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Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

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Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#61

Post by pdeuchler »

hrktb wrote: post #56
pdeuchler wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I found it difficult to read the entire essay, so I didn't. I had problems with a lot of the characterizations. ... >> Remember too the author writes for the Hoover Institute, a conservative think tank. As such, works from them are more likely to be aligned with conservative views, and not, say, rail against patriarchy. There's no need to politicize the article and then make subjective judgements based on your aff…

I read the whole thing, and am also quite disturbed. I also had the feeling that while there is a some discussion surrounding food, an awful lot of small jabs are made at people's sexual views. There is a repeated point driven accros that people of this area are morally depleted, in difference to previous generations. It's summed up in the introduction statement: > * things we might signal by shorthand as mindful eat…

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the article, why would you assume either way? I think she's got some very interesting points but I'm more inclined to think the phenomenon she addresses has more to do with humanity's newfound ability to work their way up Maslow's hierarchy, and the issues we encounter while society evolves away from trying to reduce risks (i.e. stockpile this food so we have something to eat during the winter) to managing them (i.e. plan global agriculture infrastructure to be able to provide a constant level of food for the greatest amount of people).

If my original point wasn't clear, it's dumb to pattern match based on supposed political affiliations and then make judgements without allowing the arguments to stand on their own. On the same note, I think you are projecting your stereotypes of "conservatives" onto her observations of society... I don't think she's necessarily advocating for one side or the other.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#62

Post by ambler0 »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #43
ambler0 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether or not an organic diet (whatever that may be exactly) ultimately proves to be healthier, it's wrong to describe the movement to eat such food as a "ridiculous cargo cult". It's clear what people are worried about (dangerous pesticides, environmental pollutants) and the expectation that food labeled as organic is better in this respect is not unreasonable. Whether or not labeling food "certified organic" makes…

My wife has a friend who is very into organic. She says that all those pesticides are not good for us, and she's probably right, at least to some degree. But the thing is, famine is really not good for you. If pesticides prevent that (and, arguably, they have done pretty well at doing so), then they're better than the alternative of not using them. Of course, the best alternative is "neither"...

Of course eating non-organic produce is better than eating no produce at all. Eating only organic is a straw man position.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#63

Post by ANTSANTS »

r00fus wrote: post #53
antidaily wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obesity rates are way up in France over the last 10 years too, though. They've doubled.

Has food become more available in the past decade? Or perhaps France is getting more factory-food on the shelves? Ten years ago I didn't notice that people were going hungry.

It might be tied to the increased rates of immigration many European countries have seen in recent years.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#64

Post by facepalm »

tacon wrote: post #5
dalke wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found it difficult to read the entire essay, so I didn't. I had problems with a lot of the characterizations. To start, "What happens when, for the first time in history, adult human beings are free to have all the sex and food they want?" This is only true for a subset of the people, but it's always been true for a subset of the people. When I read about the nobility of the 1600s, I see that there was a whole lot…

It would have helped if you read the entire essay. I was a kid during that 1958 description, and it is exactly what was happening in my house (Alexandria, VA). My mom wasn't shopping at farmers markets. And now no one particularly cares how much sex you have in the privacy of your home, but "food woo" is rampant, and if you are feeding your kids gluten, well, you are just a bad parent. At the moment my father is havi…

"No, the freedom to have all the sex you want is new, for pretty much everyone in the US."

Except for the tiny problem that you need somebody who wants to have sex with you to have sex.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#65

Post by vbezhenar »

GuiA wrote: post #27
lentil_soup wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We know what happens when humans are free to have all the food we want. They get fat. Next question". I'm not so sure about that, not all societies that can "have all the food" they want are fat, for example France.

I don't know if I agree or not with you, but I don't think France is the best example because it has such a strong food culture. I'm a French person who's been living in the US for about 5 years now. My main realization regarding the way food is treated in each country is that in France, the relationship with food is conditioned culturally very strongly since the moment you're born. When you grow up as a French perso…

It probably because France never had problems with food itself (because of good climate and good earth). So people had to develop food culture.

In russia, where climate is hard, earth is not very fertile and one unsuccessful harvest could mean country-scaled global hunger, food culture is more about eating while you can, conservate food while it's fresh. With current excess of food there are many fat men and women out there.

I believe that all countries will develop food culture very soon, it's already happening around. Dietology is a popular topic.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#66

Post by ANTSANTS »

martinflack wrote: post #45

How much of this is more easily explained in that Betty is conservative and her granddaughter Jennifer is liberal? Jonathan Haidt's TED talk on the moral roots of liberals and conservatives touches on sex and food (see time index 7:09): http://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind If there is a shift in the decades in common cultural attitudes, it might be explained by a general pendulum swing back and f…

My family is conservative and holds more traditional views about sex, family, and religion than most, yet is caught up in the obsession with healthy eating just as much as its liberal counterparts. That's what makes this interesting from my perspective: attitudes about food have changed dramatically across social boundaries and political boundaries, to a greater degree than even our attitudes about sex.

You don't have to agree with the author's conclusions (I mostly don't) to be interested in the way food is being treated in recent years as simultaneously a status symbol and the object of moral and political dogma.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#68

Post by fennecfoxen »

Retric wrote: post #54
fennecfoxen wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last I checked, attending San Diego Christian College or pursuing private religious employment is kinda a voluntary deal which a very, very small portion of the population pursues, and when they do so it is frequently because they agree with the ideals the college or the religious employers represent. Are these counterexamples really supposed to represent the worst out there?

You only really need 1 counterexample to disprove a theory. The reality is prostitution is still illegal in the vast majority of the US which is a clear sign of a deeply repressed culture. However, TV and video game ratings are another. As is the fairly common ban on breastfeeding in public let alone a lack of nude beaches. And the list just keeps getting longer.

> You only really need 1 counterexample to disprove a theory.

No. Don't be absurd. By and large the conversation people are having here is meaningful because we're talking about the extent to which people (mostly american citizens of the age of majority in this case) face substantial constraints to doing what they want, constraints which are imposed on them by a third party against their will. If your counterexamples substantially consist of people voluntarily making commitments for the sake of their beliefs in a world where avoiding that commitment is trivial, then your counterexamples don't really expose a problem and any remedies which would purport to address the problem would in fact act to reduce freedom.

You are, however, right to retreat from some of the trivial barriers you had been mentioning before and looking instead into the sphere of cultural sentiment and public perception. This is easily more relevant than availability of opportunities of employment by a religious institution.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#69

Post by ambler0 »

sowhatquestion wrote: post #35
ambler0 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether or not an organic diet (whatever that may be exactly) ultimately proves to be healthier, it's wrong to describe the movement to eat such food as a "ridiculous cargo cult". It's clear what people are worried about (dangerous pesticides, environmental pollutants) and the expectation that food labeled as organic is better in this respect is not unreasonable. Whether or not labeling food "certified organic" makes…

> you have an oversimplified view of these issues Nice try, but no. "On average, GM technology adoption has reduced chemical pesticide use by 37%, increased crop yields by 22%, and increased farmer profits by 68%. Yield gains and pesticide reductions are larger for insect-resistant crops than for herbicide-tolerant crops. Yield and profit gains are higher in developing countries than in developed countries ." (emphas…

You're lumping them all together again, but each issue deserves to be discussed by itself.

Regarding GMOs, what is interesting is not the fact that an organism was geneticially modified in a lab. What one wants to know is why it was modified. You can bet that your Roundup Ready crop is going to be slathered in ...Roundup. It's up to you to decide whether or not that's a big deal. The point is that this isn't superstition, it's basic fact-finding about the food we eat.

I never claimed that organic produce is more nutritous than non-organic produce. I did suggest that it's a reasonable working hypothesis that it is safer because of lower pesticide levels.

If anything on your list deserves your derisive attitude, it's the gluten-free craze. I have very little interest in that one; it strikes me as another diet fad and the testimonials are reiminiscent of other bogus complaints, e.g. re MSG. Which is too bad, since celiac disease is real and these patients are now being taken less seriously.

"the amount of money" Spending 10 cents more per pound for the organic fair-trade bananas so I can practice the precautionary principle and possibly help improve the lot of the serfs that pick them seems OK to me.

"You would think it cured cancer" Well, it is one of the things people are hoping to prevent...

Of course, none of this touches on the other reasons one might be picky about how their food is sourced, namely environmental and labor concerns.

What frustrates me so much about your post is that you see people doing things for stupid reasons and conclude from this that there aren't good reasons for doing these things. There are plenty of smart, dare I say skeptical (seems to be one of the fetishes on HN), people thinking about these issues who don't share your perspective.

Re: Is Food the New Sex? (2009)

#70

Post by ambler0 »

humanrebar wrote: post #58
pizza234 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hence we get ridiculous cargo cults like gluten-free, organic, anti-GMO, everything Dr. Oz pushes As a 20-something in the US, you're certainly very uninformed. Gluten free, organic and anti-gmo have nothing to do with cargo cults and food fanatism. Essentially nobody buys gluten-free products because they're gluten free (except who needs it). GF products are a very little minority, because the lack of gluten is a…

> not to follow a fad who lasts a short time (which is essential to cargo culting). Cargo cults are groups who follow rituals they don't understand: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult If a group is following a diet without understanding it, I think it's apt (though perhaps needlessly divisive) to call that group a cargo cult. If someone doesn't eat gluten and can't describe what gluten is and why it's bad , he o…

Thanks for bringing this up for the people who aren't familiar with the history of the term. In my opinion, "cargo cult" is overused and overly specific. We have a perfectly good word for these kinds of behaviors, i.e. "superstition"
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