This is perhaps one of the most colorful communities I have been to. Its full of life, art, crime-- the arts district on Santa Fe in Denver, Colorado, is truly remarkable. It contains a delicate balance between the preservation of the Chicano culture and the appreciation of art. Not far from here is a large area of section-8 housing, community projects such as organic gardens and even a free build-it-yourself bike shop.
So my mother decided to take me and my sister out grocery shopping. We did the usual health-food store sweep, then decided to go to Wal-Mart, where my sister was determined to find better prices for the things that she needed. Being the social activist, I resolutely decided I wasn’t going to contribute to Wal-Mart’s corporate money feed, so I chose to see exactly what was so “great” about the store.
I believe I have discovered one of the many things wrong with America. Though this should come as no surprise, it is a fascinating discovery. Walking through the grocery department, I decided to find organic produce. This being a super center, it should have everything, right? I found organic spinach, and that was about it. More interesting, however, was that many of their prices on produce were higher than those of the grocery store we had just come from, some of them even 2 or 3 times as much. Along with this was my realization of the fact that this is where most of the American diet originates. Proportionately, the produce department was much smaller than the meat and dairy department, and more interestingly, the processed and boxed foods aisles comprised the majority of the grocery department. Proportionately to this, many of the customers shopping these aisles were heavyset, many of them severely overweight.
On to the clothing aisle. Walking through a Wal-Mart clothing aisle is severely depressing for anyone who has even the slightest fashion sense. Items are on cheap hangers on cheap racks, or folded in mass quantities on shelves. They look as though they came straight off the assembly line to the store; there is no personality. A quick walk through here reveals that the majority of dyes the manufacturers use is riddled with formaldehyde and other synthetic dyes. There is hardly a clothing item over $20.00, and it all looks as though it’s made to fit the plus-size people shopping the grocery aisles.
After being in Wal-Mart for 20 minutes, having had a cold for the past few days, I began to feel my symptoms worsen. My eyes started itching and my sore throat felt worse. As soon as I walked outside, I felt better. I realized that it was most likely the indoor air pollution—the overpowering fry smell from the resident McDonald’s which overpowered the produce department; the formaldehyde from the clothing department, and the overall plastic smell from the entire store. The synthetic air was just too much for me to handle.
If we wish to change America, we must change the way that we consume; we must think of the impact of our choices and work towards more responsibility and environmental stewardship.
