Just Because You Think Everyone's Out to Get You...

The birds and fish mysteriously dying all over the world have really got me thinking. And not just wondering what's going on. I'm finding my own reaction to my questions pretty odd. Maybe you're experiencing the same thing.

Thousands of birds are dead. We're told it might be fireworks. Millions of fish and crabs are dead. It might be a temperature phenomenon.

I don't know about you, but that sounds pretty weak to me. And yet, the minute I start to question whether we're being told the truth, a part of me steps aside and starts to shake her head.

"You're becoming a conspiracy theorist," she says sadly. "Wack job territory lies ahead. Beware."

How have we been conditioned to so blindly accept everything we're told by those "in the know"? Hasn't it been proven time and again that the official reaction to a potential problem is not unvarnished truth but, instead, a bland and comforting message to keep reaction to a minimum?

I understand that. If there is a serious problem, there is some incentive to try to avoid a mass panic. But that breeds mistrust. Far better, in my opinion, to honestly say "We just don't know. We're trying to figure it out." Treat people like adults. Act like adults.

And if there is something going on that might lead to a problem and the link is made, tell people. There's nothing like public pressure to speed up reform and change.

This country was built on rebellion (along with some other traits which I'm not proud of). The settlers who arrived were misfits and outcasts who would not conform. They, of course, then tried to impose their own rules on the new land but eventually the freedom of a wild country won - and the mistrust of authority finally led to our independence from Britain.

The sixties, a time of intense turmoil and upheaval, were a time of intense questioning of authority. It seemed like everything was changing and, perhaps, the harsh light of day might burn away the worst of what had accumulated on this experiment in democracy.

But we've been tamed. We're told we must work within The System. Connecting the dots of motive and corruption is called conspiracy theory. Conspiracy theory is a synonym for paranoia.

We've bought it. We're the sheep we never believed we would be. We sit through ten minutes of commercials for drugs, makeup and useless garbage for five minutes of reality entertainment again and again without any action.

We spend hours telling people what we're having for lunch on Facebook. We escape into mindless computer games. Our kids frantically text each other in an effort to prove they're interested in each other's lives.

We are watching life happen instead of living it.

Our food is mass produced junk full of chemicals that is contributing to not only to our obesity and declining health, but animal cruelty and pollution. But say something and you're a crackpot.

Our climate is having wild mood swings that would seem a logical extension of the massive changes we've imposed on the environment. But that's crazy talk.

We glance disapprovingly as Pennsylvania dumps chemically polluted water from its horizontal gas wells into its streams and pure water all over the world is increasingly scarce. Investors are buying up water futures. We know it. And to say we're heading to a global drought is paranoia.

What is wrong here? Why, when you connect the dots, is it crazy? Why aren't we demanding things change? Why do we doubt ourselves?

Conditioning, apparently, has been successful. I'm not convinced there's a single person or group responsible. I think it's our philosophy that's doing it.

Capitalism, the great god Profit, is a master at protecting Its interests.

And even as I write all this, and believe it to be truth, I wonder if I'm just another fruitcake.

Dying for a Cookie

The toll house cookie dough disappeared off the store shelves in June. I had no idea what was going on. It's still gone and I now have more information. It's a little frightening.

Bill Marler is an attorney who specialize in food poisoning cases. His client is a woman who's been hospitalized for months and is probably going to die. It appears to be linked to eating raw, pre-made cookie dough.

The culprit is EColi and it's caught everyone by surprised. No one expected such a highly processed food to be contaminated with fecal matter, which is how EColi is spread. And despite a voluntary recall by Nestles and continuing investigation, Marler says no one is still certain how it happened.

But it's clear our mass produced food addiction is starting to come back to bite us. There has been contaminated spinach, contaminated peanuts, peanut butter, peppers. There's lots of proposed safety legislation on Capitol Hill and it's mostly focused on making food easier to trace when it's found to be a problem.

The issue of how the contamination happens in the first place isn't getting a lot of attention yet. Factory farms grow food on a massive scale. One bad apple can, indeed, spoil the whole bushel. Germs in one place quickly spread throughout a facility.

Factory farms raise animals in filthy, inhumane conditions that now are proving to lead to not only bacteria, but antibiotic resistant germs that have adapted to a constant low dose of preventative antibiotics. An easy solution, according to an expert I spoke to this week, is to give the animals more space, clean up the waste and let newborns spend more time with their mothers so they can naturally ingest more infection-fighting organisms.

Where did your salad ingredients come from? Was it your neighborhood farmer or a factory farm in another country? Do you know if it's safe? If you eat meat, where does it come from? What kind of conditions existed at the farm or at the processing plant?

We want our food when we want it. We have no patience with seasonal restrictions. We want it cheap, convenient and plentiful. And the indications are growing that the price we may pay is very dear indeed.

Peaceable Kingdom Is Coming - Pass It On

Did you see the climate change issue differently after watching Al Gore's
"An Inconvenient Truth"? Then you are the audience for a new film that's about to be released by NY-based filmmakers Tribe of Heart.

It's a movie that will change the way you see farm animals. I saw it as part of their pre-release audience testing. It is called "Peaceable Kingdom, The Journey Home".

Filmmakers Jenny Stein and James LaVeck have made a powerful film on a controversial issue, but they've kept a compassionate touch. Rather than strident demands for change, they've focused the film on livestock farmers whose own lives transformed when they began to question what they were doing. The answers to those questions haven't been easy, and their conclusions have cost them friendships and a great deal of money. But those answers have also created amazing relationships with animals they once considered food. The softening of their hearts is reflected in their faces.

Tribe of Heart goes to farm animal sanctuaries and introduces us to farm animals in a way many of us have never experienced. Once you've gotten to know them, it is impossible to believe they are any less individual, sentient creatures than the pets we love.

There is inescapable evidence that our factory farm, mass produced food system is dangerous. The latest recall involves the most benign food of all - cookie dough. Tribe of Heart goes behind the scenes, showing the creatures at those farms, showing the conditions in which they live and the way they die. These are tough scenes to watch, but open your own heart. Realize that what you eat, what you ate at your last meal, came from those conditions. Be brave enough to see where that food that's presented so neatly wrapped at your cavernous grocery store really comes from. If it raises questions in your own mind - all the better.

Open yourself to the possibility of change. "Peaceable Kingdom - The Journey Home" is a great first step.