“There are No Seasons in the Supermarket”

Where does our food actually come from?  Are we actually eating what we think we are eating?  Through the documentary Food Inc., the director explores the food system in general from its production on farms to being placed in the supermarket aisles.    Unlike what food companies and supermarkets want us to believe about the diversity of most of the food we are eating, the majority of the food we eat comes from a very small amount of companies and producers.  Our food is no longer thought of as being produced by individual farmers, but rather it is thought of as being produced by a system.  A system that has become so accustomed to modifying our food so that it is easy to produce and cheap for the consumers.  People are no longer willing to pay for expensive meats or really any other processed food when they can get the same amount for half the price.  Franchises like McDonalds are creating menus such as the dollar menu, where they are able to charge meat for just a dollar.  This obviously cannot be sanitary, and the probability of the consumers contracting diseases such as e coli is significantly higher. 

How does this disgusting meat make it to our plates?  Throughout the video, the process of catching the chickens and cattle is shown vividly, and the lack of the catchers’ attention to detail is evident.  The chickens are left in a dark tunnel to facilitate the process for the catchers, but by no means is this process hygienic.  It is atrocious what these poor animals go through, but it is also atrocious that these farmers and producers deem it appropriate to put these packages of meat on the shelves of our supermarkets.   

            I have never been more disgusted from watching a movie than after I watched Food Inc.  I cannot believe the process our meats and poultry experience before they are cooked and eaten.  The segment on fast food chains scared me the most.  The fact that unhealthy and unsanitary meat is being served to customers worldwide every day is abominable.  Fast food chains generally gross me out anyways, and I try to stay as far away from them when I’m choosing my meals.  The specific case with Kevin’s death was a wakeup call in the seriousness of the food we put into our bodies.  I am a huge meat eater.  Whenever I’m home, I eat meat all the time whether it is my mom’s cooking or at a small diner down the street.  I never realized the consequences of “bad” meat or even the severity of eating “bad” meat.   Throughout the years, people have stopped checking the quality of the meat, and instead they have been checking the price of the meat.  Especially in this economy it is so difficult to eat healthy and support a family.  In my opinion it is outrageous that the meat companies are lining the supermarkets with unsanitary, processed, uniformed meats.     

WHY?

Is the government going to create new laws requiring certain sanitary needs for the production of our meat?

If the meat production increases the price of meet at the expense of making the meat more sanitary, will consumers still buy as much meat?

Why do you think people still eat as much meat even while it is so unsanitary, and processed so thoroughly?