Fast Food Nation

When I saw Super Size Me, a documentary about the terrible things McDonald's food does to your body, it only made me crave some McDonald's fries. When I got this book for Christmas, I was hoping for a different result. Mind you, I don't actively want to be turned off from fast food or anything, but more knowledge about "the dark side of the All-American meal" (the book's subtitle) could never be a bad thing. But instead of giving me anecdote after anecdote about why fast food was unhealthy for me, the book primarily focused on anecdote after anecdote about why fast food corporations were ruining America. I can't say it left me disappointed - I learned a lot of things, many disturbing, that will surely affect the way I perceive fast food companies in the future. But all in all, it lacked the decisive stomach punch I wanted. Instead, it hit my heart. Page after page talked about the tragic and preventable deaths of slaughterhouse workers. One particular man was severely injured as many as a dozen times. This guy was hit by a train on the job, chemically burned on the job, physically beaten and bruised by flying cattle parts several times, and stabbed a time or two on the job. And after sixteen years of working for the same slaughterhouse where all of this happened, he was ultimately fired and given no pension or severance pay. Heartstrings were also pulled when I read about various E. coli outbreaks that took the lives of young children while corporate fat cats adamantly refused that their unsanitary meats were doing any harm to anyone. The thing is, the vast brunt of my anger fell on the slaughterhouses themselves - independently owned companies not directly affiliated with fast food restaurants - responsible for sending the tainted meat not just to fast food restaurants but also to elementary school cafeterias. After all, there's always an underlying feeling of "well, what did you expect?" toward someone who gets food poisoning from a McDonalds, but taxpayer-purchased hamburgers served in public schools are another story entirely. The book felt in many ways like an updated and revised version of Upton Sinclair's 1906 classic, The Jungle. Unfortunately, it too almost already feels a bit dated. Since the book was first published in 2001, it has an obligatory mad cow disease chapter. Also, the book focuses primarily on the fast food landscape of the 1990s. I'm not naive enough to think fast food has gotten any healthier since then or optimistic enough to think the lives of slaughterhouse workers has improved at all, but the 2000s were certainly not kind to fast food at all. A real health craze took root and by now Americans in general seem much more skeptical and cautious around fast food and red meat in general. Perhaps this book itself was part of the recent shift in the public's attitude about fast food, but reading it now I just didn't feel like it was nearly as eye-opening or astounding as I'm sure it was in 2001. Another beef I had with Schlosser was his inability to remain politically neutral or unbiased. I understand the need to point out that congress has blocked or allowed various legislation to more strictly police slaughterhouses and restaurants, but several times he attacked the Republican party in general, instead of pinpointing specific congressmen, for backing the cattle tycoons of the country. It's his book, and he can say what he wants to say, but as the anti-Republican sentiment piled up, I found myself unable to consider the book "leftist" rather than scientific in nature. After all, attack ads never work. Finally, I appreciated that Schlosser cited certain fast food restaurants for their "good" behaviors and practices - chief among these were Jack in the Box (post-E. coli scare) and In-N-Out Burger. Sadly, an East Coast guy like me is incapable of eating at either one. Something I would have liked to see, or still would like to, is a rundown of every major fast food company rated in various categories such as food quality, kitchen sterility, etc. I think that would drive fast food restaurants to take pride in their cleanliness and general humane practices. For example, if Burger King suddenly surged ahead of McDonald's at such ratings, it could easily advertise accordingly, and McDonald's would have no choice but to clean up their ways. Ultimately, I suppose Fast Food Nation was an insightful and meaningful book, but it didn't make for the super-interesting tell-all I had hoped for. And I still want french fries.