Tag: diabetes

Trash Nature, Trash Ourselves

pond

Near my daughter’s apartment in the Midd Cities, Texas, there is a small pond next to a highway. It is the only place to walk in an unconstrained natural landscape, though the pond has the feel of a very damaged place. There are few waterfowl to be found on the water, though I saw a beautiful bluebird (sialia sialis) in a tree the other day. The flora is the sort that propagates in disturbed habitats: a couple of black willows, Roosevelt Weed (bacchais neglecta), common sunflowers, asters, goldenrod, and a field of Silver Nightshade (solanum elaegnifolium), their silvery stems now carrying tiny tomato-like seeds.

Towering over the southeast corner is an immense Lotto/Power Ball billboard (https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/five-myths/five-myths-about-the-lottery/2019/12/27/742b9662-2664-11ea-ad73-2fd294520e97_story.html ) that announces in huge letters the money to be won; the numbers increase daily. Below, the still lovely landscape is polluted by trash, some tossed from cars, some left by the fishermen who use the pond for occasional recreation.

There is no signage anywhere, and as the property appears neither connected to the neighboring apartment complex nor to the golf course across the street, it is fair game for trashing. In this place, at this time in history, to most people this small piece of the Earth-unappropriated, unowned, and unprotected- is unconnected to them, so they feel free to dump on it. (This is a problem for the whole area. Tarrant County is attempting to control it with citizens’ help: https://access.tarrantcounty.com/en/transportation/environmental/illegal-dumping.html)

I have been cleaning up the trash since I began using the walk around the pond for exercise and started using the leaf piles for clandestine composting of my kitchen scraps. It is clear that the majority of garbage is from food and drink containers: soda cans, plastic juice bottles, liquor bottles, styrofoam dishes, plastic silverware, Starbuck cups, plastic bags of every size, most advertising some sort of fast food: chicken wings, fries, burgers, tacos, etc. And while this pollution is degrading the landscape, it has already done the damage to the people who have bought and eaten this cheap and unwholesome food (diabetes and obesity are diet related and increasing in Texas: https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/annual/measure/Obesity/state/TX)!

This is my point: every one of us, every human being is an integral part of the environment in which we are embedded. Our own personal environment is as susceptible as the greater enveloping environment to being exploited and ruined, and by the same forces of greed and ignorance.

A society like the one here in Texas which denies climate change and supports the exploitation of the land is the same one that sees people as being only a means to make money, without taking responsibility for the destruction of people’s health or well being.

Without a connection to the natural world, without an understanding of the laws of Nature, how do we instill in ourselves, our society, and our culture a love and care for the natural world and for our bodies which are just an extension of that world?! To be blind to the interdependence of the land, the air, the water, the insects, the birds, the plants, the microbes, and ourselves is to be blind to the reality of life itself!

When is Profit not profitable?

Apples on green place web — ‘Apples on Green Plate’ oil on canvas © J.Hart

The choices we make as individuals, to grow our own food; to curtail our shopping; to live a zero waste life, might seem beside the point, especially when seen against the horrific worldwide rise of abusive authoritarian governments. For me, the question becomes: what is the engine that is driving these disastrous governments; and where is the point at which we can effect the most pressure? As I understand the system, most of the necessities we buy (one of the most basic is food) are provided by giant corporations whose sole reason for being is profit. It is the money from these corporate entities and owners that supports our present politicians.

Once profit becomes the only goal of every action taken, the more humane and real needs of people such as health, safety, and peace are ignored or even actively destroyed! But conversely, if we, as individual consumers, also make our individual profit and comfort the end all and be all of our lives, we collude with the corporations in our own destruction and support our own impoverishment! The corporations and the billionaires who own them can only exist if we buy what they are selling! (For a concise repeat of this message: http://realfarmacy.com/the-woody-harrelson-video-message-the-mainstream-media-does-not-want-you-to-watch/

Surprisingly, we are not captives to the status quo, especially here in North America; (some other occupied and exploited parts of the world are not so lucky). We can disengage from the corporate stranglehold by refusing to buy what we don’t honestly need, and by creating ourselves what we do need. I feel that the most basic way to disengage from an unhealthy economic system is in the foods we chose to buy, and the foods we take the time to grow.

Our industrial profit-driven economic system views resources (soil, fossil fuel, and, yes, people) as unlimited. ( This link by a car engineer who now “builds” forests, gives a very clear description of the difference between industrial and natural uses of resources: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjUsobGWhs8&t=17s) It sees soil*, our most important strategic resource, as merely another material to be used and used up (without any thought being given to replenishing the soil!) to grow massive amounts foods that we can buy very cheaply at home and export abroad.

Because we are all habituated to look for the “biggest bang for our buck” we happily buy the inexpensive wheat, soy, and corn which make up most fast foods and commercial food products. The actual costs of these foods-pollution, government subsidies, and the ruination of the soil- are hidden from us, but their health costs have been directly linked to the obesity and diabetes epidemics in the States!

But how do I convince you that what seems profitable is not; that buying food which saves you a couple of bucks will, in the long run, ruin your health? How do I show you that by buying food that is fast and convenient-ready made, widely advertised, and easily accessible- you are profiting large corporations, wealthy stockholders, and billionaire owners that have neither your health nor your well-being at heart? How do I encourage you to learn to grow your own food and not assume that large farms will do it for you? (The methods that agroecology are utilizing to grow food on farms are the same ones that will allow you to grow food in your backyard! )

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/26/opinion/farming-organic-nature-movement.html

How do we, who are eating better, choosing organically raised produce, raising our own foods (even if only on windowsills and balconies), convince friends and family that taking the time and money to support local organic farms or grow food themselves will profit us all in ways that cannot be expressed simply as the bottom line? Or perhaps health should be the real bottom line!

*(An important book that explains how soil depletion can destroy whole societies is Dirt by David Montgomery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQACN-XiqHU).

https://www.matthieuricard.org/fr/blog/posts/justice-sociale-societe-de-consommation-et-simplicite-volontaire?fbclid=IwAR0qs2GhqhZCkp2eJy6DJTdpcads93n2LbeDEE-Cc5IBictZVuc1zPRUWr8

How an American family got “supersized.”

heavy Texans eating web — Visitors to the Texas State Fair, 2017

My true story starts about one hundred years ago in a village in a rural part of central Ohio. There a family (mother, father, and six children) had a small home with enough land to grow food for themselves, including apples, walnuts, and golden raspberries, as well as flowers to sell for income. The parents were such good cooks that they also ran a local restaurant.

The youngest daughter married a boy from a nearby small town. They were ambitious and both went to work out of the home to pay for their starter house. The mother, now a widow, took care of her two grandchildren, a girl and a boy while their parents were away at work. She cooked for them every day, and the boy learned to make pies from her.

Eventually, the daughter and her husband decided to leave the countryside and move to a suburb of a large eastern city. The husband bought a store, and he and his wife worked long hours to be successful. The wife continued to cook, but the food she bought came from the large grocery store nearby, and much of it was processed and packaged. There was a yard large enough to grow vegetables behind their home, but nobody had the time or interest in doing that. In fact, the father of this family believed that only poor country people too ignorant to know better would want to grow their own food.

Now it was time for their eldest daughter to have a family. She married a man from the Midwest, and she returned with him to live there in a suburb near a large Midwestern city. She cooked occasionally, but mostly she bought fast food and ready-made meals for her family. This daughter had always been heavy, and after having three children, a girl and two boys, she found that she could not lose the weight, no matter how hard she tried, so she had an operation to have her stomach reduced. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bariatric_surgery)

Meanwhile, her husband was diagnosed with diabetes and high blood pressure and two of her three children also had serious weight issues. Her eldest daughter had to have stomach surgery too, and her youngest son became morbidly obese. The other son didn’t cook at all, and he married a girl who had never cooked. All their food is prepackaged or bought at fast food outlets.

This American family is middle class, educated, and health conscious. They use doctors and read articles about medical issues. They didn’t realize that they were choosing a way of eating that would give them obesity, diabetes, and other serious diseases. The information- why eating foods produced by industrial farming in the now normalized manner of huge portions with meat at almost every meal is unhealthy- was not available to them through mainstream media outlets.

Changes in the nutrient quality of the food itself as it is grown on exhausted soil through industrial agribusiness processes; the inexpensiveness of food (the U.S. has the cheapest food in the world!); and the idea promoted by advertising that food (and I use the word loosely!) should be processed and pre-cooked for immediate consumption (let’s not waste any time on that dreary chore of cooking!) are some of the complex causes for this weight gain in many Americans, but even doctors seem unaware of this or unwilling to talk about it to their patients!

I suggested in this story that there are furthermore two important cultural reasons for the disruption of healthy eating patterns: the loss of the skill of cooking in many families as processed and fast foods replaced real sit-down meals, and the deep alienation of Americans from the sources of their food. Joel Salatin, Michael Pollen, and Barbara Kingslover write about these major shifts in our American traditions.

Michael Pollen in his In Defense of Food has some good suggestions about how, through simple small steps, one can reverse this debilitating trend and bring back older more sustainable habits. His mantra is: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”

So how does one begin cooking again and start reconnecting with the staples of a good healthy diet? First, buy food that is grown or raised locally. This food will appear to be more expensive than the stuff trucked in from thousands of miles away, but it will taste much better! Dallas, which is a great foodie city, turns out to have a lot of organic Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farms. I pick up my weekly box of vegetables every Friday from one of them (https://johnsonsfarm.com/farm-market/produce/csa/). Still experimenting with recipes to use up all the jalapeño peppers I got in my first order (did you know that you can make cowboy candy with them? http://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/candied-jalapeno-or-cowboy-candy-453141)

Another great way to get into cooking is to grow one’s own food. This doesn’t have to be a big deal: a couple of containers with herbs or tomatoes or salad will work to begin. I have no garden in the apartment I rent in Dallas (though I am in the process of looking for a community garden to join), and my balcony is too shaded to grow much. However, I have installed a grow light (total price $35 with bulbs) in my kitchen to raise rosemary, cilantro, mint, basil, and chives this winter. And I have all these herbs right at hand when I’m cooking!