The Food Revolution
by John Robbins, California

I was born into ice cream. Well, not literally, but just about. My father, Irv Robbins, founded, and for many years owned and ran what would become the world’s largest ice cream company: Baskin-Robbins (31 Flavors). Along with my uncle, Burt Baskin, he built an empire, with thousands of stores worldwide and sales eventually measuring in the billions of dollars.

Not surprisingly, many people in the family struggled with weight problems; my uncle died of a heart attack in his early fifties, my father developed serious diabetes and high blood pressure, and I was sick more often than not.

None of that showed up on the balance sheets, however, and my father was grooming me to succeed him. I was his only son, and he expected me to follow in his footsteps. But things did not develop that way. I chose to leave behind the ice cream company and the money it represented in order to take my own rocky road. I walked away from an opportunity to live a life of wealth to live a different kind of life, a life in which, I hoped, I might be able to be true to my values and learn to make a contribution to the well-being and happiness of others. It was a choice for integrity. Instead of the “Great American Dream” of financial success, I was pulled forward by a deeper dream.

Explaining that kind of thing to my father, was not easy. I told him, “Look, Dad, it’s a different world than when you grew up. The environment is deteriorating rapidly under the impact of human activities. Every two seconds somewhere on Earth a child dies of starvation while elsewhere there are abundant food resources going to waste. Do you see that for me, under these circumstances, inventing a thirty-second flavor just would not be an adequate response for my life?”

In my book, Diet for a New America. I illustrated the immense toll exacted by the standard American diet—and the benefits that might be gained by a shift in a healthier direction. I learned that the same food choices that do so much to prevent disease—that give you the most vitality, the strongest immune system, and the greatest life expectancy—were also the ones that took the least toll on the environment, conserved our precious natural resources, and were the most compassionate toward our fellow creatures.

I don’t think I could ever have imagined the full impact of my book -- in the five years immediately following the book’s publication, beef consumption in the United States dropped nearly 20 percent.

But there’s been a backlash. Fad diet books have sold millions of copies telling people they can lose weight and obtain optimum health while eating all the bacon and sausage they want. The U.S. meat industry has managed to divert attention away from the fact that the animals raised in modern factory farms are forced to endure conditions of almost unimaginable cruelty and deprivation. The USDA irradiates an increasing number of foods to combat the deadly food-borne diseases such as E. coli that increasingly breed in today’s factory farms and slaughterhouses.

Meanwhile, the chemical industry has mounted an aggressive campaign to discredit organic food. And without the knowledge or consent of most Americans, two-thirds of the products on our supermarket shelves now contain genetically engineered ingredients.

Those seeking a more humane and sustainable way of life—for themselves and for our society—are criticized and attacked by the industries that profit from activities that are harming people and the planet. There is still a strong belief in our society, that animals and the natural world have value only insofar as they can be converted into revenue. That nature is a commodity. And that the American dream is one of unlimited consumption.

There are many of us, on the other hand, who believe that animals and the natural world have value by virtue of being alive. That Nature is a community to which we belong and to which we owe our lives. And that the deeper American dream is one of unlimited compassion.

I don’t care whether you call yourself a vegetarian, a vegan, or an asparagus. I care whether you live in accord with your values, whether your life has integrity and purpose, whether you act with compassion for yourself and for all of life.

The truth, as has been said countless times, will set you free. But what is said far less often is that sometimes it first will make you confront habits of behavior and thought that might be limiting you, so that you might attain the awareness to use your freedom for the benefit of your greater self and all of life.

Not that long ago: The average American mother would have been more concerned to learn that her son or daughter was becoming a vegetarian than to learn that he or she was taking up smoking. Patients in hospital coronary care units were fed bacon and eggs, and white toast with margarine and jam for breakfast. People who ate food that was healthy, environmentally friendly, and caused no animals to suffer were considered “health nuts.” But all this is changing.

The revolution sweeping our relationship to our food and our world, I believe, is part of an historical imperative. This is what happens when the human spirit is activated. One hundred and fifty years ago, slavery was legal in the United States. One hundred years ago, women could not vote in most states. Eighty years ago, there were no laws in the United States against any form of child abuse. Fifty years ago, we had no Civil Rights Act.

I don’t believe we are isolated consumers, alienated from what gives life, and condemned to make a terrible mess of things on this planet. I believe we are human beings, flawed but learning, stumbling but somehow making our way toward wisdom, sometimes ignorant but learning through it all to live with respect for ourselves, for each other, and for the whole Earth community.

Reprinted with permission from Conari Press, The Food Revolution by John Robbins is available wherever books are sold or directly from the publisher at 1-800-423-7087 or orders@redwheelweiser.com as well as Conari Press, Amazon.com or BN.com.

John Robbins, author of numerous bestsellers, is the founder of EarthSave International. He also serves as director of many nonprofit organizations concerned with the environment, health, world hunger, genetic engineering, & the welfare of all species.