Unhealthy Food Donations & An Injury: Bumps On The Road to Green

This post I am going to try and tackle the food ethics of unhealthy food donations and talk about my sprained ankle!  The injury has limited my green activities like gardening for the present, so I have been left to mull over the ethics of food donations this Thanksgiving season.

Right now, I'm recovering from a sprained ankle. It's doing much better, though they take a while to heal. I'm walking around, but I have to be careful about doing too much and re-injuring it. So, I've not been able to get to the organic co-op as much as I want. I have been managing about once a week, or so.  So, I've been having a lot of free time on my hands to ponder things like the ethics of seasonal food donations.. I really struggle with being green in light of things like this. Personally, I've done as much organic/free range stuff as I can afford this Thanksgiving, and I'm giving thanks that I can. But should we be so picky when trying to feed the hungry? Yes, a box of Hamburger Helper or instant Mashed Potatoes isn't healthy and its contributing to the environment, but it's also cheap, filling and appreciated by hungry bellies.  It's the whole 'if a vegetarian is hungry enough, he'll eat a burger' argument, which by the way is true. When I was extremely poor, I ate the bland food of the Krishnas for free, gratefully, and whoever else wanted to was welcome to feed me, as well. I wasn't likely to complain or insist on free range, grass fed meat, regardless of how well-intended or important to the environment it might have been.

And yet, eating cheap, industrialized food is exacerbating things. Unhealthy food donations could be part of the problem...It would be nice to wave a magic wand and have all cranberries be organic, and all turkeys grass fed, and all eggs cage-free. But with food prices going up, a 50-cent box of mac-n-cheese is a feast to some.

So, where do you personally draw the line? Ethics? Environment? Full Stomach?