Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation expose working conditions and animal slaughter in the food industry. Even though these texts were published years apart, they both share similar details and goals. Sinclair is a muckraker who exposed political and social problems during the Progressive Era, and Eric Schlosser is a journalist. Both of these excerpts express the problems that workers faced, mostly immigrants, and the gruesome details of animal slaughter in the food industry. Both publications share similarities and differences in their goals, details to prove their points, and effects of their publication when dealing with the hidden aspects of the food industry. Both excerpts’ goals are to produce outrage …show more content…
He wanted people to be outraged and demand reform in the working conditions for workers. Although Sinclair’s main goal was to inform people about immigrants’ working conditions, the public focused more on the way the meat was produced and what was going into their bodies and that led to reforms in the meat industry, not the immigrants’ lives. Although time has passed, immigrant’s working conditions are still terrible and not much has changed in that aspect. Similar to Sinclair, Eric Schlosser also has the same goal in mind and wants to produce outrage and desire in people for a change. Schlosser mostly describes the working conditions they faced in their dangerous jobs and the lack of consideration towards them. He describes how “Meatpacking is now the most dangerous job in the United States,” and “Thousands of additional injuries and illnesses most likely go unrecorded.” Schlosser uses this to help the audience understand how all the helpless workers were in …show more content…
For example, Sinclair’s novel led to the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. This Act was meant to regulate the sale and manufacturing of food products and prevent harmful products from reaching the consumer. Sinclair’s main goal was to expose the working conditions and improve the lives of the workers, but it was overlooked, and people mostly focused on the food production, and the unsanitary items that went into their food and then bodies. Although the novel did not lead to a change in working conditions, it exposed those issues and made people aware. Sinclair’s publication also led to the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 that ensured that meat was produced in sanitary environments. Sinclair was a socialist who did not agree with capitalism and blamed these issues on capitalism. Theodore Roosevelt read his novel and ordered for the investigation, but it also negatively affected the country because countries refused to import American meat, which was another effect of the publication. Sinclair may not have reached his goal, but he made readers aware of the working conditions. Some possible effects of Fast Food Nation could have been the increase in vegetarians because of the way meat is slaughtered, or an increase in healthy foods served in restaurants. Similar to Sinclair, Schlosser’s goal is to inspire change in the working conditions of the food industry, but the animal