I don't feel at home in this house anymore

[sovay]

It is beautifully sunny outside. I want to check on the magnolia I discovered at the start of this month. I am so tired, I am randomly falling asleep as a passenger in cars, which is not normal for me. I used to sleep on long-distance buses and trains, which I miss, in the ways that I miss traveling generally.

I just heard about the food companies which, faced with the enforcement of sesame as a legally identified allergen, decided to contaminate all of their products with sesame rather than make the effort of avoiding cross-contamination in their facilities, which seems to me indistinguishable from a city's water and sewer department making sure that all the drinking water contains nicely labeled lead. In addition to finding this letter-of-the-law mass fuck-you upsetting in the nearly incoherent way of things that are wrong, I don't understand how it's actually legal—it is an obvious dodge of the entire purpose of laws about food safety and labeling—and as a precedent it makes me feel a little like painting arsenic onto the morning toast of the persons responsible.

When I saw that Ben Ferencz had died, the first thing I thought after his memory for a blessing was how much I hated that he had not outlived the relevance of his life's work, which probably means he felt a lot more strongly about it.

Assembling tax materials and writing to doctors in the same afternoon is incredibly demoralizing and the overall condition of the world is not helping.

Comments

[davidgillon]

I just heard about the food companies which, faced with the enforcement of sesame as a legally identified allergen, decided to contaminate all of their products with sesame rather than make the effort of avoiding cross-contamination in their facilities,

That's pretty much the definition of dog in the manger!

[thomasyan]

> overall condition of the world is not helping.

I know. I complained that _Brazil_ is *satire*, not something to aspire to

[dewline]

Such "letter of the law as written" nonsense as reported by Karen Weese for the Post should be out of bounds!

[yhlee]

The sesame thing is awful but...yeah, malicious compliance is definitely a thing in this field. :/

One of my college friends works for the FDA - he's currently in management but he started out as a field inspector and he had SO MANY STORIES of malicious/etc. compliance. For example, "organic"/"pesticide-free" (I forget the exact regulatory label, which probably has changed in 20 years anyway) crops that were grown in fields adjacent to crops-with-pesticides such that the prevailing winds would carry the pesticides over to the "organic" crops but they still could legally be labeled "organic" and he couldn't do a damn thing about it because they were technically legally in compliance.

He also noted that because of, well, staffing vs. the GIGANTIC amount of food labeling, manufacture, etc. that goes on in the USA, the FDA relies a LOT on voluntary compliance with labeling laws. They actually do not check the labels on everything that's gonna show up in your supermarket; they do not have the staff levels that would permit this. So inevitably stuff can fall between the cracks even if there isn't corporate/etc. malice.

[yhlee]

Oh, I forget specifics - he visited us once early in his FDA career and we went grocery shopping for snacks and stuff, and I remember he picked up some drink or snack or whatever and pointed out that the label was not in compliance (there are sort of graphic design/standard rules on how information needs to be laid out and presented? I don't remember the details, this was ~20 years ago), he said this was almost certainly a "small company that doesn't realize they messed this up" rather than malice issue (apparently common with formatting/label design stuff), and also, no one from the FDA was EVER going to act on this or send them a note to fix the problem or fine them or whatever unless for some reason somebody else noticed and reported them and kicked it up the priority list (very unlikely).

[minoanmiss]

I hear you.

(I too remember sleepign on conveyances, fondly)

[selkie]

Hiiii I'm doomed! I'm going to be checking labels on things we've brought into our house for years!

[sovay]

Hiiii I'm doomed! I'm going to be checking labels on things we've brought into our house for years!

I know! I hate it!

*hugs*

[sovay]

The sesame thing is awful but...yeah, malicious compliance is definitely a thing in this field.

Understood. Adding the sesame as opposed to not bothering to take it out just somehow feels like going the extra mile to me. Malice isn't that special, no one needs to work on it, there's been a superabundance for years. It's glutted the market. The bottom can fall out of the malice futures any second now.

(I appreciate the stories from your friend at the FDA; the tiny company labeling thing is actually neat.)

[sovay]

I hear you.

*hugs*

[sovay]

That's pretty much the definition of dog in the manger!

I mean, I assume the people who made this decision can still eat their own sesame-laced bread, but seriously.

[sovay]

I complained that _Brazil_ is *satire*, not something to aspire to

It really isn't.

[sovay]

Such "letter of the law as written" nonsense as reported by Karen Weese for the Post should be out of bounds!

I am having a lot of trouble with how much it seems possible to get away with, if you are simply cruel and greedy enough to decide to.

[aurumcalendula]

Ugh, that's an awful thing for them to do!

*hugs*

[sovay]

Ugh, that's an awful thing for them to do!

I hope they are losing business in meaningful numbers, because I don't know what else makes a difference anymore.

*hugs*