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Title: Fast Food Nation : The Dark Side of the All-American Meal by ERIC SCHLOSSER, RICK ADAMSON ISBN: 0-7393-1250-2 Publisher: Random House Audio Pub. Date: 04 May, 2004 Format: Audio CD Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $34.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.32 (1014 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Young Adolescents + Fast Food = Obesity
Comment: As the co-author of three books for parents of young adolescents (Roller-Coaster Years, Parenting 911, and Cliques), I have long been concerned with the youthful addiction to fast food. Parents frequently come to post on our message boards at Parent Soup to complain about their children's eating habits. How did our children become such bad eaters? As Schlosser points out in his well-written book, children's tastebuds quickly become accustomed to the high-fat, salty taste of chicken nuggets and Big Macs. If a child doesn't develop a palate for good food at a young age, he never will. Parents unwittingly play into this scheme. Fast food is cheap, quick, tasty (thanks to the flavor industry), filling, and an easy answer to "What's for dinner?" With more dual-working couples, endless after school activities, and limited budgets, grabbing take-out has, for many families, become a way of life. Unfortunately, families sacrifice good nutrition, as well as the traditional evening meal. How can we be surprised that diseases of the old---obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure---now plague our young people? Schlosser's book is a must read for any parent who is concerned about her child's eating habits. After digesting the book's content, a parent may think twice about heading for the drive-through.
Rating: 5
Summary: Comprehensive, profound, discouraging and troubling
Comment: The excerpt from this book on food additives which appeared in "The Atlantic" was by itself an incentive to read this book. However, it is far more comprehensive and fascinating. I was "pleased" to find this a thorough, scholarly, and also quite interesting overview of the history and impact of fast food upon American society.
I found myself continually reminded of Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle", Ruth Ozeki's "My Year of Meats" and, more pleasantly, David Halberstam's "The Fifties". Schlosser provides a fascinating history of the fast food industry and food notes to relevant agricultural and related labor history and legislation. The irony of the later, however, is overpowering.
Clearly the issues of food safety are the most terrifying aspect of this book. I was left chilled by how particularly critical it is to protect my children from consuming fast food. However, one is left with an incredible sense of outrage, and impotence, about the recidivism of American corporate practices in terms of minimal fair labor practices and its lack of fundamental social conscience regarding consumer safety. It is too reminiscent of Sinclair's seminal work and ironically the impact of Schlosser will probably be the same -- to raise concern about food quality alone rather than the egregious exploitation of those in fast food production and service. It leaves you increasingly cynical about the corporate lack of business ethics, and failure of politicians to act as guardians of the common good.
This book will terrify, enrage, and depress you. It is not sensational; the validity of the basic facts is inescapable. The author has performed a great service to society -- regrettably, it seems unlikely to result in any call to action.
Rating: 5
Summary: Appalling. Read it and weep.
Comment: Since many other reviewers cover the more repulsive details of Schlosser's book, I will stick to pointing out something I think deserves even more attention: one of the themes of the book is that the fast food industry has its tentacles in EVERY aspect of Americans' lives. Changing this goes far, far beyond bypassing a Big Mac...boycotting fast food is not the same thing as boycotting the fast food industry, when industry practices have made the USDA powerless against meatpackers, advertisers target children as consumers, and schools are taking money for corporate sponsorship.
This a fantastic book and it touches on a lot of areas that I don't normally think of relating to fast food, such as the plight of abused migrant workers in the slaughterhouses and the economics of teen labor. Everybody should read it, even if you never eat fast food, because you're affected too.
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Title: Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market by Eric Schlosser ISBN: 0618334661 Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Company Pub. Date: 01 May, 2003 List Price(USD): $23.00 |
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Title: Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich ISBN: 0805063897 Publisher: Owl Books Pub. Date: 01 May, 2002 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic by John De Graaf, David Wann, Thomas H. Naylor, David Horsey, Scott Simon ISBN: 1576751996 Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers Pub. Date: 01 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health (California Studies in Food and Culture) by Marion Nestle ISBN: 0520240677 Publisher: University of California Press Pub. Date: 01 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: Dude, Where's My Country? by Michael Moore ISBN: 0446532231 Publisher: Warner Books Pub. Date: 07 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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