and Paul Rovey, Chairman of Dairy Management.

The second session offered during this time slot is the, indisputably, the most despicable of the entire Forum; the “battles” panelists (including one Dan Colgrove, Senior Director of State and Local Government Affairs for Kraft Foods, Inc.) will be discussing anything “from sugar taxes to labels, from raw milk to recycling” and attendees are supposed to be enticed to the session as they will “hear experienced state lobbyists discuss trends in state food regulation and discuss strategies that have successfully beaten bad policies.”

I could break this down for each area noted but I’d rather call attention to the correlation between “recycling” and “bad policies:” what about state, or federal, regulations or requirements for recycling could be a “bad policy?” As liquid waste (yes, it’s exactly what you think) is typical stored on farms in what I would describe as cesspits, they often run the risk of overflowing when it rains; when overflowing occurs, the waste ends up in nearby water sources (2). A policy that would force farmers to fix this problem would not be “bad” as the cost they would incur for correcting it would outweigh the environmental cost that people living around the farm suffer from on a daily basis. However, as the goal of the IDFA is to prevent more regulations from being put into place, I can see where such a policy would be “bad” for them.

Merriam-Webster defines “industry” in several ways; I personally find the second one to be the most desirable form: “a systematic labor especially for some useful purpose or the creation of something of value.” However, a sub-definition is provided that describes the dairy industry more accurately: “a distinct group of productive or profit-making enterprises.”

If the companies and corporations that make up the dairy industry were more focused on creating a product of value instead of making a profit, things like the Dairy Forum would not have to take place. Factory farming would not exist. People living near farms would not become ill from waste run-off and their air would be breathable. Consumers would not be having dairy products shoved down their throat by the government. These products would not be genetically modified, they would not have to carry labels that say ‘hormone free’ because hormones would never have entered the bodies of the animals being consumed. The world as we know it would not exist.

However, dairy is an industry that exists solely to make a profit, by any means necessary. These companies are buying their wealth with the livelihood of the planet. Take a step back and see that what you are told to be “true,” that dairy is good, that dairy is healthy, that dairy is necessary, is not based on fact but on a forgery.

I am not asking you to stop consuming all dairy – if you want to drink a glass of milk, do so. But find a farmer close to you, who isn’t a part of the industry but a part of the community, and buy from them. Chances are it’ll taste better.

Notes:
1: The same NRA that First Lady Obama told to make all restaurants have healthy options, if you remember.
2: Lappe, Anna. Diet For A Hot Planet. I recommend this book to everyone interested in learning about how food and climate change are intrinsically interwoven.

Photo credit: http://www.epa.gov/

You Want Some Pizza With That Cheese? (Dairy, It's What the Government Ordered, Part 2)

The underlying implication of all of Dairy Management’s campaigns and efforts is that an increase in cheese consumption equates to an increase in healthiness. According to its I Love Cheese campaign, “Research indicates that enjoying 3-A-Day of Dairy servings of milk, cheese or yogurt each day as part of a reduced calorie weight loss plan can help adults achieve better results, when it comes to trimming the waistline, than just cutting calories and consuming little or no dairy.” However, there is no proven correlation between dairy consumption and weight-loss.

As such, while these campaigns and websites are informative, there are a few things they do not tell consumers. For example, the BodyByMilk website tells its readers, “Milk is one of the “food groups to encourage” in the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which recommended 3 cups of lowfat or fat free milk a day for everyone over the age of nine.” The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, incidentally, were written by the Department of Health and Human Services and the USDA and “serve as the basis for Federal food and nutrition education programs.”

Such circular logic, however, is not apparent unless one knows that the USDA funds Dairy Management who, in turn, runs the BodyByMilk campaign which cites the USDA as the source of its information. Of course, this is not the only area where the government contradicts itself along its concurrent “war on obesity” and “push for dairy.”

First lady Michelle Obama and United States Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack have pledged to make child nutrition a priority. They’ve worked with Congress to make changes to the Senate-approved Child Nutrition Act which is currently awaiting approval from the House. The proposed bill would give more money to schools to spend more meal, including meal “upgrades” and the banning of junk food from school lunch lines and vending machines. And this isn’t the only area that First Lady Obama has tackled in terms of “healthy” changes. She’s also called for “every restaurant to offer healthy menu options” at the National Restaurant Association’s annual meeting.

However, work behind the scenes contradicts Mrs. Obama’s goals as a series of confidential agreements have been approved by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture under both the Bush AND Obama administrations to expand cheese-laden products in restaurants under the direction of Dairy Management. (Given the presence of a product reminiscent of one of Innovate With Dairy’s suggestions (Hidden Healthies) that was highlighted in Part 1 of this series, it seems as if these agreements might have also extended into the school system as well.)

Through the help of Dairy Management, Domino’s Pizza was able to concoct new, and grotesque, forms of increasing their use of cheese: they now have a line of pizzas that have 40 percent more cheese on them than previously.

In what could only be called an attempt to remove blame, Domino’s website states: “Pizza can be healthy. It’s just a matter of choosing the right ingredients. Lean toward vegetables, go light on the cheese and you’ll be surprised how healthy it can be.” However, Domino’s provides its consumers with the option of “double cheese” and “triple cheese.” It also, at least on the website, allows its buyers to calculate the nutritional value of the pizza they’re ordering – one of the measure’s the company provides to “help you build a healthier pizza.”

When a customer purchases a hand-tossed, cheese-only medium pizza, their serving size (one slice) gives them 210 calories, 70 of which are from fat and providing the consumer with 18 percent of their saturated fats for the day. When a customer selects the “triple cheese” option, the caloric intake per serving jumps up to 375 with 185 of those coming from fat and 11 grams of saturated fat or 54 percent of your daily value. Again, this is for a single slice of pizza – not necessarily what the average American limits themselves to for dinner.

The Domino’s website also provides another handy tool for its frequenters: an area that provides you with suggestions to “lighten” your meal. When selecting the triple-cheesed, hand-tossed crust medium pizza, this area reads: “Based on the products and toppings you selected, we have no further recommendations to lighten your meal.” This lack of suggestion seems counterintuitive as one, single, solitary slice of this pizza will give you 54 percent of your saturated fat – the same saturated fat that the USDA is claiming to convince Americans to “give up” despite the fact that it’s throwing its money into efforts such as Domino’s triple-cheese option.

Domino’s is not the only company partaking in the cheesing of America. Fast food giant Taco Bell has become notorious for throwing copious amounts of cheese into and onto its products for years. In fact, the following products all make use of Taco Bells “three cheese blend” of cheddar, mozzarella, and pepper-jack: the Seven Layer Burrito (calories: 510; 160 fat calories; 6 from saturated fat), the Cheesy Rice Burrito (480 calories; 190 fat calories; 5 from saturated fat), Pintos and Cheese (which is labeled as ‘side) (calories: 170; 5 fat calories; 2.5 from saturated fat), and the Mexican Pizza(!) (540 calories; 270 fat calories; 8 from saturated fat).
Some Taco Bell products that rely heavily on nacho cheese (and saturated fat): the Cheesy Double-Beef Burrito (calories: 470; 180 fat calories; 6 grams of saturated fat), ½ Pound Cheese Potato Burrito (calories: 530; 230 fat calories; 8 grams of saturated fat), the ½ Pound Nacho Crunch Burrito (calories: 520; 230 from fat; 8 grams of saturated fat), and the side option of Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes (270 calories; 140 fat calories, 2.5 grams of saturated fat).

Others consist mostly of cheese, such as cheese roll-ups (200 calories, 90 from fat, 5 grams of saturated fat) and the cheese quesadilla (470 calories, 240 from fat, 11 grams of saturated fat).The barrage of numbers is a bit rough on the eyes, and the stomach, but it’s a testament to Taco Bell’s transparency, though, I won’t blame you if you glossed over the majority of it – most consumers probably do as well. Additionally, this “transparency” only goes so deep: despite providing information for all other condiments, sauces, and products, Taco Bell does not provide the values for the nacho cheese sauce or the three-cheese blend. It does, however, provide the following ingredient breakdowns for the nacho cheese sauce, three cheese blend, and cheddar cheese for your convenience and browsing. Though, if you’re going to a fast food place, you’re not necessarily looking to spend time to check out their website to acquire this information.

It would appear as if the government either doesn’t expect Americans to educate themselves on the sources of their food and nutritional education or they simply do not care. The research for this article only took roughly two hours and the amount of contradictions and circular logic encountered cannot be all that there is to find. However, with the average citizen not knowing, or caring, about the source of their food, it is not at all shocking that the government would be, unabashedly, trying to pull one over on America: they’ve been doing it for years and, at this point, it will be difficult in preventing them from continuing to do so.

That is, unless we, as humans, begin to know our food – where it comes from, who is making it, and what it’s made from.

References:
http://www.tacobell.com
http://www.dominos.com

Hidden Contradictions in Stealth "Health" for Kids (Dairy, It's What the Government Ordered Part 1)

A recent push for products with increased amounts of dairy ingredients has swept America. Some items have made their ways onto menus quietly, without drawing much attention to their dairy components – the reconfiguration of Domino’s cheese-to-pizza ratio is a good example - while others have prided themselves on their incorporation of dairy in their make-up – Burger King’s Cheesy Breakfast Potatoes, just one of many breakfast foods that have amped up the dairy. And, of course, there’s the onslaught of Taco Bell’s “cheesy” Mexi-American items that have become a central component of their menu.

(This post is part of a three-part series addressing the recent rise in dairy products and promotion and the ethical and health repercussions of this increase.)

While cheese has been a ‘staple’ in the Standard American Diet (1) for quite some time – there have been “double cheeseburgers” and “cheese lover’s pizzas” at restaurants for decades, the amount of cheese that companies are putting into their products is not necessarily the result of American demand but of government influence. The source? Dairy Management Incorporated.

Dairy Management is the marketing creation of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). The same USDA that has been pouring money into a federal anti-obesity campaign centered around promoting a decline in consumption of the very foods that Dairy Management is promoting. According the New York Times, the USDA declined to comment for an article which ran on Nov. 6th entitled “While Warning About Fat, U.S. Pushes Cheese (2)." However, officials did state that, “dairy promotion was intended to bolster farmers and rural economics, and that its oversight left Dairy Management’s board with “significance independence” in deciding how best to support those interests.”

The independence that Dairy Management is able to exercise, however, comes from levies imposed on dairy farmers and the USDA itself. (The Times, for comparative analysis, also noted that the USDA’s Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion has a total budget of $6.5 million while Dairy Management receives $5.3 million for overseas dairy promotion ALONE.) Additionally, though the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture must approve Dairy Management’s contracts and advertising campaigns, the unit also functions as a company, employing 162 skilled product developers and marketing experts, including the research and communications branch National Dairy Council.

If you visit the Dairy Management website, you’ll see links to a few familiar marketing strategies, among them the Got Milk?, 3-A-Day, and BodybyMilk campaigns that have barraged consumer’s sensory receptors through television, magazine, and radio advertisements. You’ll also come across a few sites that aren’t media-savvy and relevant.

Innovate With Dairy might be the most interesting. According to the website, “America’s dairy producers created DMI to help increase demand for their products by promoting how dairy adds the difference in nutrition, taste, functionality and convenience.” The Innovate With Dairy website serves to provide producers with tips to incorporate dairy into their products in order to “add value in lots of different ways, helping you create and position new or improved products, processes and packaging.”

Individuals browsing the website can click and choose which ingredients they’d like to use and the potential applications for those ingredients in order to concoct a new, dairy-infused product. There are hundreds of options and possibilities and many of their descriptions are noteworthy. “Persuade children and teens to eat their vegetables by appealing to the all-American love of pizza” one tag reads and encourages the production of cheese dips for carrots and celery.

In fact, one company has already capitalized on this idea and begun marketing it as part of their cafeteria food line. In a story run by National Public Radio on Nov. 8, Alison Aubrey reported that Hidden Healthies was being distributed at Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia to a high approval rate among students (3). However, according to the story, “What the kids don’t seem to notice is that isn’t your standard nacho dip. Pureed into the cheese are a bunch of vegetables.” Aubrey herself supports the decision to “hide” the healthy aspect of these new foods as “[Middle-schoolers] are notoriously picky eaters, and rejecting foods that adults insist are good for you is part of growing up.”

What Aubrey doesn’t talk about in the article is the fact that, by “hiding” the healthy aspect of these foods in a smothering of USDA encouraged cheese, the children are not becoming educated on what it means to eat healthy. Instead, they see the nacho dip as something akin to the other unhealthy foods they eat regularly (cheese-loaded pizza, which will be discussed in Part 2 of this series) and do not understand the benefits of the vegetables being “hidden” from them.

In short, what makes the new dip appealing is the cheese, an addition that works dualistically for the USDA’s dairy campaign: if students equate tasty food with cheese, they’re going to want more food with cheese in it; if students accept these foods simply based on the fact they taste good, it becomes irrelevant if they’re good them, setting them up for a life where taste outweighs healthiness.

Taste, it seems, is important to all consumers, not just children. Most marketing strategies, in fact, appeal simply to taste rather than benefits. David Just, a researcher who co-directs the Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition, was quoted by NPR as saying, “If you think something is going to taste really good – if you’ve been told by others that it tastes good – you build that into your head when you eat it.” Of course, such psychological manipulation is in his job description. Just has a new grant from the USDA to encourage kids to make “healthier choices” through the use of “subtle psychological nudges.”

Interestingly enough Just cites chocolate milk as a prime example of “subtle nudging” for school children. As many younger children prefer the taste of chocolate milk, they’ll grab a carton of that in the lunch line instead of white milk. However, Just suggested simply putting the chocolate milk behind the white milk as a way to nudge students from choosing it. The rational? It works. However, yet again, it doesn’t tell children why they shouldn’t be guzzling chocolate milk – they just, out of habit, begin drinking it less without realizing it. Convenience, a factor often cited by adults for as to why they don’t make healthy choices, is also a part of school children’s decision making process.

However, Just’s example of chocolate milk is worth nothing most importantly because it high-lights the countless contradictions that the USDA is currently creating. While individuals such as Just have been hired by the USDA to help create “healthy changes” in the diets of young Americans, marketing campaigns created by the USDA funded Dairy Management are promoting the very products its researchers are disavowing.

As part of the BodyByMilk campaign, an advertising strategy created by the USDA funded Dairy Management Inc that targets young athletes, chocolate milk has seen a “resurgence” and is being hampioned as the ideal post-work drink for athletes. In fact, the BodyByMilk website features superstars such as Apollo Ono as spokespeople for the benefits of drinking chocolate milk: “Its protein and carbs refuel exhausted muscles, while fluids and electrolytes rehydrate and help replenish what’s lost. Plus, it has the added bonus of other nutrients, like calcium and vitamin D to keep bones strong.”

If children are unknowingly receiving mixed messages about what to eat and not to eat without receiving any guidance about why, they’re left just as uneducated as they were before Dairy Management and the USDA stepped in with their contradictory influence. Such reckless, and harmful, tactics set children up for a lifetime of uneducated food choices based upon taste and convenience.

Of course, this could just be the underlying goal of the USDA: if children are ‘nudged’ into their food choices by committees, researchers, and professionals they don’t even know exist, they will continue these practices throughout their life, perpetuating the unnerving cycle of blindly consuming food promoted by the government so that the government’s economic interests are satisfied, even if the consumer’s health isn’t.

1: Singer, Peter and Jim Mason: “The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter.”
2: Moss, Michael. “While Warning About Fat, U.S. Pushes Cheese.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/07/us/07fat.html)
3: Aubrey, Allison. “Stealth Health: Nudging Kids Toward A Better Diet.” (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130732347)

Photo credit: briancromer.com

Things in the World.

Read these; be informed:

Yet Another Food Irony ("Fast Food Ads for Kids Up Despite Industry Pledge"): from NPR.

The Economy Outweighs the Environment ("Cost of Green Power Makes Projects Tougher Sell"): from Nov. 8, 2010 NYTimes front page.

The Death of Cap-And-Trade ("Energy Policy Explored As Cap-And-Trade Dies"): from NPR.

Get that Soymilk Out of Your Fridge ("USDA report sends beans above $13"): from Des Moines Register.

Good Idea, Bad Planning ("Ohio Encouraging more people to start fish farming"): from Cincinnati Enquirer.

Thanks, Governor-elect ("Fed: No train, no money"): from Cincinnati Enquirer.

High-Speed Rail Slows Down (Thanks, Governor-elect 2)("Branstad, Paulsen want to study Iowa City rail plan"): from The Gazette.

Moving forward.

Late enough in the game for Francis Thicke to matter to eco-conscious Iowans but before Michael Pollan’s comment made national waves, I heard Thicke speak at the Linn County Democrats office in Marion, Iowa. I had followed his campaign quietly, surprised at its platform for progression.

Thicke’s speech was delivered to two Cornell College students, two reporters, two members of his own campaign, the office staff, and me. He spoke explicitly about wind energy, biomass fuels, and topsoil erosion, addressing the big “sells” of any political campaign: infrastructure, industry, and employment. There were breadcrumbs, however, that led to the environmental powerhouse: localization, renewability, and longevity.

Thicke would be the radical’s politician despite working from the top-down: if you start restructuring the larger order, changing how industrialized farms operate, you begin to dismantle the hierarchy altogether and, those of us on the bottom, can meet you half-way through the rumble.

Less reliance on fossil fuels means less consumption of fossil fuels means less production of fossil fuels; less exportation and importation of food means less distance your food has to travel (less fossil fuels, too) means more local business; more local business means better local economy means more money for sustainable projects in state. And the cycle continues and feeds into itself and grows. (Remember the Earth’s never-ending life-cycle?)

If 280,000 more people understood this, maybe this post would be different. Maybe we would be one step closer to that faraway goal of a sustainable society. Maybe I would have fallen asleep much more quickly on Tuesday; maybe shoulders wouldn’t have been quite as slumped yesterday; maybe today my jaw wouldn’t have been set so grimly.

Today, after working on articles I have been writing, rewriting, and editing for weeks, I was struck by something.

395,046* people stood behind one man taking on a political giant. Unquestionably, Francis Thicke is a hero. He became a rallying point for a movement whose numbers will only continue to grow. Those 395,0476* voters, though, they are heroes, too. So, too, are the individuals across the nation who vocalized their support for Thicke and his voters. Just as Thicke himself goes against BigAg everyday on his Fairfield farm, those individuals are fighting corporate agriculture by buying local, organic products instead of processed, industrialized food. They are the foot soldiers leaders like Thicke need.

We might have lost the battle on November 2nd, 2010, but the war is not over. It will not be over until society, as we know it, ceases to exist and a new, sustainable way of living comes into being.

I took yesterday to rest; I ran five miles instead of my usual ten – sixty minutes to myself and John Cage instead of environmental podcasts; I began re-reading “Evasion” instead of scouring periodicals for post topics; and … I did not call Francis for a post-election day interview as I had intended.

Tuesday might have been the failure of 670,570 people to see the larger picture, but Tuesday was also a testament of compassion. On Tuesday, Iowa counted 395,047 humans who are changing the world. And yesterday … Yesterday, I rested because today was the beginning of a new chapter in the war.

Today Iowa governor-elect Terry Branstad stated that he would not support a sales tax increase that would fund the voter approved state conservation fund. Politicians on both sides of the spectrum are opposed to the tax increase and, now, it’s up to us to make sure that something happens. Those of us who already voted to approve the fund now have to insure that it ever sees any money.

It’s time to put our money where our mouths are: we must stop murmuring our discontent with the practices of this world and start screaming for the change that we so desperately need.

The Earth has been crying for it for decades. It’s time people start listening.

Live free, stay hungry.

To the future.

Politics have always been a mixed-bag for me. As a pre-pubescent adolescent, I had “discovered” punk rock and, like most unknowing 11 year-olds spinning Anti-Flag’s “Underground Network” for the first time, I became suspicious of the government. I recall attempting to butt into my parent’s conversations about the upcoming election – “George Bush is a fascist!” I would say (I laugh now – what would I have known about fascism when I was too busy reading every issue of X-Men?) – but not really quite getting “it.” It took a few years, and the 9/11 tragedy, for any political knowledge to really impress itself upon me the knowledge of what “I” was trying to say; in fact, on the one year anniversary of the World Trade Center attack, I wore a t-shirt with Anti-Flag lyrics on it to the ceremony my school was holding and spoke eloquently, for a 12 year-old, regarding my opposition to George W. Bush’s presidency to the most influential teacher of my life.

While my shirt sported “911 For Peace” lyrics, I had shifted away from the Fat Wreck Chords catalog for my political knowledge and began following newspapers, cable television, and books for every piece of information I could about politician’s platforms, shortcomings, and promises. For two years, I followed Bush’s career as president closely as his performance – and the country – continued to decline. Once, I even told my Social Studies teacher that, “Bill Clinton was one the greatest presidents.”

Maybe she believed me to be naïve of the “finer” moments of Clinton’s presidency, but she merely chuckled and rolled her eyes. Unlike most kids my age, though, I sat and watched CNN with my parents every night – an event that still happens to this day whenever I go home – and I was savvy on Clinton’s indiscretions as well as his strong-points.

Therefore, while I couldn’t vote in the 2004 elections, I encouraged both of my parents to do so (they both voted for Kerry) and argued with my freshman ceramics teacher as we watched Kerry concede during eighth period.

It could have been that defeat that led to my steadily declining interest in American politics. I became progressively more radical (as radical as a teenage resident of rural, Southern Ohio could be) and disenchanted with the nation as a whole. When the Obama train first pulled out of the station, I was less impassioned than my peers – I knew his platform, I knew the implications his mere running for candidacy had, I knew the impact his – unimaginable – election would have. I, however, had registered green on my 18th birthday and started writing bad short stories about rural anarchists, and generally was uninterested in the “system.”

I voted for Hilary in the primaries and went off to college without much thought. I was going to be a writer, not a politician or a “tool” of the man. I also read a lot of Abbe Hoffman and listened to a lot of This Is Hell so I, generally, had a bad attitude. As such, the first three months of my freshman year passed without much note – I drank, I watched Obama win the presidency on a jumbo screen, I faced a few hairy situations, and I went home before winter had the chance to set in.

The ten months of my life is incapable of summarization. This is not a literary device: much of it is hazy, blurred together by bottle after bottle of cheap booze and pack after pack of Camel Wides, and other parts are self-incriminating. The rest was spent in smoky bars, playing bass in a pseudo-hardcore band, and couch surfing until I returned, rather quietly, to college in hopes of “starting over,” refreshing, and resetting my life.

Just as with most things that was easier said than done; I crawled from Microeconomics all the way to Advanced Critical Writing, a class that, undoubtedly, made me the writer I am today (though, I’m not sure that ‘s saying very much as my sentence are usually convoluted and my penchant for parallel structure is a bit much). Simultaneously, I also found a group of people who would, through a series of events, alter my perception of the world indefinitely. I found feminism. Or feminism found me, drunk and stumbling about a house party with people who shared, for the most part, my own disenchantment with the world but were, for the most part, doing something about it.

I ended up living in that house the next year, throwing myself into reading, writing, and organizing while reshaping, refining, and reevaluating myself. I became a vegetarian (again), I debated politics, sexuality, social class, music, literature, wrote reviews of shows and albums, volunteered at women’s shelters, and read thousands of pages about oppression, suppression, and depression. Slowly, I started caring about the things that I thought I stopped caring about – animal rights, women’s rights, worker’s rights, gay rights. I didn’t need a political label to become educated and, in turn, spread that education. I just needed a voice.

I barreled through “Eating Animals,” “Fun Home,” essays about environmentalism, each issue of Slingshot, and read feministing every day. And then, after the recommendation of a friend, I picked up Derrick Jensen’s “Endgame: Volume I.” For two weeks, I poured over every page, agonizing over every death that I had a part in without knowing it over the course of my life. From the moment I finished the book, I knew that my life had to change.

Jensen spoke to 15 year-old me, the one who thought anarchy was the key dismantling all systems of oppression, the one who had a “KFC is Cruelty” poster in their locker. He also spoke to the 21 year-old me who knew that words were just as powerful of a weapon as a bullet or a bomb. I started to change my life.

I had taken small steps – reading “Eating Animals” after reverting back to vegetarianism reaffirmed my deep-seeded hatred for the food industry and factory farming – but I knew that it wasn’t enough (even now I wonder if anything will ever be enough). So, over time, I started changing my life to further my commitment to environmentalism and the pursuit of sustainability. I became more conservative in my vegetarian practices, cutting out, completely, cheese and milk and only consuming ‘traces’ of dairy until transitioning to veganism completely, stopped funneling money into the economy, and started reading. And talking.

Over the next five months, I read, as author Gary Paulsen said, like a wolf eats – ravenously. “The Vegan Monologues,” “Overshoot,” “The Vegetarian Myth," “Walking On Water,” “Earth and Mind,” and the list goes on and will continue to grow. I stopped buying “alternative” food, I started eating out of trashcans and off of discarded plates whenever the opportunity arises (though, I have yet to truly commit to a full-on dumpster diving, freegan lifestyle for any extended period of my life), I’ve started writing opinion pieces about the consumption and production of food, and for the last few weeks, I’ve been campaigning for Francis Thicke as the next Secretary of Agriculture in the state of Iowa. And now, on election day, I’m starting this blog.

Whether or not Thicke wins this election (and I hope – almost pray – that he does), work will need to be done (there always be work to be done). Americans throw away 25% of their food annually. Factory farms and agribusiness still dominant food production. Countless species go extinct daily. Politicians oppose cap and trade because Americans don’t want to save the planet. Excuse me. They don’t want to pay more taxes. The list goes on and on.

However, Thicke’s campaign has done something that I am proud to say I’ve been a part of: he has raised the consciousness of countless individuals about the benefits of local, organic, and sustainable farming and received the backing of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents who, six months ago, did not know what the difference between a grain-fed and a grass-fed cow is. And, for those of us who did know – and know so much more – he has received our gratitude, support, and admiration. (I cannot count the times over the last few days that someone, myself included, has said something to the effect, “Thicke is my hero.”)

And, I figure, if Thicke can do something that most people didn’t dream possible – an organic farmer running against a BigAg-endorsed candidate?! – I can finally start writing about the things that I care about. If he wins, he’ll need people out there educating others on his practices, policies, and beliefs. If he doesn’t win, he’ll need people out there that won’t give up, that won’t let the world die quietly.

- Live free, stay hungry.