In the most respectful way, reading this book felt like when a friend sits down in front of you and is like "are you ready to hear some BULLSHIT?" and you're all ohhhh let's go and then they proceed to incisively detail exactly how and why some situation is complete and total wretched nonsense such that if situations would able to feel emotions the whole shebang would be left a shriveled up humiliated mess by the end of it. And it is GREAT.

Absolute fury at each of these injustices undergirds every chapter of this book ending in a positively delicious excoriation of the US government and the Supreme Court in particular. If you're picking up this book you probably already know that the whole US food system is on some fucked up shit (example: student lunch debt...exists), but Andrea Freeman makes it clear that girl, you don't even know. I learned a hell of a lot, I got super mad, I spent some time brooding about how everyone in the whole government needs to be strapped down and made to read this and acknowledge what they've done and fix ittttt. Because yikes, man.

This book is sourced to hell and back btw, so if you pick it up thinking it's very, very long, that is a trick - the book ended for me at 59% and the remaining whole 2/5ths of it was footnotes. The length is actually perfect. Fantastic work all around.

My thanks to Henry Holt & Company and NetGalley for the ARC.

Thank you so much to @netgalley and Metropolitan Books for the chance to review Ruin Their Crops on the Ground by Andrea Freeman. This book was truly eye-opening and I appreciated that there were over 500 references cited. This book describes America’s politics of food: Food as political power, with especially powerful stories of historical injustices experienced by Indigenous nations and enslaved people. Freeman described the origins of free breakfast programs, forced assimilation of immigrants, and racially targeted advertising. Stories of lunch debt and shame for free lunches were so powerful. Truly, an excellent historical perspective that ties into today’s food insecurity experience.

Thank you, Henry Holt & Company, Metropolitan Books, and NetGalley for allowing me to read a copy of this book!

I truly appreciated getting the opportunity to read this; though I was somewhat aware of some of the information from conversations and online resources, few had gone into depth and provided sources as often and neatly as Ruin Their Crops On the Ground, due to being more casual interactions. There was still a great amount of information I’d learned and desire to incorporate while teaching.

Though too I knew many are lactose inpersistent (as RTCotG suggests it), I had not considered it deeply as a tool of colonialism and hurt pre-1950s, as I’d heard far more about alcohol and crop monocultures.

I appreciated the references to recent media and the statements of how food eaten in times of struggle can have a multitude of meanings, both as harm and a source of community and memories. I wish the last chapter had gone into more action-based solutions of band-aids than statements of how full, broad change must be enacted, though I am in firm and full agreement.

What a fascinating look at how racism plays into food and hunger.

The author separates the book into Native Americans, Black and Mexican groups and how the white race has tried to control their food and what they eat.

I had known about the Native Americans but the Black and Mexican sections were really eye opening and I had never heard of some of the material presented.

With a STRONG emphasis upon milk and lactose intolerance, the author begins a great adventure into the inequalities in food and races.

Reaching back through history to trace the way in which dairy farmers, corn, soybean farmers all have a stake in getting their products in front of the American people. Either by commodities or by producing cheap junk, they are front and center.

The only drawback that I had with the book was the end chapter. I thought that the author was stretching and reaching with the court cases.
I wished that the author did not spend so much of the last chapter talking about the supreme court, but rather actionable things that everyone could do to help fight this injustice.

Overall a great book, I learned a lot and I appreciate the authors diligence in researching it and making a cohesive narrative.