Extra Credit Blog Post

This quarter when we watched Food, Inc I learned a lot about our food industry that I did not know before. I learned a lot of things that made an impact for me and made me want to make a conscious effort to change the way I eat.

Before Food, Inc, I never really paid much attention to the food I ate or especially to the food I bought. Up until college, I gave literally zero consideration to the food I ate, I simply ate whatever my parents had in the refrigerator. At college, my food purchases are motivated largely by price and I tend to buy whatever is the cheapest. I've been working to change that since I've been educated by the film and book Food, Inc.

I've always been a big meat fan. Meat has been a staple in my diet for my entire life, that's 21 years, and I never knew half of the information that Food Inc talked about. I remember this past summer, my mom made a big deal about buying "grass fed" beef. Honestly, at the time I thought it was stupid, and I thought to myself "Why dont you just go to the grocery store and get meat there....it looks better there anyways." But my mom insisted on going to the farmers market to get her meat there. After the movie, I can understand why my mom did what she did. Food Inc taught me that grass fed beef is the natural way cows ought to be raised. Grass provides them with more vital nutrition than corn feed does. On some levels, corn actually physically hurts the cows and makes them sick because they cant digest it properly. The whole system of meat production in our food industry is pretty shady if you ask me.

On another note, I've always known a few vegetarians who take their stand against the meat industry for one reason or another. Most of the time it's either that they say vegetables are more healthy or that their standing against animal cruelty. I never thought I would agree with these people, I always have thought they were being dramatic when it came to the treatment of animals. But after what I saw in Food Inc, I cant help but feel obligated to agree to some extent that the way we treat our animals, the way we farm our meat seems inhumane to me.

Because of this, I've decided to change the way that I eat. I'll never be able to be a vegetarian - meat is too much a part of my diet and I like it too much to give it up. But what I can do is try to get my meat from a farmers market instead of at wal-mart. Every saturday there is a farmers market in Athens, and I've been trying to get my produce there instead of at Wal-Mart. Even when I have to go to Krogers or Wal-Mart, I'm a much more conscious consumer. I pay attention to the nutritional value of the food Im looking at. Also, I've always eaten mostly red meat. I figured for my first goal in the process of changing the way I eat could be to cut down on my red meat consumption and eat more turkey and chicken. I also like fish a lot, so I want to probably try to eat more fish instead of burgers and steaks.