Home o' the Whopper

Eric Schlosser's bestselling book-length exposé on America's fast food industry, and the culture it spawned, has now been (loosely) adapted into a feature-length film, directed by Richard Linklater. In case you missed it, Schlosser has a piece in the latest edition of Sierra magazine about the hidden costs of cheap eats. Among other things, he notes, "The cost of a 99-cent hamburger doesn't include the dialysis you may need years later."

Fast Food Nation, the film, hits cinemas today, and Grist has an interview with Schlosser, who is touring to promote the film. It's gratifying to see that he gives the Sierra Club props for its work on CAFOs, or Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations:

The Sierra Club is doing a good job right now in terms of [working to mitigate] the environmental impact of factory farms. The runoff from these farms is one of the leading causes of water pollution in the United States. The hormones that they're giving to these cattle are excreted in their manure and are winding up in streams. And they're finding fish that are weirdly deformed -- their sexual organs are deformed -- downstream of these feedlots, and that's just crazy.

Ultimately, Schlosser wants us all to think about agro-industry in America, because, as he tells Grist, "Each one of us who eats is part of that. If you eat, you're connected to this, and you've got to think about it and do something about it."