RosasGhost
7th August 2014, 23:17
Via SpeciesAndClass dot com
Marxism is self-determination which includes the right to nutritionally dense, delicious food
By Biff Anderson
The key component of Marxism for me is freedom. Another way to say that is the right to self-determination. In the famous Communist Manifesto penned by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels they wrote: “The free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.” Without any food it is obvious one dies of starvation. But without nutritious food a person dies of a slower and less evident starvation. Lack of nutrients and vitamins can cause any number of health problems including reduced immune systems, reduced brain function, organ failure, and of course death. The right to freedom and self-determination includes the right to nutritionally dense food because without that true self-determination is impossible.
Modern food lacks nutrients
Modern food is less rich in nutrients. This is due in part to the erosion of topsoil by the introduction of petroleum-based fertilizers and nitrogen which upset the balance of bacteria in the topsoil that help regulate it. In addition to this, nutrients (vitamins and minerals required by the human body for health) are taken up into the plants as they grow, but are not replaced afterward using current farming and soil management techniques. At this rate all topsoil on the planet may be gone within 48 years.
Meat unfit for human consumption
What makes meat farming a race-to-the-bottom for profits also makes it unfit for human consumption. Cattle are pumped full of antibiotics to prevent infections because it is less expensive than just treating infections as they come up. This reinforces the trend of antibiotic-resistant bacteria which is a serious threat to human health especially in hospitals. Cattle are also injected with testosterone and other growth hormones to artificially promote the growth of muscle and fat and increase the size of the entire animal. The chemicals and effects of these antibiotics, bacteria, and hormones are then passed onto the human that eats it in various ways. Meat recalls because of E. Coli are common. Chickens are so poorly treated that they are fed anti-depressants in an attempt to get them to live long enough to be slaughtered for their meat and for the profit of selling that meat. There is not just the usual physical torture involved in the stunted life of a modern factory farm animal, but chemical and even psychiatric torture as well.
Organic, nutritious food costs much more
The cost of organic food is much higher. There is much more demand for organic food and much less supply. This is desired by organic farmers trying to make profit off of food. It is not desirable for masses of people who actually need nutritious food to live healthy and satisfying lives. Lives they have a right to live, in that manner. Higher prices for organic foods mean that people on the rich side of the income and wealth inequality divide can afford to live healthier lives, effectively making food markets another mechanism that punishes the poor globally.
Food speculators are an enemy of food rights and human rights
Because food, like most other goods and services under post-Neoliberal Capitalism, are treated as a commodity, they are subject to market manipulation by food speculators who profit on the rise in food prices. A speculator has no interest in trading goods. A speculator is only interested in making profit, even moreso than other capitalists. So a speculator will buy a futures contract, and then sell on it before it is due, at a profit. Normally a futures contract is simply an agreement between a buyer and a seller to a price for a product that has not yet been produced. In this case, food. This guarantees the buyer the product at a certain cost and guarantees the seller a buyer and a known revenue. Speculators increase the price of food above what it would have been normally. Speculators who buy and sell commodities futures contracts are an obstacle to the right to nutritious food and human self-determination.
Under capitalism, everything becomes a commodity
“In economics, a commodity is a marketable item produced to satisfy wants or needs. Economic commodities comprise goods and services.”
But under capitalism, everything is a commodity. People no longer grow their own food. Communities no longer even grow their own food, at least in the most economically “developed” nations. Food is a commodity. Even water is a commodity. Human labor is a commodity. Extended logically humans themselves become commodities. Commodities are exchanged on a market according to their exchange-value. An exchange-value is literally just what value the commodity can be exchanged for according to the market. But the use-value is what the thing being traded is actually useful for. We must think about and envision a world where this exchange-value is no longer a part of distributing goods and services. We must envision an alternative to capitalism that doesn’t just fight for a more democratic economy but which abolishes the value-form altogether. At that point labor becomes liberating instead of oppressive. And production becomes both in appearance and reality, a social relation between people, and not an abstract relationship between things. In that world costs would never be cut below what was needed to grow nutritious and therefore much more tasty and satisfying fruits, vegetables, grains and other vegan food.
Make veganism possible
If we are to move from a society that enslaves animals for food to one that liberates animals and nature in addition to liberating humans, then an alternative to a meat-eating diet must be envisioned and made possible. Having a market-based food distribution system that produces less and less nutritious vegan food poses an enormous obstacle to this task. We as a society will have much more success imploring people to give up eating meat or even using any product produced with animal torture, slaughter, and slavery if we are a society that grows and produces vegetable and fruit matter that can maintain a happy and healthy human life. Just asking or demanding that people go vegetarian or vegan is not going to the root of the problem, but going after the symptoms. It may work slightly and temporarily, but it will never succeed in the goal of liberating animals once and for all.
Marxism is self-determination which includes the right to nutritionally dense, delicious food
By Biff Anderson
The key component of Marxism for me is freedom. Another way to say that is the right to self-determination. In the famous Communist Manifesto penned by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels they wrote: “The free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.” Without any food it is obvious one dies of starvation. But without nutritious food a person dies of a slower and less evident starvation. Lack of nutrients and vitamins can cause any number of health problems including reduced immune systems, reduced brain function, organ failure, and of course death. The right to freedom and self-determination includes the right to nutritionally dense food because without that true self-determination is impossible.
Modern food lacks nutrients
Modern food is less rich in nutrients. This is due in part to the erosion of topsoil by the introduction of petroleum-based fertilizers and nitrogen which upset the balance of bacteria in the topsoil that help regulate it. In addition to this, nutrients (vitamins and minerals required by the human body for health) are taken up into the plants as they grow, but are not replaced afterward using current farming and soil management techniques. At this rate all topsoil on the planet may be gone within 48 years.
Meat unfit for human consumption
What makes meat farming a race-to-the-bottom for profits also makes it unfit for human consumption. Cattle are pumped full of antibiotics to prevent infections because it is less expensive than just treating infections as they come up. This reinforces the trend of antibiotic-resistant bacteria which is a serious threat to human health especially in hospitals. Cattle are also injected with testosterone and other growth hormones to artificially promote the growth of muscle and fat and increase the size of the entire animal. The chemicals and effects of these antibiotics, bacteria, and hormones are then passed onto the human that eats it in various ways. Meat recalls because of E. Coli are common. Chickens are so poorly treated that they are fed anti-depressants in an attempt to get them to live long enough to be slaughtered for their meat and for the profit of selling that meat. There is not just the usual physical torture involved in the stunted life of a modern factory farm animal, but chemical and even psychiatric torture as well.
Organic, nutritious food costs much more
The cost of organic food is much higher. There is much more demand for organic food and much less supply. This is desired by organic farmers trying to make profit off of food. It is not desirable for masses of people who actually need nutritious food to live healthy and satisfying lives. Lives they have a right to live, in that manner. Higher prices for organic foods mean that people on the rich side of the income and wealth inequality divide can afford to live healthier lives, effectively making food markets another mechanism that punishes the poor globally.
Food speculators are an enemy of food rights and human rights
Because food, like most other goods and services under post-Neoliberal Capitalism, are treated as a commodity, they are subject to market manipulation by food speculators who profit on the rise in food prices. A speculator has no interest in trading goods. A speculator is only interested in making profit, even moreso than other capitalists. So a speculator will buy a futures contract, and then sell on it before it is due, at a profit. Normally a futures contract is simply an agreement between a buyer and a seller to a price for a product that has not yet been produced. In this case, food. This guarantees the buyer the product at a certain cost and guarantees the seller a buyer and a known revenue. Speculators increase the price of food above what it would have been normally. Speculators who buy and sell commodities futures contracts are an obstacle to the right to nutritious food and human self-determination.
Under capitalism, everything becomes a commodity
“In economics, a commodity is a marketable item produced to satisfy wants or needs. Economic commodities comprise goods and services.”
But under capitalism, everything is a commodity. People no longer grow their own food. Communities no longer even grow their own food, at least in the most economically “developed” nations. Food is a commodity. Even water is a commodity. Human labor is a commodity. Extended logically humans themselves become commodities. Commodities are exchanged on a market according to their exchange-value. An exchange-value is literally just what value the commodity can be exchanged for according to the market. But the use-value is what the thing being traded is actually useful for. We must think about and envision a world where this exchange-value is no longer a part of distributing goods and services. We must envision an alternative to capitalism that doesn’t just fight for a more democratic economy but which abolishes the value-form altogether. At that point labor becomes liberating instead of oppressive. And production becomes both in appearance and reality, a social relation between people, and not an abstract relationship between things. In that world costs would never be cut below what was needed to grow nutritious and therefore much more tasty and satisfying fruits, vegetables, grains and other vegan food.
Make veganism possible
If we are to move from a society that enslaves animals for food to one that liberates animals and nature in addition to liberating humans, then an alternative to a meat-eating diet must be envisioned and made possible. Having a market-based food distribution system that produces less and less nutritious vegan food poses an enormous obstacle to this task. We as a society will have much more success imploring people to give up eating meat or even using any product produced with animal torture, slaughter, and slavery if we are a society that grows and produces vegetable and fruit matter that can maintain a happy and healthy human life. Just asking or demanding that people go vegetarian or vegan is not going to the root of the problem, but going after the symptoms. It may work slightly and temporarily, but it will never succeed in the goal of liberating animals once and for all.