The Well Blog on the New York Times posted an interview with Rachel Ray, the cooking show host and founder of a nonprofit that focuses on getting kids into healthy eating and home cooking. I think this is great, I really do. She operates in a great middle place between Slow Food foodies and On-The-Go-Americans. Despite my support of this work I felt inclined to comment on my feeling that this support is diminished somewhat by Ms. Ray’s role as a spokesperson for Dunkin Donuts. Other people also mentioned this issue, but many more comments stated that bringing up this point was unnecessary and fell under the “no good deed goes unpunished” realm and we shouldn’t have to be so extreme or idealogical about food.
My reason for bringing this up isn’t about telling people donuts are unhealthy or criticizing people for drinking arguably shitty coffee. It’s that Dunkin Donuts (and all fast food, Starbucks, Mcdonalds, etc.) contributes to the problems Ms. Ray’s nonprofit is explicitly trying to address- that almost a third of American children are obese because sugary salty processed fast food is more accessible to children than healthy food or home cooked meals.
 (a picture of health, esp. that Styrofoam cup)
People eat there and that’s fine to an extent- but what really frustrates me is that we are supposed to reserve criticism for these places and their patrons because they are more affordable than healthy food. So we should support fast food because it feeds the poor? This is unacceptable right? Can we take a step back and see the ways in which these places contribute to the problem of access rather than being the only viable solution to feeding low-income families? How much does Dunkin Donuts pay their workers? Do they have reasonable pay and hours in order to provide home cooked meals for their families? Does any of the money spend at Dunkin Donuts stay in the community in which its located? Do any rural farm families profit from the eggs or wheat sales? Likely no, for any chain.
They may have a 300 calorie sandwich but they are not making any real difference in issue that 1 in 5 kids in the US face food insecurity (from Ray’s site) and almost a third are obese (how these overlap is another matter).
People are so quick to defend these products for the “regular, everyday folks who keep America running”, but they fail to see the ways in which the profits from these products contribute to the larger problems our communities face. It’s important not to be too idealogical about your own or other’s food choices, but when it comes down to the ways in which these choices impact us generally- e.g. the annual cost to society for obesity is estimated at nearly $100 billion, who pays for the landfills for all those styrofoam cups, do workers at these places rely on public programs for health care- then I think we have a right to look at the bigger picture and get a little nitpicky with those who have an audience and money to make a difference.
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