Entry #7: The Greed of Humanity

 I recently had an opportunity to watch the film Fresh, and its primary focus was to educate the American public about the issues in the industrialized food industry, and where the food comes from exactly. In the first half of the film, the director highlighted all the problems and concerns that can be found within the food industry. Things like mistreatment of animals, unsanitary conditions, inefficiency in getting rid of waste, etc. Factory farms and concentrated animal feeding operations are the two main sources that produce "cheap" animal products. It so happens to be that they are also the two sources in which the most problems lie. In the second half of the film, the director shifted focus from the industrialized food part of the industry, to the natural and safer part of the food industry. The fact that natural food grown "normally" was more delicious and nutritious was a key point in the second half, and local farms and manual labor was showcased as an alternative to the current industry.

While watching the film, I felt a swirl of emotions- disappointment was the main one. While I was watching the first half of the film, I felt disappointed because of the fact that factory farms exist. I already knew of their existence and how they operate before I watched the film, but getting a sort of "insider's" perspective made me furious with the things I witnessed. There was a part of the film where chicks were being transported in large quantities on a truck, inside baskets. They were taken and unloaded at a factory farm, but the way in which they were handled and unloaded bugged me immensely. Chicks are tiny beings, and they are very much alive, yet in spite of that, the worker literally dropped them to the ground, without a care in the world. To give you a visualization of what I am referencing, let me describe his actions. The basket of chicks was on the truck, upright mind you. The worker grabbed the basket, went over to an empty patch of cold, hard ground, flipped the basket upside-down, and all the chicks landed with a thud. A THUD. I had to skip that part after witnessing it once because I was getting riled-up. I was angry with the way the animals were handled, but I was also disappointed. I knew the type of people that work in factory farms view nature and animals as a resource to exploit and throw away, and that saddened me greatly, on top of all the anger and disappointment. I am aware that we, as humans, cannot possibly thrive and survive without inflicting some matter of harm to some other party, but if harming nature or an animal is avoidable, wouldn't the obvious thing to do be to avoid it? 

Of course, there will always be people that wouldn't even bat an eye to the issues described above, but fact of the matter is, factory farms are a harm to the body too. Factory farms aim to produce cheap food, but there is no such thing as "cheap" food. The price was payed somewhere, and if it wasn't at the register, then it was the quality and nutrition of the food that took the blow. Cheap food is "cheap" for a reason- it's because it's trash food. It can't even be called food. Food produced from factory farms have all sorts of chemicals and additives put into them, and they end up destroying the "food" aspect of the food. You would basically be eating some concoction from medieval times made of animal products. You don't need me to tell you that such food is bad for your health, do you?

The film did a phenomenal job of presenting the facts as they are. I'm honestly baffled because the number of local farms that produce real, deliciously nutritious food, are dwindling. I don't understand why people don't see that factory farms are just terrible. The only good thing about them is their "efficiency" but because factory farms are so blergh, that can't even be counted as a good thing. 

Humans...are greedy. They are selfish, vile, creatures that think of themselves as the apex of the world, yet...they are also extremely ingenuitive. Now that I think about it, it might be too late, but it should be easy to see that local farming is the way to go. So why not take some time to get educated on the reality behind the food we eat. If getting rid of factory farms completely is out of the question, then why not change how we view the world? Why not shift our view of ourselves from being on top of the part, to being a part of the world? Until then, the world will always be a scary place, so why not work to make our world more pleasant to love and live in.