What Are You Buying When You Buy Organic Summary

When we first hear the word “organic,” we automatically assume “healthy,” “free of chemicals and pesticides,” and “ethically grown/raised.” This is largely due to the way organic foods have been advertised to the public as free of herbicides, synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, chemicals, and fumigants. However, is organic food really as perfect as it sounds? Is it really the answer for a healthier generation of humans? In the article “What Are You Buying When You Buy Organic?” Steven Shapin tells us what organic food really means and gives us his perspective on the organic growing organic food awareness. Organic food is about as healthy as food purchased from a regular supermarket. In “What Are You Buying When You Buy Organic?” Steven Shapin …show more content…
In Pollan’s book The Omnivore’s Dilemna: A Natural History of Four Meals, he discussed four different meals and traced them back to their origins. Among these meals the first was fast food followed by, organic food he purchased at his local Whole Foods, produce directly retrieved from a farm along with poultry prepared by Pollan himself, and produce grown by Pollan and wild pig that he hunted himself. Shapin argues that if we all were to look for “the perfect meal,” then about two billion people would starve. He writes, “Does your friendly local farmer use a tractor or a horse? If a tractor, does it use fuel made from biomass? If a horse, are the oats it eats organic? If the oats are organic, does the manure with which they were grown come from organically fed animals?” (Shapin, 438). Shapin’s point is that we can never be completely organic and if we try to do so, then “someone must decide which fifty million of our people will starve!” (Shapin, 439). He effectively ends his article quoting Cascadian Farm’s Gene Kahn, “This is just lunch for most people. Just lunch. We can call it sacred, we can talk about communion, but it’s just lunch” (Shapin, 440). In essence, the perspective of having food free of all toxins is acceptable but to most people, the idea of food is just something they need to keep on …show more content…
Until recently, I was one of the 90 percent that believed organic meant natural and healthier. Now, after reading this article, Shapin’s argument regarding the truth behind the word organic is something I can coincide with. Shapin mentions Sir Albert Howard, an English agronomist, and his belief that the soil, the health of what grew in it, and the health of its consumers are “one great subject” (434). I can support this argument as I too believe that the foundation of anything is the most important. In essence, if the soil is bad, then the produce that grows on it will be less nutritious--- perhaps ultimately leading to declining health of the consumer. Eliminating the use of pesticides and synthetic fertilizers are not beneficial if the soil the produce grows on is bad to begin with. Furthermore, I also agree with Shapin’s point that relying on only true organic products grown in local farms will lead to mass starvation. Growing organic food requires more time and cannot be mass produced as fast. Shapin states, “Genetically modified, industrially produced monocultural corn is what feeds the victims of an African famine, not the gorgeous organic technicolor or Swiss chard from your local farmers’ market” (439). Shapin’s point is that it is more important that people have any kind of food rather than the natural and seemingly healthy “organic” food. I agree with this argument