Karen Washington joins me on The Doctor’s Farmacy to discuss the overarching inequalities in our food system when it comes to the demographics of race, location, affluence, and economics. We talk about how land ownership among Black communities has been stifled due to systemically racist policies, and Karen how she began getting involved as an activist to elicit change.
Karen Washington is a farmer, activist, and food advocate. She is the Co-owner and Farmer at Rise & Root Farm in Chester, New York. In 2010, Karen Co-Founded Black Urban Growers (BUGS), an organization supporting growers in both urban and rural settings. In 2012, Ebony magazine voted her one of the 100 most influential African Americans in the country, and in 2014 Karen was the recipient of the James Beard Leadership Award. Karen serves on the boards of the New York Botanical Gardens, SoulFire Farm, the Mary Mitchell Center, Why Hunger, and Farm School NYC.
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Sounds like an opportunity to open a business selling fruits veggies urban farm
My wish for the world is to see everyone as an individual. I believe our food system has been weopnized against all Americans. Why break it down by race, how ridiculous! Things wont change unless we stand together, so why discuss the effects on the just the black community. What happens to the least of us happens to ALL of us. Stop the race batting, it grows old.
@Destiny Winters my point is it effects all of us, not just one race over another, lets educate that. We are one race, the human race. I would love to hear a black american speak up for all people for once, not just their unique group. Especially on a subject that is important to all. Yes, food education is important, we have been lied to for decades, yet nothing will change if we dont come together as humans to fight the power of our food system.
Anita Cost coming together means listening to our unique individual experiences, our individual group experiences, and our collective experiences. If you haven’t hear a Black person say the same sentiment I just posted, then you’re not listening hard enough. They’re saying this. Everywhere. My point is that speaking about individual/group experiences does not discount the collective experience. It’s all a part of it, and we need to listen.
Anita Cost one more thing to consider. If someone feels dismissed or invalidated, they arent going to respond to your comments to have a conversation with you, because they’ll have the assumption that you don’t want to listen, even if that’s not true.
@Destiny Winters I find it highly divisive and not inclusive enough (maybe even defensive about it) when listening to others place blame outside of individual responibility. It is unAmerican to do so. I hear the other side and am tired of the lack of individual responsiblity and their cries of not being included. I am not keeping them out of the discission, but do not accept blame for others lack of understanding of HUMAN nature. Lets leave skin color out of the discussion of food, all humans eat.
Anita Cost ahh your true opinion shows now. That’s good, it’s good to know where someone actually stands. When you say it’s “unamerican,” you’re speaking for majority Americans. Minority Americans weren’t allowed to stand up for themselves without dire consequences, such as death, losing a job, or not being allowed to get a mortgage or rent an apartment. So your version of America is much different, and I’m so glad you are able to stand up on your own two feet and take care of your own responsibilities, but that is not the case for all Americans. Your last comment was the most divisive of all. I do respect you can own that you get defensive, and I invite you to consider what becoming non-defensive would look like and what that would mean for you.
Yessir! Money is the root of all evil. Exactly why I permanently quit processed foods & drinks. Quit TV “programming”, explicit Music, video games, movies etc. It’s not just one tool they’re using to divide people, it’s many. Silent Weapons, for quiet wars!
Likewise and spot on!
a genocide? Sure African Amercans probably do have a worse diet due to poverty and what not….but to suggest that there are people actively changing the diet of this community to cause a genocide? I need some major sources to believe that.
Also American diets suck in general, are we all being genocided?
Unfortunately, yes… destroy people from the inside out… create a fake plandemic, make everybody even more ill by enforcing mask mandates then release round 2 this fall when everyone’s immune system gets weaker and are going to be more susceptible to illnesses…genocide is a “nice” way to put it! It’s becoming clear to more and more people what these lobbyists/string operators have been pushing over the past 40-50 years…unfortunately, it’s not going to end well for most sheeple! Sorry, but these are FACTS!
People never hear from the black prospective. People will say why just them, why not all of us? Well to break things down the term “all of us” has left many minorities out of the conversation of the majority for century’s. Thank you Dr. Hyman for all of your work & never leaving minorities out. This is how all Doctors should be. I’ve personally worked around doctors/surgeons, and to be honest I’ve seen them treat minorities differently from Caucasian’s. We have a long way to go to get to the change that we want. This is one way for us to start.
Unfortunately you are correct!
For most, food is a choice…for others it is not! Fact: poorer people that live in urban settings have a hard time getting fresh organic food and grass fed beef is going to be out of their reach due to cost…even conventional beef, albeit cheaper, is still going to be out of most of their range…so If they are trying to feed a family of 4-5 on a budget of $10/day, they are forced to buy foods like Mac and Cheese which is heavily processed and can cause a boatload of health issues over a period of time…there are solutions, like growing your own food etc… but there are a lot of people that either don’t have the resources or skills or are to afraid to try it… bottom line is this: food is going to go up in price substantially over the next few years and these poorer populations are going to be impacted even more! Even feeding a family of 4-5 at McDonalds every day is crazy expensive and super unhealthy and most on a budget can not afford the more calorie dense menu items and opt for the deals…if you can even call it “food”
When do you have someone on your show talk about white genocide?
In 2015, when researchers Anne Case and Angus Deaton discovered that death rates had been rising dramatically since 1999 among middle-aged white Americans, they weren’t sure why people were dying younger, reversing decades of longer life expectancy.
Now the husband-and-wife economists say they have a better understanding of what’s causing these “deaths of despair” by suicide, drugs and alcohol.
In a follow-up to their groundbreaking 2015 work, they say that a lack of steady, well-paying jobs for whites without college degrees has caused pain, distress and social dysfunction to build up over time. The mortality rate for that group, ages 45 to 54, increased by a half percent each year from 1999 to 2013.
But whites with college degrees haven’t suffered the same lack of economic opportunity and haven’t seen the same loss of life expectancy. The study was published Thursday in Brookings Papers on Economic Activity.
Case and Deaton, who are both at Princeton University, spoke with NPR’s David Greene about what’s driving these trends. The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/03/23/521083335/the-forces-driving-middle-aged-white-peoples-deaths-of-despair