Hw # 26

• Many do not have death on their mind until they are dying and sick, and now after this unit I now constantly think of it. I look at my younger brother and realize he will probably outlive me and catch myself doing this once on train as well with people of all ages. Weird huh.
• Important information for me was seeing how other people view death from parents to friends to strangers and helped develop my view at the end of this unit.
• We believe healthcare insurance is there for our benefit but actually just running our pockets.
• Time is essential because one day our time will be over and on doesn’t want to die regretting how we spent it throughout our life.

Source I found most helpful was hearing other’s voices on their experiences on death and thoughts on it because it was easy for me to connect it to my life and thoughts. Sometimes I found myself nodding my head or confused on why they thought this way. Another source that was helpful was watching Sicko because it helped me understand the complications one is dying or ill, before this believed it was simple that you’d receive the care you needed no matter what, so this movie changed my idea of healthcare insurance.

I believe we should just all have a class discussion and listen to each other’s experiences or thoughts because even if they write about it on their blog, one doesn’t have time to read every single’s classmates blog on death. A question we should explore is what words come up in our mind when one thinks of death? Or what is the point of life if we are going to die in the end?

Hw - 25

Begins with viewing lives of those who do not have insurance. But this movie is not about these people; it’s about the happy Americans who do have insurance. Of course this isn't as pretty as it is painted, how insurance companies only care about our health and are there for our benefit. In actuality it’s a business; businesses do everything in order to profit more and unfortunately keeping Americans healthy is not one. Not wanting to just view just our country’s insurance he compares it to the one in Cuba and in Britain. Their health insurance is, “ If you have power, you meet the needs of your community.” So why do we not adapt to this? Because the way their insurance works is communist.

Two pieces of evidence that supports Michael Moor's argument is of this man who is 79 still working and has two jobs and other is when this person was knocked unconscious, the insurance didn't cover ambulance. These two pieces of evidence were important to his thesis; Insurance doesn't fully cover health care because this man should be retired resting and being cared for but instead still working in order to pay his insurance. The other evidence is important because this woman did not confirm an ambulance or something and so the insurance did not cover the ambulance bill. But when was this woman supposed to call she was unconscious?!

http://healthpolicyandreform.nejm.org/?p=2610

The fact used in Sicko is in fact accurate that our healthcare system is #37, this citation another piece of proof other than the one Michael Moore uses on his website proving that he did not "fudge" this fact. But one thing did notice is that it is true that Cuba is ranked lower than us, what does this mean? Is Cuba's healthcare insurance not as great as Moore presented it?

Most important excerpts of the movie I believe was listening to not only the patients point of view but the doctor's. Showing that they care about keeping the patient healthy and the Britain doctors were glad they did not have to worry about whether the patient can afford it or not, but concentrate on what can do in order to keep patient healthy and alive. The idea that struck me as the most crucial was having healthcare insurance free and universal,and how we can make this possible in the US because it seems to work in other countries.

This movie has affected even changed my view on healthcare insurance companies, I like most Americans believed up until watching this movie that healthcare insurance was there for our benefit and healthcare. So finding out that they are there to profit from us being sick or close to death was shocking and in my view inhuman. I believe that we can sometimes cover ourselves in this bubble of how everything is good and when experience something that tells us otherwise it kinda literally pops and can feel like "everything's just bullshit." - Jay

Hw # 24 - Part 3

“ Why can’t everybody just get used to it? People are born and they just can’t go on and on, then they must go, but it is so hard, so hard for the people left behind; it’s so hard to see them go, as if it had never happened before, and so hard it could not happen to anyone else, no one but you can survive this kind of loss, seeing someone go, seeing them leave you behind; you don’t want to go with them, you only don’t want them to go.” – pg. 138 This was her point of view on death, and I felt myself nodding my head to everything she was saying. It is true we hate seeing people leave us although we don’t want to leave with them just not have them go.

“My friend Bud said to me he found it strange the way people in Antigua regard illness, that when a person is ill no one mentions it, no one pays a visit; but if the person should die, there is a big outpouring of people at the funeral, there are bouquets, people sing hymns for the dead with much feeling.” Pg. 146 This for me was informative because it showed me how somewhere other then US people deal with illness and death, this book spoke specifically of Antigua.

“ And my brother died, for he kept dying; each time remembered that he died it was as if he had just at that moment died, and the whole experience of it would begin again; my brother had died, and I didn’t love him; or, at any rate, I didn’t love him in the way that I had come to understand love, something so immediate it was always in front of me even when my back was turned away from it, something so immediate it was like breath itself.” Pg. 148 This is a feeling many have, when someone close has died every time you recall them dying it is like they are dying all over again and you feel the pain or any other emotion that comes with this memory.

“ A great sadness overcame me, and the source of sadness was the deep feeling I had always had about him: that he had died without ever understanding or knowing, or being able to let the world in which he lived know, who he was; that who he really was – not a single sense of identity but all the complexities of who he was – he could not express fully: his fear of being laughed at, his fear of meeting with the scorn of the people he knew best were overwhelming and he could not live with all of it openly.” Pg. 162 This was moment when her brother, the puzzle piece she couldn’t solve was unfolded before her eyes. She finally understood why her brother acted that way toward woman; it was a front, a cover of his true feelings for men. And the way the lesbian described homosexuality before this quote; Antigua seemed like a culture that did not accept it.

The first quote was the one I felt the most connection with because I agree, when we are deep in our own pain and sorrow we think no one but me is going to have to go through this. But in actuality everyone does and her question is why can’t get used to it? I believe this is because we believe or like to think this will never happen to one or loved one and it catches us off guard when we’ve known it’d happen all along. Something most people do is push any painful memories to back of mind and fill one’s mind with any other memories/ thoughts we want to recall. I personally can say that I do this at times, I can purposely forget a painful memory or just never put a second thought on it instead fill my mind with good memories of my life so far. Jus recently I was on the phone with my grandmother talking to her about how her 50^th wedding anniversary went and then her saying how if God will it she’d come to see another year. This comment and this unit on illness and dying made me think how much I’d be utter sorrow if she would leave even when I know she will and all of us in turn will one day. Like Jamaica said perfectly, “ seeing them leave you behind; you don’t want to go with them, you only don’t want them to go.”

HW # 23 - book Part 2

Jamaica Kincaid, My Brother, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1997

"And as we sat there, not face -to-face, she rubbing his head, telling humiliating stories about him, telling me some God or other would bless me, she did not remember this, she did not remember that if it had been up to her, I would not have been in a position to be blessed by any God, I might in fact be in the position as my brother right now." - pg. 75 Before this sentence her mother was telling her how God would bless her for bringing medicine to help her brother. But in reality Jamiaca would not have be in this position to help her brother if it had been up to her mother, because she didn't believe her children needed an education. And Jamaica against her mother's will went to New York got an education and become a writer which allowed her to access the medicine he needed. So why was her mother blessing Jamiaca on something that she almost made impossible? Doesn't life work in funny ways, if you look at the could've beens or what ifs?

" His face was sharp like a carving, like an image embossed on an emblem, a face full of deep suffering, beyond regrets or pleadings for a second chance. It was the face of someone who had lived in extremes, sometimes a saint, sometimes a sinner." - pg.83 The beauty of this quote was reason why I chose it because her brother at that point wasn't regretful of the way he lived his life, even when sick didn't stop having sex. she described perfectly for only knowing him the first and last few years of his life.

"When he was still alive I used to try to imagine what it would be like when he was no longer alive, what the world would seem like the moment I knew he was no longer alive, I didn't know what to think, I didn't know what to feel." - pg. 87 Thoughts on his death, before, during and after.

During the 2/3 of this book, it begins with her finding out that her brother has finally died. In the third quote I use, it shows some of the thoughts she had when finding out her brother had finally died even though just like Beth to her it seemed like he had already been dead the last few weeks. While reading the book I notice she writes exactly how she speaks and thinks because when she was writing about her feelings toward her brother's death, she questions herself why she did not know what think or feel about his death. Especially when she only saw him the last 2 years of his life so love was something she did not feel...yet. For most people when just losing someone it can be pretty confusing next days; of questioning why him? to blame or to not know what to feel or react but to all of us it make us question life and death.

Comments made on my blog

Michelle,

The best part while reading this analysis in paragraph 3 "For me the huge thing that scares me about dying (which might seem weird) is to never think again, at times in my life I enjoy letting myself be swallowed by my own thoughts and visions and not being able to do this terrifies me." I actually disagree, from my point of view the scariest part of death is not dying but leaving the loved ones behind. You could've expanded this further by asking yourself: Why does it scare you? Past experience? Is there a specific thought/memory that you focus on when you immerse yourself in your thoughts?

Eduardo (Younger Mentor)

While reading Michelle's response to her guest speaker's story I could easily relate to the topic of death and how we pretend tht "death isn't going to happen." Death is something that is inevitable and she expands on this throughout her writing, she even has the same fear about it as most people including myself do. The fear of not being able to think again once you die, is it like sleeping? I wonder, more than fear it is uncertainty.

My favorite quote from her writing is " Without realizing it we spend too much time on things we shouldn't. I like it because it is very true for me I used to pend so much in fact that it came to the point that I asked my self "what have I been doing for the past 2-3 years." and all that came to mind was amassing killing spree's online, something that I wish I could now cash in and get some of my time back.

One thing I thought she could have elaborated on is about how we all strive to leave an imprint on the world as if this would make us immortal, we all seem to be chasing that imaginary bone that will somehow make a difference in the world if we chase it.

Older Mentor

Hw # 22

Jamaica Kincaid, My Brother, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1997

“ I could have said to my mother, You and I do not get along, I am too well, I am not a sick child, you cannot be a mother to a well child, you are a great person but you are very bad mother to a child who is not dying or in jail; but I did not say that.” – pg. 27 When I read this it made think of how you can see how much someone loves you or cares about you when you are sick or ill. And in Jamaica’s case this was the only time her mother showed her love.

“ I told him to use condoms when having sex with anyone; I told him to protect himself from the HIV virus and he laughed at me and said that he would never get such a stupid thing (“Me no get dat chupidness, man.”)” – pg. 8 This quote reminded me how some people think their invincible and in their mind think, “ Oh that’ll never happen to me.” And when it does it takes us a while, like Jamaica’s brother or like Beth’s husband to accept the truth about our health.

“ It was then I decided that only people in Antigua died, that people living in other places did not die and as soon as I could, I would move somewhere else, to hose places where the people living there did not die.” – pg. 26 In other words, Jamaica when in her home with her family, death did not exist and it seemed like it never would in her “world.” But standing next to her brother in Antigua death became a reality for her and it frightened her, so much she mentioned several time how she just wanted be back home with her husband and kids.

How Jamaica dealt with the fact that her brother was dying due to Aids, I found was significant because for the first time she was bonding with the family (especially with her brother) she had tried to avoid most of her life. And when she finally did, she was hit by many emotions like the love she felt for her brother and having to face death when she had been avoiding it most of her life in the comfort of her home. I believe that when people find out someone of their own blood is ill or dying, even if they haven’t talked to this person in years they reach out to them. Or at least in Jamaica's case and mine. As a child, I never heard my father talk to or about his father but one day I saw that my father look different, more old, tired and weary than his usual self. And then a week after my mother told me that my father was going away to Mexico to my grandfather’s funeral. A man who I had never met or heard much about. But just like Jamaica, once my father heard his father was ill he went to his native land to see him in his last days. I would like to know whether if it was just something in common between my family's life and Jamaica’s or is it true for majority of people?

Hw # 21b - Comments on Partner's Blog

Leah,

Your response to our guest speaker's experience with death aligned with what was asked for in this homework because you connected her insights to events from your own life. Like the insight Beth mentioned about how most men don't get medical attention right away, because they deny their pain/illness. You then connected this insight to your life by mentioning the time your father had an erupted appendix and denied his pain until it was too much and he luckily got there before it was too late. I agree that it might have something to do with their masculinity being in play because they must ask others for help and must be looked after when when it's usually the other way around. Next time try to add more depth to these big ideas you mention in your post by just focusing on one and expanding it. Besides that I enjoyed reading this post:)

Raven,

The first insight you mentioned I felt like you went into depth and showed how in your life it is true, when one is in deep struggle we turn to religion no matter if you don't even have one. I like how you shared experiences you've had of death. Maybe you should go deeper on this and say if these deaths have affected your life or view on life? Also could've explained why you think it didn't trigger feelings when she told her experience. Besides this I enjoyed reading someone else's point of view on death of my age and cant wait to read future one:)

Hw # 21

• Most men don’t get medical attention right away because are in denial at first.
• Wanting to seem invincible: that death will never “catch” us and to continue to be positive until the end.
• Movies don’t show the reality of how a disease or cancer can affect the patient
• Remember to do nice things to people even those who you’ve never met because you will never be able to once you die and can sometimes regret leaving unfinished business with those close to you.
• The best times of the 26 years of marriage were weirdly the ones spent when he was sick because did not have to focus on anything but her husband.
• Was to be paralyzed all he said was “ If I can still move my hands and paint than I’ll be alright.” (Art was his passion, this was his way to me of leaving an imprint in the world)
• TIME; something one shouldn’t waste especially on silly things (when one is a teenager we can do this) and spend it more on the important and fulfilling moments in life.
• Keeping it “human” as possible was important; making sure people saw him as a real person, a husband, and a father not as cancer.
• Went to Buddhist monk and he told her the signs to know when it was coming; one was pushing his hands out as if he were pushing away death and he did! (During the final weeks)
• Stillness that was felt in the room and in his body was indescribable when he died.

The second insight I got from our guest speaker, the one about wanting to seem invincible; that death will never catch us I can connect with because I agree that most people just shove the thought right out of their head and let anything else that is on their mind distract them from reality. That we, humans are not invincible, much less immortal and that we will one day have to face our fate, death. This for me and I’m sure for most people is true, we avoid it like death isn’t going to happen, or we even joke about it when it is a serious topic that exhausts us. When I was younger I would read books about men who were immortal and while reading these books I would forget everything around me. Reading was an escape for me especially from the thought of dying because during these minutes I believed it was possible to live for centuries. But even this had a cost, because you would have to watch again and again those who you’ve come to care for and love (who aren’t immortal) die before your eyes.

The insight about time was definitely the one that impacted me the most and I believe it is something many can relate to. Without realizing it we spend too much time on things we shouldn’t, like spending extra hours at work or in the digital world instead of enjoying time with other humans, like our friends and family. And we don’t realize this until we are about to die. Our guest speaker mentioned that in our final moments we don’t go, “Oh, I wish I could’ve spent an hour more at work.” We really just say, “ Oh, I wish could’ve spent more time with my family.” A lot of time it feels like there isn't ever enough time to get everything we want done much less the energy because we all need at least 8 hours of sleep . I believe we should make this realization now instead of when we are about to die by looking at our lives and making a list of the number of things we can drop that are really not needed like 4 hours of watching TV and change it for something that we will feel more accomplished and even happy about afterwards.

A question that sparked while listening to our guest speaker was are there some common things we all do before we die? For example he began to push his hands out as if pushing away death. Or does everyone do something different? An idea that sparked after hearing our speaker was about TIME that I mentioned about before in the previous paragraph. It also sparked the idea of us all wanting to leave some kind of imprint in the world before we die whether it is our art, a book, being a celebrity or for simply making a difference. To not just fade away and to never have your name spoken ever again. For me the huge thing that scares me about dying (which might seem weird) is to never think again, at times in my life I enjoy letting myself be swallowed by my own thoughts and visions and not being able to do this terrifies me.

Hw #19

I remember one time when I was 10; at this age I enjoyed to explore and analyze different topics/ideas and one of them happened to be death. And once I began to start thinking about this topic I couldn’t stop, I started to shudder and all wanted to do was curl up in a ball in a corner. The thoughts going through my head what happens to me after, will I just rot while those around me will forget about me until one day no who knew me will be alive and my name would be forgotten. So I decided to go ask my mother about it, needing answers and hopefully some comfort as well. So I asked my mother if she was scared of death and she told me no that we were all going to die someday, but she told me not to worry to enjoy life and to remember that if we follow God’s commandments we will then join him in heaven. Me being ten I thought to myself, oh cool I’ll just follow these rules and I’ll go to heaven. Now age 17 I believe there is more to this, so hearing other opinions and religions and their views on death is interesting. But growing up with Catholicism I believe it is true that we will go to heaven or hell and it personally brings me comfort that I may be in heaven in the end and can watch those I left and loved from above.

Today asking my mother again this time about illness, she told me that when someone you know or when you are sick especially when the sickness is serious, it is sad but one must be strong and have the will to continue living what ever life you have left. We also should look for a treatment or cure that will help us get better. And that one must always pray to God and/or the Virgin Mary to become healthy once again. The Virgin Mary for my family and I the religion I follow is an important figure being the mother of Jesus. Because coming from a Hispanic background, and being Mexican on top of that, she is very important in my culture. When you walk around any Mexican neighborhood, restaurant (actually owned by Mexicans) or the Catholic churches in Mexico there are huge portraits and/or sculptures of the Virgin Mary. So sometimes in my prayer I am told to pray to her as well as to God, because she will listen me as well, and Jesus loving his mother dearly he will listen to her about my prayer. In my culture, religion plays a huge role in our lives and when I went to Mexico this summer I saw it even more. Every time someone walked by a church they made a sign of the cross, the churches tare usually overcrowded during mass which surprised me because here in NY it is not like this. The reason I believe this is, is because they find comfort to many issues in their life, including the topic of death. It brings reassurance that when we die, it is not the end that there will be an after and that after depends on what you believe in.

When I asked my dad about death he told me it's part of life, and is what completes the cycle of life. I asked him what he imaged when he was telling me this and he said the image in his mind was of a tree and continued to say that humans must die so makes room for the next generation of humans. He said when we die we transform and give life to others, his example was of a dead rabbit that turns into fertilizer for the dirt which then a plant grows in. He took it differently then my mother did, she took it more as a sad occurrence while my father was more calm and it's just part of life while shrugging his shoulders. He continues to say that our ancestors (Aztecs) worshiped death because they would sacrifice people to make Gods happy and wouldn't send them illness, calamities, bad crops, or a drought. And when something like drought occurred they believed it was because the Gods were angry with them so they sacrificed even more people. This and watching the news made me think why is it OK for people to take other's life? Isn't life sacred? Nowadays we honor the dead, my father ended.

This talk with my parents definitely has impacted the way I see it now, never before did we have a full length conversation of death, it's a topic most families avoid. Because it is a hard topic to speak of the answers can be depressing and just plain tiring. But it goes to show that we shouldn't wait for death or illness to live our life to the fullest, instead of wasting so much time on the technology. I'm trying now to just spend 2 hours not 4 hours on my computer the amount of time I usually spend on it and instead going to volunteer to walk dogs until I get my own which I hope will get soon. A dog that will also someday die... but I know death is something that is unavoidable no matter if dog, human or fish.

hw # 18

My experience this holiday fits into both "anti - body" and "body - centered practices, because at first the minute our guests walked through the door we hug and kiss on cheek due to having hispanic background which is more touchy feely than in the American culture, so we pay more attention to each other's body movements. Then when it came time to eat it became anti - body ( although not as anti - body like in school) but we still sat very still and listened to each other say what they were thankful for and say grace. At Thanksgiving in my family the food pleasure supplement did dominate the event, because most of what we did was sit there and eat as a family, all 7 of us on one table and talk about how good the turkey and sweet potatoes were, even my sister in law's dog joined us eating turkey as well under the table. Which makes me wonder for other animals like dogs isn't most of their life body - centered?

A tradition we have after we've "stuffed" ourselves we watch TV, usually the specials that are on like the Beyonce Special. So this is an Anti - Body practice we have because we sit on couch ignoring our bodies and just concentrating on the TV screen for the rest of the night. Except when we say goodbye again. But this time when the Beyonce Special ended I decided to take my sister- in law's dog for a walk, so now I was paying attention to my body and the dog's ( as well as protecting it from other dogs) after leaving my body for an hour.

The nutritiousness of the meal was definitely huge for my family dinner, the first thing my mother commented was that turkey compared to other meats isn't as bad for us. And she made sure we all had our huge share of veggies, a side of fresh homemade sweet potatoes my father made, and with only a piece of turkey. Health was a topic that was brought up at the table because my brother was sick so we started talking about what medicine he should take. Shoud he take Dimatap or DayQui? Or something natural? Like his wife suggested a ginger tea with raisins which helped her feel better when she had a cold. There also were empty chairs which should have been filled by my sister-in law's parents but because of her dad's condition (diabetes) they were back in Domincan Republic so he would not have to deal with winter in NY. And the main reason he had come to NY was because unfortunately he had a stroke, so he had come to New York to get check up and medicine here then go back to DR but he promised to come back. So during dinner we asked questions on how they were and his health for politeness and our general care. So as you can see my Thanksgiving dinner had both of the anti - body practices and "body - centered" practices that occurred through out the night.

hw # 17

My experience with illness is not much, I've seen my little brother get a cold and everyone else I know but experiencing some one who has been seriously ill I have not. Dying unfortunately I have had experience with, I had a class mate die in front me ( honest truth not trying to sound melodramatic) in middle school. At first the feelings I felt were of confusion, why did he collapse when he seemed so healthy? It kinda hits you how quickly a person can go from seeming so alive at one moment and the next be dead. And the thoughts one has after, of the dead can be "was it my fault this happened? Or why couldn't I have done anything to save him/her?" and even feelings of pain, loss, regret come to mind as well.

The way I've been taught to see dying is that if he/she was a good person and followed god's path, he/she would join him in his kingdom, if not he/she would go to hell. My entire life I've been brought up to believe this due to my family's religion. Illness I was taught was something that one should avoid by keeping healthy and choosing the correct life style. It is also something that must not to be avoided and should be treated right away. But for my family, the medicine doctors prescribe aren't the always the answer to an illness because they can fix your problem but can cause another in a long run. So my grandparents and mother are huge believers of homeopathic medicine, because it is natural and will still treat the problem but without causing any other.

A social norm of illness and dying is to always rush a person who is ill or dying to a hospital to be cured or to find them a cure. The idea of a hospital brings several images to my mind: blue uniforms, hospital beds, seat right next to bedside, curtain, and the smell of plastic and fear. Hospital; Someone being born in a hospital at the same time that someone is dying is what comes to mind when I see the word. How life and death can all occur under the same roof. A second social norm is to visit the sick and accompany them through their pain because you know one day you will have the same fate. Another social norm is to shrink away from the idea death, to avoid the thought and topic, so we occupy our mind on everything else and try to forget. Last social norm I can think of at the moment as I mentioned before is to use medicine as the answer of many illnesses and research to find one for those that are still incurable.

Hw #11

I chose experiential (a) and decided to change my diet, but in order to do this I began the change slowly. With parental consent I began to buy vegetables we needed for dinner at the farmer's market which was located on 1st ave right in front of the housing for low income families. ( Reminded me of how in class we talked about how the government was subsidizing fruit stands in order for them to stand in poor neighborhoods.) Once I bought peppers, one an orange color and the other in a green color, and they both tasted real good. The orange pepper was oddly shaped (I believe due to fact didn't have any chemicals, naturally grown) and it tasted sweet. And when my mother cooked it with meat and olive oil the juices gave meat an extra flavor. The green peppers were also good but tasted more like most regular peppers except a little more tangy.

After slowly changing the vegetables in my food, I also began to cut back on the junk food I ate during the week, ate homemade food for a week and did not eat out until Sunday. It did work and I personally don't eat McDonald's or Wendy's only like 3 or 4 times a year. Usually when I finish eating I feel sick and stuffed, and an hours later I am hungry again, while when I eat a regular home cooked meal it is more filling and healthy. I'm also type of person who is tempted to buy snacks like chips, candy or cookies like any teen. But decided to instead throw an apple or pear in bag to eat as a snack instead.

From this unit I have definitely learned a lot, its been eye opening about the food our society eats. And for me its important because now every time I eat, how the animals and farmers are actually treated is now always is in the back of my mind and has made me change some of what I eat. It honestly hasn't made me want to become vegetarian, but it has made me want to see a change in the process of food and for it to become more about the consumer not the business.

Hw #12

Thesis: Many of the dominant social practices in our society - practices that define a "normal" life - on further investigation turn out to involve nightmares and industrial atrocities. Argument 1: Most people aren’t informed about the nightmarish atrocities that happen behind “the kitchen.” And this is normal, so we continue to eat these foods on our plates because it is a normal social practice. Supporting Claim 1: Much of what we are uninformed about is being kept hidden by the mass production companies.

Evidence: What goes on in the feedlots

Evidence: Animals and workers are mistreated

Evidence: What is put into our food

Evidence: Over production

Supporting Claim 2: Companies do not care about the consumer; it is all about the business. Business = money.

Evidence: Organic now government owned word

Evidence: No interest in if food is healthy but in selling it

Evidence: Whole foods

Not done.. evidence is almost done

Hw # 7d

Chapter 17:

Precis: In this chapter I venture into the word vegan and why this has become a food trend and the moral/reasons people become vegetarian.

Gems: " Eating meat has become morally problematic, at least for people who take the trouble to think about it. Vegetarianism is more popular than it has ever been, and animal rights, the fringiest of fringe movements until few years ago, is rapidly finding its way into the cultural mainstream." - pg. 303

" That's not because slaughter is necessarily inhumane, but because most of us would simply rather not be reminded of exactly what meat is or what it takes to bring it to our plates." - pg. 302

Questions/Thoughts: Most people learn to see "we" eating animals as cycle of life, but some people see it as morally wrong. Who knows what the right way is? The one our ancestors ate or this new modern way of seeing foo and animals?

Chapter 18:

Precis: To understand how before existence of supermarket I needed experience another way of feeding oneself besides food shopping, the method people used long go. Hunting. With help of a friend, I was able to learn how to hunt and one day I tried out these skills. On the second outing was finally able to shoot my first pig and when I did I had a feeling, i never would've thought i would have after, happiness. Instead of guilt or disgust, I was excited that I had killed this animal. But this didn't feeling didn't last, it ended when it came time to carry its carcass and cook it.

Gems: " Nothing in my experience (with the possible exception of certain intoxicants) has prepared me for the quality of this attention." - pg. 334

" The one emotion I expected to feel but did not, inexplicably, was remorse, or even ambivalence. All that would come later, but now, I'm slightly embarrassed to admit, I felt absolutely terrific - unambiguously happy." - pg. 353

" But I realized that here in this single picture you could actually observe this food chain in its totality, the entire circuit of energy and matter that had created the pig we were turning into meat for our meal." - pg. 362

Question/Thoughts: I enjoyed this chapter, was able to take peek in how it feels like to hunt and what goes into hunting.

Chapter 19:

Precis:Nature doesn't entirely make every plant we see as edible (i.e. chanterelle mushrooms) and throughout history we have learned what we can and cannot eat.

Gems: " Gardening is a way of being in nature steeped in assumptions of which the gardener is seldom more than vaguely aware - if at all. To work exclusively with domesticated species, for example, is bound to color your view of nature as being a fairly benign place, one that answers to human desires ( for beauty, for tastiness). " - pg. 365

" I wonder if books fail us here because the teaching transaction - this one is good to eat, that one not - is so fundamental, even primordial, that we're instinctively reluctant to trust it to any communication medium save the oldest: that is, direct personal testimony from, to put it bluntly, survivors." - pg. 372

Questions/Thoughts:

Chapter 20:

Precis: At the end of hard work of hunting, foraging and gathering, had a cooked meal surrounded by friends. Cooking and sitting at table, not necessarily the food, made it the best meal.

Gems: "Another thing cooking is, or can be, is a way to honor the things we're eating, the animal and plants and fungi that have been sacrificed to gratify our needs and desires, as well as the place and the people that produced them." - pg. 404

“Putting a great dish on the table is our way of celebrating the wonders of form we humans can create from this matter-this quality of sacrificed life-just before the body takes its first destructive bite.” - Pg. 405

" For we would no longer need any reminding that however we choose to feed ourselves, we eat by the grace of nature, not industry, and what we're eating is never anything more or less than the body of the world."

Questions/Thoughts: We have reached the end of the book, but I feel OK now that I know all this information how can I or people do to stop these deep dark secrets of food industry? Or as Ally put it " How do we avoid eating this shit?" Do we just accept it?

hw # 10

The viewer gets the chance to take a "peek inside the kitchen." To see where our food comes from, who produces it and how it is produced. The main point of this film was to lift the veil on what is being hidden on the farms, in the supermarket and in the fast food companies. Something which most people put little thought into even though they've been eating food fortheir entire life. Normal.

The movie provides a more real image of what's going on in slaughterhouses, whereas in the book they might describe how bad the produce is being treated but seeing with our two eyes is more impacting. The movie shows a short and sweet precis on every section Pollan went over in his book, so the book of course gives more evidence, details, and goes infinitely deeper in these subjects than in the movie. In the movie they didn't show part where he goes hunting and how connected he is to nature around him and how it's all food, found this chapter interesting aspect.

The image that remained with me after watching the movie was of the animals being alive one second and in the next are being turned into what I see all the time in the supermarket. Meat. The feeling that dominates my response on what is going on with our food is disgust, how we are sold food full of chemicals and antibiotics and there is not much we can do about it. And if we try to make a change or to inform, we'll become in debt and spend long time in court. Not even a distraught mother over her dead son could move these companies, it's all just a business.

Hw # 7c

Chapter 11:

Precis: Its Tuesday my second day on Joel's farm and today I learn how important chicken feed is, "feeds the broilers but, transformed into chicken crap, feeds the grass that feeds the cows that, as I was about to see, feed the pigs, and the laying hens." Joel seems to say that these animals do most of the work for him but from what I saw today it is more work, him and his workers work sun up to sun down while the mass production farmers only work like 5o days a year.

Gems: " It was hard to believe this hillside had ever been the gullied wreck Joel had described at dinner, and even harder to believe that farming such a damaged landscape so intensively, rather than just letting it be, could restore it to health and yield this beauty. This is not the environmentalist's standard prescription." - pg. 209

" By means of this simple management trick, Joel is able to use his cattle's waste to "grow"large quantities of high - protein chicken feed for free; he says this trims his cost of producing eggs by twenty - five cents per dozen." - pg. 211

" It's all connected. This farm is more like an organism than a machine, and like any organism it has its proper scale. A mouse is the size of a mouse for a good reason, and a mouse that was the size of an elephant wouldn't do very well." - pg. 213

" Pig happiness is simply the by - product of treating a pig as a pig rather than as " a protein machine with flaws" - flaws such as pigtails and a tendency, when emiserated, to get stressed." - pg. 219

" Its a foolish culture that entrusts its food supply to simpletons." -pg. 221

Questions/ Thoughts:

How come we haven't found a way to get polyface farm to provide our food instead?

Is it because the government doesn't agree with way they farm?

If we gave these farmers more land and less debt I believe they'd be able to produce a lot more in these polyface farms.

Chapter 12:

Precis: On Wednesday it was not about " the ecstasy of life on a farm" but the day to slaughter the chickens. Unlike other farms Joel slaughters them in his very own farm not another facility. The workers became mechanical no longer felt morally troubled about killing the chickens this is why it's so easy for them to kill them than for us to watch them. In the end the customer can even chose its on chicken and out in plastic bag to ensure their chickens aren't just another processed food product. Joel saw all the chickens waste or guts or other things that are usually thrown out as treasures because unlike other farms nothing goes to waste and all have a cycle where one thing helps and leads to the other.

Gems: " Joel's reasons for wanting to do this work here himself are economic, ecological, political, ethical, and even spiritual. " The way I produce a chicken is an extension of my worldview." he'd told me the first time we'd talked." - pg. 227

" I couldn't make out any insects in the gizzard, but its contents recapitulated the Polyface food chain: pasture on its way to becoming meat." - pg. 234

" Joel can seethe future of this one in a way I can't, its promise to transubstantiate this mass of blood and guts and feathers into a particularly rich, cakey black compost, improbably sweet - smelling stuff that, by spring, will be ready for him to spread into the pastures and turn back into grass." - pg. 238

Questions/Thoughts: Wonder if the author after experiencing all this will he continue to eat meat?

Why does the USDA see what they are doing as wrong when it is so much better than the other farms they regulate?

Wonder what Joel thought about letting chickens living in their own waste?

Chapter 13:

Precis: It is Wednesday and today comes the day when the consumers of Joel's polyface farm come, some as far as a few miles away. The buyers have the chance to connect with who and where their produce grew creating a trusting bond between consumer and producer and are more willing to pay the higher price. Joel says if we took off all subsidies the mass - produced food has, it would "level the playing field." Which in reality in a way is true the price we see in supermarket, it is not the actual price due to the government policies.

Gems: " After that, it didn't surprise me to read that the typical item of food on an Americans plate travels some fifteen hundred miles to get there, and is frequently better traveled and more worldly than its eater." - pg. 239

" Don't you find it odd that people will put more work into choosing their mechanic or house contractor than they will into choosing the person who grows their food?" - Joel pg. 240

"This is the chicken I remember from my childhood. It actually tastes like chicken." - pg. 242

" One day Frank Perdue and Don Tyson are going to wake up and find that their world has changed. It won't happen overnight, but it will happen, just as it did for those catholic priests who came to church one Sunday morning only to find that, my goodness, there aren't as many people in the pews today. Where in the world has everybody gone?" - pg. 261

Questions/Thoughts:

These people who have access to a polyface are lucky i believe they can meet and see where their chickens are grown letting them know their food is safe.

Will we one day no longer buy from mass- produced but instead from these type of farms? or will it just never happen?

Chapter 14:

Precis: I decide to try this food I've watch grow and be killed in front of my eyes, at first felt a little queasy at thought of me being able to eat it. But I cooked a dinner for two friends from nearby buying two chickens, eggs and corn from Joel's farm to make dinner. ( Although he gave it to me free as a gift.) With a good conversation, surrounded my friendly people and good and healthy food.

Gems: " The anthropologist Claude Levi - Strauss described the work of civilization as the process of transforming the raw into the cooked - nature into culture." - pg. 264

" Willie agreed there was something neat about the alchemy involved, how a plant could transform chicken crap into something as sweet and tasty and golden as an ear of corn." - pg. 265

" When chickens get to live like chickens, they'll taste like chickens, too." - pg. 271

" I closed my eyes and suddenly there they were: Joel's hens, marching down the gangplank from out of their Eggmobile, fanning out across the early morning pasture, there in the grass where this sublime bite began." - pg. 273

Questions/Thoughts:

When he described what this food tasted like, he to me seemed to speak honestly of what the chicken and eggs tasted like and that it didn't taste out of this world but the chicken did taste more chickeny and the eggs had a "muscle tone."

My question of if the author would ever eat chicken after having seen the farms and foods process to his own plate was answered in this chapter, he did. He came off as proud and happy to be eating these foods form Joel's farm.

Chapter 15:

Precis: I've decided to do the thing that will connect me with my food more than going to supermarket or even a farm could ever. Become a hunter gatherer. After finding someone who knew this style of living. Started with easier part the gathering, after recognizing a couple plants found a wild mushroom that matched what chanterelle mushroom is but he faced the decision to eat it or not. The omnivore's dilemma.

Gems: " My mother had inculcated a fear of fungi in me that put picking a wild mushroom in the same class of certain - death behaviors as touching downed power lines or climbing into the cars of strangers proffering candy." - pg. 278

" Anthropologists estimate that typical hunter - gatherers worked at feeding themselves no more than seventeen hours a week, and were more robust and long- lived than agriculturists, who have only in the last century or two regained the physical stature and longevity of their Paleolithic ancestors." - pg. 279

" Some very basic things: about the ties between us and the species (and natural systems) we depend upon; about how we decide what in nature is good to eat and what is not; and about how the human body fits into the food chain, not only as an eater but as hunter and yes, a killer of other creautures. " - pg. 281

Questions/Thoughts:

The fact that the hunter gathers were healthier than we are today but we can't just go back to this way of living because there is not enough wild game for everyone to eat.

This way of livng brings a new view of what you see around you at least in the woods because it all has potential as a source of food.

Chapter 16:

Precis: The omnivore's dilemma is what one as humans face every day in our lives and due to the flavors we taste, disgust, sweetness, bitterness are some of what helps us decide what to eat and what not to eat. In America it is even harder to decide because of the types of foods many of the immigrants who come bring and the constant fads and diets we have. We also have certain ways to eat the food like raw fish with wasabi to minimize danger of eating. Cooking led to another way of eating to bringing more energy to us humans.

Gems: " The blessing of the omnivore is that he can eat a great many different things of nature. The curse of the omnivore is that when it comes to figuring out which of those things are safe to eat, he's pretty much on his own." - pg. 287

Questions/Thoughts:Its interesting to know how much goes into the decision we make every day on what to eat, how other animals like rat or koala have their own ways of deciding what to eat.

We rely on others to know what to eat and not to but why do we when we are still eating things that may be food we shouldn't?

Hw # 9 - Freakonomics

A tool the protagonists in "Freakonomics" used were conducting experiments to find evidence to determine the truth. An example of this was when they conducted one in a school by giving high school students money as an incentive to get their grades up. But in the end the reality was many didn't, only 5-7% had a change in their grades. Another tool was asking questions by surveying people, when they talked about the baby names they had several moments in film where they showed people being asked questions and what they thought about names. Giving them more evidence for the truth. Last tool I saw they used was evaluating the research, in the one about sumo wrestlers and how it seemed tobe the purest of sports they still had cheating. So they evaluated the numbers the sumo wrestlers would have in many matches to see a common occurence. And it seemed that those who were already assured to next round would let a companion who just needed one more win would let them.

I agree that Freakonomics serves as an inspiration and good example to our attempt to explore the hidden – in – plain – sight” weirdness of dominant social practices because they show evidence and real – life situations that let people know the “truth” of things. Like how names don’t change who you are or become, but where you grow up and your economic class does. Their example was a girl named Temptress who didn’t act the way she did because of her name but because of where she grew up. In a poor neighborhood and single mom household. Another example was the two kids named winner and loser, and loser ended being the actual winner graduating college and having the good life, while winner was a convict and in jail. Showing that your name won’t determine whether you’ll become a screw up or successful in life. I understood that it could affect you in life as in more/less job opportunity but can’t affect your life in a huge way.

These are things most may not know even though it seems obvious especially for those out there who hire baby name specialists just so their child won’t be a failure. This reminded me of my current math class and how sometimes the truth is not as obvious as we think, and an example was if there are more colored people jail, doesn't that make a colored person more likely to be a criminal? Well we learned using logic that this wasn't true it didn't actually make them any more likely to be a criminal than any other person. But cops still stop colored people more than any Caucasians. Weird. We could possibly conduct an experiment we think answer would be obvious to see if it actually is, like determine whether it is true those who eat meat are the ones more obese than those who don't? Maybe the answer won't be as obvious as we think.

Hw # 7b

Chapter 6:

Précis: Comparing 1820 to modern day America, drinking half a pint of whiskey every day was normal then. And today eating huge portions is also seen as normal due to the serving size some genius invented in order to sell more, leading to the rise in obesity. Another reason is that the cost is these foods are cheap because of the cost per calories. And corn is the cheapest energy on the market so of course we end up eating a lot of it in our diet. Especially with the huge portions being served to us in processed foods.

Gems: "It turns out the price of a calorie of sugar or fat plummeted since the 1970s. One reason that obesity and diabetes become more prevalent the further down the socioeconomic scale you look is that the industrial food chain has made energy - dense foods the cheapest foods in the market, which measured in terms cost per calories." - pg. 107

"While the surgeon general is raising alarms over the epidemic of obesity, the president is signing farm bills designed to keep the river flowing, guaranteeing that the cheapest calories in the market will continue to be the unhealthiest." - pg. 108

"Researchers have found that people (and animals) presented with large portions will eat up to 30 percent more than they would otherwise." - pg. 106

Questions/Thoughts:

Why is the President, the very own government letting us eat these cheap calories when it is unhealthy for us?

I believe that not allowing fast food restaurants to super size foods would help decrease obesity, because it is what led to the increase of obesity.

Chapter 7:

Précis: Family day at McDonalds I inspect the number of corn we intake in a single meal even include our transportation and the amount would fill and overflow the back trunk of my car of kernels. But the question is whether or not so much corn intake is really as bad as we think. The idea of McDonalds also has huge impact on why we eat it; to me it brought memories of my childhood and the smell brought comfort. But these cheap calories seem to have a consequence because in long run it can cost more to one becoming obese or get heart disease later on in life.

Gems: " The myriad streams of commodity corn, after being variously processed and turned into meat, converge in all sorts of different meals I might eaten, at KFC, or Pizza Hut or Apple bee's, or prepared myself from ingredients bought at supermarket. Industrial meals are all around us, after all; they make up the food chain from which most of us eat most of the time. " - Pg. 109

"I loved everything about fast food: the individual crunchy all wrapped up like presents; the familiar meaty perfume of the French fries filling the car; and the pleasingly sequenced bite into a burger - the soft, sweet roll, the crunchy pickle, the savory moistness of the meat." - pg. 111

" No I could not taste the feed corn or the petroleum or the antibiotics or the hormones - or the feedlot manure. Yet awhile " A Full Serving of Nutrition Facts" did not enumerate these facts, they too have gone into the making of this hamburger, are part of its natural history." - pg. 114- 115

Questions/Thoughts: The numbers given of how much corn we intake is huge compared of what one thought of before.

These cheap calories have a cause and effect I believe, they may be cheaper for those in low economic class but these people can later pay a higher price of becoming obese or having heart disease later on.

Chapter 8:

Précis: Visiting a Polyface farm and doing manual work the visual picture of the happy farmer and the leisure work disappears in my mind. After spending a day with Salatin I learn how he believes he is not a chicken farmer or cattle rancher but a grass farmer! To him and his farm the most important part is the grass because there everything else connects, the animals, their food and in the end the animals we eat. He believes they are better than the organic farms to him organic is just something else government owns. While unlike his farm it is just for him and his community, none of it can be exported. Soon I’ll find out whether this is true or not...

Gems: " Grass," so understood, is the foundation of the intricate food chain Salatin has assembled at Polyface, where a half dozen different animal species are raised together in an intensive rotational dance on the theme of symbiosis. Salatin is the choreographer and the grasses are verdurous stage; the dance has made Polyface one of the most productive and influential alternative farms in America." - pg. 126

" A great many animals, too, are drawn to grass, which partly accounts for our own deep attraction to it: We come here to eat the animals that ate the grass that we (lacking rumuns) can't eat ourselves. " All Flesh is Grass." - pg. 127

" We never called ourselves organic - we call ourselves 'beyond organic.' Why dumb down to a lesser level than we are?" - pg. 132

"A ten- thousand - bird shed that stinks to high heaven or a new paddock of fresh green grass every day? Now which chicken shall we call 'organic'? I'm afraid you'll have to ask the government, because now they own the word." - pg. 132

Questions/Thoughts: The author says he will investigate whether this farmer was telling the truth that this farm is better than organic farm. Wonder if it is? And if it is why then is organic seen so highly?

Chapter 9:

Precis

Gems: "In several corners of the store I was actually forced to choose between subtly competing stories. For example, some of the organic milk in the milk case was " ultrapasteurized," an extra processing step that was presented as a boon to the consumer, since it extends shelf life. But then another, more local dairy boosted about the fact they had said no to ultrapastueurization, implying that their product was fresher, less processed, and therefore more organic. This was the dairy that talked about cows living free from distress, something I was beginning to feel a bit of myself by this point." - Pg. 135

" The organic movement , as itwas once called, has come a remarkably long way in the last thirty years, to the pointwhere it now looks considerably less like a movement than a big business." - Pg. 138

Questions/Thoughts: Happy cow = real good steak

How with so many choices in Supermarket like Whole Foods can one make right decision in what to buy?

Chapter 10:

Precis:

Gems:" Curiously, we seem to like grass less for what it is than for what it isn't - the forest, I mean - and yet we're much more likely to identify with a tree than a blade of grass." - pg. 184

" Grass farmers grow animals - for meat, eggs, milk, and wool - but regard them as part of a food chain in which grass is the keystone species, the nexus between the solar energy that powers every food chain and the animals we eat." - pg. 188

" Joel pulled a single blade of orchard grass, showing me exactly where a cow had sheared it the week before, and pointing out the finger of fresh green growth that had emerged from the cut in the days since. " - (talking about cows grazing) - pg. 190

Questions/Thoughts:

Grass for a farm is like what corn is for us essential, ( well for us it has become) and this chapter really helped me understand why the farmer called himself a grass famrerand learn a little about /joel's past of how he comes from generations of farmers and how his father's dream and hard work was taken away. Would this be why he doesn't follow government so this one day won't happen to him?