Editor: Throwing pumpkins off of a roof? I disagree, they are food

This past weekend I ran a race in Charlottetown to benefit ALS, a noble cause. Yet, I found it odd that you could also pitch your pumpkin off of the roof of the hotel. Hmmmm. While I commend the organizers for rallying the community for a charitable cause, I think that we need to re- think the pumpkin smashing.

To me at least, it seems inappropriate to smash a food source when some of our P. E. I. neighbours are hungry. It is true; food items are sometimes used in our cultural traditions. Remember bobbing for apples at autumn parties? Yet, a pumpkin smash? We at least got to eat the apples that we bobbed for.

Why I am so disenfranchised with this practice . . . that might have been a smashing success? P. E. I., according to the most recent estimates, has some of the worst food insecurity among the provinces, with 15.4 per cent of households experiencing food insecurity. In fact, of the provinces, P. E. I. has the worst food insecurity among children, with one in four living in households characterized by it. Food insecurity is when families and individuals do not have access to nutritionally- adequate and safe foods for an active, healthy life, due to resources constraints. Why does food insecurity exist in a country and province with such agricultural abundance? I wish that I had the answer to that . . . and the silver bullet to solve it.

I think that there are more productive things to do, rather than throw pumpkins off of the roof of a hotel. Families First Family Resource Centre in Montague recently taught families how to roast a pumpkin and use it in family meals. I am wondering if this approach is worth considering, rather than smashing pumpkins?

Why not cook pumpkin flesh and seeds and add them to the chili traditionally served at this run? I am not meaning to be a stuffed shirt or a wet blanket for good, “clean” fun. Maybe a slight paradigm shift is needed though. Isn’t the run enough? Could runners smash an orange water balloon from the hotel roof, if the act of smashing is the goal?

Many others things can be done to gain positive publicity while investing into the community. After the race, runners could partner with a local organization like the P. E. I. Food Exchange to glean pumpkins from a field and then donate them to a local organization to combat food insecurity. I am encouraged that we have individuals and groups willing to rally for a cause, especially one that invests into the community. Yet, I think that while one problem is on the road to being solved, another may be getting worse.