Bill Maher & Michael Pollen – Food Production
Michael Pollen, the author of “In Defense Of Food”
http://www.michaelpollan.com/
and is also in the documentary movie “Food Inc.” to be released June 12th, 2009
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eKYyD14d_0
speaks with Bill Maher about our food supply.
This segment aired on HBO – May 29th, 2009.
Duration : 0:9:59
If all food is evil …
If all food is evil what the do I eat?
Excellent video my …
Excellent video my friend. Thankyou so much for the share.
Culturally, the …
Culturally, the western world doesn’t eat cat’s and dogs. They are our domesticated companions; a part of the family. We’d only eat them if got really desperate….. stranded on a desert island desperate.
Just an observation.. hear me out. Cultures/regions of the world that TODAY eat cats and dogs…… are
A. DESPERATE
B. HAVE BRUTALITY
The poor, desperate and brutally victimized people of some African and Asian countries couldn’t care less.
If you care about …
If you care about human and nonhuman animals Pollan is not your ally. In this clip he says he’s in favor of consuming chicken and cow’s milk. He conventiently ignores extensive research (google the China Study) linking animal protein to cancer. He conveniently avoids that directly consuming plants is the most ecologically efficient way to get protein. (If he cared about efficiently concentrating protein from a diverse range of crops he would promote Leaf Protein Concentrate production).
Try to eat a plant …
Try to eat a plant based diet, with lots of whole grains, pasta, rice, potatoes… all the veggies and fruit you want… keep it simple and pure… spice it up… enjoy. Your body will thank you.
skeletonmom: I’m …
skeletonmom: I’m not sure what you’re claiming about the ethics of consuming plants, but if you were to argue that one must hold that eating plants is as immoral as eating animals, it would still follow that to kill the least number of plants and animals you should only eat plants (the fewest number of plants are consumed when you eat them directly). ‘Ancestral people’ (ie our ancestors) also engaged in slavery, committed genocide. Consuming animals is no longer required to preserve our lives.
You know Locrian08 …
You know Locrian08 I agree. I love the fact this issue was raised on HBO at least… in fact, you would never see this discussion on mainstream tv… The China Study is life altering… I have T. Colin Campbell interviews on my fav’s log.. I am just trying to get people to stop and think, and even take baby steps to save to planet as well and most important, to make the connection with the sentient beings that have just as might right to this world as we do…..
well, I think what …
well, I think what Slugg’s saying is that everyone has a bone to pick with everything. You suggest pasta, which is a good alternative, but in the recent months, all the scare talk has been about gluten. Somebody else mentioned the growing connection between animal protein and cancer. We all know why we have to avoid high fructose corn syrup.
I would say that everything in moderation is fine. Try your best to get corn syrup out of your diet. (i.e. if you’re making cookies, make them from scratch
eggs, butter, flour …
eggs, butter, flour, etc., rather than buying store-bought crap) Make adjustments to the environment, like eating locally, and as Food, Inc. mentions, don’t eat out-of-season foods.
Then, of course, as an ethical vegetarian I couldn’t not mention giving up all animal meats, or at the bare minimum, buy free range and never from corporate fat-cats, i.e. McDonalds, Tyson, etc.
What? He exposes a …
What? He exposes a corrupt system and you badmouth him? If you want to make a movie about the China Study do it but don’t tear down people who are trying to help. I think this is a very good documentary, I’d love to see something similar on the China study.
I agree with …
I agree with healthy animals make healthy meat & to cut down on the total amount of meat we consume. However, to say that not eating meat is ethical ignores the fact that when you pluck a plant out of the ground to consume it, you are killing this as well. Just because it doesnt bleed or scream doesnt negate its life. I beleive that animals should be ethically raised & slaughtered-just like many ancestral people have done-they also thanked the animal for giving its life to preserve their own.
Listen, Locrian08- …
Listen, Locrian08-please understand: Something has to die for something to live. It applies to everything. Whether it is killed or dies at the end of its life and decomposes for other organisms to feed. There are studies that plants do go thru shock and trauma when plucked from the ground-and I see it every day in my garden when I pick it to eat, or replant it somewhere else on the property. Just because it doesnt scream, doesnt mean it doesnt suffer. Its just not as uncomfortable to do.
Life is messy. …
Life is messy. Some of us do the best we can for the most vocal of the life forms we consume. There will always be some form or harm or suffering. It is the way this world. Even if I was vegan, something suffers to come to my dinner tale. Something suffers to build my home. Something suffers even at the expense of me taking a step upon the earth. Mother nature is beautiful, but also vicious. Have you considered becoming a Breatharian? Just kidding… ;P
animals feel pain, …
animals feel pain, get stressed, develop a social connection to other living creatures. plants, on the other hand, have not yet been proven to do all of the above. a fully vegan diet saves creatures a lot of suffering. killing them (the whole some die some live thing) is the mildest issue, it’s the abuse and painful unhealthy lives they’re forced to experience that’s unnatural & we can avoid. meat is not necessary. fact. we’ve evolved since old times, we ought to do what we now know is best.
Hm. I like Maher …
Hm. I like Maher generally, but until today I had no idea he was a nutter.
stop being lazy and …
stop being lazy and source out organic food. buy direct from farmers. cut out the corporations and go back to the way it used to be. we dont need supermarkets at all. the more everyone supports the organic food industry, the cheaper it wil become and everyone may just get a little healthier.
Pollan is so weak! …
Pollan is so weak! – he’s supposed to be some sort of natural food spokesperson, but he apologizes for all of these unhealthy foods (either for ourselves or the environment or the economy or our consciousness) Maher is listing! Drink green juice, people. Pollan is charming, but there are so many other people that have written about this in so much more depth.
Pigs are filthy …
Pigs are filthy animals — not gonna live in my house– that were discovered to be very tasty thousands of years ago and have stayed on the menu ever since. Dogs and cats have had functionality as domesticated animals throughout human history. Cats have vermin patrol and dogs can be trained to do all sorts of things. Instinctively, without ANY TRAINING dogs = security systems.
Personally I don’t like dogs barking their balls off when a stranger comes close. Dogs are assholes. ha
Another thing. …
Another thing. Mankind has raised cows, chickens, pigs, lambs, etc, for so long BECAUSE we could.
What do I mean?
Those animals listed above are defenseless animals. Mankind couldn’t have gotten to where it is today with out easy meat in our diets.
During long past eras in world history meat was not as easy to come by then today; it was a luxury; still exits in the poorest places. As Americans, meat and food in general are not a luxury anymore; now it’s better cars, homes and toys.
Everything dies in …
Everything dies in order for something to survive. I see this in the animal kingdom, and animals do not take slaves or commit genecide. And, before you say we are not animals, but humans: we are organisms that belong to the ape family (not monkeys), warm blooded mammals with spines.
Listen, I am not saying people shouldnt be vegetarians. We should all recognize that some life (however large or small) will die because we or another species needs to survive.
We as humans can ( …
We as humans can (and in some cases do) give animals more well lived lives and ethical, painless deaths-not what the corporate feedlot allows. May seem strange to read, but after getting to know many individuals of the American Indian cultures, they are deeply spiritual about the animals they take into their bodies as food. They even state it as such-as a union of two individuals.
And not all indigenous cultures were warlike. Some, yes, but history likes to paint them all as savages.
I agree that we are …
I agree that we are animals. We are also moral agents who can reflect on how we believe other animals (human and nonhuman) should be treated. Nonhuman predators don’t have that capacity. Are you really saying that seeing something happen in the animal kingdom constitutes moral justification? Groups of male nurse sharks routinely attack lone female nurse sharks and block escape attempts while one male in the group forcibly copulates with the female. Could this in any way justify rape?
How many painless …
How many painless slaughters have you witnessed? What was the method of slaughter?
You repeatedly make claims that treat plants and animals as if they have the same characteristics, yet your reference to ‘painless death’ acknowledges that you believe other animals are conscious and feel pain. The point is that other animals suffer, have conscious experiences, are capable of being better or worse off experientially. Death deprives them of the possibility of having any future experiences.
As for the painless …
As for the painless death I am referring to read the book by Temple Grandin “Humane Livestock Handling”
she is a high functioning autistic who works for the beef industry who designed one of the most state of the art cow chutes in the US. It seems many US companies understand a stressed cow is a cow whose meat doesnt taste good. Now, I know that is not all of them, and it doesnt apply to chickens and pigs.
When we speak of …
When we speak of the harm that it is for a human to be killed or needlessly caused to suffer, we are referring to the same kinds of harms that apply to other conscious animals. Do you really think the death of a human infant and the death of plant have any moral similarities?
In 1st world countries, eating other animals is a choice, not a necessity. Feeling a union with what you kill (perhaps serial killers feel the same way) has no bearing on the justifiability of eating animals.