Steel Lettuce?

I am married to someone who has a degree in chemical engineering, and another degree in metallurgical engineering.  He laughs at the very term "organic food".

What, he says, is the alternative?  Inorganic food?

Then he collapses into the giggles.

(For those of you who aren't chemists, "organic" in chemistry just means "with carbon"; "inorganic" would apply to things like steel or possibly molybdenum.)

Nobody with a TV or a parenting magazine can be ignorant that All The Best People use organics these days.  By organic, they mean nothing clearly defined, but something more along the lines of "natural, without chemicals and pesticides and preservatives, and probably in some sort of recycled packaging, possibly with a happy cow on the front".

The claims are vast--organic food is better for you, better for the environment, and better for farmers.  Organic food will cure your diabetes, your autism, and your asthma.  Organic food is what Responsible Parents give their children.

Inorganic--sorry, "conventional"--food, on the other hand, is supposed to be the cause of a whole host of ills, from obesity to how dumb children are these days.

So here, in no particular order, is my debunking of the Organic mythos:

1. Organic food is not chemical-free food.

1. a) Organic food does not mean you love the planet more.

You'd think this would be obvious, given how everything on earth is made of chemicals, but hey, let's say "poison chemicals" and use the word how people use it conversationally.

You'd think with such high-falutin' claims that there would be some sort of research on the topic. Like, how much of a pesticide load does an organic apple carry vs. a conventional apple (easily testable, you'd think) and does the pesticide load of a conventional apple do any demonstrable harm to humans (perhaps not so easily testable)?
Alas, I haven't seen such research. I've seen claims that organic apples don't have particular icky poisons on them, but then I have to wonder what the farmers DO use, considering that even my two apple trees had to be treated to prevent boring beetles from killing them last year, with a pesticide.

The research I've seen is somewhat interesting: organic farmers use pesticides and fertilizers, just not the same pesticides as conventional farmers. For instance, organic farmers spray "BT", which is the abbreviation for a bacteria, on plants as a pesticide. This is ok. But for some reason it is not okay to use genetically modified (read: hybrid) cotton that's been impregnanted with BT, minimizing the need for spraying (and the hazards to humans involved). It's ok to use copper as a fertilizer, although it never breaks down and can contaminate groundwater, but not nitrogen, even though it does break down when it is used by the plants and even though the EPA has rules about whether it can get into the groundwater.

a) There is no evidence that pesticides and fertilizers used by organic farmers are any better for the soil and groundwater than pesticides and fertilizers used in conventional agriculture.  It seems like they should be, but in reality whether your nitrogen is from a nozzle or from six truckloads of pig poop, you are still putting nitrogen in the groundwater.  Ya dig?

2. Buying Organic food does not mean you are sticking it to the man.

A lot of arguments about/for organic food respond to criticisms by saying "Well, of course!  That's what the USDA/FDA would say--they're always supporting conventional agriculture and the big food companies!  Didn't you see Food Inc.?"

This argument is often made smugly by someone chomping on a carrot from a package by Earthbound Farms, which, if you didn't know, is owned by Kraft Foods.

That's right.  Most of the organic food you see in supermarkets?  It's produced by the same big food companies that produce the conventional food.  So unless you're buying all your organic food at a (local) farmer's market or growing it yourself, you are not supporting small farms.

3. Buying Organic food does not mean you are automatically buying healthy food.

I have a jar of organic animal crackers on my counter, mostly because there was no conventional animal crackers at Costco on the day I needed animal crackers.  They have no high-fructose corn syrup in them, but they have just as much sugar as the regular kind and are probably not the thing you should base your diet around.

I have also seen organic mac n' cheese, organic chips, organic chocolate, and organic cheese.  I'm just sayin'.  It's possible to get heart disease eating high-fat organic soy patties just as it is eating burgers.

4. Buying Organic food does not make you a better parent.

Ouch.  This one is tough for people to hear.  Here is the truth: people want a way to measure their righteousness.  Martha Beck, in Expecting Adam, tells about being an atheist student at Harvard trying to make sense of being pregnant with a baby diagnosed with Down's Syndrome.  She admits to studying everything about it she could get her hands on, as "my secular humanist's way of trying to sacrifice the right goat".

Parents have so much tied up in their kids, and so little way of recieving feedback reliably.  Does your baby sleep through the night?  No?  Why not?  Does your baby ever sleep in your bed?  Does your baby always sleep in his own bed?  What kind of clothes do they wear?  Cloth or disposable diapers?  Spanking or no spanking?  Schedules or no schedules?  Do they play outside every day?  How much do you bathe them, once or twice a day?  Too much!  Not enough!

There are dissenting voices on every parenting topic under the sun, but pretty much nobody is against organic food.  The people who are unconvinced of its benefits see nothing harmful about a carrot, be it organic or conventional, and the people who believe organic is better see it as a divine right of childhood to have "real organic lettuce".  (Like as opposed to steel lettuce?)

So a parent can buy Good Earth Organic wheat teething biscuts (I buy them because they don't make as big a mess as the Gerber ones) and feel that here, at least, is one decision s/he can be sure of.

The problem?  There's not a shred of proof that organic is any better for children than conventional.  And parents who don't have a lot of money are going to have a hard time affording organic food (thrice the cost at my local supermarket), let alone organic cotton clothing, organic crib mattresses (they have those) and organic diapers (yep).
 
But let's be honest, a lot of the Organic stuff is the premium stuff--it's fancier, prettier, and certainly more stylish.  Which brings us to point five:

5. Organic is not a "movement", it's a fashion.

Gasp!  What?  How can something so widespread be a mere fashion?  How can I think that?  Clearly Americans have finally figured out that their diets are vastly wrong, right?  They demanded change with their dollars and got it!

Well, sure, but I remember a couple of other times that products began showing up on supermarket shelves, and they're not really there anymore.  For instance, low-fat.

Remember the low-fat thing?  Susan Powers?  "The fat makes you fat"?  Yeah.

How about Dr. Atkins?  The low-carb thing?  Remember when you could get low-carb bread, low-carb wraps, low-carb candy, everything?  Yeah.

So forgive me if I'm not buying the idea that organic food isn't going to go the same way, particularly if we are really having an "extended economic downturn", and most people simply can't pay a premium on their food.

But why, if what you say is true, do so many people buy organic religiously?

Well, that's the kicker, isn't it?  Religiously?

It's very tempting to have a way to measure our righteousness so that we come out better than our neighbors.  Whether we do this by the clothes we wear ("I wear headcoverings."  "Oh really? Well I wear only skirts." "Oh really? Well I wear only organic natural fibers.") or our political leanings ("I marched in a peace rally."  "Oh yeah? I held a sign that said 'no gay marriage'.") or our food choices ("I keep kosher."  "Oh really? Well, I eat all organic."  "Oh yeah? Well, I eat organic, seasonal, and local."), we are still only manufacturing false righteousness.

I'm not saying that anybody who enjoys organic food is being a Pharisee.  But that's the way to tell: do you enjoy it, like a hobby or any other taste--a taste for orange juice instead of grape juice, say?  Or are you stressed and worried about it?  Perhaps you can't find organic toothpaste.  Do you sit and worry that your teeth are bathed in bad chemicals and (saints forfend!) fluoride?  Do you insist that other people conform to your organic-ness, to the point of toting food with you when you go to someone's house?  Do you secretly think that people who could afford organic food but choose not to are being irresponsible?

In the end, it's simple:

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear.

Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?

Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?

Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.

If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.

Each day has enough trouble of its own."

--Matthew 6: 25-34

Cheers,

Breanna