Capital Conceptualization

I found the concept of capital to be an idea with multiple facets. However, I found that it is important in nearly every aspect of business creation and success. With a simple use of Wikipedia, I was able to determine that there are several types of capital, and nearly all of them can be associated with businesses. Capital can range from types of investments, cash flow, profits, ideas, resources, and even relationships between individuals; all associated in terms of business.

In terms of our association in addressing social issues, capital can be the most volatile factor when it comes to how businesses manage themselves in the social eye. They start off with smaller expectations, begun from the investment of financial capital by investors, loans, or personal jump-starting. Then the company begins to grow, spanning out into different methods of production. Different areas of capital begin to form; relationships, resources, and cash flow are beginning to dictate the direction and growth of the company.

Capital is both an asset when it comes to creation of the company or business in question, but is also highly important when it comes to how the social problems are formed. Issues of the social type can always be classified by a discrepancy in how this capital is prioritized. More attention paid to a certain form of capital in terms of importance to the company can diminish the attention paid to the value and scarcity of another. This is where we find ourselves at odds with ideas such as the rights of farmers, globalization, media concentration, industrial food, etc. The priorities of certain issues of capital have been set aside as insignificant in terms of the larger company, whether it be the idea of relationship capital, financial capital, ideas, or resources. If one concept is prioritized differently, there will be controversy.

Are "Yes Men" Really Changing the World?

When we watched “Yes Men Fix the World”, I did not know what to expect. But when we began watching it, and I began to get the general gist of the film and what these men were doing, I was suddenly aware of a new sensation that was perhaps different from that of my peers.

Although I will take the time to applaud these men for their cleverness and the well-thought out presentations they were managing to create within the web of corporate PR representatives and customers, I felt a familiar sinking feeling in my stomach. Although people may admire these men for what they are doing for the underrepresented victims of corporate mistakes, I cannot shake the fact that these men are lying. They’re lying to the public, they’re lying to the victims, they’re lying to the press on a national scale; and, worst of all, they’re lying to the victims of these events. Personally, I found their work intriguing, but at the base, it goes against all I stand for. They are incredibly convincing actors, though sometimes their ideas that they sell to the corporations seem to ridiculous to be believable. Their schemes are entertaining and over the top.

Though I do not agree with how the victims of corporate discord are being treated, I feel like they deserve more respect than to be given false hope through an actor wearing a suit. Although the victims in Bhopal say that they took the joke with humor, I feel like not all of them feel like that; and personally, I feel like the Yes Men did wrong on the part of the victims by even raising the idea of a hope for justice of their plight. It was cruel to raise even one hope, simply to have it crushed by the reality of a hoax committed by a pair of activists.  

I feel like these men addressed a very good issue within all our projects. It’s the prevalence of a capitalistic ideology. We make money. We spend money. We create means for money. It’s a process that will never die. All of the issues within class: globalization, the industrial food system, farmer’s rights, or genetic modification; These are all driven by the idea of economic impact. Money is a god in our reality, and its right that the Yes Men acknowledge this.

An Occupied Community.

Amid the popular “Occupy” movement, there have come several subdivisions of social issues that seem to be impacting the supposed “99%” of the common population. Among these branches of awareness movements is the newly found “Occupy Against Big Food” ideology. In November of 2011, this group decided to jump onto the Occupy bandwagon by forming a peaceful protest group that gathered in Zuccotti Park in New York City. The group was organized and founded by a nutritional expert and an NYU food studies graduate and managed to gather at least 50 people in the small paved park in the middle New York City.

The rally-goers for this particular event are often associated as a type of “occupant” involved in the Occupy Movement. They often identify themselves as the ‘Foodie’ population or part of the “Slow Food Movement”. In previous times, the ‘Foodies’ have associated themselves with the ideology of sustainable farms, small farms, fair trade of crops within poverty-stricken agricultural communities, and more humane treatment of massive industrial-sized factory farm livestock. The Slow Food Movement was founded as part of a countermovement against the fast food industry, endorsing ideas of small, organic, and close-knitted farming and distribution trends. This community declares themselves to be crusaders for the cause of organic and healthy food for everyone.

However, this rally, as well as the community has been met with much disdain from the populous. Like many of the Occupy rallies, the police have become involved due to public discourse within the greater scheme of the city, such as disruption of public peace and obstruction of traffic. The Slow Food Movement as a whole, similar to many facets of the Occupy argument (which deals with the discrepancy of the supposed “1% vs. 99%” has been met with criticism from actual members of more poverty-stricken communities. These members of poorer communities are often forced to support a fast food habit due to their income, but do not see these protesters as doing anything constructive for their cause. Many members of these less fortunate communities are dead-set against these crusaders for Slow Food, arguing that they often depend on these fast food restaurants for survival, and that this cause  has no business trying to change the status quo of economic impact since they themselves are not dependent on fast food.

This community seems to be doing its own agenda, maintaining its calm throughout much protest. It’s a cause which when gathered into small groups, seems to not have much power; but as whole, it is recognized as something to be reasoned with.

For more information on the Occupy Big Food Rallies, please see the following sites. 
http://occupybigfood.wordpress.com/
http://eatdrinkbetter.com/2011/11/01/occupy-big-food/ 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kristin-wartman/occupy-wall-street-food_b_1062967.html

Sources:

Wartman, Kristin. “Occupy Against Big Food.” Huffington Post, October 28, 2011. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kristin-wartman/occupy-wall-street-food_b_1062967.html.

One...Two...Three Strikes; You're Art.

When I initially started looking up art to describe the industrial food system, I first and formally thought of the film “Food, Inc”; but then I realized that it would be unwise to create a blog post about a film that I had heard so much about, but had not yet seen. So I chose against that initial impulse. Then, I thought once more about my subject. I want to focus on the industrial food systems in terms of their location and the economic success/ impact of the area. It is my knowledge that many fast food places are located in poverty-stricken areas, and that they hold a dominant market of customers. These customers are often unable to afford things other than fast food, so the fast food restaurants grab a greater hold on the population by being the only option. I’m interested in seeing this connection explored more, especially how the corporate food system chooses to place their stores.

In thinking about the social aspects of the fast food industry when it comes to financial situations of the customers, I thought of the film made by Morgan Spurlock in 2004 called “Supersize Me”. Within the documentary, there are pieces of art that make an obvious hyperbole of the grasp that the fast food industry has on its customers.

HOWEVER, in my final decision, I decided to go back to the initial idea of an industrial food system. How it is an industry, as opposed to the idea of simply being a business. With that and a little help from Google, I was able to find a series of paintings done by a satirical painter named Nathan Meltz. He has a series of paintings devoted to the pure, cold, mechanical presence of the industrial food system. In his paintings and screens, Meltz creates depictions of large quantities of livestock often kept and harvested on an industrial scale. Instead of creating these creatures as they are in nature, with soft curves of flesh and expressive faces, these creatures are made to look entirely mechanical. Their joints are gears, and their eyes are lenses. There is nothing natural about them except their general shape. I believe that Meltz is attempting to comment on how the industrial food system has created these creatures to not be viewed as pieces of living tissue, but rather as a mechanized resource that is cold and inorganic. I added his main website to the Zotero site. He has several pieces of animation that use the same style. In a brief overview of his paintings, I have seen the theme of mechanization throughout.

When It Comes to Peers...

For the "peer review" exercise, I viewed the first blog posts of Andrew, Tatiana, and Katie. In all their blogs, I ended up reviewing the post that spoke of the "A New World is Possible" documentary that we viewed in the first few days of class.

Andrew's Blog talked about the festival as a whole, focusing mainly on the aspects of performance as power within the festivals. He aptly highlighted the effective use of different cultural aspects to try and drive home the issues at hand.

Tatiana's Blog spoke about the World Social Forum in the idea that it was overshadowed by so many other things that Western society seems to find important. A very interesting take about the acknowledgement of the obvious bias when it comes to seeing social issues in a Western gaze.

Katie's Blog took time to focus on the issues with farmers according to the World Social Forum gathering of 2002. She brings to light her own opinion about how we see native farmers according to a Western gaze. She acknowledges the issues associated with farmers trying to stay loyal to natural ways.

Concerning Organ Transplantation...

In the issue of modern organ donation and transplantation, we come across the idea that the organ donation in itself carries major controversy over its most basic of foundations. When one takes time to look at the controversy carried within the idea of someone donating their own tissue to another human being, the idea can be construed as either as a charitable service to another human being; or, on the other side of the issue, it can be seen as an opportunity for personal gain.

Popular belief is the idea that when someone needs an organ, they are given one by a newly deceased donor or an anonymous living donor; but the reality of this situation is much starker by comparison. According to researchers at government-sanctioned site “organdonor.gov”, 18 people in the United States die every day because they do not receive an organ transplant. This is the principle problem from which our controversy springs. The fact is that the demand for organ transplantation is more than twice the actual availability of these organs, and the controversy created in this disproportion has spawned the idea of illegal acquisition of organs as an alternative to the legal process that we know today.

For those wishing to donate an organ legally, one must be a registered organ donor. But according to a New York Times article by a kidney transplant recipient named Sally Satel, only 30-40 percent of Americans are registered as organ donors who will willingly donate their organs either in life or in the event of their untimely death. The discrepancy in those willing to donate and the actual need is noticeable later on in her article; and while many have proposed a reform in organ transplantation policy, some have found ways to bypass the bureaucracy of the organ transplantation process. A new trend is occurring where people who have been waiting on the organ transplantation list are now finding eager donors that will willingly donate their own tissues for a fee. CBS correspondent David Freeman wrote about an instance in New York City where one man was being convicted for being a mediator between such relations. The man said that he was able to procure the kidneys of willing donors for immediate transplant for the fee of $120,000 apiece.

The defense of these illegal transplantations can be seen from a moral standpoint. If the statistics are accurate, then thousands of people are simply waiting to die while on the organ transplant list. One might find this “waiting to die” idea morally detestable, and find such means as selling their extra organs as completely acceptable; but according to a legal standpoint, one might find this unregulated transplantation to be dangerous and unprofessional to both the donor and recipient. From the perspective of a healthy human being who might one day need an organ, one might find both sides of the issue acceptable. To some, in the end when our backs are to the wall and fight or flight response has failed us, and we are forced to wait on a list, it is ultimately our choice and our risk to follow through with any type of organ transplantation- whether it be legal or illegal, the process carries risk 100% of the time.

WORKS CITED:

1. Sally Satel, “Death’s Waiting List,” The New York Times, May 15, 2006, sec. Opinion, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/15/opinion/15satel.html.
   
2. David Freeman, “Organ theft? Guilty plea spotlights illegal organ trade - HealthPop - CBS News,” CBS News, July 23, 2009, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-20126993-10391704/organ-theft-guilty-plea-spotlights-illegal-organ-trade/.

"Another World is Possible" Response

In the “Another World is Possible” documentary, which both followed and brought to light a condensed version of the 2002 World Social Forum, the viewer is accosted by certain issues that certain members of the world population are facing today. Among those issues are the ideas of intellectual property, genetically modified crops, and the widening of the digital divide among “civilized” and “uncivilized” nations. However, in my personal point of a view as a fellow human being with seemingly varied opinion from the majority, I was more concerned with the fact that many attendees of the WSF did not see these issues as beneficial to the population. 

 I’m concerned with the fact that much of the populous which is against the genetically modified food is not considering the benefits that they give. For example, this food, which has been genetically altered, was altered for the fact that it could not grow in certain areas before; and now, after being modified, it can grow in new areas of the world on a much larger scale. The need for new areas for farming grew out of a rising population around the world; and the idea of genetically altering seeds and domesticated creatures was a potential assist for this growing population issue.

It distresses me that the documentary failed to mention that much of this research that goes into creating growth hormones and genetically altered foods is the lifeblood of many people. Observers who think that these foods are a problem often overlook that researchers and scientists have put years of their life into finding correct ways to modify these foods. If we look at something with a gaze that ignores the realities of capitalism and a growing planetary population, we deny the accomplishments of many who have worked their entire life to alter nature for more practical uses. That is my response to this documentary; though I agree with the issue of accountability and a moral obligation to society when it comes to altering nature, I disagree with the demonization of processes that have helped so many.