When I immigrated to the U.S and whenever I used to walk through the isle of the stores loaded with different varieties of food, meat and milk I used to be awed at the abundance that this country had to offer. The huge warehouse of food marts used to overwhelm me with the sheer size and the amount of food that was stored inside.
But of late when I walk through these same stores, I feel a dread. A dread that says that when so many people out there are suffering without a single day meal, here the food that is about to expire is sent to landfills to perish. The amount of meat that is on display is actually a life that had feelings and emotions but were killed to feed our stomach. But because there is more supply than the demand they are too thrown away without any regard to the animal’s life that was taken.
When man was a hunter he hunted what he wanted and ate that. But now with the industrialization, we are sucking the life out of our planet and animals and feeding the consumerism monster where making money is the only goal there is.
How long will planet earth sustain with this kind of an insensitive act by the humans?
Will we eat ourselves to the extinction of this home that we live in?
What is scarier, is that, the developing world’s like China and India are catching up to this same culture of departmental stores where supply is more than the demand. How are we going to sustain ourselves in the future when are lands are barren? Are the money making Moguls going to eat their money instead of food?
In the end it is always the poor man who suffers- in a world filled with abundance as well as in a world without its abundance.
I hope we can take a minute and think about what we are doing to ourselves and make a change.
I believe there is a solution to every problem, if only we are open to suggestions from unexpected sources.
We have learnt with the global warming and the floods and drought that the way of this life is not working. I am sure, with a global togetherness we can find solutions to a sustainable future.
As consumers we have more power to demand change. Let’s do it! Before it is too late.
Nimmu's 