One Picture. A Thousand Words. “Lovin’ It” Ain’t Two Of Them.

You’re probably looking at these workers and thinking “Oh, great, more guys in hazard suits. Here we go again. Ebola has now reached Asia.”

Like usual, you’d be wrong.

These fellows are actually working in a Chinese plant that supplies meat-products to McDonalds. According to a recent article in CNN, Chinese authorities “investigated the factory and found that expired beef and chicken products were processed and repackaged with new expiration dates.”

It reminds me of those “reduced for quick sale” stickers I used to see on steaks at my college grocery store. It’s no longer in business. The store, it appears, had its own expiration date.

But enough background. Let’s get to the important point. You probably think these workers are suited up so they won’t tarnish the meat with their germs. Once again you’d be wrong. They’re wearing that gear so the meat doesn’t infect them. I ran the words on the image through a translation program and they say “Holy crap, Chen. You touched the so-called meat with your bare hands. You are a dead man.”

Reached for comment, the factory owners said “Hey, at least there’s no fox or donkey in there. We’re getting better. Give us some credit.”

This picture caused a huge scandal in China. You probably think it’s because the “meat” on the ground was put back into that tube. For the third time in only minutes you’d be wrong. See the guy with his back to the camera? Notice how you can’t see his hands? Yup, they really need to start giving these guys bathroom breaks.

Okay, that’s a joke. But so is our industrialized food system.