Food Inc.: McDonald's

According to Carl Ritzer (2007) in its journal on Mcdonaldization of society, he found out that in the

I was immediately intrigued from the beginning of Food, Inc. There was interesting and valuable information brought up during the film. Many people do not think about where their food comes from. I believe that if people were to know where their food comes from, they would not want to eat it. There are 47,000 products at a grocery store. But, Food, Inc. implies that this is in fact an illusion because all of them are made with the same crops. The fact that there are only a few multi-national corporations that control all of the crops and meat production is a huge surprise. I believe that each person in society would be absolutely shocked if they were to watch this documentary.

The way that Burger King and other fast food restaurant chains do business and markets their products to consumers is due to the change in our society to where the consumer wants the biggest, fastest, and best product they can get for their money. This change in society can be attributed to a process known as McDonaldization. Although McDonaldization can be applied to many other parts of our society, this paper will focus on its impact on Burger King and Taco Bell restaurants. My belief is that the process of McDonaldization has lead our generations toward a more a much more efficient lifestyle, with much less quality. From my observations and studies of these fast food resturants, several themes have become

When reading the book, there were many examples of all four principals of McDonaldization throughout. The first principal, efficiency, was the most common example, found very frequently. When she was working as a server at a restaurant called Hearthside, in Key

The documentary Food inc. by Robert Kenner is a documentary about the food industry and some of the issues that have emerged with the modernization of said food industry. Robert Kenner presents his arguments in sorts of subtitle such as “The dollar menu”, and “The cornucopia” to help identify his main points. Robert Kenner also brings in some experts such as Michael Pollen and Barbara Kowalcyk, into his documentary to bring some credibility to his argument, as well as adding specific music at particular times to tug at the emotions of the viewers. In this documentary Robert Kenner not only shows what happens to those who eat the products produced by the corporate food industry but also those who help in the production.

Food, Inc. had the objective to share the truth behind our food and how it is actually created. It states the process the food undergoes. Shows how the live stock is treated and engineered. Displays how the plans also experience genetic engineering and how the workers, themselves are treated.

McDonald’s is a drive thru restaurant where customers need to wait in line to order as well as pick up their food. This is likely the most dehumanising aspect of the company since they treated people as parts of an assembly line. Moreover, routinization such as maximising managerial control can be found in McDonald’s and it is related to the idea of Taylorism. Where Max Weber used bureaucratic model to describe the movement of the shifting society, George Ritzer believed the operation of fast food restaurants have become a more suitable contemporary paradigm in modern community. Therefore, Ritzer introduced his idea of McDonaldization in 1993 and it comprises four key dimensions: efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control. Among these components, ‘control’ represents workers become standardized and nonhuman technologies would substitute for them. He declared that the principles of fast food restaurant would dominate more and more regions of American society and throughout the world. In fact, apart from food industry, McDonaldization expands all over the world which include bookstores (B.Dalton’s) and toy stores (Toys R Us) (Ritzer, 1993:1).

McDonaldization is Max Weber's concept of rationalization, which is the process of replacing traditional and emotional thought with reason and efficiency (George Ritzer and the McDonaldization of Society). Likewise, Ritzer uses McDonald's as a metaphor for the over-rationalization of society. The popularity of the restaurant

I agree with the general stance of the author, and that is that I am extremely suspicious of McDonaldization and whether it is really a harm to society rather than a blessing. I disagree with three of the five key elements of McDonaldization, those being predictability, calculability, and control by non-human technologies. Firstly, by making the daily interactions of life more and more predictable, life loses some of its meaning. People are meant to confront all different types of situations and interactions to get a feel for the possibilities of life. For example, in the case of home-cooked meals, if people were not to occasionally receive a meal which was bad tasting, how would they be able to appreciate a really delicious meal. The whole idea of predictability goes against our ‘human-ness’, because we were all created to perform differently. Secondly, calculability leads to a belief that quantity is more important than quality. According to Ritzer, “In terms of processes, the emphasis is on speed(usually high), whereas for end results the focus is on the number of products served(usually large).”(pg. 59) In my opinion, the reason the majority of Americans are overweight is because of this “bigger is better” theory. The quality of other things is also affected in this way, such as of education, healthcare, and general productivity in a business. Thirdly, I think the increasing use

Happy Hamburger pride itself as the leading fast-food company of the nation. We have brands all over the United States, and we are growing by the minute. Wherever there is a hungry American, there is Happy Hamburger. As a leading fast food company, finding glass in burgers is far from ideal situation and it is the right kind of situation that potentially can create a crisis and lead to a smeared reputation, decline in sales, and the brand to tumble. My concerns as a director of purchasing is the recall of one month worth of products and having to start with anew with another supplier; the first will cost us a lot of money, while the later would consume time and effort to find a supplier that fit the specifications we

McDonaldization is becoming the new wave of job types where workers are being deskilled, dehumanized and exploited. Machines are taking over tasks which the employees used to do such as bank machines (interact). The McDonaldized jobs now instead of making the employee do all the work they have the customer working too, for example when the customer cleans up after eating. These jobs are becoming less interactive and personal because workers are becoming dehumanized and only allowed to follow a script, there is also the fact that fast food Company’s use drive through, where limited interaction occurs and are many restrictions. These types of jobs which the author George Ritzer labeled

McDonaldization is a terminology created by George Ritzier a sociologist in the book “The McDonaldization of Society” (1993). Ritzier explains on how the modern society is adopting the physiognomies of the fast food industry. McDonaldization is a reconceptualization of rationalization, or moving from traditional to rational modes of thought, and scientific management. McDonaldization has become a way life and it’s affecting society in all aspects of life and not only the food industry, from Health care, education, and the workplace. The reason for this is because society is moving at a faster and a moderate pace.

McDonaldization involves a process of rationalization described by George Ritzer that is utilized by sociologists (Ritzer 292). Ritzer elaborates the aspect of McDonaldization of society is manifested in situations, for example, where a society adopts the features of a fast-food joints. Worth a note, fast-foods are growing very popular because they highly fits with most individual contemporary lifestyle.

The McDonaldization theory defines the process of which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as the rest of the world (Ritzer 1). Within McDonaldization there are five different concepts embedded into this theory, which are efficiency, calculability, predictability, control and lastly irrationality of rationality. These concepts are not just used in fast-food restaurants, but are becoming more

I am very glad that I picked this topic, it is very interesting and exciting for me to write about McDonald’s chain of restaurants and why did it become so popular in the USA. In the 1940s two brothers, Richard and Maurice MacDonalds opened their restaurant in California. They named it after their last name McDonald's. A lot of people from all over the country moved to California. People moved there to have a better life. It was unusually a lot of vehicles in California, people loved driving vehicles. It was very popular to have it back then. So, two brothers, McDonald's came up with the plan to open their own drive-in restaurant in California.