“There’s no food here, just vegetables.”
This post may look like it’s about poor people and free food but it’s about our culture. I’ve heard this quote several times at the community fridge where I volunteer: “There’s no food here, just vegetables.”
I help deliver a lot of vegetables from the farmers market. People coming to get free food tend to prefer pre-made meals and doof. I recommend reflecting on what the statement means and implies.
It’s said when people are crowding the fridge and cupboard trying to find what they want, seeing that there’s a lot on the shelves, but it’s fresh vegetables, which they don’t want.
The community norm is to consider fresh vegetables not food. It’s tempting, especially for liberals, to say someone who isn’t homeless doesn’t understand their situation. Some guests don’t have kitchens if they’re living in shelters or on the street, but they’re a minority. Also, many of the vegetables are edible without cooking and can be eaten right there.
But for this point, they’re a distraction from the larger number of people who do have homes but want doof or salt, sugar, fat-laden stuff.
Conservatives might say giving things away makes people not value them and makes people feel entitled and spoiled. There’s something to this view. Yesterday, I saw a guy take a big bag of produce, walk about half a block, leave it by the side of the curb, and walk away, leaving it for garbage. My friend with me said he was probably crazy. Maybe, but I suspect he just felt good for a moment getting something free, but that he didn’t value, so he left it.
They miss the point that our culture largely devalues fresh fruit and vegetables. Americans waste 40 percent of our food.
We live in a disposable culture. We live in material abundance but lack meaning, purpose, connection to our values, or connection to community or other people. We’ve lost how to value many of the most important things in life. Fresh produce is what we need to live and could be delicious. It literally becomes us. And the most needy among us treat it like not food.
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