Friday, January 9, 2015

Did you even know the term "food justice" existed?

Yet another innocuous word in our language gets "justice" tacked onto it and takes on  an entirely different significance.

And then Mrs. Food Desert brings on board to the failed attempt to revolutionize school lunches the champion of this new concept:

First Lady Michelle Obama named the new Executive Director of Let’s Move on Thursday, Debra Eschmeyer, a self-described “food justice” activist who believes that all aspects of food production and consumption should be “shared fairly.”
Eschmeyer, who grew up on a dairy farm in Ohio and is now an organic vegetable farmer, previously campaigned for “school lunch reform” and has been involved in anti-obesity and school gardening initiatives.
Eschmeyer was asked in an interview in May 2011 what her definition of “food justice” is.
“I was an editor of ‘Food Justice’ (the new book by Robert Gottlieb and Anupama Joshi) so I spent several years thinking about the definition,” she said. “Food justice seeks to ensure that the benefits and risks of where, what, and how food is grown, produced, transported, distributed, accessed, and eaten are shared fairly.”
“It represents a transformation of the current food system, including but not limited to eliminating disparities and inequities,” Eschmeyer added.
Food Justice, published by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), argues that the food system needs to be “transformed” because of too many fast food restaurants and “food deserts.”
“In today’s food system, farm workers face difficult and hazardous conditions, low-income neighborhoods lack supermarkets but abound in fast-food restaurants and liquor stores, food products emphasize convenience rather than wholesomeness, and the international reach of American fast-food franchises has been a major contributor to an epidemic of ‘globesity,’” a description of the book states. “To combat these inequities and excesses, a movement for food justice has emerged in recent years seeking to transform the food system from seed to table.”
How much more immediate can the threat to our liberty get than our mouths?


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