Happy Co-Dependence Day

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By Reynard Loki (about the author) Page 1 of 1 page(s)

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For OpEdNews: Reynard Loki - Writer

As Americans head to the grill to
celebrate July 4th, it's a perfect time to ponder another kind of
freedom -- the gastronomic kind

On Saturday, barbecues across the United States will be fired up to celebrate Independence Day, a national holiday during which Americans will eat 150 million hot dogs, according to the National Hot Dog & Sausage Council, which notes that's "enough to stretch from D.C. to L.A. over five times."

Iowans in particular have a big appetite for pork. On March 1, 2008, according to the U.S. Census Bureau,
the Hawkeye State had 17.6 million market hogs and pigs -- more than
one-fourth the nation's total. Most of those piggies stayed home: About
a quarter of Iowa's citizens ate hot dogs and pork sausages last July
4th.

But there is another celebration lurking, just outside the plates of over-antibioticized, factory-processed meat and GMO corn on the cob. It's Food Independence Day.

Coordinated by the nonprofit group Kitchen Gardeners International in partnership with the IATP Food and Society Fellows program and the Mother Nature Network,
the sustainable, eco-friendly holiday calls upon Americans to declare
their "food independence...by sourcing the ingredients for our holiday
meals as locally, sustainably and deliciously as possible and let's ask
our elected officials to do the same," according to their Web site.

"For
too many in the US, the 'choices' will be Bud or Miller or an
industrially-produced hotdog or an industrially-produced hamburger,"
writes Food Independence organizer Roger Doiron in a Kitchen Gardeners
International article.

The Food Independence Day campaign comes on the heels of the June 12 U.S. theatrical release of Food, Inc., a new documentary by Robert Kenner that, according to the film's Web site, asks the question: "How much do we really know about the food we buy at our local supermarkets and serve to our families?"

The film exposes the harsh realities of the American food industry, such as widespread obesity, the development of new strains of harmful E. coli
bacteria, cows living in their own waste before being led to slaughter,
chickens that can't walk because their breasts have been artificially
plumped and companies that value profit over consumer health and
environmental protection.

The New York Times
called it "one of the scariest movies of the year...an informative,
often infuriating activist documentary about the big business of
feeding or, more to the political point, force-feeding, Americans all
the junk that multinational corporate money can buy. You'll shudder,
shake and just possibly lose your genetically modified lunch."

Big
agribusiness and giant factory farms are exposed in the film. These
corporations rely on uneducated consumers, many of whom maintain
extremely unhealthy diets in a broken system that is quite literally
killing people. What many consumers don't realize is that their voice
can be heard with their food choices.

The Fourth of July is all
about the independence of the United States. But when it comes to its
food industry and the eating habits of its citizens, the nation is
stuck in a vicious cycle of co-dependency.

Hopefully this July
4th, Americans will think of a different kind of independence and heed
the rallying cry of sustainable-food advocate Michael Pollan: "Vote with your fork."

http://www.13point7billion.org

Reynard Loki is a New York-based writer, artist and environmental activist who runs the blog 13.7 Billion Years (http://www.13point7billion.org). Loki founded the Underground Desert Living Institute (http://www.udlu.org) to promote the research and (more...)

The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
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