Friend or Foe?

Did you know that four multi-national corporations hold more than 80% of the meat market in the United States? I found this out watching the academy award nominee, Food Inc., which is a food documentary that brings incite to what goes on in the factories these corporations own and operate.

Walking into a grocery store, there seems to be all different kinds of variety, but in actuality, these four companies own the majority of what you’re seeing. This wouldn’t necessarily be a horrible thing, if these companies operated humanly- but they don’t.

Most people know that meat is produced in a factory environment, but what a lot of people don’t know is the conditions. People want food, faster, cheaper, and more of it. Because of this, cows are fed corn in these factories because it’s cheap. According to Food Inc, it is so cheap the United States put 1,000,000 Mexican workers in Mexico out of work because people, like I said, like things cheap. Corn might not seem like a bad thing to feed cows, but cows were not made to eat corn- they were made to eat grass. According to Food Inc. feeding them corn is what caused E. coli to show up in cows. Because cows in these factories mostly stand in manure up to their ankles, if one cow gets it, the others do as well.

Chickens that are owned by these multi-national corporations have it just as bad. Chickens are kept in the dark all day, with barely any room to walk around because there are so many of them. Which doesn’t even matter because they feed them so many hormones to –guess what? Grow them, faster, cheaper and bigger- that they can’t walk for than a couple of steps because they can’t keep up with the rapid growth.

Besides being terribly inhuman to the animals slaughtered in these factories, the multi-national corporations have very low accountability according to Food Inc. These corporations found the 1,000,000 Mexican workers out of work as an opportunity to get cheap labor. The corporations advertised in Mexico and hired illegal immigrants to work in the factories. When the government cracked down on illegal immigration, the workers were arrested, while the CEO’s got a slap of the wrist. The workers, who were brought over here by the companies, were arrested for trying to take care of their families.

I’m not trying to convert anyone to vegan, or vegetarian. If people want to eat meat, then they should. There are some good, honest organic farmers that farm and produce meat the way they should. Cows and chickens get to eat grass; they are both raised with respect and value and don’t have any hormones put in them. We get three votes a day, choosing to support a company that does good, even if it costs a little more, is worth it to me. The only reason the multi-national corporations are doing this is because of demand. With the recent green movement, it’s been changing, but it can change even more if people just become aware.