Comically Oversimplified: A Tale of Trying to Talk Food Policy
When even your partner in policy gets her brain rocked.
Fun fact that I learned about two seconds after sending my last newsletter: I oversimplified the way I plan to talk to you about existing food policy. I dove into all the easily accessible literature about food policy only to find out that there is a laundry list of issues that are all linking arms and huddled together under the food policy umbrella. Before I even hit the Farm Bill (one of the largest federal food policies in the United States) I was reading about so many issues that must be considered when talking about food policy that I had never even thought through fully. Crop insurance, conservation programs, nutrition assistance and food insecurity, food waste, corporate consolidation, food and the economy, regional food systems and closed loop supply chains, declining mental health of farmers; these were all things I knew about, but I hadn’t considered in depth. Turns out, I could turn this entire blog into one dedicated to only food policy, and I would never run out of topics to discuss.
And here I was thinking I would just talk about subsidies, and throw a couple darts at large-scale industrial farming and environmental degradation, and call it a day…but I was asking all the wrong questions. “YOU’RE CUTE,” is literally all I could think about the letter-writing version of myself that existed five minutes prior to the version of me that was now opening tab, after tab, after tab on my computer. Twenty-three tabs in under five minutes to be exact, and speed reading was only taking me down more rabbit holes.
Rookie move Taylor, rookie move.
I studied policy and have a baseline understanding of how complex and complicated the systems we live in are…and I am still regularly getting my headspace rocked by the layers I hadn’t considered. I know a lot about a lot of systems…but I am one of the privileged individuals (probably like you if we are being honest with ourselves) who often has the privilege of criticizing systems without having a full scope of the practices and policies in place, and why they exist, how they are succeeding, and in what ways they are actually failing.
It is my hope that in being transparent with you about when I am in my (sometimes uncomfortable) learning zone, like I am while trying to make this very complex topic palatable and demonstrate its relevance to your life, you may be inspired to exist in your (sometimes uncomfortable) learning zone. The one where we learn instead of blame, where we engage research material and compare it to our own habits. May it be an example of our need to think critically about policies, and systems, and each other, in conjunction with our fight for a better world. May we pause and think and question (question even ourselves) before we conclude and fight and blame others…because if we are being honest here, I have blamed others for broken systems and so have you.
So here is where I pivot and tell you that while policy is my jam and making it accessible to people who want to make sense of the world is my passion project, I am not the expert (yet) in any of these independent areas of policy.
QUE RESOURCE PAGE PLUG. While I am not the expert in the given fields I am talking about, there are a lot of people and organizations with specific knowledge that you should know if you want to be a changemaker. Details about the experts and advocates will soon live on the Resources page on the website, so that if you are eager to sink your hands into the policy work or deeper research you know where to turn.
In the meantime I hope you are eating something tasty, and thinking about all the badass food policy we will soon be discussing on the blog. If you need a good recipe, I highly recommend the cookbook I am modeling above - My Paris Kitchen by David Lebovitz. It was my souvenir from Paris (back in the good ol’ days when I could travel) and I am working the binding into a nice soft crease. It’s giving me all the international feels from the comfort of my own kitchen.
Your Partner in Policy,
Taylor Patrice
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See you all over the place.