Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal

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Summary: Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlossen: A REVIEW BY B. REYNOLDS
Review: The ends justify the means and in the fast food industry the ends justify a meticulous path towards poverty, disease, obesity, and an assault on American democracy. Eric Schlossen illustrates in the book Fast Food Nation that the fast food industry is a metaphor for the commodification of our culture and how it institutionalizes the disintegration of the well being of the middle and welfare classes.
Fast Food Nation takes you through a rigorous journey from the regurgitation of a hamburger on to the tray and back to McDonald's counter. From there the burger is unwrapped from is colorful paper, slapped back onto the grill, re-frozen, and sent back to the processing plant. The journey does not end here however, because the burger is dissected and taken back to the farm where the cow is revitalized and enabled to graze off the vast American pasture. Eric Schlossen, in Fast Food Nation, backtracks the reader through the industry's processes and emphasizes viewing the industry and all of it's components in small factions demonstrating all of the unintended consequences of our laissez-faire culture.
"This is an industry that both feeds and feeds off the young," (Schlossen 9). Schlossen points out that children are being exploited because of the marketing focus towards children as well as the necessity of children in the restaurant work force. The pay is so outlandishly low and since such a vast majority of the welfare class have participated in this employment, which no skills are gained from, they are left to a life of dismay. This aspect of poverty disgusts me when taking into account how much the small percentage of people at the top actually benefit from this exploitation.
Besides the exploitation of children and impoverishing the people of this country, the industry also impairs the vitality of our democracy. Schlossen alludes to the idea that subsidies to the meat industry are the only reason the industry is still making it possible to thrive. Small business have the life squeezed out of them and don't have a fair chance at surviving in this industry. This concerns me greatly, because it is threatens democracy and inhibits the right of the average person (public) to compete, and competition is one sign of the vital democracy. Schlossen also mentions how lobbyists make it possible for corporations to be the most powerful political force by keeping restriction laws on quality from ever going into action. I agree with Schlossen because corporations are the biggest special interest group that donate the most money into the government. Corporations political sway has led to a lacking restriction for things like contaminated meat and the safety of immigrant workers.
Fast Food Nation, although very vivid and disturbing is an excellent facade of American culture. Schlossen supplies the reader with all of unintended consequences that this booming industry has created. He mentions similar industries, but the McDonald's example is the easiest and most universally understood. A detailed look is given at this capstone industry and has proved to be very effective in mapping the direction our culture has gone up to where we are now. I would definitely recommend this book if you want to understand all the most malevolent aspects of industries like McDonald's.

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Summary: Fast Food, Anyone?
Review: About three years ago, during my short stint as a drivers' education instructor, I noticed something I considered very odd at Madison's Memorial High School. There is quite an impressive bank of soda machines along the wall opposite the front door. And, as if this weren't enough to shock me, there is a Big Mike's Super Subs stand in the cafeteria. This would have never been acceptable when I was in high school! Why is this marketing to children tolerated, and seemingly encouraged? As is illustrated in Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation, our 'fast food culture' has become just that.

Schlosser began this book with the deceptively quaint story of the Carl's Jr. restaurants. In just a few pages I would learn exactly how incongruous this charming story is within Schlosser's rant about the 'big business' of fast food. I found myself rooting for Carl Karcher, all the while anticipating the underlying immorality the book is intended to portray.

Fast Food Nation is very easy to read and interesting, but is also very bogged down with excessive details. Schlosser painstakingly describes potato dehydration and reformulation (including the added 'bonus' of beef products), paying attention to every detail. Yet he makes no mention of the sheer volume of paper products, and even FOAM in the past, that is wasted and now clutters our landfills.. The individual, colorful packaging, especially that of children's meals and toys, is unbelievable. I am ashamed to say I visited a White Castle in Chicago a couple of weekends ago and was appalled at the presentation: individual five-sided cardboard boxes for each two inch square 'burger'.

Schlosser also wrote of the working conditions of the meat packing plants. The descriptions of rendering, dreadful injuries, and non-English-speaking immigrant workers were reminiscent of Upton Sinclair's 1906 novel The Jungle. It is extremely obvious that conditions and regulation enforcement have, unfortunately, not changed noticeably in the industry in the past century. On top of all this, E. coli is a very real risk and the information Schlosser gives about the deadly Shiga virus is enough to scare anyone off of beef for life.

Back to my previous question: Why is marketing to children tolerated? The answer is more complex than I at first thought. Much school funding by the government has been cut and these advertising dollars replace lost revenue for the schools. What about the 'lost' emphasis on nutrition education? Surely this sends a hypocritical message, and the children of today will certainly 'pay' for this in the long run, with obesity epidemics.

The moral of this book is best summed up in the following sentence. 'Nobody in the United States is forced to buy fast food'stop buying it.' (Fast Food Nation, pg.269) I strongly urge you to follow Schlosser's advice.

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Summary: Fast Food for Thought
Review: Fast Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser, is an enlightening and entertaining work that outlines the development of the fast food industry. It also explains how it affected the economy and culture of the United States, and how it is currently affecting the global economy and global perspectives. In the United States, the Speedee Service System, the system made popular by McDonalds restaurants, has influenced industries far removed from food service. The idea of teaching workers to repeatedly perform one simple task has allowed these industries to employ uneducated workers, and keep them uneducated. Though I had been aware of this practice, I was amazed to find out that fast food chains were rewarded with large tax breaks for high turn over rates of minimum wage workers. The government justifies this by claiming that these restaurants allow new workers to enter the work force; however, these mostly immigrant workers are not trained in job skills, or even communication, and a closer look at the political associations gives reason for thought.
I also applaud Schlosser for his objectivity, particularly in the sections regarding obesity in the U.S. and the fast food industry. Although the book is decidedly anti-fast food, it does give credit where credit is due. Schlosser admits that fast food tastes good, and that those individuals responsible for the large fast food chains had, for the most part, started from nothing and earned their wealth through shrewd investments and hard work (and the hard work of the minimum wage laborers they employed). It is an easy-to-manipulate, widely known fact that the American population is dangerously overweight, and Schlosser provides documented statistics relevant to the rise of this trend. However, rather than blaming this increase mainly on the fast food industry, Schlosser admits that Americans have an increasingly sedative lifestyle, but he does not exclude the effects of high-fat, low nutrition, timely, affordable meals provided by fast food chains. One fast food meal can easily provide more calories than is recommended for consumption in an entire day, and Schlosser points out that the spread of McDonalds to Asian countries directly correlates with the rise of obesity in these countries.
Schlosser also faults fast food companies, particularly McDonalds, for advertising to children. Children are unable to rationally determine that McDonald's hamburgers and fries do not provide a balanced nutritional meal. They are taken in by the clowns and cheap toys, and grow up with fond memories that cause them to return with increasing frequency in their later, more stressful, adult years. Advertising to young children is illegal in Europe, and although advertising cigarettes to minors is illegal in the U.S., all attempts to regulate other advertisements directed at young children have been unsuccessful. It is arguable that the effects of obesity, which is rising at alarming rate in the juvenile population, are equally or even more dangerous than the effects of tobacco.
Schlosser gives a very thorough, but never tedious, look at the fast food industry and its effects on the population. I found the Fast Food Nation to be extremely fair and illuminating, and I highly recommend the book.

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Summary: Fast Food Will Never Be The Same
Review: Schlosser's book is more than just the story of how the third most populous nation in the world has become dependent on greasy, quick food, but rather deals with a variety of issues ranging from the history of the fast food industry in the United States to the horrors of the meatpacking industry in the U.S., to the teenage employees who handle the millions of orders across the country everyday.

Schlosser begins by recounting to the reader the success stories of the fast food industry's founding fathers and how a bunch of hot dog carts amidst the drive-in post World War II culture in southern California grew to be internationally recognized and dominant powers. He relates the story of the McDonald's brothers and their Speedee Service Famous Hamburger restaurant in San Bernardino and a brilliant salesman from Illinois named Ray Kroc, the mastermind behind what we now know as McDonald's. The beginnings of Carl's Jr., and Kentucky Fried Chicken (which, by the way, opened its first store in Salt Lake City in 1952) are also told by Schlosser.

Schlosser also notes that the fast food industry in the U.S. is the largest multinational industry in the world that depends largely on young, unskilled, immigrant, and sometimes illiterate workers to handle the work load. Managers of restaurants are usually in their twenties and the lack of specific training to operate any of the equipment in a fast food restaurant allows the industry to continue to replace employees at an alarming rate. The author notes that the average fast food employee is only employed between three to four months before he or she quits or leaves their job. The desperation for temporary employment for many of the fast food chain's workers causes them to settle for minimum wage and allows the industry to pocket a much higher profit because the vast majority of employees do not stay long enough to receive the benefits offered by most chains.

Schlosser then takes the reader into the secret world where the fast food flavors and smells are manufactured, Yup, I said it, manufactured. The familiar smells of fresh fries and hamburger patties from behind the counter at our local McDonald's are largely the outcome of years of research and hard work by food scientists in large factories just off the New Jersey Turnpike, the same factories that manufacture six of the ten best-selling perfumes in the country. These artificial flavors are completely safe, remarks Schlosser, and appear in some form in most of the foods Americans eat today.

The book then journeys from the flavor factories of New Jersey to the slaughterhouses and meat packing plants of the Midwest. As a warning, the several chapters dealing with meat are not recommended for those with a weak stomach. Schlosser reveals some of the terrors of the meat packing industry. He tells of everything, from how the E-Coli breakouts across the country in the past decade started, to the stories of the occasional illegal immigrant who accidentally loses a body part in the meat-grinding machine. The author claims the worst and some of the most dangerous jobs in the country are those found inside of a slaughterhouse and recounts many gruesome personal stories from interviews he conducted over the course of his research. However, almost a century later, much of Fast Food Nation still reads like Upton Sinclair's famous 1906 work, The Jungle, the book that exposed the disgusting conditions of the Chicago slaughterhouses at the turn of the century and forced President Theodore Roosevelt and Congress to enact food safety legislation. The meat packing industry has since developed one of the strongest lobbying groups in Washington and uses their power to manipulate what will bring them the most profit, many times with little regard to their workers or safety conditions.

The final chapter deals with the global repercussions of the American fast food industry and the backlash the industry has received recently from around the world. McDonald's and other American fast food restaurants have been blamed by many for trying to homogenize the entire world with hamburgers, fries, and a smile. I however, have traveled briefly overseas at various occasions and can testify that McDonald's fries do taste the same throughout the world, and that the golden arches are often times a welcome sight to the overseas American.

In the end, Schlosser proposes a plan to his readers telling what and how to clean up the fast food industry. He also encourages readers to choose wisely.¡§Nobody in the United States is forced to buy fast food," he remarks. The billion dollar grossing fast food companies are here to give us what we, the consumers, want, and until we demand something different or better, we will continue to get it their way.

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Summary: America's Fast Food Problem
Review: From the southern California drive-in restaurants of the early 1940s to the fast food restaurants of today, much has changed over the last sixty years. For one thing, people are becoming fatter. This phenomenon is not just taking place in the US, but in other countries as well. People now have the excuse not to cook and opt for easier solutions to feed themselves and others. In Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser covers everything about the fast food empire, from its origins to a detailed description of what goes into creating a product. Some of the truths he uncovers are painful to read, but are important in understanding the process.
In particular, the stories about the unsanitary conditions of meatpacking plants and the number of accidents that occur there made me cringe. These unsanitary conditions especially raise the concern of what we put in our mouths. With the recent epidemics of E. coli and mad-cow disease, people are now aware that meat is not 100% safe to eat. Not only has bacteria infested meat been found in fast food restaurants, but in grocery stores across the country as well. Where we choose to buy our food though will help reduce the problem of eating low-quality meat.
Eric Schlosser's main reason for writing this book is to make people think before they eat. He sees the fast food empire as taking over peoples' lives and creating problems. These days, fast food restaurants are all over the place. However, as more restaurants are opening, the quality of food is deteriorating. Unfortunately, this dilemna is not changing the weight problem of America. Instead, people are continuing to go to these places, and as a result, are getting lazier and fatter. Maybe after reading this book, people will think twice about going to fast food restaurants.
Although this book is very well written, the author doesn't talk about what would happen if people stopped going to fast food restaurants. He is obviously against the fast food empire for several various reasons. I agree that the quality of fast food and service is poor most of the time, and that Americans in particular have serious eating issues. But at the same time, the economy depends on the fast food restaurants. Millions of people are employed either at the restaurants or through indirect ways. If the entire empire were to go out of business, then millions of people would be unemployed. I think that this would lead to more violence and chaos in America. Also, I don't think that fast food restaurants are evil. I have to admit that the occasional McDonald's or Wendy's is a nice treat when I am sick of cooking.

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Summary: The Truth Behind the Fast Food Industry
Review: Erik Schlosser's book, Fast Food Nation, provides a unique analysis of the food Americans consume and where it comes from. He reveals many shocking secrets of the fast food industry that are kept from the public regarding sanitation, food quality, and the mysterious economics behind their success. The book kept me on the edge of my seat and stirred up feelings of anger as I learned how the fast food industry works, taking advantage of poor franchise owners and poor packing and slaughter house workers. I also realized how its development of monotonous chain restaurants also changed America for the worse, by putting private companies and farmers out of business and creating an empire that controls crop and livestock pricing and lessens government regulation laws on meat and plant safety. It is really frustrating that we trust these things to be fair and safe and in reality they are not. Schlosser gave me reason to further doubt the fast food industry providing me with negative implications at every level, not with just the bad images I had previously with the unhealthy food.

Schlosser does a good job portraying information in a story-like way giving anecdotes of people he met in the industry to link readers' emotions with the trouble and prosperity they are experiencing. For instance he tells many stories of people he met working at fast food restaurants and slaughter houses who are overworked, underpaid, and spontaneously fired. These companies do not care about their employees, but only about a profit, something which is a big problem in today's society. He also gives examples of workers who have been injured or even killed in slaughter houses and receive no medical benefits. I was very disturbed by the section describing the meat processing procedure. I cannot believe that regulations by the government are so light regarding sanitation for meat and that fast food industries get away with manipulating the laws in order to keep practicing these unsafe, but economically cheap processes. Reading about this really opened my eyes to what goes on behind the scenes in big corporations and really encompassed me to want to do something about this unfair dictatorship the fast food industry runs, which I think is part of what Schlosser intended in writing the book.

I think that this book carries a powerful message that things are not often as good as they seem which Schlosser demonstrates by showing how America has changed for the worse since the fast food industry was erected. We are losing the unique landscape and our traditional values at the expense of having a McDonalds at every corner with cheap food for our convenience. The book was a great resource to me to confirm my suspicions of the fast food industry's sanitation and food quality as well as to introduce unfavorable feelings of the industry based on its economic manipulation of laws. I know that it is not the only industry to do so, but it gives Americans a bad reputation that our biggest industry is also one of the most unhealthy and that most of us support it every day.

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Summary: Wonderful book for the informed and uninformed alike!
Review: You probably gather what the whole premise of the book is about from the other reviews. Therefore, I will give you my personal opinion on it. This book is simply enlightening. Whatever your knowledge of not only the fast food industry, but other related industries will be enhanced and/or challenged by this compelling book.

It gives a general summary of the history of how the fast food industry became the industry it is today, and how it affected (and still does affect) politics, labor unions, food safety, decisions made my lawmakers, the well being of the general public, children, and local farmers. Although he offers what improvements have been done to correct a lot of the problems, he also recommends further actions that could prove beneficial to society.

What I would have like to see from this book is more of an emphasis on education: the more you are educated on something, the more likely you will make educated decisions in your daily life. Everybody needs to be at least aware of information such as this. So before you go to another fast food restaurant, read this book. You may decide otherwise not only because of the food itself, but everything associated with supporting it.

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Summary: Eating Away At Our Lives
Review: I was greatly torn between wanting to read Eric Schlosser's book and wanting to get it far out of my sight. Like most Americans, I enjoy eating fast food. I like the convenience, the cheap price, and even the taste. Yet, somewhere inside, I know that this business could not be good, somewhere there is something wrong with and I was sure that Fast Food Nation would tell me. And it did just that.

Schlosser does an excellent job of examining the great expanse of issues involved in the fast food industry. He begins by addressing the slightly less direct, slightly less obvious impacts of fast food on American society. Fast food has become such an ingrained part of American existence, that most people do not even notice the shear number of restaurants in his/her area. It's a self-perpetuating two-way cycle. American lifestyle encourages the development and spread of fast food while fast food encourages the continuance of current lifestyles. Schlosser clearly makes this idea by commenting on the spread of the highway system and increased "business" of American families. As these characteristics grow, so does fast food. In fact, fast food even encourages such activity in its advertising as well as its knack for targeting young children.

The second half of Schlosser's book goes behind the scenes to the actual business behind the business. The book takes the reader all over the place from the fast food restaurant workers, to the meat packing and French fry factories. The chapters that develop are quite chilling.

Another interesting part of the book is how well it describes American fast food expansion into other countries. It is sad to see how powerful America is, in such a negative, often over-looked, way.

While I recommend this book to everyone, I do have some negative critiques. Schlosser focuses most of the book on McDonalds which makes sense in a way since McDonalds is the largest fast food company. But by doing this, Schlosser begins to sound more anti-McDonalds than anti-fast food industries. Also, he fails to inform the reader that not all of the meat processes at the identified factories goes to fast food. Much of it in fact goes to the supermarkets across the country. It's not just fast food meat that is dangerous, it's all meat from these factories.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed reading Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser. This book is making me take a second look at what foods I'm eating and where I am eating. Being in college and living where I do, it is not easy, not affordable to eat as organically and locally as I would like to, but I am inspired to try to change what I can.

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Summary: Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All American Meal
Review: Christine Kovac
Sociology 248
Book Review #2
February 27, 2003

Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All American Meal

How many of you make a weekly stop or two at McDonalds¡¯s, Taco Bell, Burger King or Little Ceasers? Do you ever stop and think twice about what you are really eating? Fast food has become an important part of our economy and our culture. Eric Schlosser¡¯s honest and alarming look in to the fast food industry will shock any fast food eaters or reinforce to the fast food avoiders why they never turn to these restaurants for an alternative meal.
With the increasing amount of time that adults and parents are putting into their work and less time being spent at home, they find it easier to stop at a local fast food restaurant for a quick, cheap, and tasty meal for themselves or even for their whole family. But how tasty really is it? Schlosser¡¯s educational and interesting look as to why the fries taste so good and how the meat is processed is quite disturbing, but it is the truth. Beef flavoring is added to the meat and fries for an artificial way to make the taste more satisfying. These extremely fatty and high calorie foods contribute to many health problems such as obesity and heart disease. Exposing children to these problems and quick fix meal habits can be dangerous to future health conditions as Schlosser states how the industry ¡°feeds and feeds off of the young¡± (Schlosser, 9). The advertisements tailored for children and the observation of their parent¡¯s eating habits comes across as fast food being an accepted way of eating without the reality behind it. And we wonder why America is getting fatter? Americans have the freedom of choice, but sometimes take for granted the consequences of the choices we make.
Large corporations such as the fast food industry do not make consumers aware of the entire truth by what it is they are producing for they fear it will hurt them financially and economically. Although fast food is affecting the health of millions of Americans everyday, citizens are making the choice to eat this harmful food being produced. Just as Americans are making the choice to eat this food, they have a choice to find out what really is in what they are eating and how it is being produced. As consumers hand over money for a quick and easy meal, they are only contributing more to the fast food industry that is taking over our fast paced culture. This book is an excellent read for learning the truth behind the counter of your favorite fast food restaurant and also looking for a way to break personal fast food eating habits. Schlosser exposes unknown facts of the fast food industry in a detailed manner and applies the issues to our economy and changing culture.

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Summary: I told you, Don't eat meat-Period!
Review: Mr. Schlosser's book continues in the tradition of Upton Sinclair's "the Jungle". An expose' of the fast food industry and mainly their suppliers of meat. This is a horror of a read and completely believable. Bad meat does, on a regular basis, get into our food supply. No one here has learned from the Mad Cow Disease encountered in Europe and we continue to feed herbivores meat to eat. We are feeding meat, which is unfit for human comsumption, to animals who aren't supposed to be eating meat in the first place. We then slaughter those animals at charnal houses unfit for the task and feed it to our children as hamburger. Without acknowledging the problems of bacteria which exist on the meat sold to us the panacea is to irradiate it. But, that is only part of the problem. A subculture of underpaid, overworked children, minorities and seniors are employed in an industry which pays the lowest of wages, without health care and which has become more risky than police work. We must do something to change this. I told you, don't eat meat-period!