Food Not Bombs Report 1/2000
Andrew Stankevich
Food Not Bombs is a nationwide movement with chapters all across the United States, as well as in other countries. Food Not Bombs serves vegetarian meals in public parks to raise awareness and to empower homeless and poor communities in a distinct fashion that distinguishes the organization from traditional soup kitchens. Serving free meals in a public park demonstrates to every passerby that homeless and poor people exist in large numbers. Furthermore, Food Not Bombs serves in public parks to reclaim public space for people to gather. Homeless and marginalized people often have no space to gather and meet; police will drive homeless people out of public areas when they gather there too often. The group champions that meeting place and organizes a presence so that the people can have a park to meet and eat in. In addition, serving in a public area saves on costs and demonstrates that people can get together and make a difference in their community with limited resources. Although Food Not Bombs serves in outdoor areas, the organization aims to distribute food on the same level as indoor soup kitchens, as to balance its advocacy with direct service to the populations that Food Not Bombs represent. Food Not Bombs serves exclusively vegetarian food. Food Not Bombs abstains from serving meat products because of ethical and nutritional reasons, the limited supply of excess meat and the health risks associated with serving leftover animal products.
The chapter of Rochester Food Not Bombs has been serving free meals for over a year. It took us over six months to really get organized, as no one in the group had any real experience in providing free meals. But after starting from scratch, we got to the point where we serve on a comparable level of other meal providers, for our weekly meal. For our first spring serving we served in a vacant lot on the corner of Monroe Ave. and S. Goodman St. Although the lot was privately owned, we felt that we had a moral right to serve their because the space had been left vacant and abandoned. However, the city, on behalf of the owner threatened us with trespassing charges for serving free food and we wound up moving to a public park. This course of events displays a disturbing trend in our society, profits before human interest. Ideally, the primary goal of a community is to support the needs and concerns of its members. However, what we are seeing is more and more loss of community control. Essentially, powerful interests determine what's valuable and what's not. People, in and of themselves, aren't valuable; for our government and ruling powers strip the rights and the dignity of those that aren't productive in the capitalist tradition. We need to realize that all people have value, and when we write off one group, another two will be soon to follow.
For the rest of the summer and fall, we served in St. Joseph's park on N. Clinton and Pleasant. Our weekly food giveaways have been successful, drawing 70+ people at times to receive free groceries and cooked meals. We're now moving indoors for the winter at the Quaker Friend's meeting house at 84 Scio St. where we'll be distributing groceries and cooked food on Sundays at 2pm. We're hoping to expand our serving capabilities in the spring. Food is a right, not a privilege!
If you can volunteer or help us in any other way, contact Food Not Bombs at 234-0884.
|
| Contact US |
|
News and Events About Us Volunteer Donate Our Cookbook Essays Press Links |
| Contact Us |
|
Rochester Food Not Bombs PO Box 39618 Rochester, NY 14604 [email protected] 585-234-0884 |