Image from the New York Times

 

Last October, Amy Pelow started a support group in Oswego, New York for the parents and loved ones of heroin addicts. Pelow discovered her 17-year-old son was addicted to heroin when she received a phone call informing her that he had overdosed and was currently being hospitalized. She rushed to the Oswego Hospital to find his lanky, teenage body hooked up to machines and injected with various tubes. Since then, he has overdosed 8 times and rotated in and out of rehabs and jail multiple times.

Pelow calls herself a reformed ambulance chaser.

When she used to hear ambulances howling across the small-city sprawl of Oswego, she would instantaneously text and call her son. If he did not respond immediately, she would hop into her car and track the sound of the mechanical wailing. The whole time she would image her son’s unconscious body waiting at the end of her chase. But after six years, she has retired from this hunt.

The prevalence of heroin throughout this country is an epidemic that has claimed headlines and lives with increased frequency in the past decade. Heroin-related deaths across the country jumped 39 percent from 2012-2013 and the rate of heroin-related overdose deaths nearly quadrupled from 2002 to 2013, according to the CDC.

In New York State alone, the number of deaths attributed to overdoses of opioids – which does include both heroin and prescription painkillers such as Oxycontin – rose from 940 in 2004 to 2,044 in 2012 – 117 percent jump, according to the state Health Department.

In downtown Syracuse, there is a needle exchange program called ACR Health. In 2011, they had just 16 people picking up clean needles. This year, they are already at 753.

Although the statistical and anecdotal evidence revealing the extent of the heroin epidemic is clear and straightforward, the factors that created and sustain this situation are more complex. The most widely accepted theory behind the heroin epidemic is one revolving around regulation oversight and greedy pharmaceutical companies, according to a commentary recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

About twenty-five years ago, pharmaceutical companies started pushing the over prescription of opiate pain killers, such as OxyContin and Vicodin, in order to increase their revenues. The intensity of these drugs and the generosity with which they were prescribed led to high rates of addiction over time. Grandmas and teens, the rich and the poor started getting hooked on these serious pain killers.

Eventually, physicians and authorities realized this incredible rate of addiction and the government subsequently started cracking down on this excess of opiate prescription. Means were implemented to limit and monitor the amount of opiates a doctor could prescribe per a patient and data bases were established that tallied the amount of opiates patients received from different doctors. Measures such as these successfully decreased the availability of and access to this very addictive drug.

But then, tens of thousands of people were suddenly looking for a similar high that would blunt their withdrawal symptoms that felt like hell. It was at this time that ingenious Mexican drug cartels took this opportunity to flood the market with heroin, another type of opiate. And there was quite a substantial consumer base waiting to be exploited.

Laura Samson’s* brother started with pills and now he battles a sometimes 100-dollar-a-day heroin addiction. “I remember the day I found out he was a heroin addict, “Laura wrote in a blog post, “My body shook, I grew nauseous, and for the first time in my entire life, my heart hurt. His life would now be a constant battle between happiness, addiction, and the law.”

Laura’s story captures the heartache that more and more families and loved ones across that nation are experiencing as the number of heroin users creeps upwards. Their reality is a tortuous oscillation between insatiable fear for the life of the user and anger at the user for how they have reduced themselves and dragged all who love them into a terrify cycle of anxiety and hopelessness.

 

Images provided by author

 

In addition to the mental, emotional and physical turmoil that people addicted to heroin and their loved ones experience, another massive obstacle is defiantly placed between them and recovery: The overwhelming lack of resources.

Even if addicts want to quit, there is simply not enough room in rehabilitation centers nor enough effective rehabilitation practices and facilities. Some specialists in places like Central and Upstate New York offer intense, one-month rehabs. This way they are able to crank people in and out as there are so many addicts looking for help and not enough available services. But the relapse rates are incredibly high.

Laura’s brother went to a one-month rehab, which cost her family twenty-one thousand dollars. They had some insurance, but still went about ten thousand dollars into debt attempting to ensure her brother’s recovery. Even though they were willing to pay for a more expensive rehab, they had to call several different facilities several times a day to secure him a spot in one. After he was finally admitted, paid the hefty fee and completed the program, he relapsed about three weeks out and is currently back to using regularly.

Syracuse addiction specialist, Dr. Laura Martin, said the methadone clinic in Syracuse has five hundred spots for treatment and a standard year-long waiting list. She has a loose-leaf notebook in her office with several pages filled with the names of opiate and heroin addicts who have come to her office looking for treatment and who she just doesn’t have room for. Pelow’s son has been on a waiting list for treatment since this past July.

In response to this national epidemic, many cities across the US are starting to implement social and community based responses to the rampant use of heroin, as traditional approaches continue to fail.

In Santa Fe, New Mexico, Emily Kaltenbach, the state director for the Drug Policy Alliance of New Mexico says she is tired of seeing the same nonviolent drug offenders filling the court’s dockets and burdening taxpayers with expensive jail stays. She is trying to implement a community-based social program to divert people away from jail before they are fingerprinted, booked and charged.

In Ithaca, New York, the mayor is proposing a safe place for addicts to get high but under the surveillance of health specialists. This would also be a step toward addicts getting serious help.

Ithaca and Santa Fe are just a couple examples of the alternative measures being taking by city and state government to compensate for the futility of federal policies.

However, there is an opinion increasing in popularity that even the Obama administration is tentatively on board with. This is the idea that heroin use should not be treated as a crime and addicts should not be framed as criminals, but heroin addiction it should be seen as a disease. Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement recently, “We are seeing tremendous advances in our understanding of drug dependency and our ability to address substance use disorders as a public health — rather than a strictly criminal justice — challenge.”

The primary approach of prohibition and criminalization has merely fed the cycle of addiction over the years. When Pelow’s son went to jail, she said he gained access to more networks to feed his addiction. A criminal record also compounds feelings of hopelessness, as now beating addiction and starting life again becomes that much more difficult.

The criminalization of heroin use and the punishment associated with this disease also feeds into the shame and stigma around it. Pelow said for years she would hid the fact that her son was a heroin addict because she was embarrassed and afraid of being judged.

Historically speaking, heroin has always been a drug with the notorious reputation of being one of the most intense, expensive drugs for the long-term, hardcore drug addicts passed out in a back ally.

But this stigma is no longer relevant, according to data such as the 2001-2002 National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism survey, which shows that lifetime opiate users (including heroin) fall across a gamete of educational, age, and financial lines. Fifty-seven percent have attended college. Thirty-five percent make less than $35,000 in their annual salary. Thirty-nine percent are female, which stands out as unusual since studies show that many forms of addiction tend to disproportionally target men. But with opiate addiction, it is men and women, high school drop outs and college graduates, people driving Hondas and people with Ferraris. Today, opiate and heroin addiction does not discriminate.

But experts, such as Dr. Martin, say this image still connected with heroin is a force that inhibits users from seeking help and doctors from extending it.

“Most doctors don’t want to have a whole bunch of addicts sitting in their waiting room because they picture an addict as coming off the streets with a blanket around them and sleeping on their floor and that kind of thing. But really they come in suits and ties and from their college campuses,” Dr. Martin said.

And people that work with heroin addiction, like employees at ACR Health in Syracuse, say that this archaic stigma prevents addicts from reaching out and trying to get help.

Decriminalizing heroin would help in combating the stigma around heroin use and perhaps encourage more addicts to pursue recovery. This decriminalization would also mean families would not have to also contend with the myriad of legalities around arrests and criminal offenses and it could make a terrible situation incrementally more bearable.

 

*Laura Samson is a pseudonym. She was comfortable sharing her story, but not here real identity.

 

 

 

[1] The title to my article is straightforward and direct, but it communicates the seriousness of this issue and article. Since heroin use and the tragedies surrounding it are so dire and bleak, I did not want to be creatively or playful with the title. I wanted to retain a serious and level tone, which reflects the tone throughout the piece.

[2] I started the piece with an anecdote, which I heard first hand in my hometown of Oswego. It is a jarring and sad story that I thought would not only pull readers in (or ‘hook’ them), but also personalize a story that is a lot of big and scary numbers. The story of Amy Pelow and her son does not really provide initial background or rationale, but it is supposed to immediately make people feel and care. It does provide exigency, as the heroin epidemic is a timely and relevant issue and the fact the Pelow’s son is hospitalized in the beginning shows even more the urgency of this issue.

[3] I think I provide multiple ‘ideas’ in this article, each with analysis and supporting evidence. First, I discuss the extent of the epidemic and the factors that have created that situation. I use a variety of statistics and sources when constructing this section. Then I discuss the complexity of the stigma and resources and community-based responses and the need to decriminalize heroin. I struggled with flow and fluidly in this piece, but I thought I manage ‘ideas’ and their analysis well.

[4] As mentioned before, clarity and fluidity were issues I had in this piece because I had so much information I wanted to include to show the melee that is the heroin epidemic and how it impacts people and how the country is trying to respond. I thought my presentation and especially my anecdotes made my take of this issue unique, in addition to my final argument to decriminalize heroin use and why that is important.

[5] I think most of the arguments and information I provided was backed up and flushed out and not vague or cliché. When I stated something, I provided examples or quotes or data to prove it. For example, I discussed the impact of heroin addiction on family and loved ones and I used Laura as an example of that.

[6] I think I deeply researched this issue, but I do think my final argument of decriminalization could have been even stronger but I was not quite sure how to do that. But I covered many aspects of this issue, building a comprehensive stance and argument. I provide an overview of the epidemic and break down some of the complexities within this reality, like lack of resources or impact on family.

[7] I used a lot of sources and a diverse set of them from news articles to scholarly journals to academic essays to multiple primary sources.

[8] I think I meshed my sources into the article fairly well, but maybe I could have included them even more of them. I think I might have done the opposite of drop quoting. I researched this issue so much that I was confident to just write about it and probably could have referenced sources more.

[9] I think I could definitely persuade my audience that heroin use should be decriminalized. I tried to do this mostly through evoking emotion. I wanted to show readers how terrible this situation was for addicts and their families and how really it is not completely their faults for being there and grace and sympathy should be extended to them as opposed to judgement.

[10] I thought the first visual I used provided context for the increasing prevalence of heroin use in the US. I placed it is the beginning because it is one of the first aspects of this issue I address. I included the texts because I thought they might further evoke emotion from readers.

[11] My development was incremental. I started with too much information trying to include every aspect of this issue and slow edited some of that content out of the article.

[12] Yes, effective. But upon reflection, I think I probably could have included even more.

[13] I tried to use very powerful language and proofread several times so I think I used language effectively overall and presented myself as credible.

In the grainy video of his deposition, the farmer hunches over the desk in front of him. He intermittently rubs his downcast forehead with a weathered hand. Moe Parr’s posture emulates defeat and heartbreak.

In this scene from the documentary, Food Inc., Monsanto lawyers berate the aged and demoralized farmer with a litany of question about bank reports and business relations. This moment serves as an appropriate analogy for the dynamics between farmers and corporations and the control corporations exact over the conventional farming industry.

Over ninety percent of the soybeans in the U.S. contain Monsanto’s patent gene and, in the above scene, the multinational corporation is suing Parr for saving soybean seeds. Even though the seeds Parr is saving are not Monsanto soybeans, Parr is still dragged through the legal process for merely influencing or “inducing” other farmers to save seed. According to the documentary, a team of Monsanto investigators roams the country monitoring and prosecuting farmers for saving seed and violating patent infringement.

“I can remember when the first prohibitions against seed saving came into being,” says Troy Roush, Vice President of American Corn Growers Association, in an interview in the documentary, “Most farmers were just absolutely disgusted with the whole concept. It’s been interesting over the course of 11 years to watch us go from utter contempt for the notion that we can’t save our own seed to acceptance.”

Corporations have a clout and reach so pervasive and powerful that they can destroy a farmer’s life with a set of charges completely detached from truth. Parr was forced to settle out of court because he couldn’t afford his legal bills.

“I am finished,” Parr’s slow country drawl plays over the footage of his interrogation with the lawyers.

For years, debates over food production and regulation in America have drifted into the national conversation. Documentaries, op-eds, studies, articles and books present arguments defending or condemning conventional farming processes and organic alternatives. Critics of conventional farming repeatedly deconstruct the processes and the environment of the industry while highlighting safety oversights, risks of food contamination and the systemic spread of food-related illnesses. The regular outbreaks of E. coli and listeria provide an example of that as they continue to claim headlines and steal lives. But parallel to discussions over the nutritional value and health risks of mass-produced food, the exploitation of the workers and animals involved in the industry is another jarring facet of this matter.

The video footage surfing the internet of baby chicks being thrown into machines or pigs being electrocuted or cows being beaten is often fodder enough to convert people to vegetarianism or convince them to shop at local farmers’ markets. But in addition to the unsightly abuse of animals, these corporations also exploit humans. This is revealed in the working conditions in slaughterhouses, notorious for being physically dangerous and emotionally exhausting. According to the food justice organization, Food Empowerment Project, of the 500,000 people working in these meat-processing facilities, many are undocumented workers or people of color from low-income communities. Most of these workers are “at-will” employees, meaning the threat of immediately termination from a supervisor is always present.

“Supervisors use a variety of intimidation tactics to suppress workers’ concerns and make it clear that other people are always available to replace them. As a result, workers are conditioned to accept a hazardous and demeaning work environment if they want to remain employed,” the Food Empowerment Project website reads.

Marion Nestle mentions in her book, “Food Politics,” that large corporations often employ illegal immigrants specifically because they are unlikely to vie for better working conditions or wages. The industry strategically constructs an employee demographic of immigrants, teenagers and other often ignored people groups because they are less likely to know their rights and more willing to endure minimum wages with no benefits or chances for pay raises.

Corruption between corporations and government agencies also makes them involved in establishing the very regulations that are supposed to leash and monitor them. Corporations often determine, or at least influence, the rules and government agencies fall in line. Without real accountability and consequences, these corporations repeatedly prove irresponsible with health and safety measures while solely perseverating on their own profit. They can introduce new methods of production that risk the safety of people and animals, but weld enough money and shady connections to silence pushback.

In the abovementioned documentary, there is a scene where the jolly and portly chicken farmer, Vince Edwards drives the documentarians to his farm. Proud of the production of his poultry, Edwards seems eager to showcase his coups to the camera crew. But his employer, Tyson, steps in before and informs Edwards he is not allowed to show the inner workings of his own farm. Edwards give a sheepish shrug and a toothy grin. He doesn’t know why he can’t. But those are his orders. Moments like this again illustrate the reach and power of these corporations.

While company authorities intimidated Edwards’ enthusiasm to showcase his coups, Carole Morison said she felt compelled to speak on the topic. “I understand why farmers don’t want to talk because the company can do what it wants to do as far as pay goes since they control everything. But it has just gotten to the point that it is not right what is going on,” said the chicken farmer. “This isn’t farming. This is mass production like as assembly line in a factory,” she continued as she toured the documentarians through her coups, expressing disgust at the conditions.

That scene shows bloated chickens pumped up on drugs to fatten them up and to increase profits. Their bulging bodies are deformed with tumors of extra and abnormal fat from the antibiotics. Their spindly legs cannot support their extreme weight so their short lives are mostly sedentary.

Some corporations require that the chickens be kept in huts that are completely enclosed. So in addition to crammed courters and malformed bodies, these animals are also sentenced to a life of pitch black. Morison refused to enclose her open-windowed coup. The film reported that her contract with Perdue was later voided for her actions.

Amid the critiques and negativity though, Blake Hurst heralds conventional farming practices in his article, “Organic Illusions.” In fact, he frames the current conditions as not repressive but as almost liberating for the workforce. With experience and insight as an actual farmer, Hurst harkens back to the olden days emphasizing that conditions today are less physically draining on workers and demand less labor from them.

“Those of us who grew up with a hoe in our hand have absolutely no nostalgia for days gone by,” Hurst remarks, “People love to talk about traditional agriculture, but I’ve noticed that their willingness to embrace the land is often mostly metaphorical.”

Hurst also believes that conventional farming methods serve an even more grandiose purpose for humanity. In a world without the pesticides and slaughterhouses that make farming easier and more efficient, Hurst notes that more people would be sweating and slaving in fields right now. But, now those people are enable to be elsewhere in the world becoming playwrights and philosophers and doctors.

But the reality of the socioeconomics of food industry workers, a collection of mostly disenfranchised laborers working meager wages and often in unsafe conditions, dulls the romanticism which Hurst paints. Although fewer people may be hoeing potato fields right now, many are being exploited and abused by corporations. And while unemployment has almost returned to pre-Great Recession rates, jobs are always welcomed in the States. So Hurst’s lofty argument that contemporary farming liberates more people from the monotony of farm work to find more artist or altruistic endeavors seems to fall flat as well.

In a Consumer Reports article analyzing conventional farming methods and how there is contamination and oversight in that process, some of the potential sicknesses animals can contract were listed. The article reads, “Regulatory loopholes could allow mad cow infection, if present, to make its way into cattle feed; drugs used in chickens could raise human exposure to arsenic or antibiotic-resistant bacteria; farmed fish could harbor PCBs and dioxins.”

This catalog of health risks present to animals (and the humans that consume them) points to these procedures not being the cleanest and healthiest means of farming. These diseases evoke a picture of these animals’ condition as clearly insufficient. No longer does the image of American farming conjure up a scene of healthy animals in green pastures. But now the snapshot of farming equates to hordes of animal bodies, pumped up on drugs or standing in feces or crammed in cages and pens. And although the condition of farmers and workers is different, many argue is just a different manifestation of abuse.

1.) The idea of a “writer’s project” is sort of like a thesis, but more expanded with more exchange and breath. Instead of summing up the writer’s whole collection of work with one statement or idea, the idea of a project tracks the process of communication and thought to encompass the whole idea with its uses and shortcomings. My own “project” is to show examples and moments of abuse and exploitation of farmers, workers and animals. These moments collectively help to inform my “thesis” that corporations are the abusers with unmatched and unrestrained power and influence.

2.)  I was actually sick during the day the class completed this workshop. But I found all the charts we made during class to be very helpful in writing my article. I was able to pull detailed and specific information from multiple sources and see how the projects in several sources parallel or contradicted each other. This was extremely helpful when synthesizing my own project. Several themes had been reiterated in different ways and I was able to construct my own narrative from that.

3.)  My understanding of synthesis is that is it the understanding of a writer’s project and being able to mesh multiple projects or perspectives together to construct a dominate message or to communicate an idea. I do this is my own piece when I use the different insights from the Food Empowerment Project and Nestle’s book to discuss the injustice of the socioeconomics of farmers and labors. I do this in another way when I pieced together Nestle or Hurst show different opinions about that same topic.

4.) I learned to collect different sources together to prove one concise point that was solidly backed up and convincing.

5.) The main idea started with inspiration. I was so disturbed after watching Food Inc. that I knew I wanted to talk about the human side of the issue. How cruel people are treated. I started with emotion and refine it to be a concise argument. I jotted down in my notebook how jarring the scenes from the documentary were and then I revisited those notes and created the narrative aspect of my article, like the anecdote with Morison and Edwards and Parr.

 

6.) The way I write in general sort of lacks organization or method. I just sit down and try to become inspired and just kind of feel when the piece is making sense or not. I write and then edit and refine and edit and refine. I think in my first drafts though, my piece was academic and wordy and as I edited I tried to water all that down and make it more conversational. Here is a paragraph from my first draft and then the final version that show this transition: ” Hurst harkens back to the olden days showing that although conditions aren’t ideal now, they might be less physically draining and involved for farmers and workers. He says conventional farming gives time and space to people that would have spent hours in a field to become playwrights and philosophers and doctors. But in her book, “Resisting Food Safety,” Marion Nestle mentions that the food industry hires mostly immigrants and teenagers at meager wages.”

“Amid the critiques and negativity though, Blake Hurst heralds conventional farming practices in his article, “Organic Illusions.” In fact, he frames the current conditions as not repressive but as almost liberating for the workforce. With experience and insight as an actual farmer, Hurst harkens back to the olden days emphasizing that conditions today are less physically draining on workers and demand less labor from them.”

I think in the second example, my point and language are more concise and direct.

 

 

7.)In discussing the work conditions of laborers in the industrial farming industry, I used Nestle and another outside source (the Food Empowerment Project website) to show how arduous working conditions in farming are today. But I also included Hurst and his positive outlook on how modern methods of farming actually benefit the workers. I did this to add balance and give two opinions on the matter.

8.)  Initially, my lede was dry and wordy. And in the passive voice. The first two sentences in my first draft were: “For years, debates over food production and regulation in America have drifted into the national conversation. Documentaries, op-eds, studies, articles and books have constructed arguments defending or condemning conventional farming processes or organic alternatives.” I tried to be creative, but it was sort of dull and dispassionate. After reading the article in class about ledes, I decided to do something more interesting and something I thought would grip the reader. I got good feedback from my peers during groups edits, so I just revised and used that: In the grainy video of his deposition, the farmer hunches over the desk in front of him. He intermittently rubs his downcast forehead with a weathered hand. Moe Parr’s posture emulates defeat and heartbreak.

In this scene from the documentary, Food Inc., Monsanto lawyers berate the aged and demoralized farmer with a litany of question about bank reports and business relations. This moment serves as an appropriate analogy for the dynamics between farmers and corporations and the control corporations exact over the conventional farming industry.

 

9.) I would like to improve my writing overall with a more developed vocabulary and concise way of communicating my intent. I want my writing to be fluid and punchy. I don’t just want to provide information, but to provide narrative and evoke emotion. Basically, I want to become a more powerful writer.

In the grainy video of his deposition with the Monsanto lawyers, the farmer hunches over the desk in front of him and intermittently reaches a weathered hand to rub his downcast forehead. His posture emulates defeat and heartbreak. In the documentary, Food Inc., Monsanto is suing Moe Parr for cleaning his own soybean seed and “inducing farmers to break the patent law.”

“This essentially puts me out of business. I am finished,” Parr says.

This anecdote illustrates the control that multinational corporations, like Monsanto, maintain over the farming industry. Their clout and reach is so pervasive and powerful that they can destroy a farmer’s life with a litany of charges completely detached from reality. Parr was forced to settle out of court because he could not afford his legal bills.

“I can remember when the first prohibitions against seed saving came into being. Most farmers were just absolutely disgusted with the whole concept. It’s been interesting over the course of 11 years to watch us go from utter contempt for the notion that we can’t save our own seed to acceptance,” says Troy Roush, Vice President of American Corn Growers Association, in an interview in the documentary.

For years, debates over food production and regulation in America have drifted into the national conversation. Arguments defending or condemning conventional farming processes and organic alternatives have been presented in documentaries, op-eds, studies, articles and books. Repeatedly, critics of conventional farming have deconstructed the process while highlighting the safety oversights and the environments created, which appear conducive to food contamination and systemic spread of food-related illnesses. Outbreaks of E. coli, semolina and listeria have claimed headlines and stolen lives. But parallel to discussions over the nutritional value and health risks of mass-produced food, the exploitation of the farmers and laborers involved in the farming industry is another jarring facet of this issue.

The corporations that form the industrial food system exploit theirs workers, as is evident in the working conditions, wages and bullying of farmers and laborers. These corporations are in positions of great power in determining the structure of farming and they repeatedly prove irresponsible with health and safety measures while solely perseverating on their own profit. They can introduce new methods or products that may risk the safety of people and animals, but have the influence to silence pushback from farmers and even government agencies. Corruption between food corporations and government agencies (specifically the personal overlap between those two realms) may be the reason why government agencies, like the FDA, are often willing to bend to the will of corporations.

Large corporations often employ illegal immigrants, a demographic unlikely to vie for better working conditions or wages. Marion Nestle mention in her book that the industry strategically employs larger numbers of immigrants and teenagers, forming an employee demographic less likely to know their rights and more willing to endure minimum wages with no benefits or chances for pay raises. And as is clearly evident in multiple narratives presented Food Inc., large corporations also monitor and control farmers and farm owners. These corporations, with money and connections, are able to change the culture of farming and determine the direction of farmers’ livelihoods.

The documentary Food Inc. emphasizes the ways in which conventional farming exploits both people and animals. The interviews in the documentary with farmers who are buried under debt to large corporations, such as Perdue and Tyson, reveal how the wealth being amassed from food production in the States does not trickle down to the farmers or labors but merely feeds into a larger divide between the rich and poor in America. One chicken farmer in the film, Vince Edwards was told by Tyson that he was not allowed to show his own chicken coup to the documentarians. A jolly and portly Edwards shrugs and grins sheepishly. He doesn’t know why he can’t show the camera crew. But that’s what he has been told. Moments like this illustrate the reach and of these corporations’ power and influence.

However, in his article, “Organics Illusions,” Blake Hurst argued from a stance framing conventional farming practices as almost liberating for participants in its workforce, as opposed to repressive or dangerous. As an actual farmer, he believes modern farming methods actually present many benefits to farm owners and laborers and make their livelihoods and jobs easier and more efficient. Hurst says, “Those of us who grew up with a hoe in our hand have absolutely no nostalgia for days gone by. People love to talk about traditional agriculture, but I’ve noticed that their willingness to embrace the land is often mostly metaphorical.” Hurst harkens back to the olden days emphasizing that conditions today are less physically draining and demand less labor.

Hurst also states in his article that since conventional farming requires fewer workers, the people who would be slaving away in fields, if the world was without pesticides and slaughterhouses, now have more time and space to become playwrights and philosophers and doctors. But in her book, “Resisting Food Safety,” the aforementioned author, Marion Nestle, presents information that dulls the romanticism Hurst paints. Nestle touches on the socioeconomics of the food industry and discussed how corporations hire mostly immigrants and teenagers at meager wages and often in unsafe conditions. And while unemployment has almost returned to pre-Great Recession rates, jobs are always welcomed in the States. But instead of providing jobs and bettering the American economy, some corporations are employing illegal immigrants. Food Inc. showed a corporation that had a constructed a deal with local authorities to only arrest a handful of their illegal immigrants every week so as not to disrupt the flow of production at their factories. Conditions in slaughterhouses are also reported as some of the most dangerous working condition and can be emotionally disruptive. So although fewer people may be hoeing potato fields right now, many are being exploited and abused by corporations.

Food Inc. also reveals the conditions that animals are kept in. Conditions that some argue are cruel and heinous. Scenes in that documentary shows bloated chickens pumped up on drugs to fatten them and increase the corporation’s profit. Their bulging bodies cannot be supported by their spindly legs so their short lives are mostly sedentary. Some corporations require that the chickens be kept in huts that are completely enclosed. Although Edwards refused to show the camera crew the conditions of his chickens, another chicken farmer, Carole Morison, said she felt compelled to speak on the topic despite the repercussions. She told the documentarians she thought current conditions for chickens were inhuman. Further, she refused to enclose her own coup. The film reported that her contract with Perdue was later voided for her actions.

In a Consumer Reports article analyzing conventional farming methods and how there is contamination and oversight in that process, some of the potential sicknesses animals can contract were listed. The article read, “Regulatory loopholes could allow mad cow infection, if present, to make its way into cattle feed; drugs used in chickens could raise human exposure to arsenic or antibiotic-resistant bacteria; farmed fish could harbor PCBs and dioxins.” This litany of health risks present to animals (and humans that consume them) points to these procedures not being the healthiest and most humane means to farm these animals. These diseases paint a picture of the conditions these animals are kept in as clearly insufficient. Instead of healthy animals being raised and slaughtered in humane and clean ways, they appear to be produced in conditions that are instead conducive to them harboring diseases.