Blog Entry 16

                                           

“Happy Meals”

     In the passage “Happy Meals” extracted from In Defense of Food by Michael Polland the author gives a list of eight suggestions in order to have better habits of eating and to be healthier. As for me and family these suggestions would be easy or difficult to follow depending on who’s cooking. Nowadays, people prefer to buy fast food instead of cooking.

     “Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.” I believe this is the most useful, and it is all that I need to know if I want to eat healthy since my grandma followed the rest of the suggestions without knowing. My grandma used to cook vegetables everyday and if someone asked her what she was cooking, she would respond “meat” but in the pot wasn’t more than “beans”. The author mention that grandmas won’t recognize food such as Go-Gurt, so in the case of my grandma if someone offered her yogurt, she would say “No thank you, how am I going to eat something that I can’t pronounce” Therefore, I take this suggestion as the most useful and easy to follow.

    “Don’t eat anything incapable of rotting.” The most difficult suggestion to follow since I love junk food such as chips, chocolates, muffins and of course “Twinkies”. I’ve tried not to eat them especially because I gained a lot of weight, but sugar is my weakness.

     “Avoid food products that make health claims.” This one I follow all the time because everything that contains preservatives is fake, and it doesn’t really helps. However, for my family it will be difficult because they believe in everything that some products say. For example, they use to buy Honey Nuts Cheerios because they said that it lows the cholesterol until was announced in the news that wasn’t truth.

     “Shop in the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle.” We only go for sugar. [at least nothing else]

     “Pay more, eat less.” This one has a good and bad side because the good side would be if you paying good for high quality food such as organic food which also makes people eat less meat because of the prices. However, not everyone can afford like some members of my family. In addition, we don’t know any place that sells this type of food that is close to our house.

  “Cook. If you can, plant a garden. Eat complete meals, at a table, if possible not alone. Eat slowly” I believe that I’ll change a little bit this suggestion by adding “Accept that you have to cook” Once I do that the rest would be easier and I consider that that is one of the main reason for people to go to McDonal’s, Chinese restaurant, Mexican tacos or any fast food restaurant because we don’t like to cook. On the other hand we do plant a garden produce at home every spring-summer season because everyone in the family like it. I agree with author about to eat at the table and not alone because if we do that we automatically eat slow and we don’t eat a lot just the enough ration.

     These suggestions are very useful yet I continue believing that the first one is the only one I need because by following my grandma I will vegetables, I’ll plant a garden, I’ll eat at the table, I’ll cook and I won’t eat junk food.

Blog Entry 15

                      

Manufactured Demand

          The myth “Plastic bottles are recyclable and are being made with thinner plastics making them increasingly GREEN” mentioned in The Bottle of Water Story, is one of the most famous one because people feel less guilty about the environment  when they dispose the bottle in a “green” trashcan. However, they ignore that the waste of bottles of water a day equal five laps around the globe. Also mostly of the waste of bottles are burned which produce the most dangerous dioxins that exist in the planet. Moreover, the very low percentage of the recycling bottles “is actually down cycling” that means the products made by this recycling plastic are lower quality and required virgin plastic and more toxins. On the other hand if it were true that they recycle the bottles, nobody has showed a product made of recycle bottles. I’ve seen some products that says “made of recycle paper” but not from recycle bottles or plastic at least.

     I have learned that media really influences people and I have the tools to promote “NO BOTTLE OF WATER” For example, all my friends, and I believe everyone has Facebook, so I can do is to post the video on it but constantly. In addition, I have contact with people at work and some of them work at very public places, so they can spread it. Also I have noticed that New York people complain a lot especially about money, so I can introduce the suggestion of a refill bottle of water. Lastly, the most important to be an example because people easily believed not only when they hear it but when they see that is true.

Blog Entry 13

The Meatrix Issues

Organic

     “The philosophy of organic food productions maintains certain principles: biodiversity, ecological balance, sustainability, natural plan fertilization, natural pest management and soil integrity.” According with The Meatrix website, around the time of WWII the intensive productivity of farming and technological advances put the manual labor aside, and synthetic fertilizers were affordable manufactured until “farmers reject the idea that this was advancement  in agriculture”, so they started to study other methods that improve the productivity ending with what we call organic. Organic farming or organic food is good not only for the environment but also for people because keeps us in balance and out of illnesses.

     Organic farming helps the environment since they don’t use pesticides or fertilizers that contaminate the soil and the environment. In addition animals such as cow, pigs and chickens are raised outdoors, fed with organic food and out antibiotics and hormones that promotes fast growing. As a result plants grow in a natural way giving more nutrients, and animal are raised happy far away from mutilations that makes them sick and that poisons their meat. Moreover, organic farming keeps sustainability which is good for people and farmers. To be mention farmers need to prove that their product is really organic, so they’ll be approve by the US Department of Agriculture’s (USDA). Therefore, consumers have to look for the “USDA” logo in order to be sure that the product they are buying is organic for real.

     To take out chemicals from food will give people a healthier environment because organic farming avoids water pollution, toxic free soil and since there are no mutilations on animals or antibiotics there would be no pandemics around. Moreover people won’t suffer of side effects such as pandemics, obesity and cancer.

     In conclusion, by following the principles of organic food production will keep us on an ecological and healthy balance that not only includes human beings but animals and plants. All these will be reached with the help of USDA and consciousness.

    

Blog Entry 14

Imitation of Film: Here’s Smoking at You Kid

[Re-writing]

    

     In the passage “Imitation o Film: Here’s Smoking at You Kid” by Nicholas Balakar, on which he states that children ages 10 to 14 tent to smoke more if they see actors smoking in the movies. Also researchers said that the 38% of children who start smoking do it because they trying to imitate what they have seen in the movies. I agree with the author because children ages 10 to 14 are looking for their own identity, they are very vulnerable and easy to be influenced by media when there no one to supervise them.

     Teenagers look for an identity everywhere, especially, when no one is there to supervise them, which occurs in most of the cases. Unfortunately, they find that sort of identity in the wrong places such as movies, where they favorite actors and actresses besides looking pretty, handsome, interesting and apparently having a lot of personality, have the habit of smoking. These characteristics are exactly what they looking for in order to be popular as them. In addition teenagers like to experiment with anything new or prohibited. Therefore, they are easy to be influenced by any type of addiction like smoking because of their vulnerability to the new things.

     Dr. James D. Sargent, the lead author on the study and a professor of pediatrics at Dartmouth Medical School said that “R-rated movies contain twice as much smoking” and those are viewed for children from fourth and fifth grade. This only shows the range that media can have since everywhere. For instance, the movies rated R on theaters require ID because they can’t be viewed by anyone under 17 since the content is considered too mature for younger viewers. However, media is not only on theaters, but also in the black market which anyone can find on the streets, and it is easy to afford it. For example, last week my ten year-old nephew asked me to take him to see Paranormal Activity 3 movie, so I respond no because it was R-rated, so he couldn’t see it. Then he said that his friend had told him what happened in the movie because his friend’s parents bought a copy of the movie on the street, so the whole family saw it including this kid who is only 10 years old. In this case not only media but the lack of consciousness of parents makes teenagers and easy prey to catch.

     In conclusion, due to the vulnerability of teenagers while looking for an identity makes them easy to influence by media into an addiction as smoking. More over parents lack of consciousness that leave our adolescents out of protection and how Dr. James D. Sargent says “This association should be taken very seriously.”   

Blog Entry 12

                                                     

                                                          The Meatrix

    The Meatrix part I is comperation a with The Matrix movie but with animals in a farm and their sad reality. The main character Leo who is a pig, seems to live happily as any other animal in  farm, suddenly a bull named Moopheus appeared telling him about the meatrix and asking if he wanted to know more about it. Moopheus offers him a blue pill which will keeps everything the same and a red pill which will show the reality of the meatrix. Leo chose the red pill and get in the reality where Moopheus show him how animals “live”, how they are abuse and mutilated. However Leo wanted to know how everything happened and started, so Moopheus explained him that since the 20^th century factory farmers found a way to to increase the production of meat for the consumerism of the entire country by reducing the space and putting the animals closer. Really close that they can even move, but this situation brough insanity between them, so to avoid the possible dieses factory farmers started to manipulate animals. For instance, They debeaking chickens and cut the cow’s tales. Moreover, they dosage them with antibiotics, to avoid dieses, but lately they’ve been overdosing them and this excess can end in an unstoppable epidemic. In addition the high quantity of pollutes the air and water of our environment   Moopheus tells Neo to help him to spread the word in order to stop the abuse to animals. So Leo responded to count him in it.

      SinceLeo “GOT INVOLVED”  with Moopheus , he had helped him to make more than 2 millions of people conscious about buying healthier meet, milk and eggs, but he needed to know more, and they get in to the meatrix. Once they get in, they appeared in a farm, but Leo who wasn’t wearing glasses saw that everything was beautiful , cows were well treated and a lady was getting milk from them manually. However, it wasn’t right, that Moophes told Leo to were his Glasses, so he could see the reality, which was that they were in a factory farm. In this factory farms the cows were always sick, even though they were dosage with antibiotics all the time. The antibiotics weren’t the only chemical the cows were dosage, but also an artificial growth hormone (RBGH) made it by Canada and the European Union. Moreover, calves were taken from their mother since they had born and factory farmers fed them with milk mixed with cow’s blood that would spread the mad cows desiese . At the end Leo recommended  people to by milk in some of the small family farms in order to stop the corporations of milk ut the agents capture Moopheus.

      In the meatrix II ½,  Leo and Chikity went to save Moopheus who is in a factory called “Happy Farms.” Inside the agents got Mopheus and show him how everything works in bad conditions such as the production is to fast that the employees hurt themselves and the meat get contaminated, also manure from the intestines were leaking on the meat. However, Leo and Chikity arrived on time to save Moopheus  but the fight will still continue. GET INVOLVED!!

        

Blog Entry 11

Does Knowledge Make You Happier?

     “As for me, all I know is that I know nothing” said Socrates meaning that despite of the vast knowledge we can get in our life, we will continue being ignorant in compare with the immensity of the universe. Therefore, I think that we would never get enough knowledge, but the more we get the happier we will become. On the other hand, there are some downs since everything is not perfect as we saw in Truman Show and in The Matrix. We can see these two sides of knowledge in our education in college and how it has influenced us as citizens and human being.

     “Te Allegory of the Cave”  in The Republic by Plato, Socrates sets up an scenario of a cave representing ignorance and to come out represents to come out to reality, to the enlightening while in The Matrix, to live in, it also represents ignorance and to come out represents knowledge but knowledge about the truth. In our daily life to get out of the cave is to get educated, or enlightened as Socrates said, so we can enjoy the beauty of the real world. This beauty is not only about nature if not the satisfactions that education brings which include a good job, competitive wages, and some luxuries that having a carrier can afford it. However, reality not always means a positive enhancement like in The Matrix, when Neo wakes up in the reality where the food is awful and barely has some clothes to wear.  In our reality, it is more than just to take a red pill because if we cannot afford to pay for school nobody is going to offer education for free, even though we are ready or willing to be enlightened. Moreover, some people in our community, who already has a degree, cannot qualify for a job or exercise the benefits of high education due to immigration status, and there is when people start to think that “ignorance is bliss” like Cypher, the traitor in The Matrix, who becomes frustrated about knowing the truth of the real world.

     “I imagine, right now, you must be feeling a bit like Alice, tumbling down the rabbit hole?” Morpheus said to Neo because he seemed confused and scared. The more Neo knew, the more he get impress. Similarly, when knowledge make people to understand things that couldn’t understand before but they are not capable of change them. For instance, knowledge makes people understand how the economy works and that the economists see people as number but not as humans that in determined situation they don’t care who die or lived. It also makes people understand that there are social problems such as poverty and famine. Because of knowledge, people get awareness about those situations and try to fix them which make them happy. However, we haven’t been capable to fix them which make us confused and scared humans beings.

     Indeed, knowledge makes us happier, but it doesn’t mean that reality it’s perfect because to know the truth, it also brings dissolutions that we aren’t capable to solve, so “all that I know is that I know nothing.”

Blog Entry 10

The Dangers of Reality TV

(Rewriting)

     Long time ago, the Romans invented the circus in order to entertain their population’s minds. Nowadays, we have something very similar to the Roman circus, and it is called reality TV. According to the passage “The Dangers of Reality TV” by Timothy Sexton, reality television minds in order to manipulate them. Sexton states that reality television is promoting competition as a key of success in shows such as Survivor and Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire. Another message is “image rather than ability” says Sexton, and the best example for that is American Idol, where no matter how talent a person can be if he or she has no personality, there will always be someone who is prettier. The last message to be mentioned by Sexton is that reality television doesn’t care about education and make the audience to believe in that. For reality TV there is no reason to go school for many years if people can get plenty of money by eating bugs and doing nasty things like in the show Fear Factor. I agree with the author, when he says that reality television promotes competition in order to reach success, image is more important than talent and education is not important because the people who are strongly influenced by these messages are teenagers who are inexperienced, and they are just developing their own criteria. Therefore teenagers are an easy prey for reality TV makers who want just block our way to education.

     Timothy Sexton says that reality TV is promoting competition in order to reach success, and we can see that in our daily life. For example, if a girl in the reality shows Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire has pretty hair, and she uses Pantene shampoo even when she is doing it just for publicity, a teenager girl who is looking for acceptance at high school and who wants to look prettier than other girls, will use it too because she wants to look pretty just as the girl in the reality show. Moreover, a teenager girl would think that she will win a handsome boyfriend or the most popular guy at school that can give her everything she wants, and she will grow up with the same idea in her head.

     Sadly, reality television not only influences teenagers with non-sense competitions but also adults, which is worse, with the idea of image rather than ability as Sexton says. It happened to two of my close friends who were absent at school for long time. One of them my friend Carlos who was a good student, but he became ill of kidney condition, which took him out of school for four months. When he came back to school, he tried to get on the same level with the rest of the class and took several tests. Unfortunately, he didn’t pass all of them. I have to mention that it was the la of three years of school, so it was the year of our graduation. Then Carlos asked for a second chance, so he would have time to prepare, but our professors said no to him. Carlos couldn’t graduate in that year. On the other side was my friend Joanna, who became pregnant, and she was absent in class for three months because she was ashamed. Joanna’s grades weren’t real good, but she was very pretty.  In fact everyone at school used to say that she was the most beautiful girl in the premises. The professors said that because it was the last year of school there was no reason to keep her stock in the same thing, and Joanna got her certificate without any challenge, and without any knowledge. This only proves that Sexton is right when he says that reality television transmits the idea that beauty is more important than any talent and people doesn’t even realize that they following it. Moreover, he is right about reality television promotes no education just as teaches at school did with my two friends. Carlos tried really hard, but Joanna didn’t have to. She only had to become pregnant and to be pretty in order to get the award as in reality TV where the pretty girl, even though she has no education or any talent, gets everything, nice and easy. Therefore people especially girls think that it would be that easy and not only at my school if not in my entire culture, but Joanna she didn’t even eat bugs.

     In conclusion, we should be smart and think twice about what we watching, so we won’t influenced by the circus  today called reality TV and we won’t be what the Romans meaning “reality” TV makers want us to be which is a “reality fan” without real education.