When did you become a ‘direct to DVD’ eater?

When the film industry creates “direct to DVD” products, we avoid them unless we’re (depressed about something and) looking for a B-list offering. But when clothing brands distribute directly to Winners/Marshall’s/other discount retailers, we act like we’re getting a deal. Why?

Are you willing to support this practice when it comes to the products you eat? Because the big box store or grocery chain most people shop at is the B market.

Produce is (usually) thousands of miles fresher at the farmers market. And most of the goods you find at grocery chains are ultra-processed, grown using pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, and genetic modification. Some of it has been irradiated, waxed, or gassed in transit.

The most premium things in a Loblaw’s are:

• Real estate: Convenience is a drug they have you hooked on.
• Interior design: Wide aisles and bright lights make the food better right? Wrong.
• Product packaging: Landfill with confusing claims and chemical terms for sugar.
• Chemical engineering: Since the food’s not natural, it can be preserved, enriched, or otherwise adulterated.

The conventional food system is only “conventional” in that it’s designed to give you as little of what’s special as possible.

When our species were fucking monkeys climbing down from trees, we knew that plucking food from branches and vines was a good idea. Now that we’re a technologically advanced society, we catch fish in BC, ship it to China to be deboned, then import it. Or, though we grow amazing apples here, our industry is decimated by the pricing of apples imported from China, covered in petroleum based wax that seals in pesticides, (maybe not if it’s pre-sliced). The apples, fish, and many other less expensive products containing dyes to make them look more palatable are distributed to big box stores we drive to.

And people who dig up their front yard to grow fresh produce are considered unconventional. Go figure.

Want to know how? Go to your Garden Centre. Buy some dirt and a seedling, put them in a pot, water them when they need it for 5 weeks, then taste a statement against the direct to DVD food system.

Need a baby-step? Next Saturday, make the trip to a farmer’s market. Bring your own bags. Walk around and look at everything that’s for sale. You can tell that this is where the premium produce is because it has dirt on it and/or it doesn’t look perfect.