alexist

(friends were talking about their decisions to go organic...)

I don't buy organic, generally. There are a few things where I do, but that's because of the quality of the specific product, rather than because it's organic (for example, the cream I buy is organic, but I buy it because it's higher-fat than the regular cream [yes higher! if you're going to have heavy cream in the first place you might as well have the stuff that's really indulgent] and is only pasteurized, not ultrapasteurized, so no stabilizers have been added.)

But the organic/free-range movement is something I have trouble with. It's not about the cost to me, the consumer. I'm willing to pay more for food I like. It's about the fact that organic is fundamentally a rich person's privilege and always will be, because organic farming (at least in its current form) is not capable of meeting demand. Modern existence relies on industrial agriculture. It's the reason we haven't met some kind of Malthusian doom. I don't know why I find it so troublesome, but for me, it's a serious ethical problem, because the choices I make are not just individual, they represent what I would want other people to choose.

This doesn't mean that I don't think we can (or that we shouldn't) demand a higher level of quality or more environmental responsibility. For example, conditions in the North American beef industry are atrocious. It relies on a system of feedlots where cows literally stand in their own shit and are fed a corn-based diet their digestive systems can't tolerate. We could afford to pay another dollar or two a pound for beef--prices are absurdly low. And there's plenty of grazing land here. I pay for kosher chicken, which is raised in better conditions and undergoes a better slaughtering process (I'm not sure if they raise kosher cows separately, or if it's only the slaughtering that's separate). But we don't. We accept what we're given. My choice is that I don't accept things. I don't buy fruit that's been picked unripe and shipped 5,000 miles. I don't buy processed crap. And that's a choice I'm comfortable with, because we do have the right to demand something that tastes good. And in order to get that, you've got to take care with what you're growing, not use the pile it high and sell it cheap method.

But when you're out there demanding that people not use pesticides or genetically modified foods for staple crops, then what have you left them? Improved yield is what's going to keep people from starving in the Third World. It's very nice that we can afford to pay higher prices for food that's been grown organically, with its attendant low yields, and that we have the space to make this possible. But not everyone does. And that's why I call it rich people's privilege. It's what we get to worry about when we don't have to worry about starvation.

As for taste, organic sometimes tastes better (I've tested this theory). It's somewhat more likely, because organic farmers are more likely to take better care--for example, selecting varieties for taste and not ability to stand up to shipping. They're more likely to be small scale growers. But the best stuff tends to be (organic or not) fruit and vegetables that were grown locally, picked ripe, and sent to market immediately. A New York apple in November will always taste better (to me) than a Washington apple I get from storage in February, even if the latter is organic and the former is not. (This isn't universally true, of course--citrus, for example, holds up very well, so it can be picked ripe in California and shipped to the Northeast in January. But just compare winter tomatoes with a locally-grown one in August.)