Conclusion.

In conclusion, I hope this blog has given you a taste of some of many views out there about eating meat, and the true question of the animal. I hope to have made you question the views you may or may not hold about the subject, entertain you with some fun facts about my friends, and inform you about the facts of becoming a vegetarian. If you would like more information about any of the articles discussed in this blog, feel free to email me at sheaferrara@yahoo.com. Thanks for reading! :)

Ashley Boucher and Jim Mason

The beef industry has contributed to more American deaths than all the wars of this century, all natural disasters, and all automobile accidents combined.  If beef is your idea of "real food for real people" you'd better live real close to a real good hospital.  ~Neal Barnard

In Jim Mason's article, Brave New Farm, he paints a picture of the picture of farm life most Americans see in their mind's eye; a "peaceful place" where chicks and little piglets roam within white picket fences and eat from bales of hay. Then, Mason points us to the reality of how most animals of this era live their lives, if it can even be called living. This article was honestly the hardest for me to stomach, and what swayed my views so heavily away from what they previously were. The picture he paints for the audience is the complete opposite of his previous. He reveals the true nature of factory farming, and all it's revolting practices, such as debeaking chickens and ducks, cutting of pigs tails as newborns, and grounding up live chickens that cannot lay eggs. These practices cause the animals considerate amounts of stress, often learned helplessness, disease, and death. He also explains how mass producing farms came to be, and how as the years roll on, they continue to replace tradition subsistence farming. This, is what I believe aligns Ashley and Mason. Like Gigi, I met Ashley through my Environmental Issues class. We came to find, as the semester went on, that we shared mutual friends, which allowed us to become closer. I asked Ashley what caused her to become a vegetarian and she told me that the book Skinny Bitch completely changed her outlook on eating meat. She said "the book made me snap so instantly I never really had a state of transition".  It has been almost three years now that Ashley has been a vegetarian. She focuses on eating healthy, and hates that animals mass produced on factory farms make up most of what is in grocery stores and fast food restaurants. "I don't eat meat because of all the steroids and preserves that are in it," says Ashley. Mason also talks about the steroids and feeding practices that factory farms use to make their animals most efficient. "Over the past three decades, many studies have pointed to the dangers posed by rampant chemical and pharmaceutical use and abuse in animal factories. There are many instances of widespread sales and abuse of illegal drugs, and there are many instances of abuse of legal drugs.(Mason, pg. 9)" How is this okay for farmers, let alone okay for our health!?  Ashley, Mason, and I all agree that it is most definitely NOT. When I asked Ashley what she eats to stay healthy and satisfy her cravings she told me she mixes dices tomatoes, black beans, corn, and fresh avocados. I got to try some during our vegan debate in class, and it was amazing! Ashley says it's "seriously DELICIOUS and sooo easy to make and cheap," which is what every college vegetarian likes to hear :)

Paige Lord and Jacques Derrida

We all love animals.  
Why do we call some "pets" and others "dinner?"  ~K.D. Lang

 In his article, "The Animal Therefore I Am", Jacques Derrida addresses the question fresh among philosophers of how we as humans can be separated and even placed above animals. He argues that over the years, the treatment of animals has been "turned upside down" by the genetic mutation and ultimate industrialization of consuming animals. He believes that due to our increased obsession with knowledge and human well being, we have done animals a great disservice; that  we have subjected animals to cruelty and violence and try hard to hide it from ourselves, so that we can "forget" or "not understand".  Why do we question as humans whether or not animals have the ability to suffer, Derrida says, when we  have physical evidence of sheer terror or fear in certain animals?

 "What of the vulnerability felt on the basis of this inability? What is the non-power at the heart of power? What is it's quality or modality? What right should be accorded to it?...Being able to suffer is no longer a power, it is a possibility without power, a possibility of the impossible"(pg. 3). 

One of my good friends, Paige Lord, has been a vegetarian since she turned 12. She explained how one christmas, she vacationed to her grandparent's farm. Every year, her grandfather would raise pigs and slaughter them for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner. That particular, he asked for Paige and her brother's help.

 "I remember him  tying the pig to a post outside the barn, and me asking him if the pig felt anything when he shot it. He said Paige honey, it doesn't feel a thing. The damn thing prolly doesn't even know what's coming. He just look so skittish against the post, and I got this really terrible feeling in my stomach. Then he shot it, and for some reason, I 

began to cry. I couldn't eat that pig at dinner, and I refused to eat meat at all after that." Paige was very much impacted by the emotions that she believed that pig felt that day, which is why I have aligned her with Derrida. Paige believes that there is no difference in the way animals should be treated and the way humans expect to be respected. "Why commit an act deemable to practical society as murder okay on something as harmless as a pig or chicken?" Paige says, "Why is it okay for me to eat a cow or sheep and not a dog or cat? Derrida claims that "animal" is a word just like "I" or "you". It is something we have assigned to mean  not human. When I told paige about Derrida's article, she actually did some research . After reading parts of it, Paige told me that she felt like her argument was "more real" and that someone got it. When I asked Paige what food or recipe sort of summed up her diet, she said she eats a lot of pasta and hummus. She actually made me a pasta dish to try. It was just whole wheat penne pasta, fresh broccoli, red pepper flakes, fava beans, olive oil, and garlic. It thought it was going to be terrible, but it really wasn't that bad!        

George Monibot and Gigi Kraynick

Why does Sea World have a seafood restaurant?  I'm halfway through my fishburger and I realize, Oh my God.  I could be eating a slow learner.  ~Lynda Montgomery

      George Monibot created a column for The Guardian that addressed the real issue of hunger, the damage meat is causing to the environment, and how not eating meat can do the entire world some good. After reading his article, I felt that my views were quite similar to George's, as well as Gigi Kraynick's! I met Gigi through my environmental issues class, and through several class discussions during our week on the question of the animal, I discovered her views on being a vegetarian and eating meat in general. Gigi is twenty years old and became a vegetarian her sophomore year of college. Like George, Gigi could not be a vegetarian for very long."I have family in France and considered it rude to refuse the food they made me..also I wanted to follow the customs in Morocco and eat what was offered." Gigi says she became a vegetarian not only because of the way meat is processed, but because she feels a difference needs to be made. She considers herself environmentally conscious, which is what I believe aligns her with Monibot. In his column, George states that "for both environmental and humanitarian reasons, beef is out." Gigi would argue that as Americans, we have so many options for food sustanence without eating meat. This is the main point of Monibot's argument. Monibot claims that eating meat is not sustainable for humans in the long run, and that either way you slice it, the equation comes up environmentally unfriendly. He offers some proof based upon the projected population growth and just how much it will take to accommodate out meat endeavors. 

                            "The UN expects the population to rise to 9 billion by 2050. These extra people will require another 325m tonnes of grain. Let us assume, perhaps generously, that politicians such as Ruth Kelly are able to "adjust policy in the light of new evidence" and stop turning food into fuel. Let us pretend that improvements in plant breeding can keep pace with the deficits caused by climate change. We would need to find an extra 225m tonnes of grain. This leaves 531m tonnes for livestock production, which suggests a sustainable consumption level for meat and milk some 30% below the current world rate. This means 420g of meat per person per week, or about 40% of the UK's average consumption."

As you can see, living sustainably and eating meat, according to Monibot and Gigi, don't really fit together. Instead, Monibot suggests being a vegetarian, or eating as little meat as possible. For a meat substitute, Monibot recommends tilapia. It is a freshwater fish that is able to be raised entirely from vegetable matter. It is "about as close as we are likely to come to sustainable flesh eating". Gigi says she tends to stick to oatmeal, salads, rice, beans, and lots of humus. However, when she wants to satisfy her cravings, she says she heads to Sonic. "They don't fry there stuff in animal fat and they will take the meat out of anything you order".

Intro

If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian.  ~Paul McCartney

    I was raised in an Italian American household, where eating meat everyday was a given. There was no question of where the meat we consumed came from, or how it was treated before it was killed. I think it's safe to say that I grew up without ever really considering that the meat I was eating had been alive and was slaughtered, much like millions of other children around the world. I was heavily influenced by the Question of The Animal section of our Environmental Issues class this semester, along with the many views presented upon becoming a vegetarian. Up until this semester, I continued to eat blindly what I ordered off a menu or what was placed in front of me. I really have enjoyed researching and reading about different stances people hold on meat, the way it should or shouldn't be eaten, and their reasons why. For my final project, I have decided to interview friends and family whose views on the question of the animal and vegetarianism align with three of the readings I enjoyed the most. My goal is to give you a sort of view from the top of some of the many perspectives out there, and let you decide for yourself which one you agree with most. My friends have answered questions that explain why they feel the way they do, and some have even given me some recipes they enjoy the most! It should be a lot of fun, so lets get started :)