The Impending Danger of Corn

           To talk about the possibility of America crumbing under the threat of a starch seems rather humorous. However, the great extent and possible danger of America’s reliance on corn is exactly what Michael Pollan’s essay progressively reveals. The extremes to which corn and corn-related products are embedded into people’s daily lives are chronologically incorporated, starting off small with the expansive and inconspicuous stock in grocery stores all the way to corn products incorporation into biological warfare. This process of progressive revelation slowly develops the readers trepidation of the impending doom, however he reassuringly concludes with a solution, leaving the reader feeling as though they have just followed a map of cause and effect that leads to a plausible and comforting solution.  

              Michael Pollan’s essay creates a pathway of escalating extremes, starting off small and relatable, and then growing to terrifying truths. This process rationalizes for the reader the manner in which a simple food such as corn can grow into a national crisis. Pollan opens up his essay with a short history of the Mayans and the heavy reliance on corn, to the extent of their being named “the corn people”.  He then proceeds to talk about the expansive use of corn products and how deeply integrated they are into the nation’s system of life. Before long, the Mayan’s simple use of ready food supply eventually developed into to such destructive weapons that the wife of the chemist who created this weapon, “sickened by her husband’s contributions…used his army pistol to kill herself” (Cohen 303). The organization strategy, as well as the incorporation of phrases such as, “it has been less then a century… yet already it has changed the earth’s ecology” (305), ushers in a sense of urgency. Pollan suggests a pattern of escalating danger that leaves the reader feeling as though if they do not do something, the problem in their society, though it may not be currently effecting their daily lives, may very well escalate to detrimental consequences in America.

              His effective organization aside, a fault in Pollan’s essay would lie in his extensive use of scientific information that may not be readily understandable to the average reader. What is otherwise a very motivating and effective essay, is riddled with the names of elements and gasses and compounds and processes that not every reader of Smithsonian magazine is able to comprehend. While this “official” wording gives a sense of factual backing, one cannot necessarily be sure of what exactly is being factually supported. Pollan’s paper, in some aspects, seems to be half an engaging and articulate essay and half an advanced biology textbook. The language he implements is not accessible to the masses, and sometimes masks his main message.  

              Nevertheless, What’s Eating America takes an extremely effective approach to sparking a movement of change in the American people against this impending national danger of corn. Silly though it may seem, Pollan presents a very strong, although a little scientifically confusing, argument as to why immediate action needs to be taken. He effectively closes his article by presenting a solution. He builds up a fear, presents facts, but does not leave his reader hopeless or facing the struggle of discovering the answer independently; he leaves the answer right in front of his readers. His essay is a clearly mapped out trail of escalating cause and effect, wrapped up with a clean bow of positive possibilities.