purity is expensive
Just returned from a nearby, self-described "organic fruit and vegetable market", which was actually a health food store with a smattering of vegetables that were three times as expensive as the stuff we usually buy.
Tell me: how does this benefit anybody except those stupid white hippie yuppies with a large wallet and a sense of entitlement? And the pseduo-scientific-sounding "organic" label rankles as well. Uh, given that most food comes from some kind of lifeform, you're pretty much guaranteed that it's "organic", you hippie dickheads. Sure, it's a populist (and yet institutionally certified) corruption of "organically grown", but that rankles as well; while I'm quite cognisant of the perils of capitalism's destructive approach to the industrialisation of food, I find the assumption of a healthy, originary organicity -- counterposed to "chemicals", synthetic substances and genetic modification -- dodgy at best, and utterly terrifying at worst, suggesting a feudal nostalgia.
This is bugs me so intensely because like many people living under late capitalism, I'm growing increasingly allergic to the sorts of preservatives, fertilizers and pesticides favoured by agribusiness. My current bind reminds me of a line (recalled from very hazy memory) in a paper by my old comrade Ben Ross: "While capitalism increasingly threatens the very capacity for the reproduction of life on this planet, I find it personally distressing that the available options for engaging with this problem consist of an assortment of tree-huggers and nature fetishists". I'm with Farscape's D'Argo on this: "No offense, but I say we take this tree-hugger, shove him out the access port, and get the hezmana out of here." But to where? That is the question.
Tell me: how does this benefit anybody except those stupid white hippie yuppies with a large wallet and a sense of entitlement? And the pseduo-scientific-sounding "organic" label rankles as well. Uh, given that most food comes from some kind of lifeform, you're pretty much guaranteed that it's "organic", you hippie dickheads. Sure, it's a populist (and yet institutionally certified) corruption of "organically grown", but that rankles as well; while I'm quite cognisant of the perils of capitalism's destructive approach to the industrialisation of food, I find the assumption of a healthy, originary organicity -- counterposed to "chemicals", synthetic substances and genetic modification -- dodgy at best, and utterly terrifying at worst, suggesting a feudal nostalgia.
This is bugs me so intensely because like many people living under late capitalism, I'm growing increasingly allergic to the sorts of preservatives, fertilizers and pesticides favoured by agribusiness. My current bind reminds me of a line (recalled from very hazy memory) in a paper by my old comrade Ben Ross: "While capitalism increasingly threatens the very capacity for the reproduction of life on this planet, I find it personally distressing that the available options for engaging with this problem consist of an assortment of tree-huggers and nature fetishists". I'm with Farscape's D'Argo on this: "No offense, but I say we take this tree-hugger, shove him out the access port, and get the hezmana out of here." But to where? That is the question.