Raw Milk Risk

I wrote yesterday about our decision to drink raw milk, and I know that this is an incredibly controversial subject.  Many people are horrified at the very thought of drinking raw milk, likening it to drinking a cocktail of toxic chemicals… er… wait… that’s commercialized milk, that’s laced with up to 20 different chemicals. Hmmm.

Anyway, I thought this would be a good time to post a quote from Ben Hewitt, whose blog I’ve really been enjoying, lately:

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I am struck by the fact that, broadly speaking, we seem unwilling to accept that the act of eating should carry a degree of risk. After all, we accept and even embrace risk in so many other facets of our lives. Every time we climb into a car, step into an airplane, or cross a street we place ourselves in harm’s way and face odds far more daunting than putting a forkful of calories into our mouths. We live in a society that allows us to carry handguns, smoke unfiltered cigarettes, and drink hard alcohol. Heck, all at once, if we so choose.

The question is, why are we so willing to own these hazards, even as we recoil at the suggestion that eating will never be entirely risk-free? I believe it’s the illusion of control that comes of engaging in an elective activity like driving, flying, or shooting at the beer cans we just emptied into our mouths. The key words are “engaging” and “elective,” because frankly, few of us in 21st century America are truly engaged in our food. And even fewer of us can elect to eat.

For me, it boils down to this: We have out-sourced the most life-giving, essential commerce we know to multi-national corporations that view us as profit, rather than people. We’ve been relieved of the toilsome, often tiresome work of feeding ourselves, having chosen instead to pursue lives of relative leisure and comfort. We exchange money, most often earned via a task far less backbreaking than growing food, for nourishment. Or whatever passes for nourishment in 2011.

In short, we no longer participate in the non-elective, essential commerce of food. And so we feel distanced, disconnected, and disempowered. We feel out of control. Because we are.

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Read the rest of the article Here.

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