Tag: choice

Consolidated Options

It was darn near Pavlovian.

As the players jogged off the field and into the dugout, the fans in the stands focused their eyes on the scoreboard high above the right field wall.

It was cap shuffle time.

An image of a baseball appeared on the scoreboard. Then suddenly, a stylized baseball cap appeared, covering it up. Two identical-looking caps emerged on the big screen to flank it.

Music blared from the stadium speakers as the baseball caps shuffled around the screen. All the while, the fans tried to keep track of the cap with the ball underneath it.

Finally, the music stopped. The baseball caps froze in place across the scoreboard, the numbers 1, 2, and 3 displayed underneath them.

At the top of the screen, a question now appeared. Which cap has the ball?

There was a momentary pause. Then a murmur rose to a dim roar.

Two! Two! Two!

A few seconds later, the cap over the number 2 on the scoreboard lifted. The baseball re-appeared.

The crowd went wild.

The cap shuffle has long been a staple at ballparks.

It’s long proven to be a cost-effective way to keep fans engaged, even when the ballplayers are off the field. And it’s an easy contest to win.

Now, that’s not to say the shuffle is easy to follow. The scoreboard maneuvers can even flummox the fans with the keenest eyes and sharpest attention spans.

But those who lose the ball get a second chance. With only three options to choose from, guessing is simple. And the roar of the crowd can nudge those guesses into the educated column.

Indeed, I’ve rarely kept track of the winning cap when I’ve gone to the ballpark. I’ve guessed nearly every time. But I’ve rarely guessed wrong.

The wisdom of the crowd carried me through.

The cap shuffle is just a bit of amusement. No more. No less.

But it illustrates an entrenched element our society – The Rule of Three.

The Rule of Three is a principle that was first articulated by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) in the 1970s. It states that most corners of commerce, there are only three significant competitors. Think Chrysler, Ford, and General Motors in the automotive space. Or Burger King, McDonald’s and Wendy’s in the fast-food sector.

The market might have started out with more competitors in these industries. But over time, those three frontrunners rose from the fray.

Such market domination has as much to do with human nature as business strategy. You see, our brains can only consider three to four options at a time. We simply cannot process a Big Six of automakers, fast-food proprietors, or nearly anything else.

But the Rule of Three only partially explains the world we live in. For while there might technically be three dominant options in just about any industry, only two of them tend to get the lion’s share of attention.

Consider soft drinks. In Texas, Dr Pepper is an immensely popular option. But once you leave the state, it’s barely relevant. Coca-Cola and Pepsi carry the mail.

The same is true in the world of computer operating systems. Linux is one of the top three options in that realm, but it doesn’t hold a candle to Apple and Microsoft.

Binary choice reigns supreme. For better or for worse.

The better refers to reliability for consumers, and a predictable revenue flow for providers. When there are only two dominant choices, each party knows what to expect.

But the worse feeds directly from those advantages. With so few dominant options, consumers must contend with the trappings of monopoly power – including higher prices and lower levels of innovation. And the main providers must contend with each other – leading to polarization and its associated ugliness.

Sound familiar?

Yes, American politics also follows the Rule of Three. Two parties have reigned supreme for generations, while a smattering of independent politicians have sat on the periphery. This dynamic has made rhetoric more extreme and consensus harder to come by with each passing year.

Representative democracy only seems to embody the most sinister corners of American existence. Elections feel like a choice for the least bad option.

And when those perceived least bad selections make it to the seat of power, precious little gets done. Accomplishments requires compromise. And compromise is a bridge too far.

This quagmire has proved demoralizing to many Americans. And the murmurs of their discontent have now risen to a dull roar.

Give us more choices, they say. Get rid of the two-party system.

It’s a seemingly sensible plea. But appearances can be deceiving.

What would a multi-party political scene look like?

We don’t have to dive into fantasyland to imagine this. Real world examples exist an ocean away.

Countries such as Germany, France, Israel, and Australia have relied on a parliamentary system for governance. That means citizens vote for parties, rather than individual politicians.

There are plenty of parties for voters to choose from, and diverse parliamentary bodies. To govern effectively in this environment, parties have traditionally formed coalitions with relatively like-minded legislators – offering a smidge of compromise in order to pool votes.

But recently, that strategy has become less of a sure thing. Voters in some of those nations have given fringe parties with extreme views a seat at the table. And traditional parties have focused on differentiating themselves in response.

Consensus has been harder to find. Coalitions have been fewer and further between. And government productivity has gone down.

The byproducts of this shift are far from pretty. Economies have stagnated. Protests have proliferated. And snap elections have become commonplace.

This is what politics would look like in America without the two-party system. But since voters select individual politicians in our nation, the dysfunction would be on another level.

Without compromise, coalitions, or consensus, bureaucracy could grind to a halt. With gridlock overwhelming funding deliberations, government shutdowns would be inevitable. Without a shared sense of accountability, dereliction of duty would weaken the nation.

Expansive choice is no panacea. Far from it.

It’s time we get used to that fact.

When I was young, my parents would ask me a question each evening.

Do you want one bedtime story, or two?

Bedtime was non-negotiable. But I still had some say over the proceedings.

I often went with the second choice. I’d listen intently to a rendition of one children’s book, then another. And by the end, I’d be down for the count.

I didn’t give this ritual much thought at the time. But I sure do now.

You see, I don’t have children of my own. But I know that kids can be a handful after the sun sets.

Crankiness, mania, hyperactivity – all are possible as youthful energy wanes. Children need their rest, but good luck getting them to acquiesce to it.

This is why my parents’ bedtime system was so brilliant. By consolidating options, they made the wind-down manageable for everyone. And they set me up for success.

I think the same is true for consolidated options in general. We might want more than Coca-Cola and Pepsi, or Republicans and Democrats. We may yearn to see 7 caps shuffling on the scoreboard.

But what we’ve got is manageable. What we’ve got is reliable. What we’ve got is familiar.

It might not work to our specifications. It might barely work at all. But it works.

And that’s no small thing.

The Cost of Free Choice

As we sat down at a table at a Mexican restaurant, my friends gave some advice.

Don’t worry. You won’t even have to look at the menu. They only serve nachos, enchiladas, and fajitas. Simple enough.

Simple enough. But also, kind of complicated.

The nachos, you see, were smothered with cheese – an ingredient I could not digest. The enchiladas were smothered in sauce, making a mess inevitable. (Oh, they also had cheese, for good measure.) And the fajitas required extra effort to assemble.

Where were the steak tacos I was craving? Or, to that end, the tamales or flautas?

Not at this restaurant. And so, my options were crude.

Order the fajita platter I didn’t want. Or go hungry – and explain to my friends why.

In essence, there was only one choice. So, when the waiter turned to me, I blurted out Beef fajitas, please, without a hint of hesitation.

My friends were right. I didn’t even have to look at the menu.

There are many reasons why this restaurant kept its menu so tidy.

Convenience. Simplicity. Tradition.

But also cost.

Mexican food, you see, often draws upon common ingredients. Corn tortillas. Flour tortillas. Salsa. Grilled steak. Grilled chicken. Peppers. Onions. Spiced rice. Refried beans. Cheese.

It’s the way that these items are assembled that comprises a menu. It’s what makes tacos different from enchiladas or burritos or chimichangas.

This interoperability makes ingredient costs a minor concern. Everything except the meat is generally affordable – no small detail in an industry with tight margins.

But preparation costs? That’s a different matter entirely.

It takes more work to, say, season grill a carne asada to perfection than it does to roll some shredded chicken in tortillas and smother the whole plate in sauce. It takes more work to assemble grilled skirt steak into tacos than it does to bring it to the table wholesale as fajitas.

This restaurant we were visiting was known for running a streamlined kitchen. Minimizing preparation costs were the ethos of its menu.

It’s a menu the restaurant has long mastered, to critical acclaim. But for someone like me, it took the words free choice off the table.

Literally.

Being saddled with one undesirable option at a restaurant might seem like a first world problem. And indeed, it is.

But this frustrating moment represents the tip of an iceberg. An iceberg sabotaging the fundamentals of our society.

We claim to live a land with liberty and justice for all. And for the most part, we do. We are free to vote, work, and entertain ourselves as we see fit.

But the options we have when exercising that free choice? Those have a cost.

Consider governance. As a representative democracy, we elect leaders to run our country’s affairs on our behalf. Those elections are open to nearly every American adult, free of charge. And myriad efforts to restrict these rights have been quashed over time.

But the choices on our ballots? Those are not nearly as open as our right to choose from them.

Not just anyone can make a serious run for office. To be viable, you need sterling credentials, a semblance of name recognition, and money. A lot of money.

You don’t rise from nothing to become President in America. You just don’t.

The earliest occupants of the office – our Founding Fathers – were wealthy plantation owners. Despite humble origins, Abraham Lincoln gained acclaim as a lawyer before pursuing the White House.

Even modern-day outsider candidates — Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan — had a leg up over everyday Americans. Obama earned a law degree from Harvard University, while Reagan earned acclaim as an actor. Each amassed a small fortune before even turning to politics, let alone pursuing the highest office in the land.

Make no mistake. Politics is awash in money. Money provided by special interest groups, by mega-donors, and by the politicians themselves. There’s a reason why the size of a candidate’s war chest matters as much as their poll numbers.

This creates a contradiction.

When we step into that voting booth, we exercise free choice. Free choice among options who paid to play.

The people whose names are on that ballot don’t seem much like us or relate to our lived experience. If we were to draft a list of who would best represent us, they likely wouldn’t make our Top 10.

And yet, here we are, left to choose between them. To decide whether Option 11 or Option 14 should be our Number 1.

We might want tacos, but we’re offered enchiladas or fajitas.

Free choice carries quite the cost. Make no mistake about that.

That’s just the way it is. Some things will never change. That’s just the way it is. Yeah, but don’t you believe them.

Bruce Hornsby and the Range rose to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart on the strength of those lyrics nearly four decades ago. Hornsby and his band found acclaim. And yes, they earned quite a bit of money in the process.

The central premise of those lyrics remains a work in progress. We are still working at breaking barriers, eliminating preconceptions, and defining what’s possible.

I believe in that work, and the mission underpinning it. But I also believe it’s critical for all of us to be clear-eyed about something fundamental.

We may have been bestowed the right of free choice. But the power contained within that right is minimal.

Sure, we can help determine who sits in the Oval Office. Sure, we can help determine which automaker sells the most vehicles.

But there are other forces — capitalist forces — that put those options on the table for us in the first place. And it’s within those forces where the true power lies.

It’s my sincere hope that someday, that process will be more accessible. That we’ll be able to determine what makes the menu, not just what we want to order from it.

But that’s a long way off.

In the meanwhile, maximizing the power of our free choice means getting comfortable with three words:

Follow the money.

I am. Are you?

The Option Anvil

There’s a picture that used to hang on the wall in my childhood home.

I’m probably 8 years old in this photograph. I’m wearing slacks and a button-down shirt. My chin is resting in the palm of my hand as I peer over a chessboard.

My parents have long adored this picture. Its candid nature seemed reminiscent of an oil painting. And it captured my essence as a child — pensive, quiet, and conscientious.

An image like this might seem to be a prelude. It might appear to be a hint of what was to come. If I took such a calculated approach to a complicated game back then, one might think, I’ve surely grown into a master tactician by now.

But appearances can be deceiving.

Yes, I was staring at a chessboard. But there were no kings or queens or rooks atop it. In their place were nondescript circular game pieces, which were either painted black or white.

Yes, this image was of me playing checkers.

Why was I so pensive, so stoic? Why was I so indecisive while playing such a straightforward game?

It all had to do with the burden of choice in my midst.

Give me liberty or give me death!

Such were the famous words of Patrick Henry. This rallying cry, uttered during a speech at the Second Virginia Convention in 1775, helped inspire the Declaration of Independence a year later. And its legacy perseveres in our society today.

Freedom is a hallmark of our nation. The liberty to chart our own path is paramount.

But for all the time we spend defending this right, we forget one thing. The actual process of choosing between options is extremely difficult.

You see, choice introduces us to both reward and risk. If we choose properly, we find ourselves in an advantageous position. But if we don’t, we face the embers of rebuke and the sting of regret.

In the moment, it can be hard to identify which decision will lead to the right outcome. It’s as if we’re playing Let’s Make a Deal and guessing what’s behind each door.

So, we waver. We procrastinate. We do all we can to mitigate the damage of a wrong choice.

And in the process, the decision gains mass. It transforms into an option anvil, weighing us down.

Yes, it sure seems liberty comes with its own set of shackles.

Steve Jobs was a visionary. A pioneer. An empire builder.

The legacy of Apple’s founder is multifaceted. But one aspect of it is particularly poignant.

Jobs was known to wear the same outfit to work, day after day. Tennis shoes, jeans, and a black turtleneck. That look was omnipresent in the keynote addresses Jobs delivered year after year. And it became synonymous with Jobs himself.

Why would Jobs opt for such a basic wardrobe? Why wouldn’t he use some of his vast fortune on flashier styles?

It was all a matter of choice.

As the head of a leading technology company, Jobs had plenty of monumental decisions to contend with each day. He didn’t want his choice of clothes to be one of them, so he removed any ambiguity from the equation.

Eventually, others in the tech industry followed this principle. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg was known to wear hoodies to the office each day. Disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes tried to evoke Jobs with her own set of black turtlenecks.

This all might seem quirky and quaint, particularly to those of us far removed from Silicon Valley. But there’s something deeper at play.

Even though these tech tycoons had enormous power and influence, they still recognized the toll that decisions can exert. So, they sought to budget their energy, expending it on only the most consequential of choices. It was their way of making that option anvil just a tad lighter.

We might not have the means to get a wardrobe of black turtlenecks. But we can still emulate the Technorati in this area. And we stand to come out ahead for doing so.

It was the experiment that changed everything.

Back around the year 2000, psychologists Sheena Iyengar and Mark Lepper set up a table of jam samples at a supermarket. The jams were free to try, and shoppers even got a coupon for taking a sample.

It all seemed simple enough. But there was a catch.

The amount of jam available for sampling was not constant. On one day, shoppers saw six options at the table. On another, they saw 24.

And that difference in sample size led to differences in behavior. Far more people bought jam when they had six options to choose from than when they had 24 to consider.

These results might seem counterintuitive. In the land of Give me liberty or give me death, going with the narrower solution set seems downright unpatriotic. And yet, The Jam Study proves that abundant choice can overwhelm us. The option anvil is quite real.

There are reminders of this research all around us. For instance, modern restaurants will often model their menus after Chipotle or Five Guys, rather than The Cheesecake Factory. And many service providers have bucketed their offerings into three tiers, rather than selling individual products piecemeal.

These businesses have done their homework. To them, the cost of indecisiveness outweighs the benefits of expansive choice.

And yet, we individuals still find ourselves behind the curve. We demand all the choices, even though it’s obvious that we buckle under their weight.

It’s a grim scene. But the die is not cast.

We can still chart a more sustainable destiny. We can note the impacts of a gauntlet of decisions. And we can be intentional about which ones we should pursue.

Yes, this process gives us one more decision to navigate. And no, it doesn’t mean that we get exactly what we want all the time.

But such a tradeoff can help improve our stamina. It can make us more adaptable, focused, and resilient. It can get free us from that option anvil, for once and for all.

I believe that’s a choice worth making. Do you?

Enfranchised

I stood in line, outside of a palm-lined church.

It was early in the morning, on a Tuesday in Florida. And I was preparing to take part in an election.

As I waited for the opportunity to cast my ballot, a strange feeling came over me.

I was a first-time voter. I hadn’t been old enough to vote in prior federal elections, so I had never experienced any of this firsthand.

Now, I was about to make a consequential decision. One of the most consequential of my life to date.

I was about to have my say over who would be the next President of the United States.

The line started to move. Moments later, I was handing a poll worker my voter registration card. And then I was in a booth, my ballot in front of me, and the moment of truth at hand.

What would my next move be?

I am a planner.

Like an expert chess player, I am always thinking two or three steps ahead. I am always seeking to avoid surprises.

So, as I embarked on my first voting journey, I had already done my homework.

I had followed the news coverage of the race. I had checked out the candidates’ websites. And I’d attended rallies for each of them — one of the benefits of attending college in a major city in a swing state.

Yet, none of it made the decision any less clear to me.

With the incumbent U.S. President facing term limits, each candidate would be new to the role. Plus, they would be taking the helm during the worst economic recession in a generation.

I found each intriguing in different ways. But I wondered how well their campaign slogans would hold up in the face of our nation’s bleak reality.

There were no easy answers. And so, as I stood in the voting booth that November morning, I agonized over my decision.

What if I made the wrong choice? What would that decision say about me?

I could feel the gravity of the moment crushing me. But as the pressure mounted, a voice in my head urged me to take a step back. To lift my gaze from the names on the paper and to think of the bigger picture.

For this moment was special.

Never again would I have the luxury of making a choice like this with no track record. Never again would I be free to decide without the crushing weight of precedent. Never again would I be a blank slate.

Remember this moment, I told myself. Cherish it.

After a few moments of hemming and hawing, I made my choice. I filled out the remainder of the ballot, submitted it, and left the polling place.

On the short walk home, I kept replaying the prior moments in my mind. How would I explain my choice to others who asked about it?

I didn’t have to wait long to find the answers.

Once I made it back to the house, I fixed up some breakfast. As I did, one of my housemates walked into the kitchen. He noticed my I voted sticker and asked me who I chose to be the next President.

I gave my answer, and he followed up with another question: Why?

I like the platform the other guy was running on, I replied. I do. But I just don’t trust him to get it done.

My housemate listened intently. He was not an American citizen, and thus would not be voting. This interaction would be the closest he got to the election.

He was the perfect person to spill the beans to regarding my choice. He had no skin in the game and no prejudice.

The conversation loosened me up. Whether my ideology was being fossilized or cognitive dissonance was setting in, I don’t know. But I felt more confident in my decision than ever. I knew I had made the right choice.

Later that evening, I stared at the television in disbelief. “The other guy” — the one who I thought was too ambitious to succeed — had won the White House.

My vote had come up short.

I stared at the image on the screen, the one that read President-Elect Barack Obama. It didn’t seem real.

But as I mused about what the months and years ahead would look like, I didn’t sulk or despair. I remained hopeful.

Change was coming. And while I might not have selected the particular brand of change, it was still an electrifying moment.

Then, there was the lineage aspect. Barack Obama would be the first Black president in United States history.

I thought immediately of my grandfather. He was likely sitting in his easy chair, about 1300 miles north of me, at that moment.

My grandfather had seen a lot in his eight decades of life. But while he had voted in 14 elections before, he had never experienced development like this. It was as new for him as it was for me.

My sense of shock was replaced by one of awe. A simple process — standing in line and casting a ballot — had consequences that were truly profound.

There are few more precious rights in America than that of the franchise.

Our nation operates under the charter of freedom. Of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

And central to that charter is the ability to choose. We can decide where to live. We can decide how to earn our keep. And we can decide who can represent us in government.

Of course, not all of us have had this ability over the years. Women and ethnic minorities have infamously only had the power of the vote for about a century or less. But these days, the biggest thing stopping us from voting is ourselves.

Politics have roiled us, divided us, and stigmatized us in recent years. We’ve come to view political parties as if they were rival football teams, instead of two components of a common goal. And those stakes have made Election Day more frightening to many than the Halloween holiday that precedes it.

But while our cultural fragmentations have made elections fraught, they are still critical. The mandate of our charter of freedom is still intact. And it’s up to us to fight through the angst and fulfill our obligations.

Doing what is uncomfortable is never easy. But perhaps, a change of perspective can help. By taking our mind off the consequences of the task at hand — and instead, taking a wider view — we might find all the motivation we need to get the job done.

So, let’s recapture the wonder of voting. Let’s harken back to that feeling we had the first time we stood at the polling place.

The awe. The power. The goosebumps. Let’s summon those once again.

The act of voting matters as much as the choices we make. Let’s make sure it matters to us.

The Character Choice

He’s not a bad person. He just has a character flaw.

You might have used this line before. Or heard of someone else who did.

This line has been used for those who smoke or drink too much. For those who act out on occasion or demonstrate a bad temper. For those who lose interest or focus at times when it’s needed.

The point? That the most unsavory characteristics of our behavior can be written off, or explained away.

That the good can cancel out the bad. Or at least make us forget about it for a while.

It’s our way of lightening up. On focusing on the positives rather than dwelling on the negatives. On seeing the good in people rather than dwelling on the bad.

It’s why we have Boys Will Be Boys. Or Girls Just Want To Have Fun.

No harm, no foul.

Shame on us.

This attitude shrugs aside incidents that can ruin lives. It gives a free pass where none is warranted. It leaves us complicit in the abdication of fair treatment.

Worse still, it misinterprets what character truly means.

 

Character is not a flaw. It is a choice.

Think about that statement for a moment. Then think of someone you consider to have character.

What comes to mind?

The way they carry themselves, most likely. The way they act and the things they do.

But if your character role models are anything like mine, another word comes to mind as well.

Consistency.

High-character individuals don’t talk the talk. They walk the walk.

They live the values they embody. Every minute of every day.

There’s no room for flaws in judgment. Character is a choice they make, and one they commit to abide by at all times.

Showing up with the right attitude every day is not as noticeable as flying off the handle now and then. Taking the right actions is not always as noteworthy as screwing up.

Yet, over a wider time frame, it stands out.

People remember what they don’t see from high-character leaders. The lack of meltdowns, embarrassments and lapses in judgment. And that lack of red marks can garner respect and adulation.

Character is not a flaw. It is a choice.

So, how can we get there?

How can we aspire to improve our character? To live into the type of behavior we idolize?

We can start by kicking the free-pass to the curb. By no longer writing off lapses in judgment. By instead yearning for something greater.

For our legacy is measured by its entirety, not its majority.

When we reduce the threshold of acceptable behavior to that second level, we all stand to lose.

We can do better than that.

We must do better than that.

So, let’s stop compromising.

Character is not a flaw. It is a choice.

Choose wisely.

Our Culinary Conundrum

What’s the universal language?

Some would say love. Or numbers. And they wouldn’t be wrong.

Both have brought us together and torn us apart. They’ve allowed us to sustain and grow over the millennia.

And they’re consistent around the globe. But that might be a problem.

You see, language is defined as much by its variations as by its meaning. By the differences between a Boston accent and a Minnesota one. By the chasm between French and French-Canadian.

The concept of love doesn’t quite have these distinct variations. And the world of numbers is standardized by definition. Due to these concrete realities, I feel that neither of them qualifies as the universal form of expression.

So, what do I consider the universal language?

Food.

Much like love and basic arithmetic, we need food to survive. But the way we go about satisfying that need varies greatly by palette, dietary restrictions and region.

Yes, much like traditional language, food certainly has its intricacies. A sandwich filled with sliced steak might be known as a Philly Cheesesteak, a French Dip, or an Italian Beef — depending on how and where it’s prepared. Although these dishes have a similar base, they’re actually quite distinct.

Our palette for these variations has spurred its own word — cuisine. And if we happen to live in a major metropolitan area, there’s a pretty good chance that we can explore much of what the world of cuisine has to offer without hitting the road or hopping on a jet.

Yet, this appears to be changing.

***

I’ve lived in North Texas for the past several years. While there are many things to love about Dallas, the wide variety of food options is certainly high on the list. In fact, I’ve had everything from Cuban sandwiches to Cajun delicacies, Nashville-style Hot Chicken to Texas barbecue in or around Dallas.

Lately, however, I’ve seen those options dwindling. New restaurants in resurgent parts of town have abruptly closed up shop, and regional chains have shuttered many of their locations. Abandoned restaurant properties now line the highways and major intersections like an eyesore.

The bursting of the restaurant bubble has left me in a bit of a bind. I now have to drive further to get something other than fast food, Chili’s or quick-service Mexican fare. And if I have a hankering for something like the aforementioned Italian Beef, I might be out of luck entirely. (Despite the large influx of Chicago transplants in Dallas, Illinois-style eateries have struggled to find traction.)

At the same time that restaurant selection is dwindling, so are my options at the supermarket. In the past year, my grocer has pulled several varieties of cold cuts from the deli and stopped supplying basic items such as sausage buns, skirt steak and coarse ground beef. This has forced me to either improvise or drive to a competing grocer for supplies when making such basic dishes as fajitas, chili or bratwurst.

I understand the financial realities that have led to these cutbacks. Commercial rents in are rising — both in North Texas and across the United States — but people are still unwilling to help cover that increase by paying more for their meals or groceries. It’s an equation that doesn’t add up, so culinary variety inevitably ends up on the chopping block.

Still, I’m discouraged by these cutbacks. On one hand, it limits my options and makes cooking more challenging. On the other, it shows that our society doesn’t varied meal options.

Consider the implications of this shift:

  • Food is being constrained into two classes: Widely accessible junk and highly restricted healthy options. If you don’t want fatty burgers, greasy pizza or gooey mac and cheese, you’ll most likely have to spend extra time, fuel and money to get something better for you — or even something different.
  • Dietary issues are ignored. Despite the best efforts of the gluten-free Millennial revolution, cutbacks on food options mean those of us with actual sensitivities to wheat, dairy, sodium or processed fats often find ourselves struggling to find a suitable meal option.
  • We’re lowering the bar. While we must adapt to dwindling food options, we can at least remember that there was once a greater amount culinary variety lining both the streets and the store shelves. But if the current trend holds, the next generation won’t have this perspective — which means it will be less likely to be reversed.

None of this is ideal. But while we’ve been complicit in our culinary demise, we’re not at the point of no return.

***

If we can see the value in our universal language and recommit to exploring it en masse, we can turn the tide.

That means swallowing our pride a bit, and getting out of our comfort zone. It means putting an end to our crusade to pinch pennies when filling our mouths — a losing proposition anyway, given the expensive health issues junk food leads to down the line.

It means committing to try new things and support the establishments that provide them to us. If restaurants see the cash register ringing, they’re more likely to thrive. And if items are flying off supermarket shelves, they’re less likely to end up in closeout.

Ultimately, it means using our collective voice to serve notice that we demand more options, more variety and more accessibility. The Internet age has given us the tools to do this, but we must do it together.

Don’t let our universal language suffer the fate that the Comanche, Welsh and Latin languages did. Our culinary future is at stake, and we have the booming voice needed to make a stand. Let’s use it.