Beef ... it's what's for dinner.

More thoughts on "Fast Food Nation".

I went into the book expecting it to be a kind of vegetarian propaganda -- an update of Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" outlining everything wrong with the business of producing and consuming meat. Well, it's not actually that. Yes, it does spend some time discussing some pretty messed up stuff with beef processing, but not with the actual raising of the cattle or the concept of eating meat. Basically, the author's beef (tee hee) with "Big Beef" is focused mainly on their lack of concern for the public's health -- they have adamantly opposed any effort to make their product safer, including opposing OSHA regulations and federal mandates to monitor beef for the E Coli bacteria. Plus, they pay their workers shit wages, falsify injury records, and fire people if they get injured on the job (which is fairly common in a slaughterhouse, what with the sharp knives and all). The descriptions of the slaughterhouses and processing plants make you think, "Shit, I'm glad I don't work there" rather than, "I'm never eating a hamburger again". Oh, and you'll probably think twice before eating a hamburger rare (or even medium-rare).

Beyond that, though, the author doesn't really have a problem with people eating beef. In fact, in the epilogue, he praises "In-N-Out Burger", a fast-food chain in California, as a prime example of how fast-food should be -- clean, more-or-less natural and tasty, and independent. His biggest complaints are more about how America has lost touch with its rugged individualistic past and how McDonald's is taking over the world. There's a very interesting (and kind of funny) part in which McDonald's sued a Greenpeace group in London for libel (which is much easier to do in England, since their libel/slander laws place much of the burden on the defendent). Seems they were distributing pamphlets that asserted that McDonald's was doing everything from destroying the rainforest to exploiting children to causing heart disease. Most of the Greenpeace'ers just apologized and moved on. Two decided to fight, compiling thousands of pages of documentation proving their claims. As of the writing of the book, the fight was still going on in some European high court. It's been going on 12+ years. Not bad for a couple of hippies who taught themselves how to be lawyers.

In short, Fast Food Nation reads more like "Bowling for Columbine" than something PETA would distribute. It's an interesting read and seems highly researched, but I find it a bit overly sentimental at times.

This is Oprah Winfrey, signing off.