Not long ago, I spoke to a teacher who had recently shownย Food, Inc.ย to her class, and she asked me my opinion ofย Cowspiracy. I told her it was equivalent to what I shovel out of the cattle pens …. [E]ven though most [documentaries] will be somewhat biased …. these food and ag docs are most often marketed as the definitive answer on a particular subject matter (such as biotech,ย nutrition, orย soil).
[Editor’s note: Jonathan Lawler operates Brandywine Creek Farms in Indiana and is an advocate for hunger relief and agriculture.]
Consider a National Geographic documentary on crocodiles, for example. You donโt walk away saying, โThose crocodiles are evil and greedy; why do they kill so many buffalo and why do they trick them by pretending to be logs?โ Of course you donโt, because the documentary director is just โฆ well โฆ documenting.
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Why state the obvious? Because these food/farm docs are doing the opposite. They take the common world view of farmers feeding the masses and then scream, โGuess What! Not only are farmers not feeding you, they are actually poisoning you!โ
At some point, I was approached by a documentary filmmaker and asked if I would be interested in appearing in her film. She was nice enough, just misguided. I thought the exposure would be good for our farm …. I think the last straw for me was being asked if I grew โchemical free.โ How could I answer that? I used toxic chemicals in organic farming ….
