In his book Fast Food Nation (2001), Eric Schlosser argues that fast food has greatly influenced American society and culture. As he discusses the development of the nation about the development of fast-food chains, Schlosser begins to paint a picture of how philosophies introduced within organizations such as McDonald’s have served to reduce the general quality of life for the average American in a variety of areas.
Not only have they served to undermine traditional American values, but fast food organizations and business concepts they’ve introduced have also served to reduce our access to basic human rights, devaluing our social expectations through their influence on the very fabric of our knowledge.
These are necessary tactics, Schlosser argues, for these organizations to maximize their profits by convincing consumers to purchase inferior products proven, in many cases, to be detrimental to health, at premium prices, and in high demand. These are strong accusations to make and seem to grossly exaggerate the probable impact the fast-food concept could have on a thinking public.
However, by examining Schlosser’s arguments with input from other experts in the field, it seems that there may be a greater element of truth of Schlosser’s claims than one would be comfortable admitting. In the end, one must conclude that fast food, as a commodity, has contributed a great deal toward the degeneration of American society by destroying traditional American values, removing social rights, and weakening the physical health of the nation through inferior products.
Schlosser begins his argument by narrating the history of the fast-food industry as the McDonald brothers incorporated the concepts of the factory line worker to the production of immediately available food products. Even within this history, he builds his case arguing organizations like McDonald’s drove out the independent restaurants through the application of factory processes to food production, the development of franchises to spread this mechanized process, and through the bold new move of advertising to children.
That franchises are still edging out the independent options is evident in a warning published by the Council of Independent Restaurants of America: “If the dinner-house chains have their way, the dining scene in most cities will soon offer the limited choices that consumers now find in shopping malls throughout America: the same 30 or 40 stores in every location” (cited in Nye & Drake, 2008). This is because they can offer seemingly more food for less money in more locations at a quicker and more predictable pace while retaining the ability to sustain long-term market slumps in a given geographic location.
The fast rate of production is due to the assembly-line approach to food preparation. Authors Heizer and Render (2006) illustrate how Mcdonald’s has used a combination of new technologies and Taylor’s scientific studies to bring the production process to its most efficient level that is expertly timed to have the completed assembly arriving for the customer at approximately the same time as their change.
While this whole process seems to dehumanize the traditional associations Americans have had of eating around the family table, these organizations managed to divert attention through media campaigns professing alignment with these values. For example, Ronald McDonald continues to be a well-known character for no other reason than he offered a friendly playground for children to disappear into while Mom and Dad shared a relatively private meal.
While this seems to support family values in that everyone is eating dinner at the same time, no one is together as the kids are playing probably independently in the playground and the restaurant is too noisy for Mom and Dad to do anything but wish, independently, they were somewhere else. As these ideas proved successful, they have leaked into other areas of the marketplace, undermining American rights.
By pulling down the American value system in its dehumanization of the eating process and infiltrating the minds of the young through appealing media campaigns, the fast-food industry has also managed to degrade our social rights in this country. Schlosser argues they’ve done this by influencing our children for future control through influencing educational curriculum selections and redirecting school funding while reducing current worker’s rights by exploiting immigrant and undereducated or younger workers. These claims are again supported in other literature, sometimes to an almost word-for-word extent: “Fast food industries are a regular presence in school cafeterias.
The industry has programs where employees regularly work with high school students, influencing course offerings through monetary support to the schools.” (Poetter et al, 2004:126). As to the claim that fast food organizations have introduced a business model that thrives on the exploitation of its workers, a newspaper study conducted in Alabama in 2007 reported “Trailing Wal-Mart employees were workers for fast-food giant McDonald’s, with 1,615 children on Medicaid. There are a total of 1,380 Medicaid children whose parents work for Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut, fast-food businesses owned by Yum! Brands” (Haas, 2007).
It should be noted that the low-cost department store chain Wal-mart was also built upon the same assembly-line, mechanized scientific process model introduced by McDonald’s. By first destroying any expectations among children that things should be any different and then exploiting workers to the point where they have lost the ability to organize, the fast-food concept has fundamentally robbed the American people of rights they worked so hard to gain during the previous centuries of our existence.
More than destroying our spirits and rights, the fast-food concept has finally affected the types of products we are now offered as sustenance for our bodies and our children. Because of the influence, these companies have managed to attain in key governmental and oversight positions, Schlosser argues that there has been a reduction in the safety levels of food preparation itself as well as in the quality of the food itself.
The hectic schedule for food preparation, using equipment that reaches temperatures above 500 degrees in only seconds, emphasizes the potential for injury within the food preparation cycle itself (Heizer & Render, 2006) while the fast-food industry has gained a great deal of criticism in the quality of its products. A majority of the food offered at fast food establishments remain high in caloric content, introducing a great deal of fat and very little in the way of nutrition into the American diet. “Health experts believe that constant promotion of high-calorie food is contributing to the epidemic of childhood obesity in the United States by encouraging preferences for junk food and contributing to poor eating habits” (Byrd-Bredbenner & Grasso, 2000).
There is little doubt that the nutritional content of a typical fast food meal remains at the lower end of the spectrum. “High-fat, high-sugar foods are widely available, taste good, and cost less than healthier foods. Vending machines are ubiquitous, Kentucky Fried Chicken delivers and most fast-food outlets now serve breakfast” (Murray, 2001). While some chains have added a few healthy food options, such as mandarin oranges or yogurt, the truth remains that the large majority of their menu items, as well as the featured items of their advertisements, are focused on the high dollar, low-quality products of yesteryear.
While the claims of Eric Schlosser seem to be overly paranoid about the possibilities of one market to influence an entire culture in these ways, there does seem to be a great deal of support for his arguments among experts in the field. It seems almost ridiculous to argue that fast food has destroyed some of our more cherished American values as we see the breakdown in the family and the disunity as they each grab an individually wrapped, impersonal sandwich and retreat to their various corners to fill their human need for sustenance.
As the family unit begins to break down with fast food concepts a contributing factor, Taylor’s scientific process continues to bleed the human element out of the process, reducing each individual to an easily replaceable part and thus eliminating any power the individual might have to bring about effective change or resistance to exploitive practices. With this kind of power in hand, the fast-food organization, along with all other organizations that have followed this same assembly-line approach to human management, have managed to bring about changes in social policy that enable them to continue degrading the food supply and the health of the nation physically, mentally and spiritually by influencing education, politics, economics, and nutritional well-being.
Works Cited
Byrd-Bredbenner C & Grasso D. “Commercials During 1992 and 1998.” Journal of School Health. Vol. 70, (2000), pp. 61-65.
Haas, Eric. “Ask Rockridge: Ending the Amnesty for Abusive Employers.” Rockridge Nation. (2007). Web.
Heizer, Jay & Barry Render. Operations Management. (8th Ed.). New York: Prentice Hall, 2006.
Murray, Bridget. “Fast-food Culture Serves up Super-Size Americans.” Monitor on Psychology. Vol. 32, N. 11, (2001). Web.
Nye, Melinda & Tom Drake. “Out to Eat.” New Jersey’s Great Northwest Skylands. (2008). Web.
Poetter, Thomas S.; Thomas Lee Goodney & Jennifer L. Bird. Critical Perspectives on the Curriculum of Teacher Education. University Press of America, 2004.
Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation. New York: Houghton Mifflin Corp., 2001.