Traditional Eating

Omnivore’s Dilemma, Food Politics and Vegetarianism

In both Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan and Food Politics by Eric Schlosser, we see the horrors of Big Agriculture, factory farms, mono-crops and the processed and fast food industries. We are shown how corruption, politics, greed, power and deception are being used by Big Ag, the fast food industry and other big corporations in bed with Congress and other Federal Agencies.  The pharmaceutical companies, food processing companies, many so called health agencies and organizations, and even many universities and hospitals all have a political/financial interest in seeing that processed, denatured, fabricated, fast and dead foods remain the mainstay of our nation’s diet. 

Pollan and Schlosser also describe an alternative to the destructive industrial agricultural practices.  The alternatives are small, mixed sustainable farms and ranches that are based on natural systems using animal rotation, grasses, natural fertilizers, composting and humanely treated animals fed their natural diet.  Animals are an integral part of the entire system and are essential for the health of the environment, biodiversity, ecologies, soils, grasses, waters, and our health.  Vegetarian ideals do not support sustainable small farms and ranches.  Even though both authors incorrectly condemn saturated fats, I think that both books actually show a strong case against vegetarianism even if this was not the author’s intention. In fact, vegetarianism ideals encourage the same destructive industrial agricultural practices that both authors exposed.         

Pollan does an excellent job of describing the excess of corn (and soy) in our food chain, how far from natural most processed foods are and the destruction this is doing to our health and the health of our planet.  Cheap corn, soy, fast food, chemical flavorings and fossil fuels are largely responsible for our present day dysfunctional, unhealthy, damaging industrial food system.  Also responsible are politics, power and greed and all the farm subsidies and other government handouts that support and encourage our present dysfunctional Industrial Agriculture model.  Most of this corn and soy is genetically modified making it even more dangerous and destructive to our environment and health.  Cheap corn and soy led to mono-crops which drove animals from the farm into factory grain feed lots.  Mono-crops destroy the soils and land and much more.  Factory farms cause pollution and environmental destruction and the inhumane treatment of animals is unconscionable.  Cows are not designed to eat grains.  This destroys their guts and health and requires rampant use of pharmaceutical drugs to keep the animals alive.  Corn and soy are used in most processed foods consumed and damage the health of all those who eat them.  High fructose corn syrup and processed vegetable oils are particularly omnipresent and destructive.  Pollan’s expose on corn is a convincing case to stop eating processed foods and by doing so, stop supporting Big Ag, Monsanto, Cargill, ConAgra, ADM, Big Pharma and all the other numerous organizations involved in our dysfunctional food supply and nutritional misinformation.  These companies and organizations are not concerned about our health but care only about profit.

Schlosser superbly shows us the insidious character of the entire fast food industry and how far its tentacles actually reach.  Big food processing corporations engage in unethical, large scale advertising practices.  Fast food advertising and the selling of fast foods is allowed in many of our schools. Big food processing companies spend exorbitant amounts of money on advertising much of it targeted at children.  Schlosser describes how big food processing companies practice price fixing and other devious practices to drive the small farmers and ranchers out of business.  

Schlosser also exposes the horrible working conditions experienced by low paid, young and unskilled workers on all levels of the fast food business.  From the farmers growing the potatoes for the French fries to the factory farmed chickens and cows to the meat processing plants and the fast food stores.  Farmers are reduced to serfdom status with little control over their farms.  They receive very little of the enormous profits made from the sale of their food after it has been highly processed, using high temperatures, pressure and chemicals like MSG and aspartame, and turned into fast food.  The meat packing industry employees are treated even worse.  Injury, low pay, long hours, unskilled, young and often immigrant workers are the norm.  Slaughterhouses sound like horror movies.  Fast food stores employ young, unskilled workers and pay them low wages with very few benefits. 

Factory animal feed lots create manure lagoons, pollution and destroy our environment and natural waters.  The animals are injected with hormones and antibiotics and are often sick and contaminated with pathogens.  E. coli, salmonella and other food pathogens are common in meats from centralized, industrialized processing plants causing widespread food born illness.  Pathogens are also spread via meat grinders.  One solution proposed by the industry is to irradiate our food creating an even more toxic substance.  Meat recalls are a common occurrence however, the public is often not informed of these recalls.  We learn that the USDA knowingly purchased contaminated industrial meat for the national school lunch programs.  Schlosser describes the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service as “demoralized and understaffed.” (p. 215).  It is difficult to distinguish the difference between the big food corporations and government agencies that regulate them.  Big Ag wields serious power over many politicians and federal employees involved with food processing industry regulation.  These big corporations use their enormous power and financial assets to convince, coerce and cajole pertinent government agencies and politicians, schools, pseudo health organizations, children, and all of us to continue to support and buy their fake, dead, chemical foods and use big pharma drugs. 

Our fast food industry has even become part of our foreign policy as big fast food franchise corporations continue to expand around the globe bringing all their widespread, destructive force with it.  The centralized, reductionist system of our food supply, controlled by a small number of huge agribusiness firms, is causing severe damage to the entire planet.

Both books make a hands down case for avoiding processed and fast foods supplied by Big Ag and Giant Food Corporations.  Reductionist science does not work when applied to a natural agricultural system.  Both authors also discuss an alternative that would actually do a much better job at feeding the world and protecting the environment.  Pollan takes us to Polyface Farm where a sustainable, health giving system is at work and it is clear that small, sustainable mixed farms are actually the only way we can save our soils, food and planet.  We see man working in harmony with nature to create a system that is beneficial for all organisms involved, and all creatures fulfill their own species’ natural expression in happy harmony.  We learn about grass farming, rotational grazing, mobility, using the sun’s energy, ponds, portable electric fences, composting and how these practices actually grow soils, nourish the fields and forests and provide natural grass foods for the variety of farm animals that in turn provide us with high quality, nutrient dense animal foods.  It is a system involving intelligent grass and grazing management, working with the lands natural topography. Water is stored in high altitude ponds that use gravity and pipes to supply the farms water supply needs.  The farm employs an efficient use of solar energy keeping fields, forests and savannah’s alive and thriving creating a plethora of plant foods for herbivores whose rumens are designed to eat these foods and transform them into nutrient dense animal foods like butter, raw milk, meat and eggs.  The variety of animals involved all play a specific role in maintaining the health, hygiene, fertility and sustainability of the farm.  The farm in turn creates an abundant supply of seasonal, health giving nutrient dense animal foods for the local community via farmers markets, local restaurants, on farm sales, metropolitan buying clubs, small shops, and CSA’s (community supported agriculture).  These farms are more efficient, more productive, provide better quality foods and are managed by intelligent, happy people who understand the wisdom of nature.  Joel Salatin believes that transparency and not government regulation is the way to creating a healthy, sustainable food system.  The way to provide for the population’s food needs, save the health of our food supply and planet is to have small, sustainable mixed farms like Polyface and natural sustainable ranches all around the country providing local food for their communities. 

In Food Politics, we get a small glimpse at a couple of sustainable cattle ranches that use rotational grazing and “range management inspired by the grazing patterns of elk and buffalo herds…” (p. 134).  No chemicals are applied and they work in harmony with nature.  They are trying to “raise cattle in a way that does not harm consumers or the land.” (p. 257).  The survival of sustainable ranches is becoming more and more precarious.  Poorly planned and expanding urban areas are causing massive land erosion from excess rain runoff and flooding.  Less conscious ranchers over graze their land destroying the lands fertility. 

Grazing animals are an integral part of these natural systems that are the key to the survival of our soils, environment and health.  Vegetarianism does not support the survival of small, sustainable, mixed farms and ranches.  In fact, vegetarianism actually supports the industrial agricultural practices that are so destructive to the soils, land, environment, biodiversities, animals, waters, and our mainstream food supply system.

Pollan gives us a good look at Industrial Organic Agriculture and we realize that “organic” may not always be what we think.  Pollan tells us that the organic industry is “now the fastest growing sector of the food economy” (p. 136) and this rapid growth has led to bigger and bigger farms, more fossil fuel use and industrial style agricultural practices that are far from the original idea of “organic.”  These farms are better than conventional farms because they do not use chemicals.  Industrial organic practices, however, do harm the land, soils, biodiversity, use lots of fossil fuel and they do more damage than good.  Cage-free chickens and organic milk cows don’t fare much of a better life than their factory farmed peers.  They do not, however receive anti-biotics or other pharma drugs and are fed organic grains (not their natural diet).  Large monocrops, even if organic are not sustainable.  They require frequent tilling which damages the soils and land.  Vegetarianism encourages large monocrops, fossil fuel consumption and the destruction of our soils.   Whole Foods is a major player in the Industrial Organic Agriculture system.  Vegetarianism supports the industrial food model and is not sustainable-neither for our environment nor our health.  

Pollan and Schlosser either failed to understand completely or omitted that, in order for this natural system to work, it is essential for us to eat the healthy, nutrient dense animal foods that these animals provide, not only for our own physical health, but for the health of the whole natural system.  This includes animal fats.  Both authors advocate eating grass-fed meats yet both wrongly condemn saturated fats as unhealthy.  They both still seemed to be duped by one of the biggest myths in nutrition; the “lipid hypothesis” and thus both inaccurately demonize butter and saturated fat. They clearly delineate the politics and corruption on many levels that have led to our dysfunctional and corrupt food system and present day misinformation on nutrition and health.  Yet they themselves are still being duped by the “lipid hypothesis” myth that has been brought about by the very same politics, corruption, greed and deception that they both so impressively exposed in their books. 

Pollan even talks about Weston A. Price in his book and tells us that the healthy indigenous people Price encountered “ate lots of meat and fats from wild or pastured animals; unpasteurized dairy products; unprocessed whole grains; and foods preserved by fermentation.” (p248). Yet Pollan doesn’t seem to understand what Price discovered about nutrition, especially the importance of animal fats in the diet.  Animal fats, like butter from grass-fed, range raised cows provide the necessary fat soluble vitamins A, D and K2.  Without these fat soluble vitamins in our diet, our bodies cannot absorb the minerals and nutrients in our food.  Butter is an excellent source of vitamins, minerals and many more health giving components.  Pollan also mentions Sally Fallon and refers to “Nourishing Traditions” yet again, fails to get the big picture on nutrition.  Pollan does not describe in detail the meals he had at Polyface farm.  The only animal foods he mentions eating are chicken, ham and eggs.  No raw butter for the corn on the cob?  Or raw milk?  What fats were eaten?  Pollan concludes that the French can eat foie gras and triple crème cheese and not have as much heart disease and obesity because they only eat them in small amounts.  Actually, I lived in France for a year during my junior year in college (a long time ago).  What I remember is that they don’t eat small amounts of foie gras and triple crème cheese, they eat enormous amounts of these foods along with prodigious amounts of butter, bone broths, eggs, cream, cheese, pate, meats, seafood, etc. and it is exactly because they eat these foods in abundance that they are less susceptible to heart disease, obesity and other chronic diseases.  No paradox involved. 

Schlosser also recommends grass fed meats.  However, he too inaccurately accuses saturated fat as the culprit in chronic disease.  He states that “heart disease, diabetes, colon cancer, and breast cancer, the principle ‘diseases of affluence,’ have been linked to diets low in fiber and high in animal fats.”  (p. 243).  He also repeats the mainstream confusion about raw milk and food born illness. (p. 201).  Good quality saturated fats and raw milk actually protect us from these chronic diseases.  Fiber on the other hand is not all that great for us especially in excess from improperly prepared grains, nuts, seeds and legumes.  Eating fiber the way the mainstream misinformation advocates causes many health problems for many people.     

Pollan and Schlosser do an excellent and thorough job of exposing the truth about the processed and fast foods industries and the seriously dismal state of our mainstream food supply system.  They both remind us that we have a choice about the foods we eat and that what we eat has an impact on our health and the entire planet.  They both point out the importance of being conscious about the food we put into our bodies and taking the necessary steps to find quality foods that support our local economies, biodiversity, health and environment.  They both understand the unknowable intricacies of nature and that everything is interconnected.  What affects one part affects the whole.  They understand the importance of healthy soils, biodiversity, and working with nature.  I think the stories and messages in both books make the case for small, local, sustainable, “beyond” organic farms and ranches.  Pollan states “The benefits of a food chain rooted in a perennial polyculture are so many and so great that they’ve inspired dreams of converting our agriculture of annual grains into something that would look a lot more like Joel Salatin’s pastures.” (p 198).  Pollan also points out some of the problems with the vegetarian argument and that all foods involve the killing of animals-many small creatures die and habitats are destroyed to create large fields of mono-crops.  Pollan writes “…Indian hunters and bison lived in a symbiotic relationship, the bison feeding and clothing the hunters while the hunters by culling the herds and forcing them to move frequently, helped keep the grasslands in good health.  Predation is deeply woven into the fabric of nature…” (p323).    

Small, sustainable, local, “beyond organic” farms and sustainable ranches are crucial for the health of our environment, ecologies, biodiversity, soils, waters, animals and humans. And even though both authors denigrate saturated fats and cholesterol, their books actually show that eating a whole foods, properly prepared diet, high in the nutrient dense animal foods (especially fats) from these sustainable farm and ranch animals, is an essential component for the success of these systems.  A vegetarian diet is in conflict with small sustainable mixed farms and ranches.  If animals are not part of the natural cyclical system of predator and prey, then the system is not sustainable.