Vegetarian Star

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Michael Pollan sat down for an interview with MSNBC’s Lifeline to discuss the benefits of organic food.

He highlights recent studies demonstrating that higher levels of organophosphates in a child’s urine is associated with higher levels of ADHD.

“That doesn’t prove cause and effect, but it’s a powerful and alarming correlation and a pretty good argument for trying to keep these things out of your children’s body.”

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"The Omnivore's Dilemma" Michael Pollan

The National Association of Scholars has compiled a report titled “What Do Colleges Want Students to Read Outside Class?” that accuses colleges of designing summer reading programs for incoming freshman that include books aimed to “either explicitly promote a liberal political agenda or advance a liberal interpretation of events.”

Michael Pollan‘s “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” is on the association’s list and is said to be “promoting environmentalism and animal rights.” Yes, a real waste of reading, that’s for sure.

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"Food Rules" Michael Pollan

Flexitarian Michael Pollan, author of books such as The Omnivore’s Dilemma, has more than a few vegetarian friendly suggestions in his latest book, Food Rules, among the list of 64 principles to healthier eating that are accompanied with a paragraph explanation.

Like eating things with one leg.

Eating what stands on one leg [mushrooms and plant foods] is better than eating what stands on two legs [fowl], which is better than eating what stands on four legs [cows, pigs and other mammals].

Our notes: “Eating” can also be extended to drinking, so you may also want to include cow’s milk if you’re following that rule.

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Author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma Michael Pollan has written an article for the June 2010 edition of the New York Review of Books chronicling various food movements in history.

“Among the many threads of advocacy that can be lumped together under that rubric we can include school lunch reform; the campaign for animal rights and welfare; the campaign against genetically modified crops; the rise of organic and locally produced food; efforts to combat obesity and type 2 diabetes; “food sovereignty” (the principle that nations should be allowed to decide their agricultural policies rather than submit to free trade regimes); farm bill reform; food safety regulation; farmland preservation; student organizing around food issues on campus; efforts to promote urban agriculture and ensure that communities have access to healthy food; initiatives to create gardens and cooking classes in schools; farm worker rights; nutrition labeling; feedlot pollution; and the various efforts to regulate food ingredients and marketing, especially to kids.”

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Michael Pollan has been named of the most influential people of 2010 on Time Magazine‘s annual list.

Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, who’s criticized the unfit conditions for humans and animals in factory farms, can still be considered a vegetarian’s ally, despite his reluctance to go any further than advocating less meat.

Alice Waters has written his bio:

“Unwilling to accept the food industry’s account of where beef comes from, Michael bought a steer in Kansas to follow the life cycle of a kernel of corn from the laboratory to the feed bin to the restaurant where the beef is served. It’s a harrowing tale, and since the moment I heard him tell it, I have not served corn-fed beef of any kind. I was Pollanized — and I am not alone.”

“In the Oscar-nominated documentary Food, Inc. and in his books Food Rules and The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael, 55, tells complex stories in an engaging voice. When he speaks live, I’ve seen thousands grip their seats as they realize what our food system has become and how badly we need to fix it.”

The full list of Time’s Most Influential People can be viewed here.

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“To the extent we push meat a little bit to the side and move vegetables to the center of our diet, we’re also going to be a lot healthier.”

–Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food, in an article from CNN on Meatless Mondays.

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Alice Waters is one of the Michael Pollans in the food world.

Not vegetarian, and maybe showing no intentions of going there, she does support eating less meat and using locally grown items to lessen our environmental impact.

One way to get people to eat less meat is to raise the price of it.

Organic, grass fed varieties of meat cost more, and if more people who are part time vegetarians choose to only buy this option, it may greatly reduce the number of animals being raised for food.

“I eat meat, but no meat that isn’t pastured is acceptable, and we probably need to eat a whole lot less.,” Waters told MNN. “But by choosing to eat only pasture-fed, that encourages you to eat differently: “If I can’t get real meat, I don’t want it.” And since it’s more expensive, you’re inclined to eat less.”

What’s your take on Water’s opinion?

Will promoting the consumption of only pasture fed or “ethically raised” meat effectively lessen the numbers of animals raised for food?

Would it be easier to get people to spend more money to only buy these types of meats or convince them eating no meat at all is a better option?

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Author Michael Pollan hasn’t always expressed warm feelings for the vegetarian and vegan community, but in a recent interview with Time magazine, he said he has “enormous respect for vegetarians,” and eats a lot less meat than in the past.

In an exclusive interview with the Huffington Post, Pollan gave his thoughts on animal rights, criticizer of factory farming and author Jonathan Safran Foer and even Oprah.

That’s quite a combination, and here are a few highlights.

On Foer and “Eating Animals”
In terms of the argument that I don’t grapple with meat, I would refer Jonathan and anyone else to Chapter…hold on, I can dig it out… (flips through book)…it’s a very long…Chapter 17 of Omnivore’s Dilemma, “The Ethics of Eating Animals.” And that is where I try to grapple with the best arguments against meat eating, which in my view are Peter Singer’s arguments, and defend a very limited kind of meat eating, which is the kind I do.

On Animal Rights:
I think one of the changes you’ve seen in the animals right’s community in the last five or ten years is a lot more interest in mitigating the worst abuses of animal agriculture …which I think is a more realistic goal than abolition.

On Oprah Winfrey:
She had a very bad run-in with the cattle industry, and she doesn’t want to spend any more time in court, so it was much to her credit and it took a certain courage for her to air the issues and show clips from Food Inc., especially, and to have me on, and the fact that she was willing to re-engage on these issues of factory farming was all to her credit.

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