Time for a good ol' fashioned rant!

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ParkerH47
ParkerH47 Posts: 463 Member
in Food and Nutrition
It drives me CRAZY that people who want/choose to eat organically and locally or want to know their farmers or choose not to eat processed foods are considered pretentious hippies.

I'm not saying I eat like this all the time or even half the time. I DO NOT tell people they need to eat this way. I do not condemn processed foods as cancer causing garbage, I do not avoid that stuff - because it is part of an enjoyable life.

BUT I also know - almost with 100% certainty we SHOULD know our farmers we SHOULD eat locally and seasonally, we should be eating pasture raised eggs etc etc etc. And yet I get eye rolls and scoffs and people think its ridiculous. It has nothing to do with weight loss, I know enough to know that a calorie deficit is all you need. I'm just sick of feeling ashamed of wanting to eat "clean" or whatever the hell you want to call it. It doesn't take a genius to know that it is not ideal to be eating some of the garbage you can get these days.

Like I said, I do not eat perfectly, sometimes I eat cookies and crackers and cake and chips - but it doesn't change the fact that someone who chooses not to eat those things is considered pretentious or elitist or something.

okay. thats all, out come the trolls to argue. Its just my educated opinion...
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Replies

  • badbcatha05
    badbcatha05 Posts: 200 Member
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    I feel you here... I get the hippie thing all the time. I don't eat 100% local meats and eggs, close.. but not quite. When I don't, I try to at least buy meats from animals that were pastured... although with non-local stuff I suppose I have no real proof other than the company's word. I don't lead on that I think it's better for weight loss or anything like that. For me it's important to know that the animals were treated with as much respect and as humanely as possible. Not to mention--- meat, eggs, and dairy from pastured and local animals always tastes better!
  • Sapporo
    Sapporo Posts: 693 Member
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    "BUT I also know - almost with 100% certainty we SHOULD know our farmers we SHOULD eat locally and seasonally..."

    Saying you know what all people should be eating is rather douchey. Well, other than saying all people should eat food. Though that is mean to all the cardboard box eaters out there so I dunno, maybe I'm a pretentious hippie too.
  • sushidulces
    sushidulces Posts: 69 Member
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    I agree. Why wouldn't/shouldn't we know exactly what we are putting in our bodies? And it boosts local business/economy if you buy from farmers markets. Maybe the farmer grows in certain soils or uses certain techniques that makes you like their vegetables or fruits more. I see nothing wrong with your opinion :) I live in a drought state, so local fruits and veggies are few and far between, but I do enjoy the ones I can get. If I were in an area with a great variety, I can tell you with great certainty I would be getting my produce there.

    I do get free eggs from my father in law. He has pet hens (they really are his pets!) and he brings me the eggs. I know they are treated well and fed a great diet and get lots of exercise :)
  • knra_grl
    knra_grl Posts: 1,568 Member
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    If the option of buying locally grown and raised foods was more readily available to me I would opt for the organic and locally grown foods but this is not always an option.

    No eye rolls here - and cudos to you for supporting your local economy!
  • emacb123
    emacb123 Posts: 254 Member
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    YAY!! I love a good rant!!

    Rage on OP!!!



    PS I have no opinion on the topic at hand.
  • skinnyinnotime
    skinnyinnotime Posts: 4,141 Member
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    BUT I also know - almost with 100% certainty we SHOULD know our farmers we SHOULD eat locally and seasonally, we should be eating pasture raised eggs etc etc etc.

    Yes, if we'd known this it would have saved us from eating horse meat over here in the UK :frown:
  • ParkerH47
    ParkerH47 Posts: 463 Member
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    Saying you know what all people should be eating is rather douchey. Well, other than saying all people should eat food. Though that is mean to all the cardboard box eaters out there so I dunno, maybe I'm a pretentious hippie too.

    I already mentioned that I don't actually tell people to eat this way. I didn't say people have to eat this way, it doesn't fit everyones life, is not available to everyone and not affordable to everyone, but maybe we would be better off if we did?
  • andylowry
    andylowry Posts: 89
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    Every SHOULD get the hell out of my way when I'm driving home from work. That's the only "should" I care about.
  • ParkerH47
    ParkerH47 Posts: 463 Member
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    Every SHOULD get the hell out of my way when I'm driving home from work. That's the only "should" I care about.

    Haha point taken...
  • bshot1
    bshot1 Posts: 44
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    The problem is economics. When you get into organics/farm raised cattle, it's difficult to scale with the overall demand for animal products/growables. It's the same issue with gmo vs heirloom.

    I think it's great we have the option though.
  • craftywitch_63
    craftywitch_63 Posts: 829 Member
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    I would love to know my farmer, but where I live it just isn't possible. First of all, because I live in the desert and the closest farmer is a couple of hundred miles a way.

    I used to live about 15 minutes from my great-aunt's farm in KS. She grew most of the vegetables for our family, and what she didn't was grown in a large patch of our backyard. The corn that I buy in the stores were the quality we would feed the horses and cattle. There is NOTHING like picking vegetables and corn and bringing them right into the kitchen, washing off the dirt and cooking them right then. Even the canned stuff we ate during the winter was premium.

    AHHHHHH! Those were the days! :wink:
  • wjstoj
    wjstoj Posts: 884 Member
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    Tree hugger :tongue:
  • megsmom2
    megsmom2 Posts: 2,362 Member
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    your "shoulds" are a bit judgmental. Not everyone has your mindset. If this is your interest and passion...hooray! Doesn't make you morally or ethically superior.
  • ParkerH47
    ParkerH47 Posts: 463 Member
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    I would love to know my farmer, but where I live it just isn't possible. First of all, because I live in the desert and the closest farmer is a couple of hundred miles a way.

    Yeah that totally sucks and leaves people with no option! I guess I'm sheltered from the fact that there are communities out their who don't have the land or climate able to support farms.
  • faithsimmons526
    faithsimmons526 Posts: 162 Member
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    Here's how I avoid the problem you're having ... I hang out with OTHER 'pretentious hippies' :flowerforyou:
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
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    your "shoulds" are a bit judgmental. Not everyone has your mindset. If this is your interest and passion...hooray! Doesn't make you morally or ethically superior.
    Or healthier, for that matter. Science has shown time and again that "organic" is just marketing, and there's very little difference from a nutritional standpoint.
  • ChristinWrites
    ChristinWrites Posts: 119 Member
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    I agree with you OP. There is nothing wrong about wanting to know where the food you eat comes from and there is certainly nothing "elitist" about supporting one's local economy or eating fresh, wholesome foods. There is also nothing wrong with being a Hippie. I don't know why so many use that term as an insult. To each their own, but yes, eating local does a lot - not only is the food better tasting when fresh, it also reduces carbon footprint to eat local, supports local businesses, and food that is fresher has more nutrients.
  • Athijade
    Athijade Posts: 3,245 Member
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    Saying you know what all people should be eating is rather douchey. Well, other than saying all people should eat food. Though that is mean to all the cardboard box eaters out there so I dunno, maybe I'm a pretentious hippie too.

    I already mentioned that I don't actually tell people to eat this way. I didn't say people have to eat this way, it doesn't fit everyones life, is not available to everyone and not affordable to everyone, but maybe we would be better off if we did?

    You say this... yet you just did it on your OP. The word "should" means that you are telling people what they are to do.

    The reason people get the the reputations they do is because of the way they act. If you didn't go around telling people what they "should" do, then you wouldn't have that reputation. Oh, and I am not saying that everyone who likes to know their farmers or eat locally is like that by the way. Believe it or not, I am very aware of where my food comes from. When I was in Tennessee still, I knew the first names of the people I bought my beef and lamb from, the names of the people who sold the bread I purchased, and the names of the farmers who grew my vegetables. But that doesn't mean I went around and told people what they "should" do. Because that just comes off as rude.
  • JustinAnimal
    JustinAnimal Posts: 1,335 Member
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    your "shoulds" are a bit judgmental. Not everyone has your mindset. If this is your interest and passion...hooray! Doesn't make you morally or ethically superior.

    I don't think the shoulds are judgemental. The arguments for local and organic are unselfish; non-local means transportation, fuel usage, fuel emissions, no one pays for that potentially long-range transportation. It also means supporting the local economy. It's not really preachy or judgemental, it just makes good sense in terms of being a responsible citizen, or at least an eco-friendly, local-friendly one. I don't think the OP feels morally superior; again, it's just common sense that these practices are responsible to the earth and to farmers. Aren't you being a judgemental?

    Now, in terms of economics, it's actually quite a bit cheaper to ship foods. We could be importing sugarcane, which yields large amounts of sugar, for more cheaply than all of the sugar beet refineries we have in the states. So that's a whole different argument.

    Still, for you to ignore the fact that the OP came right out and said they don't tell people how to live their lives, in fact, means the exact opposite of what you said...

    The WHOLE POINT of her post was that she's not preachy, yet gets eye rolls for expressing her views.
  • JustinAnimal
    JustinAnimal Posts: 1,335 Member
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    your "shoulds" are a bit judgmental. Not everyone has your mindset. If this is your interest and passion...hooray! Doesn't make you morally or ethically superior.
    Or healthier, for that matter. Science has shown time and again that "organic" is just marketing, and there's very little difference from a nutritional standpoint.

    Are you freakin' kidding me? Do you know how much pesticides things like apples and tomatoes absorb? That was a truly stupid comment. Try doing some reading on the "dirty dozen," the vegetables that are actually more harmful to humans than helpful, when grown in ways that don't qualify as organic. Not true for all fruits and veggies, but that was one ignorant comment to make...

    ETA: read In Defense of Food by Michael Pollen, where he goes into detail about how apples and other fruits from the past, prior to genetic modification, pesticides, non-organic fertilizers, when those fruits and veggies held 3-5 times more nutrients than they do now. You literally have to eat something like four apples to get the nutritional content of an apple grown in the last century or two.

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