Food Inc, who's seen it?

[Akula]

I watched it on the flight back from San Fran. Since I am into the whole real food thing right now I really liked it, but I know not enough people have seen it.

[Ramsey]

pretty good, its on netflix instant btw

[LJ]

I don't let getting into debates about the movie because it REALLY tugs on the appeal to emotion and appeal to nature fallacies.

 

The biggest thing I like to point out is when they mention "and e coli is even making it into vegetables now" is that the e coli strains found in veggies are from human feces.

 

 

Also, Frito Lay has been suing people for the same thing that Monsanto has for over 40 years now. A seed contract is a seed contract. Find me 1 case that Monsanto won where the contract was not violated?

 

The Tyson chicken farming is gross, but check out hog farming, why they chose to not go after they is amazing to me.

 

In other words, there is nothing wrong with educating yourself, but if you want to actually do it, don't just watch a propagandist movie, do some leg work yourself. Contact local farmers, speaks with profs at local OSU branches. There are some things in that movie that are spot on but other claims are completely off. Like the "80% of e coli disappears in 1 week if a cow is put on grass" that is completely made up out of thin air and there is absolutely 0 veterinary study that states anything like that.

[Akula]

Monsanto sued a guy that was cleaning seeds, he didn't have a contract with Monsanto.

 

Seems to me they have a monopoly....would they survive an anti-trust suit?

 

Joel Salatin (Polyface Farms) makes very good points regarding nutrient dense foods and transparency. Why is it that Tyson won't let people into the growing operation?

[LJ]

Monsanto sued a guy that was cleaning seeds, he didn't have a contract with Monsanto.

 

Seems to me they have a monopoly....would they survive an anti-trust suit?

 

Joel Salatin (Polyface Farms) makes very good points regarding nutrient dense foods and transparency. Why is it that Tyson won't let people into the growing operation?

 

Because he knowingly had cleaned Monsanto seeds. Back in the late 70's a good friend of mine was a head buyer and contract agent for Frito Lay. In those days they selected their own seed stock and sold it to the farmer. It was in their contracts that they COULD NOT clean seeds. They won lawsuits against farmers and seed cleaners for cleaning the seed that had been sold to them.

 

Would they survive an anti-trust suit? Probably, there are other seed companies out there. Big Agri Business is no dirtier than any other large corporations and industries in the U.S.

 

I missed the nutrient dense foods part. There was a part of the movie that I missed.

 

Why won't Tyson let people in? I don't know. A lot of it probably has to do with the amount of dead chickens from heart attacks. I don't know much about chicken farming. I do know that the reasoning they claim behind the closed in houses are for disease prevention.

[Akula]

I raise chickens and turkeys, I don't worry about ANYONE coming and seeing how I do my grow out. The Cornish X chickens do have a high mortality rate when they are not given a clean environment or natural diet.

[LJ]

I raise chickens and turkeys, I don't worry about ANYONE coming and seeing how I do my grow out. The Cornish X chickens do have a high mortality rate when they are not given a clean environment or natural diet.

 

I'm not so sure it's clean enviroment or natural diet with the tyson chickens, it's their rate of growth gives them heart attacks and mobility issues.

 

There is a reason that a lot of food production vets choose to not do poultry. I've always thought that hog farming needs the most changes, poultry a distant 2nd to hog farming and cattle a distant 3rd to poultry.

[RC K9]

Just like with the Michael Moore films there is an agenda…however, that does not mean there are not some very important truths. The fact that my chicken, beef, pork is washed in ammonia and/or bleached is disgusting. Pumping our food full of antibiotics doesn’t help anything either. Just makes the bacteria strains adapt and become stronger. I thought it was a good film but I have been discussing with my wife having our own garden and raising our own chickens and buying beef from local farmers that grass feed before I ever saw this movie. (Need to move out into the country first though) Just makes more sense if one has the means.

 

One excellent point I thought was made was why is a twinkie cheaper than a bunch of carrots? I think that is one of the sickest things about our society. It is less expensive to pump your body full of poison than nourishment.

[Akula]

I'm not so sure it's clean enviroment or natural diet with the tyson chickens, it's their rate of growth gives them heart attacks and mobility issues.

 

There is a reason that a lot of food production vets choose to not do poultry. I've always thought that hog farming needs the most changes, poultry a distant 2nd to hog farming and cattle a distant 3rd to poultry.

 

I raise the same type of chicken they do, its called a Cornish Cross Rock or Cornish Cross. I don't have anywhere near the mortality rate because I give them the diet they need to ensure they put on bone density and their organs mature correctly. If you just feed them corn/soy, they get huge and keel over. If you supplement them with grasses and bugs they do very well.

 

Hogs are the same, let them run wild in the woods and give them a stable food source.

 

Slaughtering is messy on any scale, but it can be done in a way that doesn't cause so many problems with diseases spreading into the meat. Just involves people rather than machines (companies don't like people).

[excell]

I've seen it, and along with lots of other research, it's changed what and the way we buy our food. We buy so little processed food now, it's actually pretty cool. Very conscious about what's in our stuff, reading labels, buying organic/natural where reasonable. Making a lot of our own foods (I make granola I eat every morning). It's a lot of work, sometimes doubling the time I spend grocery shopping - but it's worth it. Especially when we have kids.

[excell]

...FWIW we also take it quite a step further and make our own cleaning products, laundry detergents, etc. Cleans as well or better with no harsh chemicals, costs pennies a bottle.

[Akula]

I was just at the OEFFA conference last weekend, I got to hear Joel Salatin talk about MOB Stocking in beeves, and he did his "Everything I want to do is Illegal" thing. He really makes very good points about us hitting the bulls eye of the wrong target. He also makes good points about growing animals quickly, that have almost no nutrients in them.

 

One of my chicken customers just told me they bought a chicken at Sams and it tasted like Amonia. GROSS!!!

 

Anyway, I liked this movie, I have been going down the path of more naturally raised foods for a while now. Beeves should only eat a herbacious diet. Chickens are omnivores, not cornavores. I don't believe in the word Organic because its a government term that has removed the ideal behind it.

 

There are a pile of opinions around this movie, some of it is propaganda, but most of it illustrates that if the food producer isn't willing to show you how they produced their product, it isn't worth your money or health to buy it.

[zeitgeist57]

...FWIW we also take it quite a step further and make our own cleaning products, laundry detergents, etc. Cleans as well or better with no harsh chemicals, costs pennies a bottle.

 

Make your own cleaning products? That's a great idea...

 

I'll google that sometime, but please feel free to let me know what you've been successful making/using, Chris...

 

BTW, My wife and I saw Food, Inc. and it also was a mind-changer...

[LJ]

We buy so little processed food now, it's actually pretty cool.

 

Umm...

 

Processing of meat is anytime it's cut up, cleaned etc.

 

And the ammonia is only used in the low end "beef product" crap. Yes they clean the machines with it, but then the low end crap is processed before the high end stuff. I've been to processing plants and seen it first hand.

Plus the amount they clean the machines with would cook off before it ever had a chance to enter your body....

[LJ]

Pumping our food full of antibiotics doesn’t help anything either. Just makes the bacteria strains adapt and become stronger.

That is a large myth as well. Farmers are required to vaccinate animals in certain states, mainly a lot of the beef producing states. These vaccines never reach your food on your table

One excellent point I thought was made was why is a twinkie cheaper than a bunch of carrots? I think that is one of the sickest things about our society. It is less expensive to pump your body full of poison than nourishment.

One part I am mad the movie didn't touch on is that amount of foreign meat that is used in this country that does not have the oversight of the meat we have here.

 

 

Overall like I said the movie really tugs on the Appeal to Nature fallacy. Is corn fed beef actually dangerous compared to grass fed? No, the corn fed beef is actually higher in fat making it tastier which is why most beef in this country is produced like that. It's due to THE CONSUMER wanting that, not the farmers. Consumers want a tasty, high quality, inexpensive beef product and the producers give it to them. 50 years later people start to complain and decide they want something else, yet they blame the farmer for producing what they have wanted for the past 50 years. It's ridiculous.

[LJ]

I raise the same type of chicken they do, its called a Cornish Cross Rock or Cornish Cross. I don't have anywhere near the mortality rate because I give them the diet they need to ensure they put on bone density and their organs mature correctly. If you just feed them corn/soy, they get huge and keel over. If you supplement them with grasses and bugs they do very well.

like I said I don't know much about chicken farming nor does anyone I know. Hell they don't even teach it to the food animal veterinary students at OSU

 

Hogs are the same, let them run wild in the woods and give them a stable food source.

Swine are a huge carrier of disease. While the way they are farmed is disgusting, it is actually the safest way to do it. If your idea were a good plan, why does just about every state in the U.S. want wild hogs eradicated from their eco system?

 

Slaughtering is messy on any scale, but it can be done in a way that doesn't cause so many problems with diseases spreading into the meat. Just involves people rather than machines (companies don't like people).

Meat is safer today than it was 50 years ago.

[Rotarded1647545491]

I'd not heard of it until now. Damn

[spankis]

This is on my netflix instant play queue right now. I was thinking I'd watch if by myself some night but I guess it's actually a decent film. Neato.

[HAOLE]

That is a large myth as well. Farmers are required to vaccinate animals in certain states, mainly a lot of the beef producing states. These vaccines never reach your food on your table

 

Oh really?? That is one of the most naive statements of this thread. lol

[LJ]

Oh really?? That is one of the most naive statements of this thread. lol

 

Because you know veterinary practices? Hmm, who to believe??? Oh I know, the girl who just passed her national veterinary board licensing exam that had the exact question of "what states require livestock vaccination".

 

Oh, I see you went back and bolded.

 

They don't reach the food on your table because proper vaccinations are given in spots on the cow, or pig where the meat is not consumed. Certain portions of the neck are such thin in muscularity that it does not reach any other meat while that portion is ruined.

[LJ]

I also think it's funny that someone calls a statement "naive" that is backed by veterinary studies. Guess they are all in on the conspiracy.

[Akula]

Vaccines are one thing, anti-biotics are quite another.

 

The reason most of the safety practices are in place is the large meat processing companies want the public to believe their products is safe. They have HUGE pull on capital hill. Just ask Kevin's mom how safe they are. (google Kevin's Law).

 

Ultimately consumers will drive the demand up to make changes, but they won't be the kinds of changes we want made. People want organic, so the government created a standard. The industrial food producers lobbied the gov. to get certain synthetic chemicals added to the "organic" list so they can change the smallest thing in their supply stream. Since the gov. owns the word, they can define it however they want.

[HAOLE]

I have seen the movie. I think it pretty accurate. The companies like Tyson and Monsanto have a goal of making as much profit for the share holders as possible, just like any other company. Putting them in charge of the building blocks of life like the SCOTUS has done is not only dangerous, it is immoral.

 

What happened with the SCOTUS allowing the patenting of GMO's has enabled Monsanto to produce a seed that looks good to the farmers at first (higher yield per acre) but in the end Monsanto wins and here is why. Because of the higher yields per acre prices will drop forcing the farmers to look for more ways to produce more per acre than the previous year, just to stay profitable. This starts a never ending cycle of being dependent on GMO seeds produced by Monsanto to sustain yield levels. So Monsanto is like the pusher that gets kids hooked on drugs. The farmers are hooked and have a hard time getting off the GMO seed due to decreases in yields if they do.

 

The natural drifting of seeds has occurred since the beginning of time. Now Since Monsanto owns the patent on the GMO the are going after farmers that have broke no laws. there have been many cases of farmers loosing nearly a life's work because their neighbor uses GMO and the seeds drift into there property and then you have a lawsuit.

 

Did you ever notice that home grown tomatoes are different than Kroger tomatoes? GMO at work. Not only do they look different, they taste different and the nutritional yields are not even close. I would suggest a book called Empty Harvest http://www.amazon.com/Empty-Harvest-Bernard-Jensen/dp/089529558X if you want to learn more about the deficient nutritional status of our foods.

 

While I am on a rant, the nutritional deficiencies of our food supply is one of the causes of obesity in the USA. The foods contains less actually nutrition but yet contain more calories. This sets up a situation where more volume of food must be consumed to get the same amount of nutrition.

 

My.02

[LJ]

Vaccines are one thing, anti-biotics are quite another.

 

The reason most of the safety practices are in place is the large meat processing companies want the public to believe their products is safe. They have HUGE pull on capital hill. Just ask Kevin's mom how safe they are. (google Kevin's Law).

No more pull than any other industry in this country. Appeal to emotions fallacy. That's all this movie does is tug on your heart strings and say "that isn't natural so it MUST be unsafe"

 

Ultimately consumers will drive the demand up to make changes, but they won't be the kinds of changes we want made. People want organic, so the government created a standard. The industrial food producers lobbied the gov. to get certain synthetic chemicals added to the "organic" list so they can change the smallest thing in their supply stream. Since the gov. owns the word, they can define it however they want.

 

Consumers don't know what they want. The food industry is what it is in this country because it is what consumers wanted. In 20 years there will be some other fight. Do I think things are perfect? Definitely not. Do I think some things needed changed? Definitely do. But this is what consumers wanted, now they want something else.

 

And yes, food most certainly safer today than it was 50 years ago.

[LJ]

.

 

The natural drifting of seeds has occurred since the beginning of time. Now Since Monsanto owns the patent on the GMO the are going after farmers that have broke no laws. there have been many cases of farmers loosing nearly a life's work because their neighbor uses GMO and the seeds drift into there property and then you have a lawsuit.

 

 

There is not 1 case where Monsanto sued where the farmer was unaware that he was reusing drifted Monsanto seeds.