Over the years McDonalds has had a reputation of being one of the largest fast food chains in the world. According to an investigation journalist, Eric Schlosser, they are known for something more negative. In the article, Fast Food Nation, Schlosser informs the audience of McDonald’s use of the tactics of illusion and a sense of care towards their consumers to reel them in. The thing with Schlosser’s claims now is that his article was over ten years ago, which means McDonald’s has made improvements since then, and a reason why I disagree with Schlosser, because his claims of attack against McDonald’s are expired and failed to realized that McDonald’s is successful globally because of their actions of trying to make a positive difference by …show more content…
For a while now, it hasn’t always appeared that McDonald’s has had good motives and intentions when it comes to their consumers. Fujita, a man responsible for bringing McDonald’s to Japan, hyped his countrymen by marketing to them with lies. “‘If we eat McDonald’s hamburgers and potatoes for a thousand years, ‘Fujita once promised his countrymen, ‘we will become taller, our skin will become white, and our hair will be blonde,’” (Schlosser 7). What Fujita has created by false advertising, psychologically, is a Nazi’s ideology of a “racially pure” master race in consumers. Not only did McDonald’s false advertise, but also, unaware of it all, feeding consumers bad health without a care in the world. McDonald’s was put on trial for the claims of the following: “The more innocuous ones (‘a diet high in fat, sugar, animal products, and salt…linked with cancers of the breast and bowel, and heart disease,’)” (Schlosser 20). This what Schlosser tries to get at, McDonald’s trying to stand for something that they are obviously aren’t meeting the expectations of who they claim to be, and benefitting off of their consumers. Unfortunately for Schlosser, this makes his argument weak in 2016. A McDonald’s commercial in UK released this year with a campaign that has changed the healthiness of Happy Meals, by changing the salt content by 47.7 percent since 2003, reduced the saturated fat in cooking oil by 83 percent between 1992 and 2010, evening making improvements to what kids put in their heads by providing books in Happy Meals. The time frame between when Schlosser wrote his book until now, has given McDonald’s more than enough time to make their improvements with better reliable and honest advertisement, and making sure the food improves and meets consumers’
Fast food, while a quick alternative to cooking, has always been known to be less healthy than traditional preparations, but the extent of its health benefits or detriments was not known until a lawsuit came out which inspired documentarian Morgan Spurlock to engage in a 30 day experiment. The resultant documentary specifically targeted McDonald’s, the largest fast food chain in the world, which also happens to be a major recipient of lawsuits linking obesity and their food. Spurlock endeavored to spend a thirty day period eating nothing but food that came from the golden arches, with the rules that he would supersize only when asked, and every time he was asked, and that he would have everything from the menu at least once. In the 2004 film Super Size Me, Morgan Spurlock explores the concept that McDonald’s contributes to the nation’s obesity problem through the utilization of statistics and scientific evidence as a logical appeal, comedy and repulsive qualities as an emotional appeal, and s...
McDonald’s is killing Americans, at least that is what Morgan Spurlock believes. In his documentary Super Size Me he embarks on a quest to not only describe and use himself as an example of the growing obesity trend, but to offer the viewers with base-line nutritional knowledge that will allow them to draw their own informed conclusions. Spurlock's primary intention is to prove through self-experimentation that eating solely McDonald's food is dangerous. His secondary intention is to denounce the rising obesity rate in American by using statistics, his own research, and the opinions of experts. His broader message is for a general audience while he tailors select chapters towards more specific demographics such as parents or McDonald's themselves.
The central argument of fast food nation by Eric Schlosser is that the large restaurant chains and corporations and their demand for unification have given these chains too much power over America’s food supply, economy, and society. Also the way that these corporations operate is now the framework for today’s retail economy. Small businesses are going bankrupt because of the franchising that the large companies are pursuing.
Fast Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser, is a stark and unrelenting look into the fast food industry that has ingrained itself in not only American culture, but in many cultures around the world. There is almost no place on earth that the golden arches has not entered. Aside from Antarctica, there is a McDonalds on every continent, and the number of countries that have fast food restaurants is growing on a daily basis. Schlosser describes in detail what happens behind the scenes, before the hamburger and fries come wrapped in environmentally safe paper and are consumed by millions of people daily.
In Fast Food Nation, Schlosser goes beyond the facts that left many people’s eye wide opened. Throughout the book, Schlosser discusses several different topics including food-borne disease, near global obesity, animal abuse, political corruption, worksite danger. The book explains the origin of the all issues and how they have affected the American society in a certain way. This book started out by introducing the Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station beside the Colorado Springs, one of the fastest growing metropolitan economies in America. This part presents the whole book of facts on fast food industry. It talks about how Americans spend more money on fast food than any other personal consumption. To promote mass production and profits, industries like MacDonald, keep their labor and materials costs low. Average US worker get the lowest income paid by fast food restaurants, and these franchise chains produces about 90% of the nation’s new jobs. In the first chapter, he interviewed Carl N. Karcher, one of the fast food industry’s leade...
He begins his argument by commenting about kids suing McDonald’s for “making them fat” (Zinczenko 462). Zinczenko ponders the absurdity of this claim considering how food choices are based on personal responsibility. However, he then considers the overwhelming availability ratio of fast food to fresh food while sympathizing he was once obese himself (Zinczenko 462). Zinczenko uses the primary argument that fast food companies are deceiving consumers with misleading advertisement, hidden nutrition facts, and calorie risks. He believes companies are encouraging the public to eat their unhealthy foods by omitting alarming information and levying “good” deals. In consequence, fast food companies are increasing the chances of obesity and diabetes in consumers by stimulating poor eating
In the book Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser talks about the working conditions of fast food meat slaughterhouses. In the chapter “The Most Dangerous Job,” one of the workers, who despised his job, gave Schlosser an opportunity to walk through a slaughterhouse. As the author was progressed backwards through the slaughterhouse, he noticed how all the workers were sitting very close to each other with steel protective vests and knives. The workers were mainly young Latina women, who worked swiftly, accurately, while trying not to fall behind. Eric Schlosser explains how working in the slaughterhouses is the most dangerous profession – these poor working conditions and horrible treatment of employees in the plants are beyond comprehension to what we see in modern everyday jobs, a lifestyle most of us take for granted.
Andrew F. Smith once said, “Eating at fast food outlets and other restaurants is simply a manifestation of the commodification of time coupled with the relatively low value many Americans have placed on the food they eat”. In the non-fiction book, “Fast Food Nation” by Eric Schlosser, the author had first-hand experiences on the aspects of fast food and conveyed that it has changed agriculture that we today did not have noticed. We eat fast food everyday and it has become an addiction that regards many non-beneficial factors to our health. Imagine the wealthy plains of grass and a farm that raises barn animals and made contributions to our daily consumptions. Have you ever wonder what the meatpacking companies and slaughterhouses had done to the meat that you eat everyday? Do you really believe that the magnificent aroma of your patties and hamburgers are actually from the burger? Wake up! The natural products that derive from farms are being tampered by the greed of America and their tactics are deceiving our perspectives on today’s agricultural industries. The growth of fast food has changed the face of farming and ranching, slaughterhouses and meatpacking, nutrition and health, and even food tastes gradually as time elapsed.
Fast food restaurants such as Burger King and McDonald’s, create advertisements where it urges people to consume their product. For example Mcdonald’s created a product where you can get two items such as a mcdouble and a medium fries for three dollars. According to “The battle against fast food begins at home”, by Daniel Weintraub, it shows how companies are intriguing their customers. “ The center blames the problem on the increasing consumption of fast food and soft drinks, larger portion sizes in restaurants and the amount of available on school campuses”(1).For the most part, the Center for Public Health believes that fast food companies are the problem for health
When we speak of McDonald’s, we will consider it as cheap food or Junk food. But if we go back to more than ten years ago, everything is different, Including our impression of McDonald. When I was a kid, I thought McDonald was the best restaurant in the world. If my mom tell me that we are going to eat some hamburger, I would be wonder and happy for whole day. Without paying attention what time, the public blamed McDonald and other similar restaurants for their food. They call it junk food. But because of the low price , good taste and better convenience that those restaurant provide, numerous people in US still prefer those food. Hamburger, pizza, bread, salad and other fast food even establish the American diet style. Mark Bittman,whose “Minimalist” column ran in the Dining section of the New York Times for more than 13 years, is a lead writer for the Time Magazine Dining section. In his “Is Junk Food Really Cheaper?” published at September 2011, he clarified a public misconception on Junk Food--Junk Food is cheaper than Real food. By comparing both the total price and the net price after measuring by calorie, he proved that real food is cheaper than Junk Food if you cook at home. He also claimed the food that cooking at home was healthier than Junk Food so he asked for political act to persuade home cooking.
“Out of every $1.50 spent on a large order of fries at fast food restaurant, perhaps 2 cents goes to the farmer that grew the potatoes,” (Schlosser 117). Investigative journalist Eric Schlosser brings to light these realities in his bestselling book, Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. Schlosser, a Princeton and Oxford graduate, is known for his inspective pieces for Atlantic Monthly. While working on article, for Rolling Stone Magazine, about immigrant workers in a strawberry field he acquired his inspiration for the aforementioned book, Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, a work examining the country’s fast food industry (Gale).
McDonalds promotes the construct of “healthiness” as a justification as to why a consumer should purchase their food. This article introduces an interesting viewpoint that despite these claims of “healthiness” or even the inclusion of low calorie options does not ensure that the consumer will not overconsume their food. I will use this source to expand the findings in "Nutritional Quality at Eight U.S. Fast-Food Chains 14-Year Trends” which argues that despite the addition of “healthy” options at fast food restaurants, the overall nutritional quality of the menu remained poor. An analysis of these two sources will be used to help answer my research questions: what consists of healthy food in the McDonalds “Questions” campaign and what are the implications of this definition of healthy food? I will use these sources to support the significance of my claim. Specifically, I will use Downs as evidence for my claim that despite marketing campaigns aimed at redefining McDonald’s as a healthy option, the definition of healthy food that these commercials promote is too limited and ultimately attempts to conform to new definitions of healthy food without actually changing their
First, my personal reaction to this is documentary is an eye opener. I knew McDonalds was more harmful to than other fast food places, but I never knew about the lawsuit between McDonalds and it consumers. I never saw McDonalds as having big impact on my life; this is probably because the McDonald’s in my hometown never had a super-size option. In the video, Spurlock conducted interviews to gain ...
When researching McDonald’s through online sources, it is clear that nutrition is a major concern of the public visiting the fast-food chain. Secondary research conducted shows that there are several case studies and other secondary source searches around the same topic. McDonald’s has often been the center of nutritional attention within the fast-food industry. Secondary research shows that the restaurant has recently made changes to the American Happy Meal to reduce the amount of French fries offered and replace the portion with fruit (Strom, 2011). In a study conducted by McDonald’s a secondary source reports the meal cuts calories by 20% for the children’s meal (Strom, 2011). This is a critical move by the organization on children’s obesity is currently a hot topic within food chains and attention is driven by the Obama administration. Secondary research also shows that although the public has major health concerns with the food chain, profits are increasing during a high point of an economic recession (Dahan & Gittens, 2008). Acco...
McDonald’s has been one of the biggest fast food chain corporations that has worldwide share in the food market. The company’s appeals were fast service, menu varieties, and affordability, which capture majority of customers’ psychological needs. Furthermore, McDonald successfully builds a relationship with consumer by promoting donation campaigns and vitally involving in societal activities. In recent years, McDonald’s sales decline is affected by food scandals causing public mistrust of its food ingredients, which deviates consumers from fast, cheap and convenient food.