The Meat-Packing Industry In Upton Sinclair's The Jungle

“I aimed at the public’s heart and by accident I hit in the stomach” stated the international famous Upton Sinclair, after writing his most prominent novel, The Jungle. The word jungle is constantly associated with a wild environment full of undomesticated animals, but in this authentic novel, it refers to the unethical actions practiced during the gilded age. Sinclair’s main idea was to end all the unjust activities experienced during this time by writing and using the experience of his main character. Throughout the novel, the audience can perceive themes such as capitalism and socialism, historical events and symbolism.

In early 1900, specifically, 1906, The Jungle by Upton Sinclair was written. This novel told the story of a Lithuanian immigrant who worked in a filthy Chicago meatpacking plant. It exposed the meatpacking industry by stating their vile practices not only towards their meat but their workers as well. This was a result of the combination of many immigrants in the United States to pursue a better life, and the fact that many big industries were looking for ways to maximize their profit.

In The Jungle, Upton Sinclair explains how horrible working conditions were for people in the meatpacking industry. Have you ever wondered what effect Upton Sinclair had on American industry? The Jungle is about the poor working conditions and the very poor sanitation in 1906. We will also be talking about the backstory behind Upton Sinclair.

Intro: When people eat food they do not think about what is in it, or how it is made. The only thing people care about is what the food tastes like and how much they get. During the 1900’s the meat packing industry had not regulations of any kind. All that mattered to the industry was that they made as much money as possible with as little expenditure as possible. During this times people were often made sick and died either from working conditions or poor food quality. Although it may seem that the meat packing industry is still in turmoil because of their unwillingness to make known what foods have Genetically Modified organisms present, the meat packing industry was much worse during the 1900’s because of the unsafe working conditions, and uncleanliness of the food.

In “ The Jungle”, the author Upton Sinclair states that “ I aimed at the public's heart and by accident I hit it in the stomach”. This means that Sinclair wanted to muckrake the Meat Packing Industry to seek attention for the workers, but instead food became a bigger concern. The characters Jurgis, Ona, and Marija with fellow family members are Lithuanian immigrants who came to PackingTown in hope for a better future, however they came to realize that the whole town is run by capitalist. Although Sinclair intentionally uses metaphors and similes to depict the characters struggle in the horrible living and working conditions in Packingtown, his purpose is undermined and overlooked by his use of realism to depict the food process.

The Progressive Era was a period of time, from 1890 to 1920, that people start believing that the society problem could be faded by providing a safe environment, good education and an efficient workplace. The people who wanted changes in the society were called Progressives. Most of them were well educated, journalist, they went to college. There were a lot of problems that people tried to fix them or improve them, most of them were fixed but other we are still trying to fix them. During this period there were a lot of issues and problems but there were some prominent ones, like: Women Suffrage, Temperance or Food and Health.

The Progressive Era was a time of many reformations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that boosted the economy tremendously and benefited many Americans. As the economy was growing, so were people’s rights and their working and living conditions. Many problems people faced during this time were corrupt governments, ruthless business practices, child labor, health hazards, unsafe working conditions and poor wages that led to many difficulties facing the many citizens. The conditions of this time were brutal forcing children to work, having unfair relations between gender roles, and causing people to become sick from the sanitized food or water. Life was definitely not easy for these hard-working Americans who were treated very unfairly,

Fortunately, this revolutionary novel was a catalyst to the creation of various laws and agencies established to protect the safety of American consumers. The book was an eye-opening slap in the face to consumers who, unknowingly, were constantly being put in danger by the food they ate every night. The Jungle also revealed the horrors of working in these unsanitary meat plants. Fortunately, The Jungle has caused food safety to become a much more relevant and serious topic today, keeping consumers and workers safe from the dangers experienced inside the meat-packing factories of the

Sinclair exposed the problem of mutilated limbs and other horrors common to the workers. Sinclair also explained how even minor injuries could become fatal and how the labor intense work done at the factories caused workers to experience swollen joints (doc 1). Unfortunately, no laws were passed to protect workers from the awful conditions they faced. Although Sinclair’s attempt at reforming working conditions was fruitless, the public’s reaction to the truth about the meat they were purchasing sparked a nationwide attempt to enact consumer protection laws. The meat packing factories were doctoring their products with chemicals so they could profit from rotten meat. The unsanitary factories were also home to rats, rat poisons, germs, dust, and dirt. The workers put contaminated meat into the meat choppers. Moldy and otherwise inedible meat was doused in chemicals and ground into sausages. When the public found out about these scandals, many were repulsed and demanded immediate government action. The government responded with the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 and the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. The Meat Inspection Act allowed, “the Secretary of

Upton Sinclair reflects the reality of the people during the late 1800’s in his novel The Jungle. In his novel, Sinclair wants to promote Socialism by showing how people lived in the meatpacking plant and under a corrupt government. The inhuman working conditions, combined with the lack of hygiene and a corrupt government, made trying to make a living a total hardships for the low class and the immigrants.

In the United States today, a large part of the average person’s life is food. Each individual consumes nearly one ton of food each year, but never knows what they are truly putting into their body. Upton Sinclair’s novel, The Jungle, was one of the earliest works that provided people an insight to the production of their food. The novel was originally written to show the mistreatment of the workers, typically immigrants, but instead resulted in the passing of the Pure Food Act of 1906. The movie, Food Inc. provides today’s people the same insight that The Jungle gave the people in 1906. Although things such as the amount of GMO’s (genetically modified organism) in the food is worse today than it was in the turn of the twentieth century, the

A leading 19th century psychologist named William James stated this about propaganda: "There's nothing so absurd that if you repeat it often enough, people will believe it”. Propaganda is information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view. This is evident in the televised premature ending of the Montag’s chase and in the symbolism of 451 by the government in Ray Bradbury’s dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451. However, in our world propaganda has been used to unite a country through targeted mass persuasion. This is seen in two classic U.S propaganda posters that encourage U.S citizens to join the army: “I want you”(index 1) and “Remember Dec. 7th” (index 2). Though

Sinclair worked undercover in a meatpacking plant to gather information firsthand, before he began writing the book. Its influence on the labor practices and regulations governing the food industry cannot be understated. It tackles subjects as varied as the poor living conditions of the immigrants, exploitation of cheap labor by industrialists, and the unsanitary conditions of the meatpacking plants and stockyards of Chicago. The descriptions of the disgusting processes that were conducted in the meatpacking plants made for shocking reading and turned the book into a bestseller. The President Teddy Roosevelt ordered an investigation into the lack of sanitation in meatpacking plants and caused the creation of legislation governing the food industry in the form of the Food and Drugs Act of 1906. This eventually led to the creation of the federal department of Food and Drug Administration which lays out laws for what is safe for inclusion in the food and medicine consumed by the

Hamburgers are some of the most, if not the most, American food that a person could get their taste buds on. Although hamburgers remain popular, the meat in such foods have their share of controversies since the labels, “organic” and “conventional,” were placed upon them. The harsh reality is that conventional farming methods of meat is gruesome and somewhat macabre; the animals are packed into a high density farms where they are constantly being pressured into confined spaces that are grossly unsanitary. For this reason, organic farming is becoming popular with their humane practices of raising farm animals. In effect, this raises the question: is the abuse in the industrialized, now called conventional, meat industry worth the final product?

The author’s purpose in this chapter was to inform and to persuade about organic food. He explains what is in these organic TV dinners, “I found one such TV dinner that included thirty-one ingredients were synthetic additives that are permitted under federal organic rules.” He is informing us because he is giving us facts how organic TV dinners were permitted by federal organic rules. He also explains why whole foods don’t have pesticides to keep the food healthy, ““But if you look a little closer you’ll see that something has been left been left behind. The organic food in stores like Whole Foods is organic because it is grown without chemical fertilizers or pesticides.” In this quote he is persuading because he is giving out facts