I just came across this story, "Hecho en America" from GQ magazine, via Longreads. It's much different than the piece we read in class today ("Dr. Don," from last week's issue of the New Yorker. Read it online if you missed class.) Writer Jeanne Marie Laskas spends time with blueberry pickers in Maine and offers a close-up of their lives, which she argues are lost in the immigration debate:
"It's easy to forget that there are people who harvest our food. Sometimes, maybe, we are reminded of the seasons and the sun and the way of the apple tree, and if we multiply that by millions of apple trees, times millions of tomato plants, times all the other fruits and vegetables, we realize, holy potato chips, that's a lot of picking. Without 1 million people on the ground, on ladders, in bushes—armies of pickers swooping in like bees—all the tilling, planting, and fertilizing of America's $144 billion horticultural production is for naught. The fruit falls to the ground and rots."
This piece has a much stronger point of view, and the writing style is more bold, energetic. This is much more of an issue piece than a profile. You might notice other differences--if you do, please comment below! Laskas has done other great work for GQ, including a piece about the reality of head injuries in football.
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