Very shocking and sickening indeed. The dangerous lead levels in noodles? No! The sudden, simulated rage as if the whole thing was tainted only the day-before-yesterday! Well, that surely is.
Why else did they get to be called junk food in the first place? Because they are. And everyone, from the media to masses to the minding agencies, knew the ‘dirty’ truth about them all along. In fact, middle India even made the term ‘junk’ very respectable and hep. And worse, quite natural: ‘Let’s order some junk stuff’ is a fashion statement and logical option across our households. Is it not fair to assume we got it because we wanted it and even craved for it?
Again, the furious furore seems farcical more because of the content of the controversy. Lead is the villain. Really? If such food is junk and still deemed palatable, why bother what it contains? Anyway, leave lead, our ‘edible’ junk contain far worse ingredients — metallic, chemical or biological — that all can make lead seem like a dud. The additives and preservatives deemed absolutely necessary to help the fast food (FF) also last guarantee a wholesome toxic package, besides leaving a big hole in the pocket. Ironically, all this is pompously paraded as perfect nutrition solution to the body’s needs and ills!
But then we know and proudly pay for the poison. I am surprised why no FF franchisee ever thought of putting a one gram gold coin inside a Burger and announcing a prize besides a photo op with some star to the ‘lucky’ one that swallowed it! By the way, why blame kids or actors or cricketers who endorse the products? The most vulnerable and easy prey are the parents, particularly the thirty to fifty middle-age group with bulging middles and hence the true targets of ads and promotions. First, they hold the purse strings. Two, they will do anything to keep their children happy, not always healthy. Three, they themselves love junk food! Kids are just alibis and benamis for parental excess. Next time a pizza arrives, see who eats the bulk!
The fancy for FF, earlier called street food, gained traction after globalisation. Still, through much of nineties these acknowledged junk food remained an occasional indulgence. They became a fad by the turn of the millennium with mobile phones and door delivery acting as marketing steroids. It did not take long thereafter for them to become the staple diet. Instant food has invaded the kitchens of India, wiping out most of the traditional, time-tested cooking inputs and even fraudulently passing off as mom’s and grandma’s recipes! Today, the store rooms and fridge shelves in homes look like supermarket display racks. And most items on them go stale since we eat out anyway!
The future shock is not hard to guess either. That such food advance the individual’s expiry date and hasten the species extinction itself is obvious. But the utter stupidity and cultivated ignorance of the current generation belies the knowledge evolution that it lays claim to. What’s the point of super gadgets and scientific or medical advancements when the basic body is abused to death, not while developing a six pack but merely by contaminated breakfasts? Also the consumption culture that we have bequeathed to our progeny makes us the most irresponsible smart ones to have lived on this planet.
Every element of nature has turned totally synthetic. Lead is not just in food, but omnipresent. And so are all the toxins. From deep soil upwards, to terra firma, water and air and even space, rampaging humans have polluted and laid waste every ounce, if that is a measure, of God’s gifts, inviting disasters on themselves, which in a way is deserved but also on unsuspecting, unfortunate animals, birds and other organisms.
We love our offsprings but we leave them an unlivable habitat! You can mull over this tragic self-goal as you munch on that stuffed, rubbery, elastic sodium roll we affectionately call junk food or as you sip on that sugary, carbonated toilet cleaner called ‘soft’ drink. And yes, that lovely lass peddling whatever she is peddling presently is an eyeful too. But I am hooked — to the food — I mean, anyway! And that, to put in a neat plastic-pack, is the point!
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