Does Organic Food Turn People into Jerks?

[Deleted]

Does organic food turn people into jerks?






Monika Graff / Getty Images


Vendors offer organically grown produce at the Union Square farmers market in New York City.

By Diane Mapes

Renate Raymond has encountered her fair share of organic food snobs, but a recent trip to a Seattle market left her feeling like she'd stumbled onto the set of "Portlandia."

"I stopped at a market to get a fruit platter for a movie night with friends but I couldn't find one so I asked the produce guy," says the 40-year-old arts administrator from Seattle. "And he was like, 'If you want fruit platters, go to Safeway. We're organic.' I finally bought a small cake and some strawberries and then at the check stand, the guy was like 'You didn't bring your own bag? I need to charge you if you didn't bring your own bag.' It was like a 'Portlandia skit.' They were so snotty and arrogant."

As it turns out, new research has determined that a judgmental attitude may just go hand in hand with exposure to organic foods. In fact, a new study published this week in the journal of Social Psychological and Personality Science, has found that organic food may just make people act a bit like jerks.

"There's a line of research showing that when people can pat themselves on the back for their moral behavior, they can become self-righteous," says author Kendall Eskine, assistant professor of the department of psychological sciences at Loyola University in New Orleans. "I've noticed a lot of organic foods are marketed with moral terminology, like Honest Tea, and wondered if you exposed people to organic food, if it would make them pat themselves on the back for their moral and environmental choices. I wondered if they would be more altruistic or not."

To find out, Eskine and his team divided 60 people into three groups. One group was shown pictures of clearly labeled organic food, like apples and spinach. Another group was shown comfort foods such as brownies and cookies. And a third group -- the controls -- were shown non-organic, non-comfort foods like rice, mustard and oatmeal. After viewing the pictures, each person was then asked to read a series of vignettes describing moral transgressions.

"One vignette was about second cousins having sex," says Eskine. "Another was about a lawyer on the prowl in an ER trying to get people to sue for their injuries. Then the groups made moral judgments on a scale from one to seven."

In another phase of the study, the three groups were asked to volunteer for a (fictitious) study, with each person writing down the amount of time -- from zero to 30 minutes -- that they would be willing to volunteer.

The results did not bode well for the organic folks.

"We found that the organic people judged much harder compared to the control or comfort food groups," says Eskine. "On a scale of 1 to 7, the organic people were like 5.5 while the controls were about a 5 and the comfort food people were like a 4.89."

When it came to helping out a needy stranger, the organic people also proved to be more selfish, volunteering only 13 minutes as compared to 19 minutes (for controls) and 24 minutes (for comfort food folks).

"There's something about being exposed to organic food that made them feel better about themselves," says Eskine. "And that made them kind of jerks a little bit, I guess."

Why does eating better make us act worse? Eskine says it probably has to do with what he calls "moral licensing."

"People may feel like they've done their good deed," he says. "That they have permission, or license, to act unethically later on. It's like when you go to the gym and run a few miles and you feel good about yourself, so you eat a candy bar."

Eskine says he was surprised by the findings ("You'd think eating organic would make you feel elevated and want to pay it forward," he says) and hopes to do additional studies that look at conditions that might prompt people to act differently.

Until then, organic eaters may want to rein in those self-righteous stink-eyes.

"At my local grocery, I sometimes catch organic eyes gazing into my grocery cart and scowling," says Sue Frause, a 61-year-old freelance writer/photographer from Whidbey Island. "So I'll often toss in really bad foods just to get them even more riled up."

[doctordonna]

That just sounds like Seattle.

[IIOY]

UO - I get tired of the organic food updates on Facebook, i.e., people posting whenever they eat something that happens to be organic. It's a weird form of Facebragging.

[Deleted]

May 18, 2012 17:59:43 GMT -5 IIOY said:

UO - I get tired of the organic food updates on Facebook, i.e., people posting whenever they eat something that happens to be organic. It's a weird form of Facebragging.

I'm pretty sure my sister 2 sent me this article so I would post it on FB for sister 5 to see.

We are a passive aggressive family.

[basilosaurus]

I admit, I totally stare and judge at other people's carts. It's highly amusing. I try to figure out their story, like if you're a male buying lots of frozen meals, junk food, but a nice bottle of wine and a roast chicken, I'm assuming you're trying to convince a girl you can actually cook.

While I eat my fair share of organic produce, if someone asks me what I had for dinner, I'm just going to say broccoli. No reason to say it was organic broccoli. Apparently this makes me unusual in the facebook world.

[Deleted]

I totally judge grocery carts.

[GailGoldie]

reminds me of the "smug cloud" episode of south park... where buying a hybrid vehicle makes you so smug, that San Francisco had a huge "smug cloud" over it- that was going to merge with the new one forming over CO.... with George Clooney's voice coming out of it.

[meshaliuknits]

I always wonder if the checkout lady thinks we never eat fruits/veggies since all we buy at the Lucky is cereal, deli meat, ice cream and mac-n-cheese.

[basilosaurus]

Mesh, I wonder if our safeway thinks we're complete winos (she wouldn't be too far off) b/c I usually only go there for wine and maybe an occasional piece of produce.

[IIOY]

May 18, 2012 18:14:22 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

May 18, 2012 17:59:43 GMT -5 IIOY said:

UO - I get tired of the organic food updates on Facebook, i.e., people posting whenever they eat something that happens to be organic. It's a weird form of Facebragging.

That's weird. And also suggests they don't eat much organic food.

To the contrary, these posts usually come from the organic regulars, which feeds into the annoyance factor. I mean, it's pretty much a given that at least something on their dinner plate is organic.

[eclaires]

My SIL is an organic food facebookbragger. She also posts incessantly about things that are toxic and going to kill everyone.

A few years ago, she sent me that forward about plastic grocery bags and how you should use reusable bags. I emailed her back with "OH! I've been doing this for years! I highly recommend the LL Bean or Land's End tote bags - they are perfect for groceries!" It pisses her off so much when someone already "knows" something she is trying to preach to them about. So I do it with everything now, even if it means I lie about knowing about something. I usually do know about it, but even if I don't, I say I do.

[msmerymac]

May 18, 2012 18:09:49 GMT -5 meshaliuknits said:

I always wonder if the checkout lady thinks we never eat fruits/veggies since all we buy at the Lucky is cereal, deli meat, ice cream and mac-n-cheese.

I never buy the produce at Trader Joes. Even though I eat salad almost every day!

[statlerwaldorf]

We usually eat non-organic and love comfort food. I'm from the midwest don't judge me. We just started an organic garden, so if I turn into an asshole someone let me know.

[IIOY]

May 18, 2012 19:04:21 GMT -5 statlerwaldorf said:

We usually eat non-organic and love comfort food. I'm from the midwest don't judge me. We just started an organic garden, so if I turn into an asshole someone let me know.

LOL!

[marie427]

it's not causation. Like the pp said, if you have to refer to everything you eat organic as organic when you talk about what you had for dinner, you're probably a pompous asshole when it comes to life in general (okay, that last part is just my opinion perhaps). It's a very smug attitude they have; they figure eventually all those people poisoning their bodies with non-organic shit will become as enlightened as they are.

And i speak as someone who tries to consume organic products as much as possible. Please don't assume I'm a judgmental asshole by the contents of my pantry and fridge; though if I lived in Park Slope I would understand you making that assumption.

[SusanBAnthony]

I have NEVER seen/heard the "I had organic broccoli for dinner" thing on FB or real life. Interesting. We eat almost all organic but I can't remember ever mentioning it unless the conversation was something specific like "do you eat organic produce?", lol.

This is an interesting phenomena to me.

[SmartyCat]

I have experienced the Seattle pearl-clutching over organics. I eat mostly organic produce, but it's not exactly FB update worthy. ANYWAY, last year we tried growing cauliflower in our vegetable garden. It got bugs. Lots and lots of bugs. So I put up a FB update to vent, something like "Done with bugs in cauliflower! Getting out the napalm. . .".

Most of my friends laughed and moved on (they got that I was just maybe kidding about the chemicals). One very earnestly lectured me that organic farmers had this figured out and if they could do it I can too.

[SusanBAnthony]

May 18, 2012 20:46:31 GMT -5 SmartyCat said:

I have experienced the Seattle pearl-clutching over organics. I eat mostly organic produce, but it's not exactly FB update worthy. ANYWAY, last year we tried growing cauliflower in our vegetable garden. It got bugs. Lots and lots of bugs. So I put up a FB update to vent, something like "Done with bugs in cauliflower! Getting out the napalm. . .".

Most of my friends laughed and moved on (they got that I was just maybe kidding about the chemicals). One very earnestly lectured me that organic farmers had this figured out and if they could do it I can too.

lolololol.

I do almost all organic in our yard, but I bust out the RoundUp for thistle. Thistle = the devil.

I take back what I said about not hearing any of this before this post. I have one friend who is super nutso about organic everything. They have basically no income (her H just graduated and is starting up a Chiropractic practice) and are on food stamps. They buy all organic (which I am cool with, btw) and she brags about how she can feed them for so cheap.

But then her kids are basically crazy food-stalkers at any get togethers- they spent a whole summer stalking watermelon rinds, and eating the last little bit of fruit off the rind. She will bring to the park for the day something like: some chicken (which gets devoured immeadiately) a bag of whole carrots, and a bag of rice cakes. After the chicken is gone, her kids eat the other people's watermelon rinds (we are all friends so its not like they are stelaing scraps from strangers, but STILL!).

She threw a major shitfit when someone brought ice cream bars for everyone to share at playgroup. She once proposed that fast food not be allowed to be brought to playgroup (at a public park, lol). Yet, when she goes to a girls night, she eats everything in sight, arguing that they don't follow the "healthy food" rules on special occasions. But with our group of friends, we get together about onec a week- so about as often as playgroup.

[emilyj]

May 18, 2012 18:25:02 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

Uggh.

I can't stand people who talk about their food on FB more than twice a month (and that is pushing it). We all eat food, FFS.

My friends wife posts their dinner every single night. At least 3 different posts. Once to post what she's making. One post that contains a picture of said dinner. And a final post that highlights all the organic/local foods in it.

I had to hide her from my feed.

[SmartyCat]

Ok, one more vent. I have a number of friends who are vegetarian or vegan. No argument from me, I enjoy some of the same meals.

But really?? Posting photos to FB of you hugging the baby cows and talking about how barbaric meat is? And how everyone would "get if" they just did yoga? Please.

It makes me want to post photos of a big bloody rare steak even if that's not what I really want for dinner.

[secretlyevil]

May 18, 2012 17:56:49 GMT -5 doctordonna said:

That just sounds like Seattle.

Remind me not topics in Seattle.

Good customer service is good customer service. This guy was a couched and if it had been me I would't have spent a dime there.

[Deleted]

Hold the phone. People post what they ate for dinner on Facebook?

[ESF]

May 18, 2012 18:03:14 GMT -5 basilosaurus said:

I admit, I totally stare and judge at other people's carts. It's highly amusing. I try to figure out their story, like if you're a male buying lots of frozen meals, junk food, but a nice bottle of wine and a roast chicken, I'm assuming you're trying to convince a girl you can actually cook.

I totally do this too. I love doing it. Grocery carts are so interesting.

This article is hilarious. I can safely say that I have never posted about eating an "organic" something on facebook, though I've probably posted a picture of some gorgeous farmers market produce a half dozen times over the years.

[Deleted]

I sometimes post food on Facebook, but it's mostly when we've made something AWESOME. Oh, and I have posted about organic food once - namely, when my neighborhood market was out of organic chocolate milk. But don't worry, I had appropriately labeled it as a yuppie sob story.

ETA: OK, more than once. The absence of organic chocolate milk was an ongoing problem for a bit. LIFE IS HARD, YO!

[Daria Morgandorffer]

One of my FB friends is a lawyer for PETA. I've almost hidden her so many times but the entertainment is totally worth it. She was a HS friend.

[Deleted]

Also, this column reads like a story from The Onion or Stuff White People Like.

[heliocentric]

May 19, 2012 11:08:48 GMT -5 @littlemoxie said:

May 19, 2012 10:56:06 GMT -5 @redbellpeppers said:

Hold the phone. People post what they ate for dinner on Facebook?

I've been noticing this more as part if the foodie trend, not so much about whether or not anything is organic. They both bug me, along with people who just post what they ate and exercise for the day. I don't need to know where you are in your p90x and paleo eating self-challenge.

I agree. Really everything posted on FB is pretty dumb, though.

[earlgreyhot]

DS and I sat outside of a organic restaurant/patio yesterday having s froyo from a nearby place. I was getting kicks listening to how smug and pretentious the servers sounded. Every thing on the menu had a freakin' novel of a description, including the beer. Poor lady patron was just staring back with a blank stare.

We eat mostly organic, but even I get annoyed with FB updates of people an their smug.

[StrawberryBlondie]

May 18, 2012 23:11:47 GMT -5 SmartyCat said:

Ok, one more vent. I have a number of friends who are vegetarian or vegan. No argument from me, I enjoy some of the same meals.

But really?? Posting photos to FB of you hugging the baby cows and talking about how barbaric meat is? And how everyone would "get if" they just did yoga? Please.

.

I do yoga and I still think cow is delicious. Maybe I do the wrong kind of yoga.

I do draw the line at veal, though.

I also will very occasionally post about food on Facebook, but it's usually only if I made something amazing or ate at an amazing restaurant. My friends totally needed to know about the totally amazeballs chicken & waffle sandwich I made, yo.

[ESF]

May 18, 2012 18:08:33 GMT -5 GailGoldie said:

reminds me of the "smug cloud" episode of south park... where buying a hybrid vehicle makes you so smug, that San Francisco had a huge "smug cloud" over it- that was going to merge with the new one forming over CO.... with George Clooney's voice coming out of it.

I had not ever seen this one, but IHO this thread, I convinced H to pull it down from Netflix last night. LMFAO. So brilliant.