Author: dphipps

“That each of us ordered something different is the hallmark of the industrial food chain, which breaks the family down into its carious demographics and markets separately to each one: Together we would be eating alone, together, and therefore probably eating more.” I agree with what Pollan is saying here, that fast food chains have the ability to specifically single out an individual and cater directly to their likes and dislikes. Fast food restaurants allow each individual in a family to eat something different, while still sharing a meal with the family. It’s strange, really, to think that you’re eating a meal by yourself, during a time where you’re surrounded by others.   “But though Judith’s Cobb salad did present a challenge from front-seat dining, eating it at fifty-five miles per hour seemed like the thing to do, since the corn was the theme of this meal: the car was eating corn too, being fueled in part by ethanol.” The claim here is that we’re always on the move, [Read more...]

 Here’s another example of a grey area, something we refuse to acknowledge and sweep it under the rug to continue living on as we do. Animals, whether we eat them or play with them in the backyard, are animals to us. It’s strange to know that we categorize them in our hearts and minds, how dogs and cats deserve to not be eaten when it’s perfectly ok to butcher and slice up cows and pigs for our gluttonous pleasure. Yet, in other parts of the world where dogs are considered an edible meat, we cringe away in apathy and denounce the practice. We have these abstract moral lines that are never crossed. It’s ok to feed mice to snakes, yet if we feed them kittens—another form of meat—it’s cruel and induces outrage. Yet, cats eat more meat than snakes, so the anger doesn’t stem from the horror of animals eating meat. Vegetarians claim they don’t eat any meat at all, yet fish is an exception to the rule? And then these self-made rules can be thrown out the window on a whimsical desire to [Read more...]

Journal 14 Reconsider the Lobster               I see my answer to the initial question “what questions would you ask [David Foster Wallace] about this essay?” is quite depthless. I confront the basic moral question he brought up in his essay, but fail to see the bigger picture beyond the morality of butchering living creatures for “our gustatory pleasure” as Wallace says. I can now draw parallels between the different readings. Each passage, from Milford to Pollen to Wallace, confront the idea of human ignorance and refusal to acknowledge basic facts which allows them to continue living on as they do. By deliberately ignoring the cold, hard facts in front of us (about death, the unhealthiness of fast food, and morality of cooking lobsters alive) we are able to push aside our uneasy, unconfronted feelings to continue doing these things that, if we took a closer look, might be in danger of forcing us to change. And in pushing these dark facts under the rug, we continue to feed [Read more...]

Deanna Phipps Journal 14: Dealing with the Living/Dead Podcast   I think it depends on the ritual being performed before deciding if I would be able to participate in the death process of a family member. Being at a crematory, and pushing a button and watching my family member burn (witness cremation) is much different compared to standing by during the embalming process and watching grandpa get pumped full of chemicals. I think Doughty has a right to feel sad and melancholy as she, alone, sends these bodies off into the Netherlands without the family with her. I think our family and friends deserve the respect of having us suck it up, and watch as their corporeal body is returned “ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” That our grief is second to the love and respect our loved ones deserve from us in their time of release.   Doughty wants to humanize the industrial crematorium because of how large a role it plays in our lives and how little we actually know about it. [Read more...]

1. “In an era when huge television audiences watch surgical operations in the comfort of their living rooms, when, thanks to the animated cartoon, the geography of the digestive system has become familiar territory even to the nursery-school set, in a land where the satisfaction of curiosity about almost all matters is a national pastime, surely the secrecy surrounding embalming cannot be attributed to the inherent gruesomeness of the subject.” (pp 44).      The American people have become desensitized to the gruesomeness of the world. We see it on television, in newspapers, enjoy it during video games, the list goes on. Mitford included this passage to exemplify that it is not because of the physically uncomforting parts of embalming that we choose to ignore what goes on behind the scenes. No one knows what this process includes because we refuse to think of how we treat our dead, as if they are a body to be hacked, sewn, pickled, etc. I think that if   2. “Positioning of [Read more...]