In Defense of Food by Micheal Pollan , an assigned summer reading book, didn't sit well with me. The book was, well, nauseating, (pardon the pun). In true Southern style, I pride myself on being strongly Conservative. Now, some guy I've never heard of telling me exactly how I should eat my own food sounds absolutely ridiculous to me, and from that point on I started to dislike the book. By the time I was 100 pages in, I was almost seething with rage at this author who, with what I perceived as shocking arrogance, proceeded to shove his beliefs down my throat, and it personally disgusted me. Sure, he made some good points and had some good old-fashioned data, but the way he repeated the results like some loony parrot made me think he was clutching at straws. I would strongly recommend no one reads it of their own free will, its merely a compilation of a couple of studies and one author arrogant to the point of dictating what we eat. Signing off-
Charles
Charles, I found your post very interesting. I wonder what made you think that Pollan was shoving something down your throat or dictating rather than offering advice following an evidence-based argument. I'm also interested in what, specifically, you found offensive to conservative ideology. Was it just the suggestions about healthier ways to approach food, or were you also troubled by Pollan's suggestion that the FDA is not doing the job they could be doing by allowing imitation products to be sold without being labeled as such? Certainly, Pollan's appeal is not uniform across the political spectrum, but I encourage you not to dismiss his ideas based on your perception of his political affiliation. Some more specific evidence would make this post stronger. I am interested to hear your refutation of his argument in class.
ReplyDeleteOn your free post, I'm not quite clear on how the song link connects to the post - you are saying we should read your writing while listening?
Sure, if you care to do so. That was a spurr of the moment thing and I don't even remember putting it in.
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