9/11 Friend or Feast?
Right now I am reading Eating Animals by: Jonathan Safran Foer and am really enjoying it. He is informative without being inflammatory and insightful in a way that makes me so curious. Every time he poses a question, I find myself digging deeper into what I actually believe and I love that. Whether he is right or wrong is not the issue…it is what he makes you figure out for yourself that I think is important.
He discusses the distinction between eating dogs/cats (any “pet” animals) versus chickens, fish you name it. He poses the question why one is acceptable and the other is not? Who makes that distinction? I read on CBS World News that Peruvians eat over 65 million guinea pigs a year. Over 1,000 guinea pigs are being shipped to the US weekly, not to be sold in your neighborhood pet store, but for food. Now for most of us, if we were in our backyard enjoying a Sangria and saw our neighbor grilling guinea pigs….we would be surprised in the minimum and perhaps outraged in the maximum, especially if our child had a pet guinea pig on the dresser in the bedroom. But if it was your cultural norm, it would just be dinner. Friend or feast?
A familiar argument we have all heard is that chickens, cows pigs…have been raised/bred for eating, which now makes them food. Once an animal is labelled as a potential meal, it is now socially acceptable to treat it as if it is, deeming it unfeeling and incapable of experiencing fear or extreme pain, when we know that just isnt true.
If you had a stunning fish tank of tropical fish and you were going out of town, you would pay the neighbor to take care of them and feed them while you were gone. If while you were away the neighbor instead took your angel fish out of the tank, slit its throat and cooked him in butter, there would be a real problem. Friend or feast?
Where is the line? Why do we look away for some animals and embrace the others? Pet or potential dinner? Once we have labelled an animal as food, it is nationally and socially acceptable to pretend as if it does not share the same ability to feel pain as our dogs, tropical fish or children’s guinea pigs. I find this so fascinating and worth exploring further.
A great article from the Vancouver Sun popped into our inbox today about this very subject and I would like to share it.
Lets keep the conversation going, continue to explore our own feelings and be open.
Have a thoughtful weekend.
Tags: compassionate eating, Eating Animals, going veg, Jonathan Safran Foer, trying vegan, trying vegetarian, Vancouver Sun, vegan, vegan challenge, vegan experience, vegan wannabe
September 11th, 2010 at 4:18 pm
When animals are in neat packages at the grocery store it is easy to ignore how that package got there, I have had three people who visited Sasha Farm that became vegetarins. They realized these animals rescued from bad situations have feelings, personalities, and can work their way into your heart just like our cats and dogs. Wish everyone could “Get This”.
September 13th, 2010 at 11:03 am
That is absolutely the case. We are desensitized by the packaging and the names of the foods that we are consuming. No one would eat Foie Gras if it was called barbarically fattened liver on a menu.
Sasha Farms looks like a magical place. We are going to their Fall Festival and chili cook off this weekend. It is our first time there.Will we see you?