After watching the film Food Inc. in class, and reading several chapter's in the book Food Inc. itself, many things have stood out that I never knew, and almost wish I still didn't know about the food industry. After viewing the film especially, I look at my food differently and having been a vegetarian for the past several years, I now defiantly stand by my lifestyle choice. In the film, the scenes that involved conventional farming practices stood out the most. In particular, the scene in which the pigs are crushed to their death and the chickens are flipped upside down and hung by their necks got to me the most. I knew that animals were treated badly in these facilities and were forced to live in crammed filthy conditions because of an animal cruelty paper I had written in years past, but seeing it in the film was a completely different reaction. I had to look away several times during the film and felt sick watching it. Being as how that is how most would respond, would probably be why it was included in the film. It is one thing to hear about how the treatment of animals is, but to actually see it really makes you realize how corrupt the food industry truly is. The farmer that used the organic techniques in the film, at least showed compassion towards his livestock, and although he was raising them to be slaughter, he at least had the decency to treat them as living beings. I liked that the movie included personal interviews with farmers and allowed them to speak on how they felt about the food industry and its corrupt policies. Although they might have not agreed with how they had to treat the animals, they had to make a living, but at least they knew what they were doing was wrong and seemed to have a moral conscious.
Moving onto the book, I feel that what was shown in the film was further explained in detail in the interviews and chapters we read. Staying along the same lines as animal cruelty in conventional farms, I found the chapter “The Dirty Six” beginning on page 61, to be extremely disturbing. The top six worst animal practices were battery cages, fast growth for birds, forced feeding, gestation crates, long-distance transportation, and electric stunning of birds. These were all visually shown in the film, so reading about how horrible they were and actually seeing it made a huge impact on me. I found this chapter incredible hard to read and had trouble getting though it because it further explained in detail exactly how they hurt or killed the animals. I like that fact that at the end of the chapter, ways in which to help and stop these torturous practices were included. I really want to get involved and follow the three R’s ( refine diet, reduce consumption, replace animal products) more so then I already do and I feel like if more people read this book and saw the film, they would be more inclined to do so also.
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I agree with you Holly, the scenes of the slaughterhouses were every brutal and hard to watch. I alos liked the part showing the organic farmers and how they produce their livestock which seems much more humane. It really semed like that farmer who had started that little ranch knew what he was talking about and planned on following his beliefs till the end.
ReplyDeleteYes! The horrific scenes shown in the movie, I also had to look away. I never felt like I wanted to go vegetarian until I saw what they do to those poor animals. I also get kinda sick when I hear all the things that can be in your meat and you not even know it. For example if its not cleaned properly and depending on what that animal is fed, both of these things can effect my own health, which is kinda scary.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you that the book just helped to elaborate on what was shown in the movie. I found it interesting that the part that stuck out for you from the movie was very similar to the part that stuck out in the book. I would agree that these were two parts of both the book and movie that were hard to watch or read. I do like that you pointed out parts from the book that you did like. I think that it is interesting that you are already a vegetarian so this movie is able to reaffirm your beliefs.
ReplyDeleteLike most, the scenes in the movie showing how the animals are treated and killed are what stood out to me the most. I was convinced, once seeing what this movie was about, it was going to be another movie trying to convince me to go vegetarian like yourself, by showing me graphic images of cute cows, pigs, and chickens that were being slaughtered. However, as much of those images that were shown in the movie, I think they did a good job not being entirely slanted towards one side which gave them a certain amount of credibility. Good Job.
ReplyDeleteThe animal practices are disturbing. I feel guilty now every time I go to eat chicken or meat. I think about maybe what terrible things happened to the chickens and cows. It is alarming that the food companies are not willing to show the public what goes on in the process of making their food.
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