Nutrition and health have become more popular in today 's society. Our generation is becoming more and more indebted to the idea of being healthy and eating nutritious meals. However, in “The American Paradox,” by Michael Pollan he argues that our unhealthy population is preoccupied with nutrition and the idea of eating healthy than their actual health. He also mentions the food industry, nutrition science and how culture affects the way we eat and make food choices. While Pollan is right about all these factor that affect our eating habits, there is more to it than that. Convenience, affordability and social influence also affects our food choices making them inadequate. Now days is very easy to have any meal without no effort or time requirement. …show more content…
According to Pollan the question “what to eat” is complicated but “to guide us we have culture” (The American Paradox). Culture influences food likes and dislikes. Culture creates food preferences which make patterns of food choices, making everyone 's selection different. Whoever the influence of our culture has been changing throughout the years, with the food industry taking over the markets. Now we do not necessarily eat what our grandparents or even what our parents used to eat, instead we have this new massive produced packaged products. This is the reason why Americans food habits are changing, now more than ver we see people consuming products not because hey are part of their culture but because is what the media tells you to consume. The 21st century has a new obsession which is body image, now more than ever people is caring about the way they look due to all the advertisement about having a perfect body. Now America is obsess with making every product beneficial to your body but how many chemicals do they use to make that diet yogurt so it can be fat free, sugar free and still have some natural ingredients in it. This is the exact point pollan is trying to make in his article we are obsess with being healthy that we forget to check what are we really eating and where ir comes
There are many different beliefs about the proper way to eat healthy. People are often mislead and live unhealthy lifestyles as a result. Both Mary Maxfield and Michael Pollan explain their own beliefs on what a healthy diet is and how to live a healthy lifestyle. In the essay, “Escape from the Western diet” Michael Pollan writes about the flaws of the western diet and how we can correct these problems to become healthier. In the essay, “Food as Thought: Resisting the Moralization of Eating”, Mary Maxfield criticizes Michael Pollan’s essay about eating healthy, and explains her own theory on how to be healthy. She believes that Pollan is contradicting himself and that what he is stating is false. Mary Maxfield ponders the
Michael pollan is an American journalist, author and activist, and he is currently working as a professor of Journalism at the UC Berkeley Graduate school of Journalism. He completed his B.A. in English from Bennington in 1977 and an M.A. in English from Colombia in 1981. Michael pollen is author of many food and eating related books For Example, The omnivore’s dilemma, A natural history of four meals, Food rules, In defense of food and many others. In 2010, Michael pollan was named one of the top magazines top 100 most influential people. As we know obesity is common in Unites States and its rate is increasing day by day, this is the reason pollan made this argument to make people aware regarding this issue that what are the causes of obesity and many other
When it comes to the topic of nutrition and eating habits, most of us will readily agree with Pollan in the instance that we as Americans are perhaps the worst offenders. To be honest, it’s quite hard to disagree with him here. Whether stereotypical or not, staples of the Western diet emit a worldwide assumption that we are a burger-eating, soda-drinking, donut-devouring nation; all unhealthy foods might I add. Is this the case for everyone? Of course not, but that’s one of the ways citizens of the United States are negatively perceived.
Richard Balko and Mary Maxfield discuss personal responsibility, and choices in one’s health in their essays “What You Eat Is Your Business,” and “Food as Thought: Resisting the Moralization of Eating” respectively. Balko feels the government should not intervene in people’s food intake because it is an individual preference. Instead, Balko asserts that the government should foster a program to assist the American people to take on personal responsibility and ownership of their own health. Similarly, Maxfield paints the same picture that our culture now finds it immoral to eat what our body needs, therefore believing in the idea of eating less is healthier. Maxfield points out the multi-billion dollar campaign of corporations into advertising false hope into consumers by buying into eradication of fatness. Why has food have suddenly become a risky subject at the dinner table? And who is to blame? Is it everyone else or do we blame ourselves?
Americans are viewed by Pollan as “a notably unhealthy people obsessed by the idea of eating healthy”(Our National Eating Disorder). An example of this obsession is the current epidemic of carbophobia.
In the article “Unhappy Meals,” Michael Pollan gives an ordinary person an overview of what food really is. Pollan starts out by saying, “If you’re concerned about your health, you should probably avoid food products that make health claims.” I feel like Americans today go out of their way to find foods that make health claims, because they truly believe what the food distributors are marketing. So many people trust everything that health food distributors say and don’t take time to actually read the labels and understand nutritional facts. Pollan, throughout the whole article, points out that almost everything we eat is nutrient enhanced food. He said that he believes that the food people are eating now days are worse for you than past generations.
From the doctor’s office visit, the doctor will prescribe them medication for their health become more stable, resulting in the Pharmacies making more money. In the end, Pollan finally ends with the assumption that the reason why so many turn to the western diet is because it is fast, cheap, and easy to get, he even goes on to include that we as American’s spend a little less than 10 percent of our total income on buying food and a little over an hour enjoying them. Pollan also goes on to add to suggest that it would benefit us to go backward in gathering and preparing food to help us live healthy lives. Essentially, by focusing on the western diet and how these people are more likely to accumulate diseases, Pollan’s theory of people who consume the western diet are more likely to accumulate chronic diseases than those who don’t consume it is extremely useful because it sheds light on the difficult problem of the more healthier foods being more expensive. With that being said, many actually choose this diet because as Pollan states, it is a lot faster, cheaper, and easier to afford and get rather than a salad which several dollars more, or a home cooked meal, which takes more time to prepare. In many cases this is the
Michael Pollan discusses two categories of food: one is real food (the kind our great-grandmother would recognize), while the other is “edible food-like substances”. The category that needs defending according to Pollan is the real food. This category of food is minimally processed, fresh (will eventually rot), and includes mostly things that are taken straight from the source (the ground, tree, etc.). When one walks into a store, they should look for and pick the foods that are more “quiet”such as fresh produce than the ones that have more labels that say they are more healthy, or better for you.
The Western Diet is basically processed food, which is foods that are full with hormones, refined grains, sweet food, and food that is high in saturated fats. This food method that America is following is the reason for the increased rate of obesity in the country and many chronic diseases, due to why many Americans are suffering from. Pollan wants Americans to take control and set goals for themselves and their health. As he states, “A hallmark of the Western diet is food that is fast, cheap, and easy.”(424) This is the reason why people tend to buy it this food. Pollan is right about how the Western diet is affecting the people’s health negatively because of recent studies have shown that most of the food that people consume are processed foods, which gone through a process letting most of its nutritional values. Also, the food is full of unhealthy nutrients that are added to it during the process. An individual cannot have assurance of what he/she is consuming from a fast food place or a cheap prepared meal from grocery store. Western diet needs to be taken away from American’s life. He states “Not Too Much”(pp.426) will be the focus from the foods themselves to the question of how to eat, the manners, mores, and the habits that go with creating a healthy diet, and pleasing culture of eating. This way it will allow Americans to live their life healthier and
In the Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan talks about 4 different models that we consume, purchase, and add it to our daily lives. Michael Pollan travels to different locations around the United States, where he mentions his models which are fast food, industrial organic, beyond organic, and hunting. I believe that the 3 important models that we need to feed the population are fast food, industrial organic, and beyond organic. Fast food is one of the most important models in this society because people nowadays, eat fast food everyday and it is hurting us in the long run. We need to stick to beyond organic or industrial organic food because it is good for our well being. Ever since the government and corporations took over on what we eat, we have lost our culture. In the introduction of the Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan states that we have lost our culture:
Michael Pollan states in his article “Escape from the Western diet”, three simple rules to follow to obtain a healthy lifestyle, “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants” (426). The food industry and medical community manipulate us to believe we are escaping the Western diet but to only find out that we are right back to where we started. Pollan provides some easy rules of thumb so that we aren’t caught up in the latest trends or diets but instead develop some eating boundaries that seem simple to follow on an everyday basis. Personally for me, following these rules can seem hard in some aspects but also easy in others because factors like role models when I was a kid, living situation and cooking skills effect my ability to follow the three
The only problem with Michael Pollan’s outlook on nutritionism is the fact that he is completely against scientific research on the subject because history in this matter has not been reliable. With any good, there is also bad that follows. This relates to scientific research on nutrients which have provided many useful things to society, yet brought some evils such as processed foods which have plagued the American Diet for many years. Amongst all the countries in the world the United States of America has a population in which two-thirds of their people are obese. When it comes to processed foods, people should take this chemically engineered food with a grain of salt, take a more traditional approach and use current knowledge to promote a healthy
There is no surprise that food is important in all aspects of our lives—it is shared amongst families, celebrated as a major part of our culture, and crucial to our daily routine that keeps us fit, healthy, and active. Today’s western culture glorifies a skewed perspective on how food is supposed to fit into our lives. Somehow this perception has led us to believe we no longer have the time or money it takes to prepare a wholesome, healthy meal that is shared at the dinner table with family. Instead, we are trained to want a meal that is fast, cheap, and easy. This meal is usually highly processed and filled with sugars and fats. This has led us to a problem of epidemic proportions characterized by the rapid increase in obesity and diabetes.
Many people in America, from toddlers to the elderly, have shown numerous signs of bad health. People have the desire to keep on eating due to more, new things being merchandised as “new and improved items” from the producers. For example, nowadays, people are eating pure junk that they find satisfying on the grocery food shelf. As, stated by Michael Pollan, in his article, “Eat Food: Food Defined” he affirmed that “real food is the type of things that our
The United States is one of the most obese countries in the world. This shows us that many people look towards food to fill voids, to de-stress themselves, for convenience, and for various other reasons. This also shows that countless Americans do not try to stop their bad habits until it is too late. This highlights that many of them have the mentality of “it won’t happen to me”. When they do develop a disease, or become obese they wish they would’ve done something about it. This also brings up the issue of many generations acting and thinking this way due to their parents’ lack of knowledge and understanding. This causes their children to grow up thinking and acting the same way towards food and potentially walking the same path as their parents did with food. Obesity has become a growing infection plaguing the world and its children. A simple forty-five-minute exercise everyday can reduce the risk of heart disease, a disease in which I struggle with daily and has become a never ending battle. If American’s would make eating properly and exercising regularly a priority, their lives would be