Focus: food

A few gems recently arrived in my mailbox.


Never mind the sawdust – as I said; we’re renovating…

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: a year of food life by Barbara Kingsolver. I first heard about Barbara Kingsolver through Therese’s blog earth and living. After checking Kingsolver ( I actually thought her name was KingsLOVER up until now… Wouldn’t that be more fun?) out on Amazon I just knew I had to read her books. And this one will be the first. I’ve just skimmed through the index and read a few sentences here and there… Have to finish the one (ehm …three…) books I’m already reading first. Oh my, I cannot wait to sink my teeth into this book… It’s mainly about when her family moved to a farm and decided to become locavores; eating only locally grown food and growing as much of it themselves as possible. The book even has recipes and facts about different issues regarding food and food production, although it is essentially the story of her family’s journey and thoughts. I even love the book itself; the paper was nice, the cover was beautiful and textured, it was perfectly bendy, the whole feel of the book, the paper, the print – it’s just perfect. Yes, I kind of have a book fetish.

The other book is Seed to Seed: seed saving and growing techniques for vegetable gardeners by Suzanne Ashworth. It’s a very straightforward and good book about saving seeds. Good winter reading, because next spring will be my first attempt to grow a larger amount of vegetables. And seed saving is so important, so fragile, so magical and for most of us: a lost art. Something that everyone had to know and learn in order to survive just a few hundred years (or maybe even decades) ago; - today it is a professionalized and institutionalized craft that just a few people know much about.

And the dvd is The Future of Food by Deborah Koons. The first time I saw this film was at a permaculture course in England in 2006. The film “offers an in-depth investigation into the disturbing truth behind the unlabeled, patented, genetically engineered foods that have quietly filled U.S. grocery store shelves for the past decade.” And it seems that it’s maybe just a matter of time before these foods will quietly fill our shelves as well. Theoretically there are almost no GMO foods in Norwegian grocery stores. Rules are strict, and the chains generally don’t want to sell it and customers don’t want to buy it. Thank God(ess). But still; almost half the food samples being analyzed by the veterinary institute has GMO. And now our politicians wonder about allowing two types of GMO corn (link in Norwegian) after recommendations from scientists… This film is full of facts and numbers, and might feel a bit heavy from time to time, but it really is a mindblowing, shocking and eyeopening ride.

The 11th Hour

I bought this documentary recently. “The 11th hour” – produced and narrated by Hollywood wonderboy Leonardo DeCaprio. It’s ok. It’s good. Some might even say it’s great. I don’t know. I’ve seen a few of these documentaries over the past few years. It’s definitely been a trend for quite a while now to make films about the environment and how we are all going to hell. Mother Earth is swallowing us, punishing us for our sins. This very well might be true of course. If it’s not a punishment, it’s definitely a natural consequence for our actions over the past decades.

Along with “The 11th hour”, I also have the movie “The Inconvenient Truth” and the mini series “The Planet” in my collection. They’re all pondering the same theme, but in different ways. And I guess these movies speak to different people. “The Inconvenient Truth” is a good source of cold, hard facts. This is how it is. Deal with it. “The Planet” is my absolute favourite. Visually stunning and it really shows how good documentaries are an artform. You should check it out.

These three movies have something in common. They focus (mostly) on the bad stuff. They focus on pollution, soil erosion, species going extinct, greenhouse gases, vast landfills, peak oil, contaminated waters, melting glaciers, toxins in food and everything else that tells us we’re going downhill. Fast. And these are the stories we have been fed for a while now. The media are full of it. Most people with access to any kind of media gets these kinds of messages every day. Most people know these stories. Most people know the facts (or at least enough to make a decision or make up their mind about it). I don’t think that is the main problem anymore.

People know what’s happening. And they know why. I think the main problem is that many don’t know what to do about it. Of course – some couldn’t care less no matter how much they learn. Some just don’t care. But the problem with these movies and with media in general, is the massive single focus on the bad stuff. We’ve been bad and now we have to face the consequences. Experts, researchers, governments, activists and organisations are smacking our hands; putting us in the naughty corner.

Smacking hands, spanking or putting kids in the naughty corner doesn’t work. It does not change behaviour or attitudes. It does not make them learn anything of value to use further in life. It. Does. Not. Make. A. Difference. At all. Making us feel guilty, ashamed, frightened and bedazzled by shitloads of scary photos, facts and numbers does nothing but that. Make us feel guilty and scared and small and unable to take action and change. Consequence is good, but punishment and fear is not.

All of these movies play on strong emotions. As all good movies and art do. And strong emotions can lead to changes and actions. That is great. But it can also make you feel like a spectator; passive. Like there is nothing you can do about it. And that is my point.

Many people really don’t know what to do, or they believe that whatever they do doesn’t make a difference. Because we get bombarded with the “you’ve been naughty” message, and no one sits down and talk with (not to) us about it, or tells us how to make a change for the better and do something. We remain spectators. And strong forces work every day to keep us in this state.

These have become big shot mainstream movies. They mostly follow standard dramatization and cause-effect narratives as foundations. And what unfolds on screen is unquestionably one of the greatest dramas possible. Superior to any Hollywood produced sfx loaded blockbuster action movie.

But still. I wish that the focus had shifted a little. That movies and media in general would focus on what to do. How to do it. In “The 11th Hour” this is mostly left out of the movie. Some of it has made its way to the extra material on the DVD. Probably because the drama is what sells. The how-to-solve-it doesn’t.

Solutions are out there. They are manageable and ready to use for anyone. You just have to dig a little deeper, see through the “end of times” scenarios and take action. The solutions don’t make money for big production companies and newspapers and they don’t make us consume more. Maybe that’s the “problem”.