What Does it Mean to Eat Ethically?

I’m a pretty flexible person who’s open to trying new things. I eat meat but I consider my diet to be balanced because I also eat fish, rice, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and other starches. After reading an excerpt from an essay by Gary Steiner titled “Animal, Vegetable, Miserable”, I’m quite offended by his writing in this piece. I respect vegetarians and vegans lifestyles because I’m a very welcoming person and believe people should have the power to make their own choices about what they put in their bodies without judgement. I’m annoyed with the perspective of Mr. Steiner and any other strict vegans who think they are morally superior to people who eat meat or use animal products. This is the world we live in, to be quite honest we would have to regress as a society to prevent the use of animals in any of commercialized products. Animals can be credited with having specific qualities that are only found in nature that cure diseases and further medicine. There are awful things that humans do to animals and I understand that and I agree with Steiner in this regard as far as pertaining to collecting and processing animals into food for human consumption. Yes, I think is horrendous what domesticated animals have to endure before they become food for human consumption, and there should be policies put in place to ameliorate such terrible conditions. But I disagree with Steiner’s perspective on boycotting any materials using animal products. Animals have been used for clothing, medicine, food, and companionship for as long as humankind has inhabited this planet and shouldn’t be stopped solely because of ethics or morality. I believe that animals are being harmed during animal testing for these products and for food consumption. I think for the balance of this world we live in; humans, animals and the environment should coexist at a sustainable level. What I mean by that is animals and humans live off the land, humans also live off the animals and then once we die we become part of the earth again in a symbiotic relationship. So all three aspects of the relationship are interchangeable because humans would hinder our potential by only utilizing one food source but in reality there should be a blend of different things as we treat animals, and our environment properly so the earth is sustainable which at the moment isn’t happening. Gary Steiner’s perspective is an extreme one and I personally think his opinion is in the minority for a reason but he did discuss ideas that I could also agree with to an extent. 

"Service Learning Reflection 2"

I was able to go to the Lord’s Acre farm on Wednesday and volunteer with fellow classmates. The first thing we did was break apart whole garlic bulbs and put the cloves into buckets so they could be used to help with farming techniques. After that we went into the gardens and pulled out weeds, so they wouldn’t interfere with the growth of the plants. Once that was done we picked sweet potatoes from out of the ground. It was really fun to get into the red clay dirt and pull out these massive sweet potatoes. It’s amazing the yield of the crops that come out of the ground. It gave me a perspective of how valuable every morsel of food can be for healthy sustenance. I thoroughly enjoyed my time at Lord’s Acre because it was a different experience from what I’m used to. I have very little experience with planting, gardening, or farming so this experience was pretty cool to get dirty and feel the earth between my fingers. I definitely appreciate good farming techniques to yield the freshest and most natural vegetables which support a healthy lifestyle as well. This trip gave me the idea of doing a little gardening myself and learning as best I can about ways to raise vegetables that I like to eat. I also watched as my other classmates picked Okra and then cut down the stalk after there was none left. I really love fried Okra and to see how it’s cultivated was cool to me. I have a newfound respect for the long hard hours that farmers and gardeners put into planting and harvesting food. I think this service trip helped me learn skills that can broaden my awareness of how food is collected before I see it in a store or market. Overall, engaging with other people and volunteering at the Lord’s Acre was a positive experience for me and I enjoyed doing it. 

Methods to Fighting Obesity

Obesity is an epidemic in the United States and is causing lots of money to be used for medical purposes to ameliorate diseases caused by it. After reading the article “Downsizing Supersize” by James Surowiecki, his display of an alternative outlook on how human choice is influenced by perceived options. The 2012 New York City bill to ban the selling of 32oz soft drinks is an example of  former Mayor Bloomberg trying to influence New Yorkers by “[offering] a choice in which one option is seen as default, [and] most people go for that default option” (123). This is a subtle way of battling obesity by influencing people’s thought process when they’re buying soft drinks. It would be more expensive to buy two 16oz drinks if the 32oz option was taken away and people would be indirectly conditioned to not want to drink as much soda. The rhetoric used by Surowiecki to emphasize his point is logos driven because his argument makes sense and he has reasoning behind the idea of this ban on soft drinks could be a step in the right direction towards combating obesity in New York City. The other text that I read was a piece by Dhruv Khullar titled “Why Shame Won’t Stop Obesity” and how the contemporary thought process to fight obesity is by shaming people into losing weight. In this piece he discusses how this mindset is ineffective due to the fact that “Americans today are exposed to an unprecedented amount of readily available high-fat, high-calorie, and low-nutrient foods” (127). I liked an idea that Khullar had about reversing this current trend by “[providing] monetary incentives to promote the production of and access to fresh, healthy food”, it would allow citizens to make healthier choices and be a real solution to the problem. Khullar’s argument was Pathos driven because he strategically addressed emotional aspects of obesity and shame in his piece. But he also used it in a positive way to inspire the millennial generation to want to make changes to status quo society.