Shame On You, Lesley Stahl! at Phoodie.info: The New Food And Drink Blog For Philadelphia

In case you missed last night’s 60 Minutes report on slow food maverick Alice Waters, check it out above. What should have been a quick, easy, “Hey, America, here’s Alice Waters, she’s trying to make you less fat and ignorant!” type piece instead came out the whole other way around. Lesley Stahl’s piece is littered with googly-eyed looks and sentiments like, “YOU CAN EAT THAT?” and “BUT ORGANIC FOOD IS TOO EXPENSIVE!” Even in the intro, Stahl dripped with condescension as she explained that “you don’t have drive a Prius or be a cappucino-sipping elite” to get into what Waters is selling. Wait, Lesley, I think you just told us that we did. At every turn, Stahl took pains to make eating healthy look like it was something for crazy rich people that you don’t have the time or money for. Meanwhile, cut to Waters merely chopping tomatoes and frying an egg, putting them both on toast. No one has the time or money to do that! Right, Lesley? Really. Really now.

8 Responses to “Shame On You, Lesley Stahl!”

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1 Joy Manning Mar 16th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
This must be why I don’t watch 60 Minutes. Shame is right.
2 mg Mar 17th, 2009 at 9:44 am
To be fair, Waters wasn’t “merely chopping tomatoes and frying an egg, putting them both on toast.” She marinated the tomatoes and then baked the eggs, one at a time in a copper spoon, in a wood-burning stove built into the wall of her kitchen.
Then she put them on the toast.
I would say that no one has the time or money for single-shirred eggs in a wood-burning stove.
3 Shola Olunloyo Mar 17th, 2009 at 10:34 am
Actually I disagree, I taped the entire thing and have watched it 3 more times since reading this.
You are missing the point. America is a broad country and all the people who “get it” already know who Alice Waters is, the show spoke to stereotypes of the “Organic” movement and to some degree dispelled the immediate questions that skeptics would have. Do you really think someone as intellectually astute and educated as Lesley Stahl really is that clueless ?
The point was to re-sell “organic” in the right way to the people who are being marketed into buying Organic at places like Walmart while shopping for a TV. It’s a common journalistic approach but I do not think it diminishes the message at all, Alice Waters was not pissed, why should we be ?
She was certainly prepped for those questions and I am certain they informed her about counterpoint questions. I though it was one of the best things on 60 minutes in a long time. You have to see the Ed Bradley-Miles Davis interview.
4 cheesesteak the impaler Mar 17th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
You tape 60 Minutes?
5 Shola Olunloyo Mar 17th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Yes I do among several other things.
Have you ever heard of a DVR/Tivo to record things on television one might be interested in ?
What’s your point ?
6 cheesesteak the impaler Mar 17th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
I’ve just never thought of 60 Minutes as “must see TV”. Any really “important” story is already broken in the online/print world well before it airs. Taping 60 Minutes to me is like archiving your morning news feeds. Apparently it’s still a relevant newsmagazine for you. At least I’ll know where to find an Andy Rooney library when the need arises … or I could just go here: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/09/08/podcast_60min/main828230.shtml
7 jo Mar 17th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
I mean you definitely do not have time to tend a roaring fire, marinate the tomatoes and cook each egg in a copper spoon. It’s common sense. You are foolish.
8 Shola Olunloyo Mar 17th, 2009 at 7:14 pm
The logic escapes me, yes certainly important breaking news is on other mediums and focusing on who tapes what and where frankly is irrelevant to the conversation.
TV news magazines like 60 minutes do not profess to dwell on important breaking news, they take a subsequent look at “ongoing issues and conversation” such at the structure of what it takes to eat healthy in America.”Must see TV” as a quote is subjective enough to be entirely useless as a descriptive baseline of what any particular person besides oneself would be interested in watching.
The underlying fact is what what was shown elicited fair questions that the general public would ask.
If it was so easy, Chez Panisse would not have 35 cooks in the kitchen.
I would add to what MG said, no one EVEN has wood burning ovens in their house let alone cook eggs one at a time on a spoon.

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Shame On You, Lesley Stahl!

8 Responses to “Shame On You, Lesley Stahl!”

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