Taking this course has been very enlightening. While I have always attempted to be wary of bad food and corporate malpractices, the books we read – Fast Food Nation and Eating Animals – helped reveal the true extent of these threats, and what can be done about them. I also feel that the challenges presented to me as a student have helped me improve my writing style and thinking skills. Perhaps greatest of all, I feel a renewed confidence in my writing abilities; I have always felt very self-conscious and worried about my writing, and I must admit it was very reassuring and satisfying to be praised for my writing ability.

In Eating Animals, Foer uses his personal ethical revelations as a highly effective vehicle to improve the reader's own perspective. Even if one does not agree with Foer's personal view, the book still bestows a much more enlightened look on the American food industry.

Foer frequently mixes the words of others with his own. Perhaps somewhat tellingly, none of the major meatpackers or slaughterhouses would speak to him. One small, local operation, Paradise Locker Meats, broke the trend and even invited him for a tour. Foer spends much of the chapter relaying the sights and sounds of his tour, but at the end he is faced with a dilemma. One of the workers offers him a sample of the meat. “Maybe there is nothing wrong with eating it,” Foer writes, recounting the experience, “But something deep inside me... simply doesn't want the meat inside my body.” He contrasts his reluctance to eat with his desire to be friendly with the workers and with doubts of his own rationality (Foer 163). Foer's quest for personal revelation has become a moral (and social) dilemma, which he in turn presents to us.

Disconnect

Often, in an attempt to justify things they find offensive, people attempt to disconnect, to remove themselves from what is happening. Take, for example, the willful ignorance toward the abuse of animals and humans alike in the food industry. Many people could never condone the conditions in the factory farms and slaughterhouses, but because nobody is willing to directly involve themselves – because everyone is disconnected – the problem remains out of sight and mind. This can also be seen in the objectification of disadvantaged people such as the poor or immigrants. “It's not MY problem,” is the constant refrain, “Why should I do anything?” Reinforcing this is the psychological “bystander effect”, where more bystanders makes it paradoxically less likely for someone to assist someone in need. Nobody wants to be the first to approach a problem everyone else is trying to ignore.

Supernormal Stimuli

In Kessler's The End of Overeating, we are introduced to the concept of a “supernormal” stimulus. A stimulus is defined as supernormal when it is both in excess of normal stimulation levels and not available in nature. For example, the neurobiologist John Staddon found that birds consistently chose to sit on the largest egg available for roosting, even if that egg was from a different species and far too large for the roosting bird to have lain. Even humans are highly susceptible to supernormal stimuli; this can be seen in the seemingly exponential spread of sugar, salt, and fat in the human diet. This mix of tastes is very rare in nature, but has become a staple of cooking. The human brain is hard wired to desire these tastes, because they represent substances that can give lots of energy. Supernormal stimulation can also be seen in the massive spread of mixing foods and using toppings; many staples of the modern diet, from cereal to burgers, are made of out of many diverse ingredients and intentionally designed to capitalize on supernormal stimuli. It is directly because of this that it can be so hard to eat sensibly – evolution has programmed us not to.

Uniformity

Another term that comes up in Fast Food Nation is “uniformity.” Schlosser relates how JR Simplot, one of America’s most successful farmers and businessmen, introduced the idea of frozen French fries to Ray Kroc of McDonalds. At the time, Kroc was having trouble ensuring that the food at the rapidly spreading franchise locations would always taste the same at every restaurant. By processing the fries at a central location and then freezing them for transport to the restaurants, it is possible to ensure uniformity of taste and quality. This uniformity is important because consumers always want the same product and experience when they visit the same business. Uniformity allows corporations to not fear randomness or local variation upsetting customers. However, with the spread of franchises, uniformity has spread from the product to every aspect of a franchised retail location. The food, packaging, architecture, and even the way the employees act and address their customers has been rendered uniform. The corporations do this in order to produce a single, unified image of their brand, relying on people’s comfort with familiar things to draw in more customers.

Encroachment

In Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser relays a concept known to franchisees as "encroachment." Franchise companies seek to open as many outlets as possible, potentially over-saturating an area. While this does improve sales for the franchise overall, the individual outlets suffer from the increased competition, even, perhaps especially, with businesses under the same banner. This also shows how little the franchises care for their franchisees; they are seen as every bit as disposable as an individual burger flipper. Subway in particular is cited as the worst possible example by both Schlosser and Dean Sager, a former economist for the House of Representatives. Subway employs sales agents to aggressively spread franchises, and imposes harsh standards on them. They are forced to open as many new franchises as possible, in a constant flow, completely ignoring any consequences this might have for existing stores. However, Subway is just one example of this form of excess, and a symptom of the thought patterns that drive the fast food industry: more shops, more sales, at any cost - the workers are expendable.