Tuesday, April 9, 2013

I'm offended for the Wheat Thins


I'm going to rant about Wheat Thins and food moralization and some related issues.

So I'm at the grocery store, meandering towards the register and thinking about the delicious sandwich that I'm about to buy that I've been craving for a week and I hear this "Wheat Thins are actually bad for you." "Yeah, they're like, SO bad for you!"  Two ladies dressed in nice workout gear are headed down the cracker/chip/cookie aisle and discussing the merits of various foods.  And I got pissed.  Please, explain to me how a multi-grain wheat cracker is 'bad' for you.  Because I think we can pretty much agree that multi-grain stuff is pretty good for you and Wheat Thins are delicious and filling and go very well with a number of other delicious foods, which puts it solidly into the 'good' food category for me.  Now I'm aware that it's 'bad' because it has the dreaded calories, that a Wheat Thin might be responsible for causing someone to gain weight, and if someone were to gain weight or even *gasp* be fat, well, that would just be the end of the world wouldn't it?  See, that's the problem, we (speaking specifically of American culture) have the most ridiculous fixation on body size and of moralizing our food (I know we're not the first to do it, I'm still pissed off about it).  Food is food.  We should be able to love to eat it, enjoy it, and be thankful for it and for those that grow or raise it.  We should feel able to eat till we're full and eat what we like and need and not have people railing at us from televisions and magazines that we're somehow lesser for not eating it the 'right' way, whatever that happens to be.  We should be able to enjoy it without being judged for enjoying it, for judging ourselves for enjoying it.   I was offended, because I love to eat.  I enjoy eating.  I'm thankful that I can eat, that I can often buy the things I want, that I can enjoy my food without feeling guilty over nothing.  And the mere memory of living a life where every meal is an exercise in guilt and self loathing infuriates me.

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