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food-review
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.gitignore vendored
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*.njsproj *.njsproj
*.sln *.sln
*.sw? *.sw?
#static files
public/topics/*

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package.json
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"lint": "vue-cli-service lint" "lint": "vue-cli-service lint"
}, },
"dependencies": { "dependencies": {
"@fortawesome/fontawesome-svg-core": "^1.2.18",
"@fortawesome/free-solid-svg-icons": "^5.8.2",
"@fortawesome/vue-fontawesome": "^0.1.6",
"bootstrap": "^4.3.1",
"bootstrap-vue": "^2.0.0-rc.20",
"core-js": "^2.6.5", "core-js": "^2.6.5",
"vue": "^2.6.10" "i": "^0.3.6",
"npm": "^6.9.0",
"vue": "^2.6.10",
"vue-router": "^3.0.6"
}, },
"devDependencies": { "devDependencies": {
"@vue/cli-plugin-babel": "^3.7.0", "@vue/cli-plugin-babel": "^3.7.0",

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src/App.vue
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<template> <template>
<div id="app"> <div id="app">
<img alt="Vue logo" src="./assets/logo.png"> <b-container fluid></b-container>
<HelloWorld msg="Welcome to Your Vue.js App"/> <router-view></router-view>
</div> </div>
</template> </template>
<script> <script>
import HelloWorld from './components/HelloWorld.vue'
export default { export default {
name: 'app', name: 'app',
components: {
HelloWorld
}
} }
</script> </script>
<style> <style>
#app { * {
font-family: 'Avenir', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; border: 0px black solid;
-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; }
-moz-osx-font-smoothing: grayscale;
text-align: center;
color: #2c3e50;
margin-top: 60px;
}
</style> </style>

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src/components/CookingCard.vue
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<style scoped>
* {
border: 0px black solid;
}
p {
text-align: justify;
font-size: 18px;
}
</style>
<template>
<div>
<b-row align-h="center">
<b-col cols="10">
<div class="card_content">
<p>
There is a <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="theory_of_evolution" title="Theory of evolution ">theory of evolution</span> that says the following: the development of the Homo Sapiens brain happened
mainly due to the discovery of fire, and subsequently cooking. By using less energy to hunt, and spending less time chewing raw food, the human brain had increasingly more space and time to develop new activities, ponder upon its surroundings
and grow in size (Wranghart, 2009). Throughout the years, cooking has maintained its crucial role worldwide, as a fundamental part of culture and society, but also as a way to make food safer to eat and easier to preserve. Cooking
also represented a catalyst for humans to become social beings, which became more civilized and introspective while sitting around the cooking fire (Pollan, 2014). But while everybody benefited from the positive aspects of cooked food,
the labour associated with it became a task reserved only for some.
</p>
<p>
Women have been pushed towards domestic work ever since the evolution from more equal hunter-gatherer societies to settled agricultural societies (Smith, 1997). Traditionally, men provided the food, earned at first by hunting, and later on through their
paid job. Women would be in charge of preparing food for everyone, and that role rarely changed. Throughout time, cooking as a means of caregiving became a practice identified more with women, while cooking for entertainment or skill
display was, and still is, associated with men (Cairns et al. 2010). In many households it is still often considered a special occasion when the man of the house cooks. This view was reinforced in cooking advice from the 20th century;
men do not cook on a daily basis, but when they do, they cook dishes that best display their talents (Vester, 2015).
</p>
<p>
Discussing the gender politics of cooking, Pollan wonders: “Was home cooking denigrated because the work was mostly done by women, or did women get stuck doing most of the cooking because our culture denigrated the work?” (Pollan, 2014). Men often had
a privileged position when it comes to their cooking practice - mostly with meat, outdoors, seen as entertainment, while women’s cooking happened behind closed kitchen doors. Today, most of the world-renowned chefs, the ones who win
countless awards and get their own TV shows are men.
</p>
<p>
However, the more time we spend watching chefs cook meals we’ll never get to eat, the less time we spend cooking for ourselves. In the past decades, studies have shown that cooking time has declined (Pollan, 2014; Ferdman, 2015). Less cooking in the average
household means, one the one side, less housework reserved for women. It also means that corporations make great profits from providing the food we eat on a daily basis, which comes with several downfalls. Food made by a corporation
has many more chemical ingredients, that people very rarely use in their kitchens (Pollan, 2014). Eating packaged foods has increased the distance between what raw ingredients are and where they come from, and the food we actually
consume. “Food becomes just another commodity, an abstraction. And as soon as that happens we become easy prey for corporations selling synthetic versions of the real thing - what I call edible foodlike substances.”(Pollan, 2014).
</p>
<p>
The phrase <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="woman_place" title="A woman's place">a woman’s place is in the kitchen</span>, or the home, has been traced back as far as Ancient Greece’s Aeschylus. Since then, it has been restated and reinterpreted throughout history, in literature, art, and politics (Popik, 2013). We can see an
example of this belief in <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="leave_it" title="Leave it to the Beaver">a clip from Leave it to Beaver</span>, a popular 50s American sitcom. In it, the father explains to a confused son why he’s more suited to do all the grilling outdoors, while his mother works inside the kitchen.
“A woman’s place is in the home, and as long she’s in the home, she might as well be in the kitchen. Women do alright when they have all the modern conveniences, but us men are better at this rugged type of outdoor cooking. Sort of
a throwback to cavemen days.” (Leave it to Beaver, 1957). His last remark reinforces the idea that gender roles have an evolutionary development, are part of human nature and should not be questioned.
<p>
A brilliant example of the portrayal of women in the kitchen, from a woman’s perspective, is Martha Rosler’s Semiotics of the Kitchen. In this performance piece, set in a typical kitchen, Martha Rosler manipulates kitchen tools with sudden, violent gestures,
sometimes even performing useless tasks such as pretending to throw the contents of a spoon over her shoulder. Her piece is meant to express the frustration of women being stuck doing domestic labour, which is taken for granted.
It is also a parody of the cooking shows of the time, particularly the one hosted by an always cheerful Julia Child. In her mock culinary show, she is no longer a cheerful performer, but uses the tools that have been assigned to
her as an expression of anger and frustration: “when the woman speaks, she names her own oppression” (Rosler, 1975). Her piece shows that gender roles enforced traditionally within the household can be oppressive, especially when
the labour of women is devalued and regarded as trivial.
</p>
<p>
As both men and women have been finding their place within the workforce, sharing the workload within the home has increased slightly. However, even in homes where both partners work full-time, the majority of chores and administrative tasks still fall
on the woman’s shoulders, either mentally, or in practice. The extra workload that consists of planning and organisation and leads to the execution of the tasks has been coined by feminists as <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="mental_load" title="The mental load">the mental load</span> (Emma, 2017). Household
management is yet another invisible task done by women, a time-consuming work nonetheless, which adds up to the time already spent doing house chores.
</p>
<p>
Today, technology corporations provide more options. Rather than sharing the work equally, both the mental load and the actual chores can be automated, to some extent, through technological solutions. No longer framed explicitly as women’s work, but continuing
to be (de)valued as such, tasks such as cooking can be facilitated through various apps. From a tool of oppression directed at women, food becomes a task delegated to gig workers by startups and other corporations. Regarding food
as a tool of oppression has opened the way for many solutions, some more realistic than others. The automation of food and cooking has been a recurrent topic of conversation and space for imagination both within social movements,
and in popular culture.</p>
</div>
</b-col>
</b-row>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'CookingCard',
data: function() {
return {
theory_of_evolution: '<a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/cooking-up-bigger-brains/?redirect=1"> A theory developed by Richard Wrangham, biological anthropologist at Harvard University</a>',
woman_place: '<a href="https://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/a_womans_place_is_in_the_kitchen/"> The origins of the phrase </a>',
leave_it: '<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/MXhlTQJcgbc" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>',
mental_load: '<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/e916cc0a952d793c9f82dcd6954afcac63d68c87/0_0_2000_2000/master/2000.png?width=1920&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=a2b1fc7a0500118c9bf17bc660b566b9"></iframe>'
}
},
}
</script>

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src/components/FutureCard.vue
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<style scoped>
* {
border: 0px black solid;
}
p {
text-align: justify;
font-size: 18px;
}
</style>
<template>
<div>
<b-row align-h="center">
<b-col cols="10">
<div class="card_content">
<p>
Within the mainstream technology field, there is a current trend towards enhancing brain and physical capacities through consumer products. More specifically, disconnecting the weakness of the body from the sharpness of the mind can be identified in trends
such as, genomics, the quantified self and biohacking. These are also a result of the frustration of not being able to change some aspects of life, such as the need to eat, rest, and the inevitability of death. Within the small circles
of the world’s millionaires, these issues are of great interest, with fortunes invested into research and development. </p>
<p>
In the view of Ray Kurzweil, the famous self-proclaimed futurist, the body deserves no respect in its fragility, and all its shortcomings can be conquered through the intelligence of the brain (Transcendent Man, 2009). In the future he predicts, a transhumanist
future, the body as an unique physical entity has no place, when our minds will be able to explore many new worlds and inhabit virtual bodies, while holding vast amounts of universal knowledge.</p>
<p>
Relating back to the previous chapter, meal replacements represent an ide- ological universal solution to the problem of the body. In my view, they play the role of a consumer market-friendly product which comes as an in- troduction to bigger and more
profitable issues, such as disease and aging. However, like universal knowledge, universal nutrition cannot represent a solution to the needs of the entire planet. The answers currently provided by companies which produce meal replacements
are not as sustainable, affordable and appealing as they claim (Huel.com, 2017). Even though companies such as Soylent pride in collaborating with the World Food Program to provide meals for those in need, I believe that corporate
solutions are not what the world needs to deal with its most pressing problems, such as climate change, poverty and access to food and water.
</p>
<p>
In recent years, more and more money and intelligence have been invested in Silicon Valley into studying the human body. The focus is not so much on curing diseases such as cancer and diabetes, but specifically on curing the one ‘disease’ affecting the
upper classes: growing old. The richest of the rich are deeply invested in making themselves live as long as possible. The most likely implication of this plan is that anti-aging technologies will only be available to the elite, and
will not benefit the rest of the world in any way. Even Bill Gates has recently warned the world that gene editing technology will only contribute to even greater inequality between the rich and the poor (Court, 2019).
</p>
</div>
</b-col>
</b-row>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'FutureCard',
data: function() {
return {
post_mom_economy: '<iframe src="https://imgur.com/i1w6ztH"></iframe>',
lot_2046: '<a href="https://www.lot2046.com/">LOT is a subscription-based service which distributes a basic set of clothing, footwear, essential self-care products, accessories, and media content.</a>'
}
},
}
</script>

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src/components/HelloWorld.vue
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<template>
<div class="hello">
<h1>{{ msg }}</h1>
<p>
For a guide and recipes on how to configure / customize this project,<br>
check out the
<a href="https://cli.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">vue-cli documentation</a>.
</p>
<h3>Installed CLI Plugins</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://github.com/vuejs/vue-cli/tree/dev/packages/%40vue/cli-plugin-babel" target="_blank" rel="noopener">babel</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/vuejs/vue-cli/tree/dev/packages/%40vue/cli-plugin-eslint" target="_blank" rel="noopener">eslint</a></li>
</ul>
<h3>Essential Links</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Core Docs</a></li>
<li><a href="https://forum.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Forum</a></li>
<li><a href="https://chat.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Community Chat</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/vuejs" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter</a></li>
<li><a href="https://news.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">News</a></li>
</ul>
<h3>Ecosystem</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://router.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">vue-router</a></li>
<li><a href="https://vuex.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">vuex</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/vuejs/vue-devtools#vue-devtools" target="_blank" rel="noopener">vue-devtools</a></li>
<li><a href="https://vue-loader.vuejs.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">vue-loader</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/vuejs/awesome-vue" target="_blank" rel="noopener">awesome-vue</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'HelloWorld',
props: {
msg: String
}
}
</script>
<!-- Add "scoped" attribute to limit CSS to this component only -->
<style scoped>
h3 {
margin: 40px 0 0;
}
ul {
list-style-type: none;
padding: 0;
}
li {
display: inline-block;
margin: 0 10px;
}
a {
color: #42b983;
}
</style>

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src/components/ReviewPage.vue
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<style scoped>
* {
border: 0px black solid;
}
.fade-enter-active,
.fade-leave-active {
transition: opacity .5s;
}
.fade-enter,
.fade-leave-to
/* .fade-leave-active below version 2.1.8 */
{
opacity: 0;
}
.intro_review {
text-align: justify;
font-size: 20px;
}
</style>
<template>
<div>
<b-row class="mb-5">
<b-col md="8" offset-md="9">
<b-button variant="light">About</b-button>
<b-button variant="light">Glossary</b-button>
<b-button variant="light">Full text</b-button>
<b-button variant="light">Full video</b-button>
</b-col>
</b-row>
<!-- End of top menu-->
<b-row align-h="center" class="mb-5">
<b-col cols="8" md-10 justify-text-center class="intro_review">
<p>
... this is more than just a simple review. Instead of just discussing the physical characteristics of one product or another, my analysis focuses on the broader context in which these products have developed. I've become interested in meal replacements
because the concept of rejecting food as inefficient, and replacing it with an ultra-processed powder, however many nutrients it contained, intrigued me. I found the idea to be completely alien, so far removed from my values and desires,
that I had to look deeper. I ended up writing an essay, following the historical path and cultural patterns that led to the growth of a culture, an ideology, a community around the act of replacing one of the most basic human habits.
</p>
<p>
Below, you will find excerpts of my essay, split into the main topics covered in my research. Scattered throughout the text are images, references, articles, quotes and video snippets, some even extracted from my own video essay, that together build a
complex image of the world of meal replacements.
</p>
</b-col>
</b-row>
<!-- End of description-->
<b-row align-h="center" class="mb-5">
<b-col cols="2" class="text-center">
<b-dropdown id="dropdown-2" class="m-md-2" variant="outline-dark" @click="onClick" no-caret>
<span slot="text"> <font-awesome-icon icon="stroopwafel" size="3x" /></span>
<b-card title="Replacing cooking" class="mb-2">
<b-card-text>
Meal replacements aim to replace food with food-like substances, which means there's no need to cook. But what do people have against cooking in the first place? When did cooking become important for humans?
</b-card-text>
<b-dropdown-item-button v-on:click="showCookingCard = !showCookingCard" href="#" variant="primary">Keep reading</b-dropdown-item-button>
</b-card>
</b-dropdown>
</b-col>
<b-col cols="2" class="text-center">
<b-dropdown id="dropdown-2" class="m-md-2" variant="outline-dark" @click="onClick" no-caret>
<span slot="text"> <font-awesome-icon icon="stopwatch" size="3x" /></span>
<b-card title="Saving time" class="mb-2">
<b-card-text>
When you have no time to eat throughout the day, you have to reconsider your priorities. sometimes, that can mean eating your meals in liquid form, on the go.
</b-card-text>
<b-dropdown-item-button v-on:click="showTimeCard = !showTimeCard" href="#" variant="primary">Keep reading</b-dropdown-item-button>
</b-card>
</b-dropdown>
</b-col>
<b-col cols="2" class="text-center">
<b-dropdown id="dropdown-3" class="m-md-2" variant="outline-dark" @click="onClick" no-caret>
<span slot="text"> <font-awesome-icon icon="code" size="3x" /></span>
<b-card title="Providing solutions" class="mb-2">
<b-card-text>
The food system has plenty of problems, from food waste to world hunger. Most meal replacement brands claim to tackle some of these issues through their products. But I don't think that's working very well.
</b-card-text>
<b-dropdown-item-button v-on:click="showSolutionsCard = !showSolutionsCard" href="#" variant="primary">Keep reading</b-dropdown-item-button>
</b-card>
</b-dropdown>
</b-col>
<b-col cols="2" class="text-center">
<b-dropdown id="dropdown-4" class="m-md-2" variant="outline-dark" @click="onClick" no-caret>
<span slot="text"> <font-awesome-icon icon="search-dollar" size="3x" /></span>
<b-card title="Adding value" class="mb-2">
<b-card-text>
If food is inefficient in keeping humans alive, what makes meal replacements, or complete foods, an appropriate alternative?
</b-card-text>
<b-dropdown-item-button v-on:click="showValueCard = !showValueCard" href="#" variant="primary">Keep reading</b-dropdown-item-button>
</b-card>
</b-dropdown>
</b-col>
<b-col cols="2" class="text-center">
<b-dropdown id="dropdown-5" class="m-md-2" variant="outline-dark" @click="onClick" no-caret>
<span slot="text"> <font-awesome-icon icon="seedling" size="3x" /></span>
<b-card title="Saving the future" class="mb-2">
<b-card-text>
In the future, we will probably have to change the ways in which we relate to food. Will future food be purely functional? Will agriculture change drastically, as well as our reliance on it?
</b-card-text>
<b-dropdown-item-button v-on:click="showFutureCard = !showFutureCard" href="#" variant="primary">Keep reading</b-dropdown-item-button>
</b-card>
</b-dropdown>
</b-col>
</b-row>
<b-row align-h="center">
<b-col cols="8" class="text-center">
<transition name="fade">
<div v-if="showCookingCard">
<CookingCard/>
</div>
<div v-if="showTimeCard">
<TimeCard/>
</div>
<div v-if="showSolutionsCard">
<SolutionsCard/>
</div>
<div v-if="showValueCard">
<ValueCard/>
</div>
<div v-if="showFutureCard">
<FutureCard/>
</div>
</transition>
</b-col>
</b-row>
</div>
</template>
<script>
import CookingCard from './CookingCard'
import TimeCard from './TimeCard'
import SolutionsCard from './SolutionsCard'
import ValueCard from './ValueCard'
import FutureCard from './FutureCard'
export default {
name: 'ReviewPage',
components: {
CookingCard, TimeCard, SolutionsCard, ValueCard, FutureCard,
},
data: function() {
return {
showCookingCard: false,
showTimeCard: false,
showSolutionsCard: false,
showValueCard: false,
showFutureCard: false,
}
},
methods: {
onClick() {
// Close the menu and (by passing true) return focus to the toggle button
this.$refs.dropdown.hide(false)
}
}
}
</script>

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src/components/SolutionsCard.vue
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<style scoped>
* {
border: 0px black solid;
}
p {
text-align: justify;
font-size: 18px;
}
</style>
<template>
<div>
<b-row align-h="center">
<b-col cols="10">
<div class="card_content">
<p>The way we eat and think of food today is bound to change. The increasing demand for food, especially meat and dairy, combined with the damaging effects of climate change on agriculture (Cho, 2018), has the potential to push the food industry
in new directions, and consumers to reconsider their choices. Within this context, technology companies, the new actors on the food industry stage, are putting forward a solution which regards food as being archaic and inefficient,
and the practices around food preparation as time- wasters. Their solution, materialized in products dubbed as ‘complete foods’ or ‘meal replacements’, which allegedly contain all the essential nutrients for the human body, is backed
up by huge financial support from venture capital, and presented as the future of food. However, besides that fact that it does not offer a real solution to the problems we are facing, this interpretation of food does not reflect its
historical importance. The cultural role of food, gender representation, or collective values associated with sharing food, are largely disregarded. Instead, the emphasis is on the continuous quest to improve food products, within
the value system of <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="techno_solutionism" title="Evgeni Morozov on techno-solutionism">techno-solutionism</span>. In his book To Save Everything, Click Here, Evgeny Morozov critically describes this value system, explaining that “this never-ending quest to ameliorate [. . . ] is shortsighted and only perfunctorily
interested in the activity for which improvement is sought” (Morozov, 2013). This critique applies to the development of meal replacements, the materialization of techno-solutionism in food, which are promoted as an universal response
to anything from time management, nutritional dilemmas, food waste and sustainability. Throughout this work, I will look at the development and implications of the meal replacement phenomenon, and, through the lens of food, provide
an outlook on tech industry’s influence on Western culture.
</p>
<p>(...)</p>
<p>
The rise of products branded as innovative foods has largely happened in the last decade, originating from Silicon Valley. The latest innovations, such as meal replacements, make promises for an empowered self, with full control over what one puts in
one’s body. Companies place a lot of emphasis on a scientific approach to selecting ingredients for a particular product, and brand their products as technologically advanced food items. But the process of producing or sourcing the
ingredients is almost never exposed, thus further obscuring the processes involved in food production. One notable example is the company Huel, which created a video on YouTube titled How Huel Is Made, but failed to actually show their
process. Instead, the video described its packaging and delivery system, a fact that was quickly noted in the comments section as disingenuous.</p>
<p>The celebration of not having time to tend to your bodily needs properly, together with the emphasis on giving the body personalized nutrition in the most pleasureless way is, of course, a paradoxical incongruity. At the same time, the
idea that you are solely responsible for your well-being, and that you can control your health and efficiency with the right consumer habits is another heavily promoted concept. Trying to reconcile and adopt all these suggestions for
how one should live their life is almost impossible, and leads to burnout. However, startups in Silicon Valley and all over the world are more than ready to provide products to any imaginable issue that can be identified, in order
to achieve their prescribed quality of life. This is problematic in many ways, because it completely ignores other factors that influence our lives, such as social class, income, education, access etc, while promoting efficiency and
production as the main goals to be achieved by humans.</p>
</div>
</b-col>
</b-row>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'SolutionsCard',
data: function() {
return {
techno_solutionism: '<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fOvaNzIxz54?start=26" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>',
lot_2046: '<a href="https://www.lot2046.com/">LOT is a subscription-based service which distributes a basic set of clothing, footwear, essential self-care products, accessories, and media content.</a>'
}
},
}
</script>

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src/components/SplashPage.vue
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<template>
<div>
<div class="row justify-content-center">
<div class="col-md-12 text-center" id="header">
<h2>A resource for the meal-replacement curious</h2>
</div>
</div> <!--end header -->
<div class="row justify-content-center" style="border-bottom: 1px solid #D3D3D3;">
<div class="col-md-10 text-left" id="introduction">
<p>
Throughout this past year, I’ve become fascinated with meal replacements. From their surprising form and aspiration to replace normal food, to the entire growing culture and community base around them, I’ve delved deep into the rabbit hole. I have now spent more than 6 months learning everything I could about them. I think I am ready to leave my review.
</p>
<p>
If you're in any way curious about this growing trend of replacing traditional food with tech food, you might find this useful. My personal opinion is based on an extensive research that has developed into a video essay, a written essay and a collection of material in various media that illustrates my views.
</p>
</div>
</div> <!--end introduction -->
<div class="row justify-content-center mt-5">
<div class="col-md-4 text-center">
<font-awesome-icon icon="stroopwafel" size="5x"/>
<p style="text-align:center;">
Replacing cooking
</p>
</div>
<div class="col-md-4 text-center">
<font-awesome-icon icon="stopwatch" size="5x"/>
<p style="text-align:center;">
Saving time
</p>
</div>
<div class="col-md-4 text-center">
<font-awesome-icon icon="code" size="5x"/>
<p style="text-align:center;">
Providing solutions
</p>
</div>
</div> <!-- end first row of icons-->
<div class="row justify-content-center mt-5" style="border-bottom: 1px solid #D3D3D3;">
<div class="col-md-2 text-center"> </div>
<div class="col-md-4 text-center">
<font-awesome-icon icon="search-dollar" size="5x" />
<p style="text-align:center;">
Adding value
</p>
</div>
<div class="col-md-4 text-center">
<font-awesome-icon icon="seedling" size="5x" />
<p style="text-align:center;">
Changing the future
</p>
</div>
<div class="col-md-2 text-center"> </div>
</div> <!-- end second row of icons-->
<div class="row justify-content-between mt-5">
<div class="col-md-2">
<p style="text-align: right;">
Alice says:
</p>
<p style="font-size: 12px; text-align: right;">
Verified user
<font-awesome-icon icon="user-check" style="color: green" />
</p>
</div>
<div class="col-md-8">
<p style="font-weight: bold;">
I have so many thoughts!
</p>
<p>
“I tried meal replacements, got sucked into the culture, and I’ve come out with many thoughts. First of all...”
</p>
</div>
<div class="col-md-2">
<b-button variant="light"><router-link to='/review'>Read full review</router-link></b-button>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'SplashPage',
}
</script>
<style scoped>
#header{
margin-top: 40px;
}
p {
text-align: justify;
}
#introduction{
margin-top: 30px;
}
</style>

64
src/components/TimeCard.vue
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<style scoped>
* {
border: 0px black solid;
}
p {
text-align: justify;
font-size: 18px;
}
</style>
<template>
<div>
<b-row align-h="center">
<b-col cols="10">
<div class="card_content">
<p>
The contemporary field of technology has created a world that suits its workers perfectly. A well-paid position in IT allows one to move from mom’s home, which also means moving away from all the benefits that come with living under her roof. But the
solution to all the extra work on their shoulders, which they are often unprepared or unwilling to do, can be easily fixed. Mother, in this situation, can be replaced with software tools - services performed via applications by gig
workers.
</p>
<p>
In the <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="post_mom_economy" title="The post-mom economy">post-mom economy</span> (Maney, 2015), there are services like Uber to drive you around, Washio to do your
laundry, Deliveroo to bring your food, <span style='border-bottom: 2px black dashed;' v-b-popover.click.html="lot_2046" title="Lot 2046">Lot 2046</span> to send you regular supplies of clothes and grooming items, Sleepscore to wake
you up, and HydroCoach to remind you to drink water. These tasks, forms of unpaid labour traditionally reserved for the woman in the household, are deemed not worthy of one’s already limited time, in a culture where people are being
constantly pushed to perform and be productive. Within the current economic regime, this workload is often performed by so-called gig workers, self-employed labourers controlled by applications, who work under the premise that they
can manage their time however they want. Once mommy stopped providing these services, it’s time for her to be replaced with an app. </p>
<p>
The main goal of these services it to convince users to separate important decisions from meaningless ones, and focus their time on paid labour. Deciding how to dress and what to eat can be outsourced to a corporation, which uses this as its selling point.
This form of convenient consumption limits the need to think about your choices, and becomes an automated form of comfort. Within this mindset, cooking is being presented as a chore rather than an activity that can be done as leisure.
Entrepreneurs are encouraged, or rather pressured, to find solutions to problems they are facing themselves, and monetize every aspect of life. For many, the problem they face is becoming an adult with too much money to spend, and
too little time outside of work. Keeping a constant high level of performance at work does not allow much time and mind space for dealing with the practicalities of adult life, especially when they are framed as low-value, time-consuming
activities, and the latest consumer products reflect this reality.</p>
<p>
The post-mom economy reflects embedded preconceptions on gender roles within the home. When the main provider of these services is not available, startups offer the option to replace her with a techno-solutionist product, that brings convenience for those
who can afford it, while pushing others into low-wage gig work. Instead of reflecting on the value of maintaining a home and caregiving, or on the struggles of those who are pushed into these roles, the tasks are simply delegated to
strangers. This further increases the infiltration of corporations into our lives under the pretense of earning more freedom (Pollan, 2014), while continuing to devalue what is regarded as women’s work. Unless it is done for the purpose
of entertainment, cooking is framed as an archaic chore, subjected to the specialization of labour, and awarded with a low wage.</p>
</div>
</b-col>
</b-row>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'TimeCard',
data: function() {
return {
post_mom_economy: '<img width="300" height="200" src="./topics/post-mom_economy/images/post_mom.png"></img>',
lot_2046: '<a href="https://www.lot2046.com/">LOT is a subscription-based service which distributes a basic set of clothing, footwear, essential self-care products, accessories, and media content.</a>'
}
},
}
</script>

82
src/components/ValueCard.vue
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<style scoped>
* {
border: 0px black solid;
}
p {
text-align: justify;
font-size: 18px;
}
</style>
<template>
<div>
<b-row align-h="center">
<b-col cols="10">
<div class="card_content">
<p>
Technology startups did not invent meal replacements, nor fortified foods. These products came on the market for various historical reasons, most importantly to deal with nutrient deficiencies. However, companies producing meal replacements frame these
products as ways to disrupt mealtimes. As expressed by Huel’s community manager, “We wanted to strip it back to what the actual purpose of food is to provide nutrition (. . . ) People are very focused on taste now – does it taste good?
That is not the primary purpose of food”(Turk, 2018). Nutritionism and the food industry in general have, for decades, capitalized on people’s fears and confusion related to food. They created the problem, and then promoted a product
to allegedly solve it.
</p>
<p>
Today, companies which produce and sell similar innovative food products 25put forward a number of health claims, including complete nutrition, better concentration, disease prevention, etc. But the lack of unaffiliated long-term scientific studies, and
the association with nutritionists that sit on the board of directors are bound to raise suspicion. The fact that the food industry is able to make such claims can be traced back to the 90s, when the United States Congress passed a
couple of laws, FDAMA 4 and DSHEA 5 , which gave more freedom to the food and supplements industries to introduce new substances into their products without much pushback from the Food and Drug Administration (Nestle, 2013). </p>
<p>
Looking at food as simply fuel for the body means completely disregarding the entire culture that has grown around food in every part of society. This phenomenon is described by Marion Nestle as reductionism, which, in this context, refers to reducing
food to containers of nutrients. “Techno-foods offer a reductionist approach to choosing a healthful diet” (ibid) which only encourages food producers to come up with more products for those who find this view appealing, or are confused
regarding what foods are good for them. The above examples reveal that there there is a structural issue that has led to ultra-processed food products to appear on the market, under various health claims. This phenomenon is further
exploited in the representation of what we perceive to be real food as an antiquated, and the push to promote processed products with a much higher market value.</p>
<p>
The way we transform nature for our personal purposes changes the way we relate to the world around us. This reductionist approach to food, as mentioned before, has led to the development of a new interpretation of food as fuel for the body. In this view,
the cultural and social role of eating is trivialized, transforming one of the most significant aspects of society into a nuisance, an antiquated and inefficient way to maintain human life.</p>
<p>
One telling example from today are complete foods, or meal replacements. Most commonly in the form of a powder meant to be mixed with water, these products allegedly contain all necessary nutrients, and can thus replace normal meals. Meal replacements
target young professionals who can’t find the time, or desire, to prepare and consume a traditional meal throughout the day, a situation many can relate to. By consuming a shake for breakfast and lunch, one does not have to sacrifice
time, or nutritional value, in order to be able to keep working. The companies producing these products, largely startups owned by technology entrepreneurs, promote them as solutions to a large variety of problems: lack of time, inconvenience
of cooking, food voids, which is all the times one doesn’t have direct access to a meal when hungry, world hunger, climate change, etc. </p>
<p>In my research, I followed the development of the brand Soylent, the first one of its kind. The product was developed in Silicon Valley by a couple of computer scientists. They were all young white males with no cooking experience, who
were surviving on frozen fast food, and were frustrated by the quality of their meals and the time it took away from their day (Widdicombe, 2014). Taking the approach of an engineer in a social vacuum, they came to the conclusion that
traditional nutrition is inefficient. The best way to go about this, according to them, is by reducing food to its most basic elements. This comes across as the ultimate life hack, as it allows them to further release themselves from
their bodily needs and exist purely for the purpose of being efficient in their search for profit. In this way, food preparation and consumption necessary on a daily basis is reduced to a minimum, and food is reinterpreted purely as
fuel for the body. </p>
<p>
After Soylent’s astonishing success, and due to the fact that it didn’t meet international food regulation standards for shipping, many similar products appeared on the international market. Meal replacement brands are often promoted similarly to software
or hardware, rather than food. They have different iterations, such as Soylent 1.0, 1.1, and so on, prominent lot numbers, and improvements are described as “fixing bugs” (Widdicombe, 2014). Fram- ing them as such pushes them further
away from traditional food products, and further abstracts the role of food in our life. </p>
<p>
The rise of meal replacements came not from a desire to improve food, but to disrupt the food industry and make the kind of profits a small technology startup can nowadays. The products are a techno-solutionist representation of the Silicon Valley culture,
manufacturing new problems in daily life that can only be fixed by them. They promote a quantified lifestyle, of an individual that is highly efficient and productive, both professionally and outside of work, to the point of burnout.
And, going even further, they claim to improve people’s health and solve food waste and world hunger, while disregarding issues such as wealth inequality and capitalist structures that have caused these problems in the first place.
However, the products target a demographic similar to that of a technology startup, which is dominated by Western, middle and upper class individuals, which heavily limits the universal solution ideal that they promote.</p>
</div>
</b-col>
</b-row>
</div>
</template>
<script>
export default {
name: 'ValueCard',
data: function() {
return {
post_mom_economy: '<iframe src="https://imgur.com/i1w6ztH"></iframe>',
lot_2046: '<a href="https://www.lot2046.com/">LOT is a subscription-based service which distributes a basic set of clothing, footwear, essential self-care products, accessories, and media content.</a>'
}
},
}
</script>

33
src/main.js
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@ -1,8 +1,41 @@
import Vue from 'vue' import Vue from 'vue'
import App from './App.vue' import App from './App.vue'
import BootstrapVue from 'bootstrap-vue'
import 'bootstrap/dist/css/bootstrap.css'
import 'bootstrap-vue/dist/bootstrap-vue.css'
import { library } from '@fortawesome/fontawesome-svg-core'
import { faCarBattery, faSeedling, faStroopwafel, faBrain, faStopwatch, faChartLine, faCode, faUserCheck, faSearchDollar } from '@fortawesome/free-solid-svg-icons'
import { FontAwesomeIcon } from '@fortawesome/vue-fontawesome'
import { VBPopover } from 'bootstrap-vue/es/directives'
import VueRouter from 'vue-router'
// Note: Vue automatically prefixes the directive name with 'v-'
Vue.directive('b-popover', VBPopover)
library.add(faCarBattery, faSeedling, faStroopwafel, faBrain, faStopwatch, faChartLine, faCode, faUserCheck, faSearchDollar)
Vue.component('font-awesome-icon', FontAwesomeIcon)
import SplashPage from './components/SplashPage'
import ReviewPage from './components/ReviewPage'
Vue.config.productionTip = false Vue.config.productionTip = false
Vue.use(BootstrapVue)
Vue.use(VueRouter)
const router = new VueRouter({
mode: 'history',
routes: [
{ path: '/', component: SplashPage },
{ path: '/review', component: ReviewPage }
]
})
new Vue({ new Vue({
router,
render: h => h(App), render: h => h(App),
}).$mount('#app') }).$mount('#app')

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