Food Over-Security

The first Paper I wrote in English 101 was about Food Insecurity, which plagues 14% of people in the United States. A large part of my paper was about the link between obesity and food insecurity - in the US, it is easy to imagine someone who is poor and fat, because healthy food is more expensive.

On this week of Halloween, the unhealthy food is FREE. What a perfect holiday to describe what is wrong with the glorification of corn syrup! Free sugar-highs, free fat, free cavities!

On Wednesday, I hung out with some homeless kids and took them trick-or-treating and felt the twinge of regret about the cultural norms that makes this the "right" things to do. However as I joined in eating a rice-crispy and painted fake blood (who knows how many carcinogens are in that dye?) on their faces, I was proud of them, I was happy that they were happy, and I loved watching them ask for cheap Mexican candy from the flower shops on their street. Despite what I know about food security, the homeless, and government-subsidized-GMO-cornsyrup, I'm still a sucker for Halloween.

Devil's Advocate

Playing the Devil's advocate is not usually encouraged. I still do it all the time, but people get annoyed.

Examples:

- "OK, but let's ASSUME that gravity is real, Anna...I know it's just a "theory," but stop playing Devil's Advocate. Please."

- "You're seriously going to argue that because the world could end tomorrow, you want to give away all your possessions?"

- "Anna, comparing playing Piano with your toes to Trigonometry is not a valid argument"

I will continue to play Devil's Advocate inside and outside of class however, because often, there is true benefit to playing with an argument, just for "fun."

Of Enthymemes and Babies

While last week's class was hectic, the presence of a baby in the classroom was as educational for me as anything that my professor could have talked about.

I had never seen a baby in a classroom before. It was a shock to my thought process as the two worlds proved completely incompatible. I've spent time as a nanny, but usually, when I'm in class, or on campus, I forget about the existence of babies. I even forget the fact that every student used to be a baby, or that in the future my friends will have babies of their own. In college, everyone is a functioning adult and no one has time to reflect on the cycle of life that begot us.

I saw how difficult it is for a Professor to keep talking while her baby is on her hip, how challenging it must be to pursue a career and raise a child at the same time. I realized that, no matter how much we pretend that we are immortally 21 year olds in college, the time will come when I may not care what kind of syllogistic argument I'm making as a plead with my child to eat her vegetables.

I think it was useful to have a baby in the classroom; it made me think about what it means to be a potentially-baby-making educated woman.

God skinned an animal?

Last week in class we talked about biblical references to food in the context of the moral eating of animals.

I'm a PK, (Pastor's Kid, duh.) so I didn't think that I would learn anything new.

However, as usual when I take a thousandth look at the Bible, I discovered something I'd never even thought of before.

Remington brought up a fascinating point about the first garments of Adam and Eve. God killed an animal to clothe them. I've always thought of God's relationship to animals as a caring one - God knows when "the sparrows fall" as Jesus explained in Matthew. However, caring for an animal and killing it may not be incompatible. Although I still see God's relationship to all of creation as a loving one, this Genesis passage made me think about how this love is manifested. God directly killed an animal and skinned it for Adam and Eve to wear. This relates directly to our class discussions about eating meat responsibly. I believe these verses show that it is possible to use animals for clothing and food in a responsible and moral way according to the Judeo-Christian tradition.

If God did it, so can we.