Uhm, I would disagree, but don't feel like arguing too much.

There is a true, in-bred food "culture" in many countries, (France, Italy, etc.), which doesn't exist in others. The foodie phenomenon is an artificial attempt at creating such a culture.

Fundamentally, this is a good thing, as others have pointed out. But too many people here (in the USA, where I live, so I know), take it to a silly extreme all the while professing to intrinsically understand something that they really don't.

Just because something is for sale at Dean and DeLuca it doesn't necessarily mean it's good, and that the purchaser can claim some sort of mystical knowledge of the product that they didn't know existed 3 weeks ago. The same goes for the granola Whole Foods crowd (of which I am a part-time member).