After reading the blog below, check this out—a Chiquita Banana commercial, in theatres, I think from the late 1940s, probably between the Banana Massacre of United Fruit Company strikers in Colombia in 1928 and UFC’s influence on the overthrowing of a democratic government in Guatemala—Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán—in 1954. The line in the cartoon commercial is brutally ironic. As a colonizer is about to be cannibalized into soup by a an indigenous/native local, the sexy Miss Chiquita Banana comes dancing in and says:

“I’m Chiquita Banana and I’ve come to say, you really shouldn’t treat a fellow man this way.”

No, United Fruit Company, no, Chiquita Brands International, you really shouldn’t…

Then she says:

“If you’d like to been refined and civilized, your eating habits really ought to be revised…”

I could not agree with her more. Unfortunately, she’s a lying, animated propaganda tool (and yet so appealing!)

Miss Chiquita Banana then gives an alternative recipe to Cannibal Soup—scalloped bananas. Me? I really like bananas. Fair trade. Organic. That is a privilege, I know, and I want to exercise it.

And here’s the great Pablo Neruda’s poem about the United Fruit Company, titled fittingly, United Fruit Co.. The opening stanza:

When the trumpet sounded
everything was prepared on earth,
and Jehovah gave the world
to Coca-Cola Inc., Anaconda,
Ford Motors, and other corporations.
The United Fruit Company
reserved for itself the most juicy
piece, the central coast of my world,
the delicate waist of America.

There is political clout in our purchases, and in being more conscious with our food, with our eating habits, and more aware of the workers who pick and grow our food—god love them. Ah, the endless abominations I take for granted. May I remember more, and do better!

Pete xo

Pete

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 15th, 2010 at 4:27 pm and is filed under posted. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.