Blog Post #4

Blog Post #4

In the book, In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan centers many of his arguments around the “Western Diet.” He defines the western diet as consuming “lots of processed foods and meats, lots of added fat and sugar, lots of everything except fruits, vegetables, and whole grains” (page 89). In actuality however, this isn’t what most “Westerners” eat. If by western he is referring to the western hemisphere then he is leaving out many different cultures and people. What about Canada? Mexico? The rest of Central and South America? Do those people not count as Westerners too?

Pollan is more or less referring to Americans when he references the Western diet. Probably on average more Americans eat a processed diet than don’t, but not all Americans eat this way. There is still a large group of people who try to stay away from having a diet consisting solely on processed foods. More people these days are going the organic route, but price and availability are deterrents for some. Also, even people who do cook meals at home can’t completely stay away from all processed foods. According to Pollan, most of what we eat is made of corn, and it is. Many food and food products we eat and use contain high fructose corn syrup. It’s hard to stay away from it.

So even if we need to get away from the Western diet to improve our health and lives it’s going to be very difficult and probably won’t happen in our lifetime. This whole culture of relying on processed foods is too ingrained. It’s going to take a big catastrophe to finally convince people “enriched”, “lowfat”, and “fortified” foods aren’t all the good they’re cracked up to be. Pollan’s argument to “Eat food. Mostly plants. Not too much.” is simple enough, and possible, but when he goes on to explain what food to eat it becomes more complicated.

It really seems like the average consumer has little choice in what they eat. Even if people want to eat a healthier, less Western diet, it’s going to be very hard. There really is no escape from “processed food land.” I’ve talked to a nutritionist before and her advice was everything you need in the grocery store is on the outside perimeter. Your fruits, vegetables, meats, and dairies are all on the walls. Don’t even go into the center aisles except for your breads and (healthy!) cereals. No junk food, no frozen food, no processed food.

Even with this advice however, even our meats and vegetables are processed. The cows we get our meat from are fed on pastures that were probably fertilized, were fed a diet rich in corn and supplements, and injected with hormones and antibiotics. So the products we think are relatively organic and free from processing are just as processed as the sugary, low cholesterol, lowfat breakfast cereals we’ve come to associate with “bad foods.” Our vegetables and fruits are genetically altered to produce high yield corn, two inch across strawberries, and large bunches of broccoli, all at the cost of poor nutrition.

Pollan makes some great arguments, but the truth is, not many of them are well supported. The “Western diet” (however untrue that title may be) is what it is because there aren’t many alternatives. Pollan’s logic in his argument that people can change the food industry isn’t even plausible. People are going to eat what they are given as long as they aren’t directly dying from it. It also doesn’t help that they are being told what they are eating is healthy and good for them even if it might not be. Pollan makes arguments, tries to back them up, but in reality they are relatively weak. Sure he has lots of evidence but the logic of it just doesn’t hold. The state of the people who eat the Western diet are perfectly okay with what they are eating, otherwise they might try to change it.