Personal food preferences aren’t really a rational choice. They’re more like an ideology that’s bordering on a religion.
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Gillian McCann, associate professor of religious studies at Nipissing University in Ontario, and her co-author, Gitte Bechsgaard, founder of the Vidya Institute in Toronto, have written a book called The Sacred in Exile, What it Really Means to Lose Our Religion. It was released this fall.
In one part of the book, the two write about how food has become more important than church or religion for part of the population.
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Put another way, people who eat organic or avoid genetically modified food are part of a group with common ethics. And the members of that group likely believe that their values are superior to people not in the group.
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McCann and Bechsgaard write that this idea of ethical purity can lead to a “sort of food fundamentalism,” or fanatical values and beliefs around food.
The authors also refer to the idea that there are different “dietary faiths,” which could mean that organic food is one type of religion and veganism is a different sect.
If beliefs around food are like a religion for at least a portion of Canadians, it might explain why science isn’t a great way to defend agricultural practices.
The GLP aggregated and excerpted this article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion and analysis. Read full, original post: Food fundamentalism: is food the new religion?
