Thank you, Food Inc.

I love watching documentaries. I'm pretty sure watching documentaries did not stem from the examples I was shown throughout my time spent in the public school system because the movies shown were usually long, boring, and shown on topics that I wasn't interested in learning about. But Netflix has been really helpful in allowing me to find documentaries that I can connect to. I've seen documentaries with the focus on anything from drugs to human trafficking or even the world of kids trying to "make it big" in Hollywood. Although I love documentaries and find that the subjects are important, I've never been affected by one for some reason. Do I think they're interesting? Sure. Do I think they are worthwhile productions that people should be watching? Absolutely. But they don't persuade me to act differently than I do currently (which is the purpose of many documentaries). I don't think that people make documentaries with the primary intention of entertainment. I think that people make them to change someone's mind or inspire someone to make a change in the world.

Food Inc. has been the only documentary that made me not only feel an emotional bond to the issue, but influenced my decisions  after I watched it. While watching it in class, I cried at a few different parts, especially the part when the pigs were killed. I will never be able to get that squealing out my head. To put it in blatant terms, it was very hard to watch. I have always been passionate about animals and have grown up to be an advocate for those who are being harmed. Specifically, my mom started advocating for retired racing greyhounds and the abolishment of the sport, and we've housed numerous dogs, seeing the consequences of cruelty and abuse firsthand.  Obviously, I know that this kind of stuff is happening in the world to animals of all kind, but I never thought that mistreatment could be a constant presence in my food sources. Maybe the unexpected nature is why the documentary affected me in such a dramatic way. After watching the documentary, I wanted to tell more people about it. Not only did I find the information shocking, but it was important to me, and I felt compelled to share the message.

I would be lying if I said that I became a vegetarian after watching Food Inc. Although I hated seeing the images of abuse and mistreatment in the documentary, I love meat. It's freaking delicious. But I have been more cognizant of where my meat products are coming from and consciously not buying foods that I know follow these same procedures. For example, I don't buy Perdue chicken anymore, one of the companies featured in Food Inc. It makes me sick just to see it stocked on the shelves. So although I didn't go the extremes of becoming a vegetarian and avoiding these food markets entirely, the documentary had a long term affect on me, and for that, I am grateful. It was hard to watch some of the parts of the documentary, but I'm glad I got to see another side of the food industry because I feel like a well informed consumer now. Hopefully this was the intention of the producers, and others feel the same way.