Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: food fads

[TR Ruddick (truddick]

Now this is interesting:

> From: John Beutler <jbeutler [at] adelphia.net>
> I have a philosophical point I want to make about the drift of the 
> discussion, and that is, I think we want to be careful to not make the 
> cohousing movement an incubator for every [nutritional] fad that comes
down 
> the pike.  I have no particular bone to pick with organic veggies, or
trans 
> fats or seafood contamination, but I think institutionalizing such points 
> of view will marginalize the cohoousing movement.

And I thought Racheli was going to voice my sentiments at first--

> From: Racheli Gai <racheli [at] sonoracohousing.com>
> It's interesting to me that you put "organic" and "low trans" in the
> same basket.  They are, of course, comparable in a certain way, 
> since they're both seen as connected to the wish
> (on the part of some) to eat healthy food.  However, the issue of 
> buying organic has a lot to do
> with a viewpoint which places high priority on creating a sustainable 
> way of life.  Is that a "fad"?

>From my perspective, many dietary trends are wrong-headed, as voiced by
another writer complaining about "vegetarians" who subside on white flour
and refined sugar.

But while the relative benefits of organic farming are still somewhat
uncertain, avoiding trans-fat seems to be an absolute certainty, not a
"fad"--yet you support ogranics and ignore the consumption of a substance
that's just one molucule removed from plastic.


> And isn't deciding what's "reasonable", as opposed to what is merely a 
> "fad" as politically motivated
> as the decision to support organic/local/etc.?

I'd have to side with the hard science.  If you and your housing mates want
to follow a particular regimen for personal choice, that's to a certain
extent political.  But if members are, as cited, lactose intolerant or
yeast-allergic, then those are objective situations, not personal
preferences.  Avoiding trans-fat is scientific, not philosophical.  Buying
organic may one day be shown by hard science to be nutritionally
superior--until then, it's a personal choice.

> On a more general level, I'm finding (after nearly 5 years in my 
> cohousing community), that the
> idea that people of all ideologies can live side by side happily is 
> truly NOT a viable one...

It's like any other intercultural communication.  You will co-exist and be
happy together if that's a priority for those on both sides of the
disagreement.  Either party can scotch it.

As regards food, I personally have grown increasingly short-tempered with
those who trumpet diet trends.  We've gone through avoiding starches, meat,
red meat, fats, salt, carbs...and America in general is not fit and
healthy.  Vegetarians unintentionally consume animal protein daily. 
Releatively well-designed long-term dietary studies, based on
anthropological data about what constitutes a natural diet for humans and
how it can be adapted for contemporary life, have been conducted.  Until I
see lots of those, I'm concluding that we're functioning under a cloud of
dietary ignorance.

Make the choice to be kosher or vegetarian or whatever if you please, but
realize that it involves differentiating yourself from others, and that's
divisive.  Making others accommodate your personal choices really isn't the
essence of community IMO.

T
R