Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal by Eric Schlosser - Paperback

I first read this book 20 years ago. Everyone should read it, to know why the whole world is obese and sick and their governments have allowed it to happen. 🤬

Fast Food NationBy Eric SchlosserIt's been selected as one of TIME's 100 Best Nonfiction books. Fast Food Nation is a landmark book right up there in importance with Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. Originally published in 2002 (and reissued in 2012 with a new Afterward), it's equally relevant today. But, if you're a fast food fanatic you might want to pass on reading it for fear of being driven to vegetarianism.Slosser traces the history of fast food, from its beginnings with the car culture in California, to its worldwide spread to the point where 65 million people eat at 28,000 McDonald's restaurants every day.Slosser explores the seamy underside of the fast food business including its impact on the environment, obesity (more than half of all Americans and 25% of American children are obese or overweight) and public health (including the risk of dangerous pathogens being entering the American food chain). He laments the fact that the business is defined by the industrialization of most of its parts.He describes how fast food chains like McDonald's are supplied with "meat" for their quarter pounders and Big Macs. Agri-business conglomerates maintain giant feedlots with thousands of cattle pressed cheek to jowl being force fed hormones and 3,000 pounds of grain to gain 400 pounds in weight and depositing 50 pounds of waste per day - waste which lies unprocessed in giant pits. He traces the food production process through the disgusting, dangerous (to workers) and often unsanitary practices of slaughterhouses and meat packing plants to the delivery of chemically enhanced pink hamburger patties, each of which can contain meat from dozens and even hundreds of different cattle. Because of all this Slosser argues that there is a greater risk than the public realizes of being made sick by a strain of E. coli in a fast-food burger. As he points out, "There's s*** in the meat!"Of greater concern, the food production process suffers from a lack of sensible government regulation.The bottom line according to Slosser is that the low price of a hamburger does not reflect its true cost. Those costs in terms of the environment, worker safety, and public health are simply passed along to the American public.Slosser suggests that, as they enter a fast food restaurant, readers should ignore the colorful backlit images and think about: "where the food came from, how it was made, what is set in motion by every fast food purchase and the ripple effect far and near." Rather than placing your order, he says, you can "turn and walk out the door." Even in fast food, he concludes," you can still have it your way."Barry Francis

The purpose of this book, about the fast food industry, is best summarized by the author within the introduction: "I do not mean to suggest that fast food is solely responsible for every social problem now haunting the United States. In some cases (such as the malling and sprawling of the West) the fast food industry has been a catalyst and a symptom of larger economic trends. In other cases (such as the rise of franchising and the spread of obesity) fast food has played a more central role. By tracing the diverse influences of fast food I hope to shed light not only on the workings of an important industry, but also on a distinctively American way of viewing the world."This book recounts the history behind the uprising of fast food to become a dominant force in our modern society. However, what most of us do not know is : "what lies behind the shiny, happy surface of every fast food transaction". Eric goes on to investigate every aspect of the fast food industry: people, cattle, vegetables, health etc. The storytelling techniques that he uses throughout the book bring this expose to life. The stories are descriptive, personal and touching.A very educative and enlightening read, and a rude (much needed) awakening about the food industry in general and the fast food industry in particular.Below are key excerpts from the book that I found particularly insightful:"The history of the twentieth century was dominated by the struggle against totalitarian systems of state power. The twenty-first will no doubt be marked by a struggle to curtail excessive corporate power. The great challenge now facing countries throughout the world is how to find a proper balance between the efficiency and the amorality of the market.""Today's fast food industry is the culmination of those larger social and economic trends. The low price of a fast food hamburger does not reflect its real cost - and should. the profits of the fast food chains have been made possible by losses imposed on the rest of society. The annual cost of obesity alone is now twice as large as the fast food industry's total revenues.""The right pressure applied to the fast food industry in the right way could produce change faster than any act of Congress. The United Students Against Sweatshops and other activist groups have brought widespread attention to the child labor, low wages, and hazardous working conditions in Asian factories that make sneakers for Nike.""Nobody in the United States is forced to buy fast food. The first steps toward meaningful change is by far the easiest: stop buying it. The executives who run the fast food industry are not bad men. They are businessmen. They will sell free-range, organic, grass-fed hamburgers if you demand it. They will sell whatever sells at a profit. The usefulness of the market, its effectiveness as a tool, cuts both ways.""Whatever replaces the fast food industry should be regional, diverse, authentic, unpredictable, sustainable, profitable - and humble. It should know its limits. People can be fed without being fattened or deceived. This new century may bring an impatience with conformity, a refusal to be kept in the dark, less greed, more compassion, less speed, more common sense, a sense of humor about bran essences and loyalties, a view of food as more than just fuel. Things don't have to be the way they are. Despite all evidence to the contrary, I remain optimistic."

una visione molto interessante del lifestyle americano (i fast food, e il loro impatto sulla catena di produzione, sul mercato del lavoro, sui settori agricoli e allevamento); cenni sulla nascita del fenomento, dai primi carrelli degli hot dog, fino all'estensione del dominio McDonald. in inglese.

ファストフードが、どんな牛肉を使い、その肉を加工する屠殺業の労働環境がいかにひどいものかという負の面も学べる一方で、ファストフードは、野心のある、ハードワーカーの努力によって誕生した事実も学べる良書。ファストフードそのものだけでなく、ファストフードが誕生し広まる事によって、その街の食生活・働き方・街の景観までをも変えていく影響力が描かれており、新たな発見があります。かなり前のベストセラーですが、今読んでも勉強になります。