Bitterness is the defining emotion of the human experience. It is at once intensely personal and universally experienced. It traces its origins to love, possessions, hope, opportunity, and status — lost. It has likely caused or contributed to more violence, failures of states, and squandered potential than any other emotion. Meanwhile, bitterness, the flavor, is something both reviled and refined, and humans are the only mammals who have cultivated a palate for bitterness.
Bitterness is also a very real outcome of poorly designed products, places, processes and experiences. But as a country, we’re not very good at dealing with bitterness. The National Bitter Melon Council explores the manifestations of bitterness and, through social interventions we create approaches to understanding and, hopefully, addressing its effects.
