Given What I Know About the Unravelling of Practically Everything...Do I Still Want Cake?

“Do you want a piece of this cake, Siobhán?" My friend asks, knife hovering.

It’s black forest cake. My favourite. Plump cherries, cream, chocolate chunks, a dark, velvety sponge that's glistening at me.

The cake is unabashedly glistening, right at me.

Do I want cake?

Do I want cake, knowing I can’t trust my hunger signals on this one? That cake bypasses real hunger entirely? That hunger won't be the gauge I use for this decision?

Do I want cake, knowing that desire might just be my body responding to the prospect of a hit of energy, an evolutionary throwback to when high-calorie food meant survival and not....this thing that came out of a factory and a packet? Nature wired us to crave energy-dense foods, but did Nature ever anticipate this engineered slice of chocolate-drenched hyper-reality?

Although I suppose there's a lot happening round here that Nature didn't have in mind.

Do I want cake, knowing that it came out of that box over there on the counter, with the plastic window, and not out of the oven of a loved one, reminding me that we’re all so busy working, striving, and doing stuff all the darn time like what the hell that we’ve outsourced almost everything, including our celebrations?

Do I want cake, knowing that while me and my friend didn't put any work into making it, a lot of other people did? That farmers, factory workers, truck drivers, supermarket staff and the unseen labour of many others, most paid poorly I bet, went into this cake? This cake —nothing to do with us at all, the people that might enjoy it, but — the end product of an efficient chain that required destruction, pollution, exploitation and despair to bring it into existence?

Do I want cake without wondering about the conditions under which the whole thing was created, or am I so used to living in a culture that's isolated me from knowing about anything that sustains me that it doesn’t matter anymore and I should be grabbing a fork already?

Do I want cake knowing that the cocoa in it is often grown in deforested regions, its cultivation linked to habitat destruction, biodiversity loss and highly unethical labour practices?

Do I want cake knowing that the wheat to make the flour has been genetically altered for 'maximum yield' at the expense of nutritional value, and that the wheat is grown in soils drained of life, propped up only by chemical fertilisers that have a known effect on our health, never mind the impact they have on other beings?

Do I want cake knowing that one of its main ingredients, sugar, is steeped in colonialism and slavery, the benefits of which I am still enjoying as a white western woman? Do I want cake knowing that the modern sugar industry remains ecologically brutal, growing it in monocultures that poison ecosystems, degrade soil, and drive deforestation?

Do I want cake, knowing that behind the sugar lies a mind-bogglingly vast industrial complex propped up by subsidies and ruthless lobbying, perpetuating exploitation, disease and harm?

Do I want cake knowing that the machinery that harvested the wheat, the energy that powered the factories, the transport that moved the ingredients, the ovens that baked the cake—all of it is underwritten by our extraction and burning of fossil fuels, having absolutely catastrophic effects on the climate that are impacting the survival of habitats, species, cultures and ecosystems globally...and will only get worse?

Do I want cake, knowing that the environmental story is not told, in this or any of our food?

Do I want cake, knowing that, instead, there's an enormously powerful and spectacularly lucrative industry controlling what stories we indeed are told about cake? That advertising, in all it's engineered intentional manipulation and tremendously deep pockets, has rewired our brains to associate cake with happiness, reward, joy, pleasure and so on?

Cake means everything’s fine!

Do I want cake, knowing that everything is not fine?

Do I want cake, knowing that I can't say for sure whether it would be me wanting the cake, or if it's just the insidious influence of all the voices who benefit greatly from me thinking that I want cake? Thinking that cake is celebration, cake is joy, that cake is connection with others?

You can't be lonely with cake, they seem to want me to think.

Do I want cake, knowing that, actually, you can be lonely with cake because I have been, many times, particularly at the height on an eating disorder that spanned so much of my life?

Do I want cake, knowing this is uneasy terrain for me? As much as I’d like to think I’ve made peace with food, moments like this remind me I’m not sure. True recovery is— apparently̦—supposed to mean being ‘fine’ with all foods but that sometimes feels like being told to stay friends with someone you were once in a mutually abusive relationship with.

Do I want cake knowing this simple food carries the weight of endless negotiation, rebellion, shame, despair, and relapse? Do I want cake, knowing it’s tethered to the interests of media, diet culture, and corporations spending billions to convince me that my worth lies in how I look? That thinness equals beauty, health, worthiness and success?

Do I want cake, knowing that this cake represents two entire decades lost to the swirling noise of food, body and worth rather than questioning who is benefitting from my distraction and low self esteem?

The cake still glistens at me. How can a cake even glisten so solicitously?

"Siobhán?!” My friend shouts. “Are you having some cake? Your birthday will be over soon at this rate!!"

Oh yeah. It's my birthday.

What I want much more than the cake is to be able to touch my friends arm and tell her what's going through my mind right now.

What I want much more than the cake is to have uncomfortable conversations about the things that matter.

What I want much more than the cake is to hug the people (how many…millions?) who’ve been ensnared by eating disorders, body obsession, and food-related despair in former years, and are only now seeing through the astonishing sleight of hand that has kept us fixated on ourselves while the the systemic, nefarious economic interests that thrive on our misery and monetise our insecurities play on.

What I want more than the cake is a time machine to go back to when I was five or six or whenever it was that I turned inward and gently shake her awake (very gently, for she is little) and ask her to pay attention to the systems, structures and forces at play which will eventually raze her childhood woods for a supermarket, plus many other horrors to the world she loves.

Although if I am wishing for a time machine, maybe I should go back way further, like 12,000 years and see if I can put a stop to all this mess?

What I want much more than the cake is to have conversations where these kinds of spiralling, roiling, unspooling thoughts will not be received with dismissive snorts and derisive, annoyingly tinkly laughter from the people who do not realise we have a serious, entangled and worsening predicament unfolding in this moment and will continue to unfold in all the remaining moments of our lives.

"You're overthinking it!" they trill. "Just have some cake! What does it matter!"

"You're overthinking it!" they trill. "Just take the flight! What does it matter!"

"You're overthinking it!" they trill. "Just get a new one! What does it matter!"

"Get the bigger car!”

“Binge the series!”

“Order the takeaway!”

“Add to cart!”

“Buy now!”

“Throw it out!”

“Upgrade!”

“Brand new!”

“Sign up!”

“Pre-order!”

“Subscribe!”

“Grab!”

“Gobble!”

“Gorge!”

“Replace!”

“Discard!”

“Consume!”

“What does it matter?!” they will trill.

Have your cake.

And eat it.