Sofia Manrique itibaren Baleta, Rajasthan, India

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05/12/2024

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Sofia Manrique Kitabın yeniden yazılması (10)

2018-09-01 15:40

2018 Tarih Konularına Göre Tamamı Çözümlü Çıkmış Sorular TrendKitaplar Kütüphanesi

Tarafından yazılmış kitap Tarafından: Yediiklim Yayınları

Disturbing, on multiple levels Publisher’s Weekly called this book a “Delightful romp though the food processing industry,” but I found Twinkie, Deconstucted a rather chilling appraisal of the state of modern food. Ettlinger sets out on what seems a lighthearted quest to source all the ingredients in a Twinkie, on the face of it an interesting and possibly edifying task. Certainly, choosing a Twinkie as his subject is clue enough that this will be a purely wink-wink/nudge-nudge sort of examination. The problem, for me, was that what he unearthed was not as entertaining as it was disturbing. Twinkie, Deconstructed has come in for a great deal of criticism from various quarters for not engaging some of the deeper issues that Ettlinger raises, but then blithely abandons. I would agree. Some even accuse him of being an apologist for the food industry, a serious charge indeed. This, I can’t go along with. Instead, I’d say the chief problem is he stubbornly adhered to a flawed plan for a book. Clearly, he set out to deconstruct the Twinkie in a casual, gee-whiz-look-at-that narrative. And I have to say he unearthed a number of downright fascinating factoids. But then the quest began to be a trudge, as Ettlinger doggedly wrote chapter after chapter for each and every one of the Twinkie’s many ingredients, regardless of the fact that one ingredient begins to blur into another after the first dozen or so. There was a great deal of discussion of chemical processes, some of which left me scratching my head. Time and again Ettlinger is taken through vast processing plants to find how this ingredient or that is produced. But just as often he is denied access to processing plants and forced to speculate how one component or another is engineered. There are a disconcerting number of secrets behind something as prosaic as a Twinkie, it seems. Ettlinger ultimately unveils what he calls the "Twinkie Nexus" - a vast international supply-and-demand-driven mechanism controlled by multinational conglomerates too complex and too multi-tentacled to fully comprehend. Again, the main problem is this: what virtue is there of tracking down each ingredient but then not really coming to grips with the bigger issues? All trees, no forest. I can't say that Ettlinger never addresses any of the darker issues, such as the role processed foods may play in the nationwide epidemic of obesity and diabetes. He does mention this, but only very briefly, and then scampers on to the next gee-whiz moment, leaving the “heavy” arguments mostly to the last chapter, "Consider the Twinkie." There he implies we have no reasonable alternative to the industrialized processed food industry. More to the point, he seems to lay the blame – and responsibility – squarely at the feet of the consumer. The argument goes something like this: We want it, so they produce it. We buy it. We eat it. So we should suffer the consequences, because it's ultimately our fault it was produced in the first place. But who the heck came up with the idea for something like Gogurt, anyways? Somehow I doubt there was a popular clamor for this product, a corporate brainchild if ever there was one. Products are researched. Studies are done. Advertising campaigns are launched. Wants are created. And, despite the habitual use there of the passive voice, someone does those things. To paraphrase Pogo, we have met the enemy, and he isn't us. “Before getting on a high horse to decry the excessive pressure of capitalism that force food to be so overwhelmingly engineered," Ettlinger writes, "we need to remember this: no farmer would bring his or her crops to market without the promise of a reward.” Huh? Come again? I’m not sure I follow that argument. And why am I left with the feeling he regards a desire for a healthier diet as "getting on a high horse"? At the end of the book, he suddenly solemnly averes, "There are choices to be made – so it is up to us to keep on top of things in the food world.” Is it, really, up to us? It doesn't much seem like it from what I gleaned from this book. It seems instead as if much is being kept from us, at least if Ettlinger's notable lack of success in penetrating "industrial secrets" (a leit motif of the book) is any indication. If ever there were an argument for stronger government oversight of the food industry, this is it. What hope has the average consumer of navigating the hazardous food maze? Ettlinger certainly doesn’t provide any. I couldn’t help but think he wasted an opportunity – nay, evaded a responsibility – to urge a greater transparency in food production. I gave this book three stars not so much because I “liked” it as because I was disturbed by it. And that, despite all my criticisms, is a good thing. Perhaps it was even the author’s intent, though I sincerely doubt it. Twinkie, Deconstructed was obviously marketed as entertainment. While I hate to sound like an utter stick in the mud, just how sad (and disturbing) is that?

2018-09-01 16:40

Yetişkinler İçin Yaratıcı Boyama 60Lar-Kolektif TrendKitaplar Kütüphanesi

Tarafından yazılmış kitap Tarafından: Libros Kitap

(written june 10, 2006) wednesday night i finished ignorance, about the third or fourth novel of milan kundera's that i have read. so far i have found that his later works, such as this, written in the language of his adopted home (french) rather than his homeland (czech) are simpler, more confined. not in a better or worse kind of way, but in a more removed way. which makes sense, after all. much of what he is writing about is the push and pull of immigration/emigration, for him and his fellow czechs all resulting from the '68 take-over by the russians. the novels written in czech are bound to be more chaotic, earthier, more scrambled. in our mother tongue we are both more ourselves yet less able to express it. and when we acquire a new language, a new way of transmitting thoughts, our very frame of reference is raised, which both grants us greater clarity yet also makes us more distant. most of all, you can't go home again. in this odyssey-like novel, irene and josef realize not only that, but how much their immigration filled other needs. there are brilliant moments, such as the description of nostalgia, a central theme. the word comes from the Greek nostos (return) and algos(suffering) and is the "suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return." yet despite this and other beautiful arcs, ignorance doesn't really compare to the two great kundera novels i have read, "the unbearable lightness of being" and "the book of laughter and forgetting." they may be more complex, and rough around the edges in some ways, but they are more thorough, more deeply philosophical, and more joyous to lose oneself in.

2018-09-01 21:40

Esmaül Hüsnanın 99 Sırrı-İsmail Çorbacı TrendKitaplar Kütüphanesi

Tarafından yazılmış kitap Tarafından: Tutku Yayınevi

I've been needing some brain candy lately (something not too complex and just a fun, enoyable read) and Matched was a perfect fit. I'm reading a lot of Dystopia novels right now and this was a really interesting take. It reminded me of the Uglies series by Scott Westerfield in a lot of different ways. I think if you've read both you could easily identify them. I think the most stunning or interesting comparison revolves around the choices they make. Both girls in these stories (Tally from Uglies and Cassia from Matched) have an option to take the easy road, or take a comfortable path for their life and future, but both girls choose the harder path. I felt almost naive when I read certain parts or the characters pointed out things the Society controls. I didn't expect it, like how they control that they die at age 80 which I think was a good surprise in the fact that the author downplayed it so it was a surprise. At least to me anyways, ha. One of the things I didn't like though, and it's not that I think it took away from the story, but I would have loved to learn more about the history and why the Society controls as much as they do. I found the red pills very intersting and how the borough had changed before so I think this series has so much potential. I would like to have more of the history explained and I see a potential uprising in the future. I'm looking forward to more of the story and I hope this story when it ends has a happy-ish ending.

Okuyucu Sofia Manrique itibaren Baleta, Rajasthan, India

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