A blight on us for a perfectly fruity fetish
Our obsession with perfect fruit is a symbol of our consumer culture and greed.
When it comes to the critical problems facing humanity, there is one issue that does not command our attention the way it should, but in its own quiet way is every bit as compelling and troublesome as climate change or the global financial crisis. It's our flagrant abuse of fruit and vegetables.
Sounds like a bit of a parody, doesn't it? But the fate of the banana, the tomato and the carrot have a lot more to do with our environmental and economic woes than many would at first suspect. How we grow, depict and treat produce in the West is a stark representation of the pernickety, self-destructive consumer society we have become.
For some years, the major supermarkets have behaved like a phalanx of door-bitches fronting exclusive nightclubs. They have decreed that the fruit and vegetables they sell must meet stringent standards of appearance, or no entry.
Although this quest for perfect-looking produce is driven by what customers want, it raises some serious agricultural, not to mention ethical, problems.
The issue has been festering for some time at the Victorian Farmers Federation, which in December doled out some home truths about consumer expectations. A frustrated Andrew Broad, the federation's president, said the expectations were unrealistic and growers were going broke.
The problem is simply stated: people only want to buy produce that looks attractive. Any fruit and veg with a few blemishes or a slightly unorthodox shape are shunned. In some cases, growers have had whole crops rejected by supermarket buyers.
The banana provides an instructive example. In Queensland, Australian Banana Growers Council chief executive Tony Heidrich recently admitted to a high level of wastage that he described as "disappointing".
A more apposite d-word would be disgraceful. At least 100,000 tonnes of bananas are deemed not attractive enough for public consumption and are sent to the shredder and buried. Unattractive fruit won't sell. Customers will only take home the perfect specimens.
This objectification of fruit satirically echoes many debates feminists have had about society's objectification of women. In the quest for some totally artificial construct of an ideal, many people are overlooking the single most important fact - that it's what's on the inside that matters.
Where is it written that wonky looking fruit isn't good for you? It is frequently remarked upon that the flavour of those perfect-looking tomatoes in the supermarket is perfectly bland. Any home gardener will tell you that a rough-looking home-grown tomato, blemished though it may be, is utterly delicious next to an insipid, store-bought example.
This is mildly amusing until you think about the implications. Fruit that fails the appearance test is rejected; thrown away or ploughed back into the ground.
This happens to up to 25 per cent of all produce.
When you consider how many people on earth are starving, and that industries are looking to minimise carbon footprints, it is totally unforgivable to throw away carefully grown and tended food just because it isn't pretty enough.
But human behaviour is often perverse. It's frequently said that what the West spends on dieting could, if re-directed, end starvation in the world. Our inexorable quest for perfection - for beautiful bodies, fabulous homes, shiny cars, breathtaking holidays, perfect meals - is largely responsible for the pollution and damage we have wreaked on earth. You don't have to be Al Gore to apprehend that our lifestyle is screwing up the planet.
It's enough to make one pessimistic. What hope is there to solve complex human problems when half the planet is so hung up on appearances that it refuses to eat food that doesn't have the right look?
It's not just the fault of supermarket managers. Until last July, the European Union had set specific cosmetic standards for most produce and oddly shaped fruit and veg were effectively banned from sale. The prohibition has been lifted largely because of the global recession, which has partially recalibrated some of our commercial decisions.
But supermarkets worldwide still insist on crazy notions of perfection and, of course, they blame us, the customer. We've asked for it. No one really knows just how much food around the world is rejected and wasted in this way. It could be billions of dollars worth each year. Is Western culture even more decadent than anyone imagined?
Under the pretext of preserving the planet's finite resources, the media and government often try to whip us into a frenzy of guilt and accountability. We're implored to get roof insulation, to invest in solar power, to recycle our rubbish, to ride a bike to work, to buy drought-resistant plants and let the lawn die. Tell it to the turnips. Until society learns to value and manage food responsibly, what's the point?
My first reflection comes from London - Westminster Abbey, in which only two scientists are found memorialised. I sat for a little while to watch the reaction of passers-by as they paused for a reality check at the name carved into the stone on the floor. One of the two scientists is an Australian, Howard Florey, who was responsible for the development of penicillin. The other, however, has been the source of much controversy within the church for nearly two hundred years: Charles Darwin. In the era in which fundamentalism has carved its voice, it is hard to imagine that Charles Darwin would be welcomed in such hallowed halls as this, and for this reason many people stopped and called to associates to come and examine the inscription. Darwin and the church have a chequered history, but not so chequered as to be outside the embrace of at least one faith community.
I wonder how many people are written off for the public profile they hold... people whose positions remained largely unexamined because of popular opinion. If Darwin's Origin of the Species was so anti-Christian, how does he end up memorialised in such a place as this? Perhaps it is more what those who came after Darwin did with his theories that shape our perceptions.
Darwin wasn't the first and won't be the last one to be misunderstood. When people challenge our perspective on the world, they are sure to be wildly opposed. Maybe even crucified.
]]>I wonder what Bible Mr Blankfein is getting that from? Maybe he's better at raising money and rewarding executives than he is at interpreting scripture...
]]>So, if I remember your face, but forget your name, you'll understand (I hope)!
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Cultural shifts are ever with us... but to ascribe a single cause is to be in error. Perhaps the impact of the economic crisis is one of the causes of staff and program reductions. Nevertheless, an interesting trend, which raises questions about discipleship and community.
]]>Two models of ministry and spirituality come to mind: engagement and withdrawal. We generally aren't very good at melding the two. Over recent decades there has been a tendency to a spiritual activism which leads to burnout on the one hand, or an ascetic spirituality which seems disconnected from the realities of life.
Much of the language of church and faith reflects first century Palestinian realities and experience rather than 21st century society, which is both more affluent, and more globally connected. The tools of trade and the context of community and commerce are vastly different. How to love one's neighbour in a world as connected yet diverse (economically, spiritually, socially, and politically) as ours is deeply perplexing. Yet I have been to (apparently successful) church where not one mention was made of anything outside the building.
Jesus picked up and used the hands-on images of his day to depict the work of God - ploughs, pigs, lilies, mustard seeds... Not many of them resonate with our present experience, although they are somewhere within our knowledge bank. What images of the kingdom resonate in our 21st century environment, and how do they help us imagine God's ideal future? Reflecting on the Navman in my car driving experience is just one example of how we might reconsider our tools as images of God's purposes.
We cannot hope to prepare people to live in their daily world as followers of Jesus without pointing to ways in which present experiences might embody God's call. Some vision of what it means to be a christian in the 21st century workplace, community space, and retail places - amongst others - is part of today's ministry challenges.
What do you think?
As the G8 Summit begins in
Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth), is rooted in a stream of papal teaching on economic justice that goes back to 1891 with the encyclical Rerum Novarum (Of New Things). It is a far-reaching look at the relationships and issues that the global economy has created, and their impact on the world’s people.
From the beginning Benedict states his basic foundation, that “charity in truth is the principle around which the Church's social doctrine turns.” It is:
a principle that takes on practical form in the criteria that govern moral action. I would like to consider two of these in particular, of special relevance to the commitment to development in an increasingly globalized society: justice and the common good.
And, he says, those principles are both in service and involvement in the political arena.
The more we strive to secure a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours, the more effectively we love them. Every Christian is called to practice this charity, in a manner corresponding to his vocation and according to the degree of influence he wields in the pólis. This is the institutional path -- we might also call it the political path -- of charity, no less excellent and effective than the kind of charity which encounters the neighbour directly, outside the institutional mediation of the pólis.
He deals with profit, writing that while it is useful, once it “becomes the exclusive goal, if it is produced by improper means and without the common good as its ultimate end, it risks destroying wealth and creating poverty.” The current economic crisis, he writes,
obliges us to re-plan our journey, to set ourselves new rules and to discover new forms of commitment. ... The crisis thus becomes an opportunity for discernment, in which to shape a new vision for the future.
He discusses globalization, which has “led to a downsizing of social security systems as the price to be paid for seeking greater competitive advantage in the global market, with consequent grave danger for the rights of workers,” and cites how
budgetary policies, with cuts in social spending often made under pressure from international financial institutions, can leave citizens powerless in the face of old and new risks; such powerlessness is increased by the lack of effective protection on the part of workers' associations. Through the combination of social and economic change, trade union organizations experience greater difficulty in carrying out their task of representing the interests of workers, partly because governments, for reasons of economic utility, often limit the freedom or the negotiating capacity of labour unions.
The crisis of world hunger and lack of clean water lead to an affirmation that:
The right to food, like the right to water, has an important place within the pursuit of other rights, beginning with the fundamental right to life. It is therefore necessary to cultivate a public conscience that considers food and access to water as universal rights of all human beings, without distinction or discrimination.
He writes about the “pernicious effects of sin” in a market where there is a “speculative use of financial resources that yields to the temptation of seeking only short-term profit” that does not make “a real contribution to local society by helping to bring about a robust productive and social system, an essential factor for stable development.” Financiers, he says,
must rediscover the genuinely ethical foundation of their activity, so as not to abuse the sophisticated instruments which can serve to betray the interests of savers.
The encyclical also addresses the rise of global inequality, the threats to the environment – “we must recognize our grave duty to hand the earth on to future generations in such a condition that they too can worthily inhabit it and continue to cultivate it” – and the need for new solutions to the world’s energy needs. “The fact that some States, power groups, and companies hoard non-renewable energy resources represents a grave obstacle to development in poor countries,” Benedict writes.
The international community has an urgent duty to find institutional means of regulating the exploitation of non-renewable resources, involving poor countries in the process, in order to plan together for the future.
Perhaps the most provocative and controversial suggestion is his call for a reform of the United Nations that would produce a “true world political authority” and would give “poorer nations an effective voice in shared decision-making.” Such a world body would “need to be universally recognized and to be vested with the effective power” to “ensure compliance with its decisions from all parties.” That power, he suggests, could include the ability
[t]o manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration...
Near the end of the encyclical, he underlines his basic premise:
While the poor of the world continue knocking on the doors of the rich, the world of affluence runs the risk of no longer hearing those knocks, on account of a conscience that can no longer distinguish what is human.
Caritas in Veritate is well worth our careful and thoughtful study. Its richness and depth will add new insights to Catholic social teaching. The entire text is available here.
As I grew up, I never questioned his place in my family. In my young mind, he had a special niche. My parents were complementary instructors: Mom taught me good from evil, and Dad taught me to obey. But the stranger...he was our storyteller. He would keep us spellbound for hours on end with adventures, mysteries and comedies.
If I wanted to know anything about politics, history or science, he always knew the answers about the past, understood the present and even seemed able to predict the future! He took my family to the first major league ball game. He made me laugh, and he made me cry the stranger never stopped talking, but Dad didn't seem to mind..
Sometimes, Mom would get up quietly while the rest of us were shushing each other to listen to what he had to say, and she would go to the kitchen for peace and quiet. (I wonder now if she ever prayed for the stranger to leave.)
Dad ruled our household with certain moral convictions, but the stranger never felt obligated to honour them. Profanity, for example, was not allowed in our home... Not from us, our friends or any visitors. Our longtime visitor, however, got away with four-letter words that burned my ears and made my dad squirm and my mother blush. My Dad didn't permit the liberal use of alcohol. But the stranger encouraged us to try it on a regular Basis. He made cigarettes look cool, cigars manly and pipes distinguished.
He talked freely (much too freely!) about sex. His comments were sometimes blatant sometimes suggestive, and generally embarrassing.
I now know that my early concepts about relationships were influenced strongly by the stranger. Time after time, he opposed the values of my parents, yet he was seldom rebuked.... And NEVER asked to leave.
More than fifty years have passed since the stranger moved in with our family. He has blended right in and is not nearly as fascinating as he was at first. Still, if you could walk into my parents' den today, you would still find him sitting over in his corner, waiting for someone to listen to him talk and watch him draw his pictures.
His name?.... .. .
We just call him 'TV.'
He has a wife now....We call her 'Computer.'
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