Betty and Jennifer

I've only read two of the essays that David Brooks has recommended. The one about why fewer students are majoring in the humanities is interesting (but long). Mary Eberstadt's "Is Food the New Sex?" is fascinating and eerily accurate, up to a point, in its hypothetical examples:

To begin to see just how recent and dramatic this change is, let us imagine some broad features of the world seen through two different sets of eyes: a hypothetical 30-year-old housewife from 1958 named Betty, and her hypothetical granddaughter Jennifer, of the same age, today.

Begin with a tour of Betty’s kitchen. Much of what she makes comes from jars and cans. Much of it is also heavy on substances that people of our time are told to minimize — dairy products, red meat, refined sugars and flours — because of compelling research about nutrition that occurred after Betty’s time. Betty’s freezer is filled with meat every four months by a visiting company that specializes in volume, and on most nights she thaws a piece of this and accompanies it with food from one or two jars. If there is anything “fresh” on the plate, it is likely a potato. Interestingly, and rudimentary to our contemporary eyes though it may be, Betty’s food is served with what for us would appear to be high ceremony, i.e., at a set table with family members present.

As it happens, there is little that Betty herself, who is adventurous by the standards of her day, will not eat; the going slogan she learned as a child is about cleaning your plate, and not doing so is still considered bad form. Aside from that notion though, which is a holdover to scarcer times, Betty is much like any other American home cook in 1958. She likes making some things and not others, even as she prefers eating some things to others — and there, in personal aesthetics, does the matter end for her. It’s not that Betty lacks opinions about food. It’s just that the ones she has are limited to what she does and does not personally like to make and eat.

Now imagine one possible counterpart to Betty today, her 30-year-old granddaughter Jennifer. Jennifer has almost no cans or jars in her cupboard. She has no children or husband or live-in boyfriend either, which is why her kitchen table on most nights features a laptop and goes unset. Yet interestingly enough, despite the lack of ceremony at the table, Jennifer pays far more attention to food, and feels far more strongly in her convictions about it, than anyone she knows from Betty’s time.

Wavering in and out of vegetarianism, Jennifer is adamantly opposed to eating red meat or endangered fish. She is also opposed to industrialized breeding, genetically enhanced fruits and vegetables, and to pesticides and other artificial agents. She tries to minimize her dairy intake, and cooks tofu as much as possible. She also buys “organic” in the belief that it is better both for her and for the animals raised in that way, even though the products are markedly more expensive than those from the local grocery store. Her diet is heavy in all the ways that Betty’s was light: with fresh vegetables and fruits in particular. Jennifer has nothing but ice in her freezer, soymilk and various other items her grandmother wouldn’t have recognized in the refrigerator, and on the counter stands a vegetable juicer she feels she “ought” to use more.

Most important of all, however, is the difference in moral attitude separating Betty and Jennifer on the matter of food. Jennifer feels that there is a right and wrong about these options that transcends her exercise of choice as a consumer. She does not exactly condemn those who believe otherwise, but she doesn’t understand why they do, either. And she certainly thinks the world would be a better place if more people evaluated their food choices as she does. She even proselytizes on occasion when she can.

I, too, proselytize on occasion--in fact, I've found myself doing so to my mother. Just before posting this, I tried to get her to read this and this, based on what she bought in the store. I spent a good ten minutes on the way back ranting against basa, so I identify with the "Jennifer" prototype... until this:

She is pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage, indifferent to ethical questions about stem cell research and other technological manipulations of nature (as she is not, ironically, when it comes to food), and agnostic on the question of whether any particular parental arrangements seem best for children.

Pro-choice is not pro-abortion; and I'm not "indifferent to ethical questions about stem cell research"--I adamantly believe that the ethics of technological manipulations must be considered--but I don't think (potentially life-saving) technologies themselves should be dismissed out of hand. But this post isn't about stem cells. The point is, just as the "Betty" prototype--I can't help but think of Betty on Mad Men--is an oversimplification for the purpose of making a point, so is Jennifer. But I take issue with how Jennifer's sex-related ethics are reduced to one dimension, perhaps more so because the food stuff is so spot-on. Betty's food behaviors correspond to mom's:

Betty does care about nutrition and food, but it doesn’t occur to her to extend her opinions to a moral judgment — i.e., to believe that other people ought to do as she does in the matter of food, and that they are wrong if they don’t. In fact, she thinks such an extension would be wrong in a different way; it would be impolite, needlessly judgmental, simply not done. Jennifer, similarly, does care to some limited degree about what other people do about sex; but it seldom occurs to her to extend her opinions to a moral judgment. In fact, she thinks such an extension would be wrong in a different way — because it would be impolite, needlessly judgmental, simply not done.

I told my mother I was reading an article "about us" (although her mores re: sexuality don't correspond to Betty's at all). She started talking about how she reuses her grocery bags, washes dishes efficiently, etc. She ranted about how it takes dad five minutes, water pouring down the drain the whole time, to wash a single wine glass. I stopped short of saying, "none of that matters as much as not buying crap--do you know how much water goes into manufacturing and transporting crap--and eating sustainably. Save all the tap water you want--you'd be better off weaning yourself off farmed salmon. And that matches the Betty prototype, too: she knows, she cares... but she won't do anything about it.