HW19 - Family Perspectives on Illness & Dying

I came home , tried, sick, lonely.Dreading the idea of having plies and plies of homework. It seems as this last year comes closer and closer to the end , I'm left more in confusion. Not just about the usual school and what not but life. I ask my self day in and day out what am I doing? where am I going ?Sometimes I wish the world would just slow down so I could. And with the current unit, it has me thinking about my own immortality even more. If I died tonight what have I done ? what am I even going to do ? It seems as most of my friends are already plotting out the finest details of their life's ,I'm lost . I'm not even sure where I'm at in the story of my life and we can never be sure that with a flip of the page it will be the end.

I guess if anything I want make sure I'm doing something right, that my life tho at this point not the definition of success, means something. That theirs someone out their when I get ill will take care of me. Its seems the more I write this the more the thought occurs, how can we be living life to the fullest under all this stress. Most of our youth is spent in the class rooms,hrs on hrs doing boring work.Coming home doing more work, spending time watching TV and updating our facebook statuses. Making some time for dinner and arguing with are parents.Then one day we wake up and where as old as the people teaching us the lessons. More time then passes , we have families, job's, and bills until where siting in a hospital room finding out we have terminal cancer.How is that spending your life to the fullest ? See we love as a society to use cliches and metaphors to make life easier. To hide the facts of life. The biggest disadvantage of life isn't death but that only at the end do we realize what we had, what we lost, what we were, what we could of been, what we did, what we never did. I'm not trying to say to live life on the edge like some of my friends ,smoking and drinking. I'm just saying not to squander it. Because it the real span of things its short.

Don't go to college cause everyone is doing it, because your parents want you to, go because you want learn, you want try to better yourself.In talking to my mom in really opened my eyes , she said seeing someone ill is difficult, That you almost subconsciously wished they would pass because you don't want see them in that kind of pain. She said she thinks about getting sick.That it scares her because your always scared of the unknown but that she wasn't fearful,she was confident in where she was going when she dyes .Her feeling was that we move on to a higher spiritual place.

I was shocked to find out my mom wasn't sure who would care for her in her final days, that she wouldn't be surprised if she was alone.As I expressed some of my thoughts on life , I asked her if she felt she has lived life to the fullest she said no.That to truly live life to the fullest you have to spend your life in enjoyment, and she hasn't. I asked her if she regrets this she said no.Then their was a almost pen drop quietness in the room, then she said "when you alive your constantly changing but when your dead your just dead.When I asked her about why she smokes even tho it could kill her she said "people don't look ahead, they live in the hear an now, maybe people are on a some kind of internal suicide". She said she didn't feel completely comfortable talking about this topic, when asked she said "I'm 47, a smoker, and a minority, you do the math". Where all going to die, at the end we'll all have some feeling , I just hope at the end I can say I had no regrets.

HW 18 - Health & Illness & Feasting

HW 17 - First Thoughts on the Illness & Dying Unit

Death is somthing thats universal. Weve all had someone that we cared for die,and all wonder where do they ? is this it ? what is death itself ? . Death is one of those topics that some can discuss very openly, and honest or you can tell in a blink of a moment feel uncomfortable talking about it, they will try to change the subject to some lighter matter or tell a joke. I think you'll find the people who are willing to discuss death with you are people who have thought about death quite a lot.

I think we should all realize that willl all die someday. Some people like to almost live in a imganiry world, where death doesnt happen, But after seeing my grandmother die I realized that death is just as real as talking, walking or hearing.Death is the ultimate realization. When you realize that with death theirs a strong possibility youll disappear completely and forever, and that nobody will remember you.So many people live their lifes wanting to be remembered . The question has to be asked why are we fighting to live if we are just living to die?

Im not sure about any of these quesstions . I have no idea what will happen when we die. Im not sure if are sould are reborn in a different body, or if we get to hover over time and space , or if we simply just dissolve into the ground, or we just disappear. I have no idea but i dont think it matters. What matters is that we get to be alive,what we do while were here. From Jesus to Budda this is what they truly preached its not where we are going but its how we act where we are. The most beautiful thing about death is the realization of life. Being alive we get to be conscious, we get to build connections with each other, and we get to be aware of these connections and to spend a few years mucking about in its possibilities. We get to have a slice of time and space that's ours.

HW 11 - Final Food Project 1

One big question facing society today is how do we deal with childhood obesity in America .Obesity in the past 20 years has tripled in children. This has especially effected minority comminties, "50 percent of adolescents in some minority populations are overweight". Heart attacks and type 2 diabetes may become a common disease for many if not most young adults.The question remains how do we deal with this epidemic ? who do we blame? In my opinion theirs only one place to point the finger at, the food industry, but what to do ? Should we fight the food industry or work together with it. The food industry, favors , of course the work it out together approach. Presently the food industry lobbying groups are invited to Agriculture Department meetings, participate in professional nutrition conferences, and have testified before Congress on obesity legislation. .I think to truly understand the food industry and what their doing we must draw a disturbing but true parallel with the tobacco industry.The same tactics used by the tobacco industry for years is now being used by the food industry. Largely because of industry resistance, it took decades before the war on tobacco reduced rates of smoking significantly.

The American Academy of Pediatrics determined in 1995 that advertising to young children is "inherently deceptive and exploitative". But yet every year, of every month,of every day, of every hour, of every minute the food industry spends an estimated "$10 billion dollars" to influence and manipulate the eating behavior of children.

The average child views "10,000 food advertisements per year", "95 percent of them for fast food, soft drinks, candy and sugared cereals" ,all high in profit but low in nutrition. Toys, games, collectibles, movies and popular personalities can all be linked fast food marketing campaigns. Soft-drink companies have made lucrative contracts with poor school districts tying financial incentives to sales.

While at the same time the entire federal budget for nutrition education is "equal to one-fifth of the advertising costs for Altoids mints." Children now consume about "15 percent of their total calories from fast food, 10 percent from sugar-sweetened soft drinks and only half the recommended amount of fruits and vegetables."

The obesity epidemic has many causes, but none more than diet. Fast food is served in massive portions, contains highly processed carbohydrate and horrible trans fats with little to no fiber. The contents of this fast food is central to the increase risk for obesity, diabetes and or heart disease. Excessive soft-drink consumption is related in scientific studies to increased calorie intake, weight gain and obesity.

The food industry argues that more research must be done before anything can be done on regulating advertising and sales; that physical inactivity and not the food should be the actual target for change; that parents must teach their children to eat responsibly; that vending and soft-drink machines in schools provide freedom of choice; and that no food or company should be demonized or made responsible.While this is all true , the food industry must be held accountable as well.

The food lobbyist use money and power to influence national nutrition policy. Even the country’s main professional dietetic association has fallen victim. Legal Times reported that industry pressure led to weakening of USDA dietary guidelines aimed at reducing consumption of added sugar.The nation cannot afford waiting, this is become more than a small problem but a problem growing fat off the backs of Americans no pun intended. The food industry must demonstrate that it will be a trustworthy . Federal and state officials must find a response to this public health crisis,they must find ways to protect children from the ravages of poor diet , physical inactivity, and the food industry. National legislation on the prevention and treatment of obesity and stopping food advertising to children must be made.

HW 12 - Final Food Project 2 - Outline

Thesis: The dominant social practices are all covered in secrecy and in fact industrial atrocities.

Supporting claim: The food industry is a direct cause of the rising tide of chronic disease in America and the high Health Care Costs

Evidence:The country's obesity epidemic caused by the food industry has lead to higher health care spending

$147 billion every year to treat obesity. It costs another $116 billion each year to treat diabetes,and hundreds of billions more to treat cardiovascular disease and many types of cancer

Evidence:Health insurance companies with their profits invest irresponsibly in food companies that are playing a significant roll in the high cost of health care in this country.The U.S., Canada and Europe hold nearly $1.9 billion in fast-food company stock, these insurance companies make billions off high premiums and denying care .

HW 10 - Food, Inc. Response

Are parents, are teachers, are politicians , are self's, are friends they were all lieing. Who would of figured It was a lie, that in fact the places where most of the pigs, chickens and cows we eat come from are Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations or CAFOs for short, and this simple fact expresses more about how farming in North America has changed over the last 50 years then we even know .

Food, Inc., is a atoushing documentary by Robert Kenner's, which discusses the industrialization of food production and delivery systems and how it has affected our daily lifes from health, to environment, to the economy. The rise in obesity, diabetes, and cases of salmonella and E Coli poisoning is all traced in Kenner's film to these CAFOs and the growth of processed foods on supermarket shelves and in fast-food restaurants.

Food, Inc does not paint a pretty picture but its a portrait that must be seen, from Giant processing plants to animals being injected with hormones and chemicals standing in their own excrement, being fed genetically engineered corn and grains to make them fatter. Chickens that never see sunlight, can barely support their own weight , unsettling and nightmarish is the least of it .

The combination of Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation and Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma adds a certain substance to the film that cant be ignored . The film gets all the experts ,farmers, food advocates, and government officials who one after the other make striking indictments against giant food corporations like Tyson and Monsanto.

The film also points out are own government , the FDA and USDA have become almost powerless by legislation and court rulings, and the happy courtship of politician's and lobbyist has led to lax health and safety controls.What got me the most, was secrecy, it astonished me the lack of information given to s about what we are eating. For example agribusiness interests lobbied the state to keep labels off meats indicating that the fact they came from cloned animals.

Food, Inc. is film making with a cause. He's wants to scare us from parent with children, to low-income families who cant afford a decent meal , politicians,regulators, he wants to scare all of us and through his film he does just that, preparing us for the battle ahead. And in his own words "I think it's one of the most important battles for consumers to fight: the right to know what's in their food, and how it was grown."

HW 7d

Chapter 9 starts with an story about histories largest recall of food. In 1997 about 35 million pounds of ground beef was recalled by Hudson Foods because of E Coli found in the meat . At the time of the recall, almost 25 million pounds were already eaten. Schlosser discusses the new ways people our experiencing food poisoning . Before the rise of the large meatpacking plants, most cases seen of tainted food localized in small arenas. But because of meat now being distributed in large quantie across the nation, an account of food poisoning in one small town may indicate a epidemic. In the United States 200, 000 people are sickened by a food borne disease everyday.

Is this one of the first signs that the government is slowly losing more and more power to big corporations ?

The old saying is the costumer is always right, so if this is the case if we demand better food products would we get it ?

How come these large food corporations are reviving government subsides and write offs, while their killing and making Americans sick at the same time?

Is their a rate of change (leaning towards increasing) in just the last 10 years of people being affected with E Coli ?

Chapter 10 discusses about Plauen, Germany. Schlosser makes point to mention that everyone he talked with about Plauen was shocked to learn he wanted to visit this town of all towns. Schlosser notes the history of the city from 1923 when it was one of the first places to subscribe to Nazism, until 1990 when it was the first in East Germany to accept a McDonald’s restaurant.


Schlosser makes a point to show the the United States in a global context and to point out the role of the consumer. So I wonder how much power does the consumer really have ? If we were more informed could we make a differences? At the end of the day if the people we send to represent us aren't but yet representing large food companies whats the point? It appears to me the fist thing we need to control in the money. If we take the lobbyist money out of politics, maybe we could see true sweeping reforms but until that day its going to be more of the same. In the words of Barrack Obama , you can slap make up on a pig but its still a pig.

In the Epiloge Schlosser discusses a bout a surreal experience he had , while researching this book .It took place in 1999 in Las Vegas. Schlosser describes Las Vegas as “the fulfillment of social and economic trends now sweeping from the American West to the farthest reaches of the globe.” While in Las Vegas, Schlosser heard Mikhail Gorbachev ones leader of the former Soviet Union speak at the Twenty-sixth Annual Chain Operators Exchange about Russia in the aftermath of the Cold War. Schlosser saw Gorbachev’s being their something like an American version of a Roman circus, displaying the leader of a captured land.

Is Fast food being a chief American export, a key example of how the United States engages the rest of the world ?