Let’s rewind to right around when our beloved Juice the Blog was born.

It was at the former residence of Beej, Choof, and Colin where I first heard Brian (BLin) go on his tirade about corn due to (what I’m assuming) was his recent reading of The Omnivore’s Dilemma.  I’ve got to be honest, at the time I thought it was little more than a BriBri rant-du-jour.

I’ve been meaning to say this for a while (especially after I read The Omnivore’s Dilemma not too long ago), but I was wrong.  Mother of fuck was I wrong.

The state of food production and consumption in this country (in addition to the surrounding regulatory bodies and main corporate players) is in an atrocious state.

The path to eating better (in a manner of purchasing higher-quality foods that were more often than not organic and absent of unnecessary corn products or by-products) has been not all that difficult for me.  It’s a lifestyle that requires responsible planning, really, and nothing more (although having a vegetarian girlfriend did ease the transition for me as I was already planning meals for the both of us nightly that were vegetarian safe).

Tonight, I saw Food, Inc., and maybe it’s because I’m more sensitive to audio/visual stimulation (damn my videogame upbringing!), but I finally can relate to the level of rage and passion Brian had that night.  There are some familiar old friends in the film, with both Michael Pollan (Omnivore’s Dilemma), and Eric Schlosser (Fast Food Nation) make significant appearances.  Upton Sinclair’s ubiquitous book The Jungle is also mentioned appropriately.

I don’t really want to take anything away from the film (not like one can really spoil a documentary film), but y’all should really go see it, even if you have read some of the aforementioned books.

Some of these regulations are really harsh.  The “Further restrict advertising…” bullet means, among other things, that tobacco companies can only advertize in black and white text (but not within 1000 feet of a school).  Imagine trying to make that look sexy…

Graphic warning lables are also intense.  They used them in Portugal, where there was basically a black and white skull and crossbones above the word MORTAL (deadly), or FUMAR MATA (smoking kills) on a full 1/3 of the front of the pack.

Maybe this will lead the push to legalize some replacement smokeable, non-cancerous cash-crop?

Read the full article here. Image and article from the NY Times.