Week 12 Resonse Saturday, Dec 10 2011

I thought the book Fast Food Nation was a good choice, because it showed that the fast food business isn’t really about the food but about money. For me I learned about various “ingredients” that are actually in most fast food products. The book is very informative but I don’t think it has the greatest impact on college students as it should. I feel this way because; most students are not able to cook their own meals. Instead they rely solely on what the cafeteria has to offer. Likewise even if a student wants to go out, its most likely going to be fast food because its inexpensive and because it easy to come by. I like that the author used a lot of background information and detailed history in order to make a simple point that eventually related to the fast food industry. For instance because of this book, it finally connected that most consumers don’t really make their own decisions about what food they buy and eat.  I think that students will only truly care about their food, when something directly affects their lives. In making the food mandatory for all freshmen, I feel that the university could have equally made it possible for other choices of food on campus besides what all ready exists. I also like that fact the book told stories of people in various careers that are/ were affected by one industry from farming all the way the meat packing.  Overall I feel that Fast Food Nation was a good choice because it makes people think beyond satisfying their own hunger cheaply and more about those who affect and are affected by a industry that is purely profit driven.

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What do I think about Fast Food Nation? Saturday, Dec 10 2011

I think that this is such a redundant question. I’m not saying I think the question is dumb or something. I just here the question being asked a lot by faculty. It makes me think that they want to know if they did a good job of picking a book. Well personally if you wanted to bore me to death with the first few chapters of a book then you definitely picked the right one. I did not hate it I just thought it was boring. All the talk about what was in The Jungle I think I would have much rather have read that. Obviously I did not have reading it. It was just too slow and too many facts and statistics for me to get into. I do admit I did like the sarcasm they author had in the book. The humor made the concepts bearable to understand. I ended up watching Food Inc. in english class and I really liked the video much better than the book. I definitely would not recommend this book to anyone who just wanted a book to read for fun. Maybe if they needed help sleeping then I would recommend it but other than that, no. But then again it really was like the first 3-5 chapters that were really slow. When it started to talk about stories that happened to people like the one about Kenny or the case with some Europeans and McDonald’s. That was good. I do feel that it is a great book to get information from if one was writing on the topic. Like I said it was really slow and too much of a chore to read it to me. A lot of people said they liked it but I guess we just think differently. All in all it was not a bad book it was pretty good other than the slowness.

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What did you think of the book Fast Food Nation? Friday, Dec 9 2011

My thoughts about the book Fast Food Nation are mostly very positive. The book was very informative, providing me with an insight on how fast food industries operate. It took me a little while to truly get interested in the book, but overall it was pretty interesting to see what goes on in our beloved McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, and other major fast food restaurants. Schlosser did a good job at providing history behind the forces that led that to the creation of these food restaurants. The author was very descriptive, using detailed language to speak on subjects that are often neglected or pushed aside. Schlosser effectively conveys the truth about the industry that is oftentimes covered up or misrepresented by using real life testaments from people who work on both sides of the industry. He shows how large companies usually take advantage of the small business owners who provide them with their products. It is very unfortunate that people have to endure such treatment with little to no benefits. I credit the author with not striking the fast food industry, but providing solid facts that uncover the truth. I like how the author is honest about what goes on behind closed doors, letting the reader into the world of the fast food industry. The conditions that workers who work in the industry have to endure to produce the food that we enjoy are very appalling. The way that they slaughter the cattle is also very disturbing. The author also effectively showed how the food is prepared. I knew that the food was processed, but I did not know that the flavors were constructed in factories. Reading this book has certainly changed my outlook on fast food and it definitely has me thinking twice about ordering a quarter pounder from McDonald’s.

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What did you think of the book Fast Food Nation? Friday, Dec 9 2011

The book Fast Food Nation was very interesting. It showed us a side to the fast food industry that we never get to see as customers.We only see the happy side. The part where the food is delievered to us and we merrily drive off into the sunset, never getting a glimpse of what is truly beyond the counter and what people go through just so you can have a Big Mac. I thought the book was an eye opener and hopefully something that will make people take a good long look at what goes on before they step into a fast food restaurant to order.

That being said,I do not plan on changing my own eating habits. Fast food is just so convenient and it has become a big part of my diet and my family’s diet.I think it is a little too late to change now, at least for me. It would be hard and maybe a little more expensive to find food where someone was not exploited to get to the finished product. People all over the world are getting lied to and used just so we can have pretty much all the products we use, not just food. So why is the fast food industry such a big target, i mean other industries do it all the time? Of course it is not right, but if you plan on persecuting one industry you minds well persecute them all. Do not discriminate.

But then again, if we cut fast foodout of our diet we would have less cases of obesity, heart attacks and strokes across America. This is a lose lose situation. If you remove the fast food industry from America billions of people will lose jobs and money. The economy will probably go plummet farther than it has ever gone before and unemployment would sky rocket. You cannot win for losing.

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Thoughts of Fast Food Nation Friday, Dec 9 2011

When I first received the book in the mail, I thought it was optional. Then I actually read the papers that came along with it and set a planned date to start reading my book. That date changed once my mother found out about the book, I started reading the day I got it. When I looked at the cover I thought it was going to be one of the dullest books I’ve ever have to read, but it caught my attention once I started to read. Time passed by and the book began to lose my attention, so I put the book to the side. When classes started and we started to get into the book, I started to see the book a different way. I learned a lot from the book that I thought was talking about things I thought I already knew. Even though I only read the introduction of the book, I’m glad I got the opportunity to have been introduced to the book. I learned a lot of facts and grasped a deeper understanding for fast food.

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Week 12 Thursday, Dec 8 2011

Fast Food Nation, was, Interesting at the least. However I can never totally get engaged in required reading when it doesn’t have a literary analysis attached or anything like that so i feel as if I didn’t retain as much from it as you would have wanted. From what I actually read the novel was quite interesting.

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My thoughts about Fast Food Nation Tuesday, Dec 6 2011

During the summer, when I received my book in the mail I was surprised that Xavier gave me a book instead of how I would have to buy it and bring it to class. When I looked at the book, I was amazed by the front cover and it looked like a fun book to read. Though it looked like a fun book, I still did not like to read so I casted the book aside. After a few days, I told myself, “I’m going to college; I really should be determined to work hard and read this book!” I read a few chapters and really liked how it had very interesting facts of how fast food came to be. But those few chapters I did read, was all I read for the rest of the summer. By the time I went to class, I thought Fast Food Nation was very educational and helped me be aware of what the fast food industry was really up to. It helped me realize that the world revolves around money and the big companies only care about profits. Though at first, the food industry really did just want to feed its customers and make them happy. But as time passed, many inventions were made to make food conveniently faster and there goes the corporation only thinking about profits.  I learned about farmers being abused by big corporations, the fast food industry finding ways to hypnotizing children, how McDonald fries got its taste, etc. Even though I still did not finish this book, I still thought this book was educational and interesting. I had a great time reading this book and now I have to decide which book I would want to read for next year. I hope next year’s book would be as interesting as this year’s book.

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Week 12 Monday, Dec 5 2011

My initial thoughts when I recieved the book in the mail during the summer was “Why do I have to read during the summer? Don’t I get a break? But as I started to read the book I began to like reading again. That was a love that I lost as I kept getting older. Sitting down and reading a book to increase my knowledge of things. But the book itself opened my eyes to America’s food system and how corrupt it was. I mean I initially heard of the horrors that happen in the numerous slaughterhouses in America and the unhealthy fast food that us Americans consume everyday, but this book really got in depth with it. Showing us the conditions that the meat packing workers have to go through. That is the biggest part of the industry that most Americans are unaware of. The unsafe and dangerous machinery that they have to work with, and if they get injured they do not get any benefits for their hardwork. It’s sad to think that humans will take advantage of their own kind just to get a leg up in civilization, but I guess the saying “Survival of the fittest” is really true. That saying also goes in hand with how the major food corporations make it impossible for the farmers to succeed. There are some farmers that are making but the majority are dealing with poverty because of the strict contracts that they signed. The book enlightens people and broadens their knowledge of our food system on how their food is first made and how it gets to their shelves. The book makes us as students really reconsider what we are eating everyday, but in our situation we really do not have no say in what we eat. Glad that we were introduced to this topic.

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Week 12 Monday, Dec 5 2011

What did you think of the book Fast Food Nation?

Whenever I first recieved Fast Food Nation in the mail, I thought the book was going to be extremely boring and I planned on reading a little bit everyday so that I would not end up having to read the whole thing at the last minute. Once I started reading it, it was really boring to me so I stopped reading it for a month in a half then i resumed and stopped reading it again. The second time whenever I began to read it again, it was more interesting to me. I did not read the whole book, just pieces of it or whatever was required for me to read. From the pieces that I’ve read, those parts were actually good. Although those parts were actually good, I still would have rather read a smaller book though. I felt like this book also taught and brought awareness to certain issues throughout the fast food world which was very helpful and informative.

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What did you think of the book Fast Food Nation? Sunday, Dec 4 2011

My thoughts on the book Fast Food Nation are as follows:

 

When I first saw the book Fast Food Nation I said to myself that this is going to be a very boring book to read.  I was semi right in thinking this, however, some parts of the book was actually interesting.  The book itself is really educational and informative.  The book gave me information about the fast food world and corporations that I would have never gotten before.  I learned that there are a lot of scandals that go on in the fast food world from this book. The personal life stories in this book made my imagination really go into a state of imagination.  I was actually putting myself into the shoes of these people and asking myself what if this is one day me from eating fast food.  This book has made me stop and think about the choices that I make when I decide to eat fast food.  The book let me know what places not to eat and what to look at for in my food.  I found it amazing that such things actually could happen to people from eating fast food.  After reading this book I realized that fast food is actually even more unhealthy for you than just making you gain weight but that it can actually kill you from diseases that you would have never expected to get.  In closing, this book turned out to actually be a good book for you to read if you were bored out of your mind and had nothing else to do and wanted to be informed on what was going on in the fast food world.  I recommend that people read this book so that they will be informed on what actually goes on in the corporations and behind closed doors in the fast food nation.

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