Gwenyth Paltrow Tries To Eat Poor For A Week, Fails Miserably Like Everyone Else
Gwyneth Paltrow is notable for her advocation of eating a nutritionally balanced diet. When the Academy Academy Award-winning actress recently placed herself into the dietary reality of a person living in poverty, however, she realized that her former health suggestions didn’t fit everyone’s budget.
On April 9, Paltrow publicly announced that she had decided to accept the #FoodBankNYCChallenge, which challenges participants to live on a $29 food stamp budget for one week. The financial restrictiveness of the entire experience hit her hard, and four days in, her plan ended up faltering over chicken and licorice.
Paltrow said on her lifestyle website, Goop:
“As I suspected, we only made it through about four days, when I personally broke and had some chicken and fresh vegetables (and in full transparency, half a bag of black licorice). My perspective has been forever altered by how difficult it was to eat wholesome, nutritious food on that budget, even for just a few days – a challenge that 47 million Americans face every day, week, and year.”
Though she broadcasted on social media that she had accepted the food stamps task on April 9, she actually started on April 3, meaning that she had already failed the challenge by the time she announced she was participating.
Despite her ultimate failure to uphold the suggestion, Paltrow did successfully publicize the weekly difficulties low-income Americans, especially working mothers, endure when attempting to maintain a sustainable diet on just below $30. Paltrow said:
“After trying to complete this challenge (I would give myself a C-), I am even more outraged that there is still not equal pay in the workplace. Sorry to go on a tangent, but many hardworking mothers are being asked to do the impossible: Feed their families on a budget which can only support food businesses that provide low-quality food.”
In order to provide background for the issue, she cited statistics released by the White House:
“Full-time women workers earnings are only about 77 percent of their male counterparts earnings. The pay gap is even greater for African-American and Latina women, with African-American women earning 64 cents and Latina women earning 56 cents for every dollar earned by a Caucasian man.”
From her experience with this challenge, Paltrow concludes:
“I know hunger doesn’t always touch us all directly — but it does touch us all indirectly. After this week, I am even more grateful that I am able to provide high-quality food for my kids. Let’s all do what we can to make this a basic human right and not a privilege.”
Written by Melinda Sherrill of NextShark
