american scholar by ralph emerson

Sheveon WhartonProf: N. Essay
ENG 150-002
09-12-12
Essay 2
Eating Healthy In America
It was Edward Stanley who said “those who think they have no time for eating
healthy, will sooner or later have time for illness”. Most to all Americans live very hectic
lifestyles, which is a very challenging for them to maintain a healthy balance diet; so
as an alternative they turn to fast food. Fast food can taste good but is it safe? What we eat can
and will eventually affect our weight, increase or reduce the risk of chronic medical conditions.
The food industry influences what we eat and, therefore, our health. In the paragraphs ahead I am
going to expose the tasty secrets behind fast food and implicate the method of food distribution
that makes unhealthy food attractive.
To process food means that it must undergo a course to become what it is when we receive it.
Of course usually the use of chemicals are involved. These companies rely heavily on petroleum
and other fossil fuels, along with antibiotics and hormones. These chemicals are needed to help
preserve the food, to sweeten it, and to give it flavor entirely. The main ingredient that the food
industry uses in food processing is corn. Roush said “In the united states today, 30% of our land
base is being planted to corn” (Food Inc). This is due to the fact that corn is cheap and it is used
in the production and engineering of our food. Corn is a great raw material that can be broken
down, and be reassemble into something else. You can make High-fructose corn syrup,
maltodextrin, and ascorbic acid just to name a few all in which is used in the production of other
food. Corn is so broadly used by big food companies that they also incorporate it in the diets of
the animals in which they rear, slaughter and then sell to us the consumer, and fast food
corporations. In the book the Omnivore?s Dilemma by Michael Pollan he said,” Beginning in the
fifties and sixties, the flood tide of cheap corn made it profitable to fatten cattle on feedlots
instead of on grass and to raise chickens in giant factories rather than in farmyards?.”(39). This
should not have happened because I am pretty sure by switching the animals diet, might have
some serious consequences. I watched a documentary and it too said, “there?s some research that
indicates that a high-corn diet result in E.coli that are acid- resistant. And these would be the
more harmful E.coli”(Food Inc). I knew it these industries are taking the cheapest route and not
taking into consideration the health of the consumer and how they are harming us; I find that to
be totally despicable. Corn is one of many grains used on industrial farms and are sometimes not
conventionally grown. This often means they contain high levels of pesticide and are genetically
engineered. In fact it is known that corn and another grain soy are the two most commonly
grown genetically-engineered crops in the US, and little is known about the long-term effects it
would have on the eating animals that were raised on that diet. Pesticides are known to build up
the fatty tissues of animals, and when these animals are eaten, the pesticide build up may be
transmitted to us the consumer. I read a food safety guide that indicated too much exposure to
these pesticides may increases people?s risk of developing cancer, and is also known to have
long term effects on our reproductive, nervous and immune systems. So from my point of view
the food industry main concern is about making money and not about the well-being of the
consumer. What they do is use the power of advertisement to persuade the customer to buy their
products, and they do not give the whole truth about the process in which our foods go through
before it gets to us.
Pollan also said, “Eat Food. Not too much. Mostly plants”(1). This statement is simply saying
that we should eat more real food; which may help us to maintain a healthy life style. We have
already explore what our food is made up of which is not much. So all we need to do is follow a
well balance nutritional diet; and to achieve that we should eat from each of the food groups
contained in the USDA food pyramid which includes vegetables 2.5 cups per day, fruits 2 cups
per day, grain 3 oz per day, milk 3 cups per day, meat and beans 5.5 oz per day and oil 6 tsp per
day . But as we can see that there is no way our nutritional needs is being met by consuming all
that corn. However, because most Americans have busy lifestyles most of them do not have the
time for cooking their own meals; so the solution to that is that they rely on McDonald’s,
Wendy’s and other popular fast food restaurants. These are the restaurants that purchases the corn
feed meat from popular manufacturing farms. Schlosser said” the whole industrial food system
really began with fast food”(Food Inc). There is nothing wrong with that but these fast food
places does not have a variety of healthy choices. Most people tends to go and purchase large
amounts of these unhealthy meals not taken into consideration the alarming health risk of
becoming obese which can lead to them becoming a diabetic. Maybe we need to lean towards the
idea of eating a more complex diet that includes carbohydrates, eating more fruits and vegetables
helps us to maintain our weights. Having more fish, and poultry but less of calories, saturated
fats ,cholesterol, salt, sugars and also less on the consumption of red meats and process food.
The more we consider our choices it will dramatically help us in the prevention of many
diseases. Eating a veggie fill diet, also has its risks, because you find that vegetables also is
produce by the use of pesticides and certain fertilizers that perhaps is dangerous to our health.
But there is another alternative, what if we started to go green? Going the organic route is a bit
more on the expensive side but with this way, what you pay for is exactly what you get.
Organic food are reliable and safe so I have been told by some of my friends who practice this
type of diet, they say that people are now looking for food with real nutrition and quality and that
they found it in organic food. Why is this you ask? The answer I got is that it is because it is
environmentally friendly and it is grown conventionally. Because of the way organic foods are
grown it helps reduce the risk for cancer. I know that organic foods are expensive but at least it
will be a better solution than to visit the fast food restaurants.

We all have busy lifestyles, we know that the food that we consume is laced with excessive
chemicals and we know the effect that it has on our health, so what are we go to do about it. In
opinion I think Americans needs to be educated , in other words start thinking differently.
Maybe we can ask the food industry to let us be more involved in the decision making of what
we want to eat. Also I think that we should try different things even though it might be a little
more expensive meaning going green, we can by start planting in our back yards that way we
have control of the kind of fertilizers we use to cultivate the vegetables we have planted. By
doing this it means that we now have total control in making healthy choices and we would
know exactly what it is we are eating.