Irony In Fast Food Nation

Fast Food Nation

The United States Department of Agriculture recommends that the average adult consume between 5.5-6.5 ounces of meat in a day. But has anyone ever considered what’s in the meat? In Fast Food Nation, a novel by Eric Schlosser, the author uses techniques like irony, appeal to emotion, and simileies to expose the meat of america- riddled with dirt, grime, and disease- to his audience composed of mostly parents and adults. By exposing the meat packing industry, Schlosser hopes to bring down the fast food industry along with it.

In chapter 9, Schlosser discusses extremely dangerous microbes and bacteria that a lot of meat is infested with. He even goes as far as to say that all raw meat must be regarded as a “potential biohazard”. Having said that, by bringing that “biohazard” into a home, that home has now been contaminated by that infectious microbe. In “A series of tests conducted by Charles Gerba, a microbiologist at the University of Arizona, discovered far more fecal bacteria in the average American kitchen sink than on the average American toilet seat” (Schlosser 221). This is a play on irony because the

place where humans produce body waste, has less fecal matter than a place where a common person cleans their food or washes their hands. This disgusting, vile, and potentially lethal ground beef is being sold to fast food companies all over the nation.
In attempts to focus on his objective audience, schlosser repeatedly mentions the repercussions of the E.

coli O157:H7 outbreak. More specifically, the impact that the illness had on younger people, like teenagers and children. “Lauren Beth Rudolph, ate a hamburger at a San Diego Jack in the Box a week before Christmas. She was admitted to the hospital on Christmas Eve, suffered terrible pain, had three heart attacks, and died in her mother’s arms on December 28, 1992. She was 6 years old” (Schlosser 198). This appeal to emotion was successfully used, considering schlosser’s target audience. Telling an emotional story about a young girl- somebody’s daughter- dying from eating a fast food hamburger will likely be a deterrent to all parents, or atleast make them skeptical about feeding their kids these fast food, E. coli ridden

hamburgers.
Throughout the book, the author compares the fast food industry to multiple things with negative connotations surrounding them. For example schlosser says “Like the multiple sex partners that helped spread the AIDS epidemic, the huge admixture of animals in most American ground beef plants has played a crucial role in spreading E. coli O157:H7”(Schlosser 204). By comparing the ground beef plants who supply the nation’s fast food industry with hamburger meat to the horrendous AIDS epidemic, schlosser makes the meat packing industry seem equally as bad as the aids epidemic.