Food as a gadget

gadget

noun

gad·​get | \ˈga-jət

\

Definition of gadget 

: an often small mechanical or electronic device with a practical use but often thought of as a novelty

 

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gadget 

 

Our food is made up of gadgets "with a practical use but often thought of as a novelty". We treat food the same as we treat new gadgets in home entertainment or social communication. We want the new, cool, fancy, sexy and hip food item on our plates. We tell our friends we had the seaweed spaghetti last night and how they are high in iodine and minerals.  In the same way as nobody is using an old phone with a rotary dial we chose our food. But is this clever?

I do admit that a lot of technical gadgets make life more comfortable. Do they make life better? I believe it all comes with a trade off. If everybody has a smartphone in their pockets it allows us to contact people easier. It also creates issues around privacy due to phone cameras, issues around cell phone use in inappropriate situations, issues around companies controlling our every step through phone apps etc. What are the trade offs with food as a gadget? Gluten Free bread contains more salt, fats and additives than conventional bread. Quinoa trade worldwide made the staple food for indigenous people unaffordable and they resolve to eating food which gives them obesity and diabetes. We design food artificially or we rob poorer areas in the world of their staple food. Only because in our world food has to be a novelty.

I am not expecting us to go back using phones with rotary dials. On the other side we still have a very simple phone at home. For times when we have a power cut which happens frequently in our area. In the same way we shouldn't throw away our old food for the new gadgets. Because the nature of gadgets is that they will be replaced by the next gadget until it reaches a point where design is driven only by making it more interesting. The benefit for the consumer will be pushed into the background. My hope is that we then still have some of the old things available to us. Same way as I am keeping my turntable to play vinyl records.