Letters to the Editor
Xanthro
Published Letters: 522 Editor's Choice: 47
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Urban vs Rural Poor
[Read the article: The anxiety of appetite]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"This week, the grocery stores in my community have: red or green seedless grapes for .99 per pound; two 16-oz bags of spinach for $3.00; granny smith apples 3-pound bag for $2.50; broccoli for .99; one head of cauliflower for $1.50; a 5-pound bag of carrots for $2.00; and one of my favorite veggies that I can get any day of the week, a two-pound bag of washed and stemmed kale, mustard, or collard greens for the everyday low price of $2.00."
First, those are rather expensive items for a poor family, and they require grocery stores to be available, and they aren't always to a poor urban family.
There is a huge difference between being raised poor and rural and poor and urban. The former, at least in my generation, knew how to grow food and you could always have at least a small garden. That's not true of much of the urban poor.
As to eating rice and beans, both are tasty and very cheap, but you need to rember that many people who are poor have never cooked either.
Those poor Mexican immigrants who chose fresh produce do so because they know how to cook and it meets their dietary tastes. Plenty of people in the US have no idea how to make a good tasting meal out of rice and beans.
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Food Choices
[Read the article: The anxiety of appetite]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"I do a lot of my shopping at Magruder's and Shoppers Food Warehouse, places that my chichi friends wouldn't be caught dead in. Sorry, I see lots of poor people buying junk: chips, candy, dreadful fatty stuff and these things are not cheap!! Don't tell me that you have $2 for a bag of chips but not $2 for two pounds of grapes."
A bag of chips never goes bad before it's eaten, grapes do. Plus, you like grapes, plenty of people do not.
I like the taste of squirrel, which is nothing but a furry rat with a long tail, I can hardly expect people to eat squirrel simply because I find it delicious.
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"You have $6 for a gallon of premium ice cream, but not $6 for two 3-pound bags of apples. Please. I understand that these people are not stupid; they simply do not know how to handle raw food. They can learn."
Why chose to spend your $6 on apples? The ice cream provides more calories and is more filling and is easier to serve, and assuming you can store it, lasts longer.
You feel apples are a better choice because of your dietary background and current cultural status.
Plus, stupid people are still people. It's naive to think stupid people don't exist. By definition half the population is below average intelligence. This does not mean they are lesser people, but it does mean that certain concepts take longer to understand.
You being raised in a rural area greatly determines your outlook on food. It's wholly different for someone raised in an urban area.
I had someone at work, who is bright, ask me if milk came for boy cows or girl cows, and if the milk was cold.
Yes, it's true many people have no idea where food comes from or how to actually cook it.
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"And that's my point: Americans of all income ranges no longer know how to take raw or simply processed foods such as dried or canned beans and combine them with lean chicken and fresh veggies and make something wonderful."
How exactly do you expect to retify this situation? Nobody is denying the position, but simple acknowledgement does not provide a solution, or even address the issue as to whether something should be done.
We are not the appointed guardians of our neighbors nor do have authority to oversee their dietary intact.
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"Yes, the urban poor have a unique problem, but don't look now, most Americans are not the urban poor. Middle class communities have options. What is their excuse?"
That's actually what the author is talking about, this food snobbery and whollier than thou attitude. Why do they need to have an excuse? They've done nothing wrong.
Someone eating differently than you do does not equal sin.
I don't care what other people eat, it's none of my business.
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"Please, let's not act as though nothing can be done. Each of us can eat a healthier tastier diet, no matter our income."
Why should we?
Sure, vast segements of the US over eat, so what.
If you want to talk about ending government support for food subsidies, I'm willing to listen, but it is not our job to tell individuals what to eat.
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Hitler was a vegetarian in the latter part of his life
[Read the article: Herbivore vs. carnivore]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Hitler wasn't a vegetarian.
It's an urban legend that he was a vegetarian. While I appreciate your attention to vegetarianism, couldn't you please have checked your sources before making such a statement?
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The fact checking needs to be done by you, and others claming that Hitler was not a vegetarian. He simply in fact was, and it's not even a debated point.
We have many records attesting to his rather silly nature of trying to force his brand of vegetaranism on his inner circle, we even have records of conflict between his chefs and others about how to cook food.
While Hitler wasn't a vegetarian for the majority of his life, that's because he became a vegetarian after his niece died in the early 30s. Hence, for the period of time that he is most know, except for win he wrote Mein Kampf, he was a vegetarian.
This has nothing to do with the morality of vegetarianism.
And yes, I'm aware of Mr. Blue and his wholly unfounded arguements. They have no basis in fact.