http://www.vox.com/2014/10/17/6988377/threats-to-americans-ranked-ebola-isis-russia-furniture
This may not seem like a food related article at first, but I would like you to take a gander at what this article says is the fourth biggest (actual) threat to Americans and the number one biggest (actual) tied threats to Americans. Determined by actual statistical and academic analysis, not media hype, these three threats are respectively, climate change (fourth), heart disease, and cancer (tied for first). Notice that these three threats are all connected very deeply to the problems with our food system. Many of the issues we discuss in class contribute to the deteriorating health of Americans which can explain that heart disease and cancer are the number one and two killers of Americans. Food marketing, diet confusion, inability to access healthful foods, and poor working conditions in farms and production centers all are factors that play into the extreme rates of obesity and cancer that we see in the US. Heart disease and cancer are responsible for over half of all American deaths and definitely have far more of a chance of affecting you than does ISIS or Ebola.
Many of the issues we discuss also cause immense greenhouse gas emissions, deplete the water supply, contribute to deforestation and ecosystem loss. All of these problems that our broken food system has played a part in creating have helped to make climate change the fourth most real threat to Americans. In the words of the article, climate change is a “potentially dire” situation and “if you care about the world your kids and grandkids will grow up in, [you should be] pretty freaked out”.
So this raises an obvious question: Why is Ebola plastered all over the news while threats related to our broken food system are exceptionally more legitimate?
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Shawn brings up a very interesting point in this post. Ebola has caused such a news scare (as have other diseases in recent years), however, typically the chances of such a disease affecting you are very, very, VERY slim. That being said, problems that exist in our world that affect NUMEROUS people such as climate change, heart disease, and cancer receive very little news attention. There are a number of reasons this may be true.
1.) People are too naive to see that cancer, climate change, and heart disease are all issues that can easily be prevented through a proper diet. While American people are starting to identify the correlation between diet and heart disease, I feel as though many people do not realize that the foods we eat (processed, GMO, etc…) are contributing to the increase in cancer cases nationally. In addition to this lack of a connection between cancer and food, there is also a large number of people who do not see food being related to climate change. Livestock production, large-scale farming, pesticide/herbicide usage, and gas-powered farm equipment are not typically what comes to mind when the average American thinks of “climate change”.
2.) These three “scares” that were mentioned about have become such a “norm” in American society that unless a large, shocking discovery is made, news companies have no reason to do reports on them. Cancer today is no different than cancer yesterday, or the day before. Unfortunately, it seems as though the American population has grown to accept the horrors of cancer, heart disease and climate change.
All of these scares can be fixed–it is the lack of education and public knowledge that is keeping the American public so distant from these solvable issues!