Michael Pollan!

I saw Michael Pollan! The superstar of the sustainable food movement! Yes, that same guy who wrote The Omnivore´s Dilemma! He was amazing. He came in with a burger from McDonald´s, four cups, and a bottle filled with a dark, viscous liquid. Oil. He poured the thick brown stuff into the cups. Yes, it takes 26 ounces of oil, or more than 3 cups, to produce a burger. This will release 13 pounds of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Pollan tasted a drop of water on his finger. “Disgusting!” he said. Then he added, “Don´t worry, it´s just chocolate syrup!” But then he rubbed it in again. “We´re eating oil and spewing greenhouse gases.”
Pollan emphasized how long the movement has gone in the last three years since his bestseller was published. People´s discontent with the American food lobby is now reflected in mainstream media; this year´s movie Food, Inc. reiterates the issues; and Obama is planning reforms. “These fringy voices are now inside,” Pollan said. But still, he openly talked of the “catastrophe of the American diet.” That guy has no mercy.
Pollan is no longer merely a “reporter.” “Activist” describes his occupation way better these days. He has a clear agenda of what needs to be changed about the system. First, farm policy. New incentives should reward farmers for growing diverse crops rather than monocultures, for keeping the fields green more days per year, and for reducing artificial fertilizers and pesticides. Second, new marketplaces and distribution networks. We need to rebuild the routes so that salmon from Alaska is no longer filleted in China and flown back into the US. We need to decentralize the system and keep it based on the land, not floating on oil. Third, ourselves. We need a food culture that doesn´t stem from the values of “fast, cheap and easy.” We need gardens, and longer lunch times, and we need to start cooking again.


(This is us following Pollan's advice in practice)


We need to be conscious and involved consumers. We need to organize ourselves and stand up for a cleaner environment and healthier people. We need the social movement to grow so that change can work on a higher, political level. Gandhi named four stages of the resistance movement: First, they ignore you. Then, they ridicule you. Then they fight you. And then you win. Pollan said that we´re in the third stage now. “We´re against powerful forces,” he said. “It won´t be easy.”
It is now 7 years since I saw Hair for the first time. And finally, here I am, in San Francisco of all places, taking part in the hippie movement of my own generation. It is time for regeneration. I´m with 2,500 beautiful people who want to live and eat together and tune in with nature and build a better society.