13 "Almost always, when I told someone I was writing a book about 'eating animals,' they assumed, even without knowing anything about my views, that it was a case for vegetarianism. It's a telling assumption, one that implies not only that a thorough inquiry into animal agriculture would lead one away from eating meat, but that most people already know that to be the case."
I ended up writing my whole 3-5 page reaction paper for class on this comment - on the significance of the idea that people already know but don't want to. I won't reproduce the whole thing here, but I'll copy a few things that I think might relate to my art-making in particular . . . or could, anyway:
How do we live with this kind of cognitive dissonance on a daily basis? This blatantly self-contradictory kind of statement – the “I don’t want to know (but I really already know)”—is on the one hand completely mystifying, and on the other, completely understandable. I fully relate to this kind of willful ignorance, as I skipped the farming section of Peter Singer's book out of knowledge that it would probably make me change my life, and I wasn't ready for that. Knowledge brings with it responsibility or the obligation to change.
Sidebar:
I want to believe
I do not want to believe, I want to know
I do not want to know (but I do)
This position sets up a different relationship to knowledge than I had thought of before, or than I had heard articulated. In direct contrast to the aims of science (ostensibly) or even the educational system as a whole, it is a rejection of knowledge. As someone engaged in the visual arts, I am interested in what this kind of phenomenon looks like, or how it can be embodied in order to make this refusal tangible. What would a museum display, typically charged with disseminating information, look like if the acts of omission were made obvious?
Again, the key to why this idea is so haunting and distressing is not the rejection of knowledge, but an a priori rejection of knowledge that relies on already knowing. Which, therefore, means it is really an act of forgetting.
What emerges from this whole discussion is this: While Foer builds a massive and complex case for halting one’s meat consumption, based very much on statistics and empirical data, we are still left at the end with the reality that our decisions regarding meat consumption are profoundly and distressingly irrational. Since we are, indeed, generally logical people who can be intellectually swayed with well-supported arguments (like the wealth of information found in this book), we respond instead the way we often do when presented with irrefutable facts: we ignore them, change the subject, or make a joke. Often, people dismiss animal welfare activists as being sentimental, swayed by emotions and illogical. As it has been suggested before, this book calls into question just whose arguments are more irrational, sentimental, or swayed by emotion. If his arguments are taken seriously, and no credible defense of eating meat exists, than those of us who consume it are left to sit uneasily our own contradiction.
In talking about his relationship with his dog, George, he says, '. . . our relationship takes place almost entirely outside of language. She seems to have thoughts and emotions. Sometimes I think I understand them, but often i don't. Like a photograph, she cannot say what she lets me see. She is an embodied secret. And I must be a photograph to her." 24. I thought this was a really interesting turn of phrase and something I'd love to think abut more. "I must be a photograph to her." how are we unintelligible to each other, and yet, depending on whose definition of communication you use, we have a very functional, operational kind of understanding. I mean, we coexist quite well and usually know . . we are no more often confused as to what a dog wants or what a dog is feeling than with a person.
33 - "For every ten tuna, sharks, and other large predatory fish that were in our oceans fifty to a hundred years ago, only one is left." This calls for a painting. :)
Nostalgia for the idealized farming past
34 "More than any set of practices, factory farming is a mind-set: reduce production costs to the absolute minimum and systematically ignore or 'externalize' such costs as environmental degradation, human disease, and animal suffering. For thousands of years, farmers took their cues from natural processes. Factory farming considers nature an obstacle to be overcome." I think this is one comment I could think more about -- the idea of the idealized farmer. Foer narrowly misses over-idealizing it . . . maybe even . . . maybe he does a bit, because of course farmers did not always know all of their animals so intimately, or their relationship was still one of forced labor and consumption. Animals have always been ours to pick and take as we pleased, even though the past certainly looks INCREDIBLY rosy compared to today's reality. As long as we are being relative, then certainly the days of old were truly worth pining for, but I can hear the dissent about farming in general, no matter how historically or traditionally its being practiced. Later, 35 "Factory farming's success depends on consumers' nostalgic images of food production--the fisherman reeling in fish, the pig farmer knowing each of his pigs as individuals, the turkey rancher watching beaks break through eggs--because these images correspond to something we respect and trust."This makes me want to do some kind of painting or drawing that merges Farmer Hoggitt and James Herriot and the idea of this traditional relationship between farmers and animals . . . because I'm sure it's somewhat true, but probably somewhat NOT true. But it makes us feel better.
38 - He talks about sea horses (and Kafka comes up again, which . . . sometimes it seems the world is conspiring to make me read Kafka, so maybe I should just get on with it :)). . . anyway, he says, "We desire to look at them so much that millions die in the aquarium and souvenir trade." I just love that he admits "we desire to look at them" . . . what is this desire and where does it come from? Why do we have the almost inborn desire to touch, pet, cuddle with animals? I don't think its really taught, or maybe it is. I want to understand that.
Another factoid that maybe I should have known but didn't "Animal agriculture makes a 40% greater contribution to global warming than all transportation in the world combined; it is the number one cause of climate change."
A really smart chapter: Words and definitions
His chapter on words-slash-meaning was, in my opinion, a particularly brilliant way to get a lot of information across, much more than you'd typically find in a set of definitions. I thought it was a really smart way of organizing information non-linearly or non-narratively, but still have a lot of editorializing in there (so it was not a completely straightforward glossary). His definition of "anthropocentrism" was particularly good as well:"Anthropocentrism: The conviction that humans are the pinnacle of evolution, the appropriate yardstick by which to measure the lives of other animals, and the rightful owners of everything that lives."
The next entry is a good example of how he really interestingly uses this format: "Anthropodenial: The refusal to concede significant experiential likeness between humans and other animals, as when my son asks if George will be lonely when we leave the house without her, and I say, "George doesn't get lonely." and
"Anthropomorphism: The urge to project human experience onto the other animals, as in when my son asks if George will be lonely." 46
Another fact I didn't know: "Chickens once had a life expectancy of 15 to 20 years, but the modern broiler is typically killed at around six weeks. Their daily growth rate has increased roughly 400 percent." 48
49 - amazing description - he is talking about how they get rid of the baby male egg chickens since they have no function without being bred for meat and without being able to lay eggs. Apparently, they just throw them into plastic containers where they suffocate. "Others are sent fulling conscious through macerators. (picture a wood chipper filled with chicks.)" which to me is like so unbelievably absurd, like popping kittens eyes out or something. . . and yet it is 100% real. That's amazing. It reminds me of Koyonaskotski or however you spell that. I should probably watch that.
He defines "Bycatch" as all the extra things brought in with the fishing nets, and says that there are 145 other species killed while killing tuna. On 49, he lists all of them. It kind of makes me want to do a very complicated drawing with all of them on it. !! on a huge painting or drawing of a tuna.
For his definition of human (which, if you think about it, is about the most ambitious task you can come up with), he lists the things that are uniquely human. I should add them to my list :)
"Humans are the only animals that have children on purpose, keep in touch (or don't), care about birthdays, waste and lose time, brush their teeth, feel nostalgia, scrub stains, have religions and political parties and laws, wear keepsakes, apologize years after an offense, whisper, fear themselves, interpret dreams, hide their genitalia, shave, bury time capsules, and can choose not to eat something for reasons of conscience. The justifications for eating animals and for not eating them are often identical: we are not them." 63
He brings up the discussion of "instinct" and shares some examples of pigeons -- how their amazing homing abilities are written off as "insinct" all the time but "Instinct, though, wouldn't go very far in explaining how pigeons use human transportation routes to navigate. Pigeons follow highways and take particular exists, likely following many of the landmarks as the humans driving below." 64
64 "Scientists have documented a pig language of sorts, and pigs will come when called (to humans or one another), will play with toys (and have favorites), and have been observed coming to the aid of other pigs in distress. Dr. Stanley Curtis, an animal scientist friendly to the industry, empirically evaluated the cognitive abilities of pigs by training them to play a video game with a joystick modified for snouts. They not only learned the game, but did so as fast as chimpanzees, demonstrating a surprising capacity for abstract representation." [ Curtis, by the way, was someone I had heard of, and its because he was the one doing language stuff with pigs here at the U of I . . . he just passed away this year, actually]
65 He then addresses the question of whether or not fish and chickens are stupid (and this reminds me of my very ill-informed essay I was wanting to write called "chickens are stupid" :)) Anyway, amazing thing about fish: "Fish build complex nests, form monogamous relationships, work cooperatively with other species, and use tools. They recognize one another as individuals. . . . They have significant long-term memories, are skilled as passing knowledge to one another through social networks, and can also pass on information generationally. They have what the scientific literature calls 'long-standing 'cultural traditions' for particular pathways to feeding, schooling, resting or mating sites." 65 Really? Why have I never heard any of this! This is amazing! My initial response is that probably some of this is a little less amazing if framed differently, but I trust enough of it to realize I don't actually know anything about fish.
In his definition of PETA, he doesn't mention any of the other controversial things about PETA, like some of their, to be generous, tacky, or more realistically, offensive and insensitive . . campaigns. He seems very positive about pETA and its results, and I don't know that I can agree with that. . . but . .
Another well-done strategy of writing: A story with multiple perspectives
Another of his great structural tactics is to have just a letter that he wrote to Tyson foods.I think the most compelling and inventive section, though, is the one called "hiding slash seeking" that begins with a section called "I am not the kind of person who finds himself on a stranger's farm in the middle of the night" about himself and an animal activist named C getting ready to break into a turkey facility. Great little description: "Adjacent to the sheds is a massive granary, which looks more like something out of Bladerunner than Little House on the Prairie. Metal pipes spiderweb the outsides of the buildings, massive fans protrude and clang, and floodlights plow weirdly discrete pockets of day."85 Then follows a sub-section called "The rescue" which ends with C "rescuing" a baby turkey by killing it as painlessly as she can.
On the marvels of science itself . . .
Side track: There is another great section in which he describes being momentarily just amazed at the orchestration of the whole thing, which I think I can relate to and has to do with this general admiration for science and "progress" in and of itself without consideration of its consequences. "I'm surprised by how easy it is to forget the anonymous life all around and simply admire the technological symphony that so precisely regulates the little world-unto-itself, to see the efficiency and mastery of the machine, and then to understand the birds as extensions of, or cogs in, that machine--not beings, but parts." This is such a great observation, one made more subtly at various other times throughout the text, and again reminds me of the "like clocks." As I contemplate that further, I should definitely take that into account. 88 Again, on 102 "On their own, and with alliances with the government and the scientific community, twentieth-century businessmen planned and executed a series of revolutions in farming. They turned the early-modern philosophical proposition (championed by Descartes) that animals should be viewed as machines into reality for thousands, then millions, and now billions of farmed animals." And then, even later, on 163, he points out how farmers too have been replaced by machines. This is really strange and sad . . . But such an interesting connection.Anyway, back the really great structure of this chapter. He then allows various people to speak for themselves, begging with "I am the kind of person who finds herself on a stranger's farm in the middle of the night." And finally a section, "I am a factory farmer." In the 4th section of this chapter, he tries to go back to the beginning, with a section called "The First Chicken" then "The First Human" and "The First Problem" He describes what chickens were like, how early humans found food, and then what happened with domestication, brining up the "myth of animal consent" that comes up a lot, is often used as justification for how we treat animals, and is pretty interesting on its own. Then, "The Myth of the Myth" and "The First Forgetting." Then, "The First Animal Ethics" and "The First Line Worker"
Forgetting
102 In his section on forgetting, he says that our lack of exposure to animals leads to this forgetting about their welfare, but says "Some have tried to resolve this gap by hunting or butchering an animal themselves, as if those experiences might somehow legitimize the endeavor of eating animals. This is very silly." and says that you don't have to kill someone to understand why it is wrong. I can see his point, but I think I disagree in some way, because I do think that it is somewhat legitimate to say that if there is a problem with forgetting, an you have decided that you do think eating animals is fine, then taking the responsibility of ending the life yourself (rather than paying someone else to do it for you) is in some way admirable, I think. Choosing to face the reality of what your are doing, rather than pretending you don't do it? Or trying to find the old connection to animals that we had, ethical or not?135 - Here's a phenominally gross thing that, alone, should probably prevent you from eating chicken: It is legal for up to 11% of the chickens' weight to be absorbed "cooling bath" water that is chlorinated, feces, and bacteria infested -- known in the industry as "fecal soup" Apparently, it says in fine print on the package just how much fecal soup has been absorbed.
There is the lengthy section about the relationship between factory farming and antibiotics, and the point at the end that basically the reason we don't have a total ban on "non-theraptuic" use of antibiotics, even though public health officials and scientists have called for it many times, is that clearly agribusiness and the pharmaceutical industry are more powerful that our government. That is so scary.
152 - He describes Paradise Locker Meats -- the nearest thing to a really good slaughter facility he can find, and the really pleasant and kind people that work there and own it And he notices the decoration on the walls of the office area (which includes taxidermy) and a bunch of notes from elementary school kids that say "'Thank you very much for the pig eyeballs. I have a fun time dissecting them and learning the different parts of the eye!" 'There were slimy but i had a lot of fun!' "Thanks for the eyes!' -- This is so great and so weird and so amazing . . . I have never stopped to revisit those experiences of my childhood and high school education. Leftover eyes from slaughter that was going to happen anyway, or eyes taken from dead animals, I suppose I'm fine with . . . but I never thought of how barbaric or strange that whole thing is. Those dented and wobbly dulled pans, filled with brown wax like brownies, tons of pin holes, textures and covered with pinholes, the smell of formaldehyde, the thin brown paper towels . . . all of that was so vivid and truly helpful -- I remember sheep eyes and I do believe the tactility of the experience was way more educational than . . . hmm.
159 He says: "A pig from one of the many breeds traditionally used in America was, and is, able to enjoy the outdoors year-round if provided proper shelter and bedding. This is a good thing, not only for avoiding Exxon Valdez-scale ecological disasters. . . but because much of what pigs enjoy doing is best done with access to the outdoors--running, playing, sunning, grazing, and caking themselves in mud and water . . . Today's factory farm pig breeds, by contrast, have been so genetically altered that more often than not they must be raised in climate-controlled buildings, cut off from sun and seasons. We are breeding creatures incapable of surviving in any place other than the most artificial of settings." This makes me think of a Blade Runner-like situation (second Blade Runner reference!!) I could imagine in the future, where all animals are hermetically sealed, and "heritage breeds" are kept in zoos so people can see what a pig looked like . . . where our most common of animals are the endangered ones. Natural pigs, cows, and turkeys seem to be genuinely in danger of extinction to me, and I wonder how one could imagine such a horrific future in a novel or something.
Then there is the very important issue of sympathy for the farmer, which Foer seems to have. . . . he chooses to villanize the huge corporations (not a hard thing to do) and to show farmers as basically forced into a system that they don't really like, and factory workers who become desensitized through their exposure to violence. So he points out that farmers have been essentially forced to have more and more land, more naimsl, etc. and notes that "American farmers are 4 times more likely to commit suicide than the general population." 162
"Not surprisingly, when farmers select for 'motherability' when breeding, and a mother pig's sense of smell is not overpowered by the stench of her own liquified feces beneath her, and her hearing is not impaired by the clanging of metal cages, and she is given space to investigate where her piglets are and exercise her legs so that she can lie down slowly, she finds it easy enough to avoid crushing her young." 165. That says a lot right there. :)
He asks the question of when he should evangelize . . . when should he take a stand and ask others to take that stand with him? Is meat eating wrong for everyone? or Just me? this kind of thing.
I found this book to be a much more personal one, perhaps in part because he allows himself and his family to enter into the book so often, but also because it is really about making a personal, individual decision and then deciding what to do about it, and he allows the reader to consider things for themselves.
32 - His comment about "The choice-obsessed modern West is probably more accommodating to individuals who choose to eat differently than any other culture has ever been, but ironically, the utterly unselective omnivore --"I'm easy; I'll eat anything" -- can appear more socially sensitive than the individual who tries to eat in a way that's good for society." I also think this seguays for me into the question of not being a pretentious a-hole about it, or maybe i should say that I feel like there is a huge amount of guilt that comes along with saying 'I get to CHOOSE what I eat, and I'm going to really be picky" in contrast to someone whose economic situation does NOT allow for choice.
A modest-proposal: Eating dogs
I really liked the Jonathan Swift Modest Proposal type logic going on in the first part, where he asks us to consider eating dogs and compares our treatment of them and other animals. I think that's a very useful strategy and one that I haven't seen employed quite exactly in the same way. either people switch humans and animals (like Peter Singer and others since by saying "well, imagine if we used human infants or the developmentally challenged, since their intellects or capacity for understanding might even be less than some animals" but not often in another animal so explicitly used in such a thorough way to shed light on our practice of eating meat. He ends with a smart little thing about looking away from the stars because our perception is better on the periphery.His logic -- he points out that, in terms of intelligence, dogs fall behind plenty of other animals, like pigs. Certainly, you wouldn't eat your OWN companion animal, but does that mean that you shouldn't eat any animal that falls into that category? (As Fudge says, the Brits eat rabbit pie AND keep them as pets). He points out that dog meat is no more unhealthy than any other type of meat, and that many think it is quite delicious. And, whats perhaps most convincing, he points out that thousands of stray animals are euthanized all the time and their meat is going to waste.Why not deal with the problem of having too many dog carcasses by putting them into food? He then points out our amazing contradictions between the kind of treatment made illegal towards dogs (beating them, electrocuting them, starving them, etc.) and our total lack of concern for the livelihood of livestock.
"If we let dogs be dogs, and breed without interference, we would create a sustainable, local meat supply with low energy inputs that would put even the most efficient grass-fed farming to shame." 28 and "Can't we get over our sentimentality? Dogs are plentiful, good for you, easy to cook, and tasty . . ." He reveals our emotional connection to dogs by arguing for consumption of at the very least the unwanted, euthanized ones that are going to waste.
Some thoughts that I have on the dissonance between science, "progress" and all the horrible things I just read:
One of the really difficult points in the book that comes up throughout is this issue of understanding where the farmer is coming from -- not necessarily understanding how it is that farm workers can do things like put out cigarrette butts in animals faces, etc. but why and how a farmer ends up being part of the factory farming system. In full disclosure, I grew up in a state, similar to this one, in which this kind farming is hugely important to the economy. I attended ISU, my dad works in agronomy, and I still currently am on the payroll for design work that I do that is often funded through projects by Pioneer, Monsanto, etc. Not to mention the masters degree I work for which was created in honor of the man who invented hybrid corn. the point is, most of the time, I have heard the kinds of high-density farming operations as describe din the book as considered to be PROGRESS and advancement, a huge improvement in efficiency and productivity over the past. Now a farmer can do so much more with so much less time . . . .but of course, this is the classic question of science itself -- is mere advancement , more control, more ability, a virtue enough in and of itself? Clearly the life of the animals, health of humans, and environmental toll all suggest that the "advancements" in terms of numbers and capital are not really improvements on many other fronts. It is deeply distressing that our economic system fosters this kind of irresponsible "growth" Later, on 236, he says "It's not that consumers won't buy the animals such farmers raise; it's that farmers can't produce them without reinventing a now destroyed rural infrastructure" (such as the traditional genetic stock, slaughter facilities, transportation, etc.)On a micro-level, divorced from context, its easy to see why people might think this kind of development is progress. its kind of amazing that we can and do purposefully breed mutant animals with the kinds of meat we want. and what amazing and unexpected questions and puzzles for science emerge -- what is stress? what chemicals signify it? what triggers it? From the position of someone who, by virtue of being in graduate school alone, is invested in the idea that learning things for the sake of knowing them is somehow good, I can understand why answering questions about these things, etc. throw in major funding sources and promise of profitability, and it become ever more obvious.
i recognize within myself the influence of our cultural biases and justifications -- the suspicion of those who advocate for animals as being too emotional or sentimental. I have grown up with and around science, and, as most of our culture really, tends to trust science and its "objectivity" with a sort of dogmatic or . . . belief system. It's a belief system, I guess. Even though I am aware of the historical origins and influences on this cultural viewpoint, and have had plenty of evidence to the contrary, I still, distressingly, find myself instinctively or initially dismissive of arguments that seem like they are going to be emotional appeals for animal rights. One thing I think Foer does particularly well, then, is to walk a fine line between making arguments without appeals to overly emotional or sentimental aspects, but to direct them, using the very logic of science, using statistics (creatively illustrated) at every possible opportunity,
I mean Peter singer does this very well - acknowledging the cultural current of dismissal by stating at the beginning of his book that he is not an "animal lover" by any means, doesn't even care for pets, but still sees, though logic and honesty, that the way animals are treated is immoral. Foer manages to make similarly hard-nosed arguments, even while admitting that he is a reluctant dog lover, and was a vegetarian at various times before researching this book. by doing this, he manages a certain amount of sympathy and reserves judgement in away t that is welcoming and helpful for the book (and is really contrasted by the more virulent position of the pETA activist's comments that he reproduces in the text.)
The rancher guy talks about how natural and ubiquitous meat-eating is, and how this is a "powerful indicator" of its morality. I too have had similar thoughts, though I think these arguments are easy to find counter-arguments for. The "naturalistic fallacy" is apparently a commonly noted kind of faulty logic studied in psychology . . . just because something happens in nature doesn't automatically make it good, or good for you, or good for anyone . . .
the marginal land idea is a good point -- I think that is probably true, especially for things like mountain goats or sheep, and that animals act as a "storage" of energy and grain (over the winter, etc.) is a fascinating idea I hadn't thought of before, though certainly a reductive one, aking to the animals as machines (219)
221 - I like how he casts the difference of opinion between animal welfare and animal rights not as much as a clash of ideas as just a clash of what they believe is reasonable, possible, etc. What's realistic. pragmatic.
There is an uncomfortable similarity to evangelism (to me) . . . this not only "making a decision and keeping it to yourself," but advocacy . . . 222 I like that the author admits his discomfort and insecurity about the answers to this question as well -- it seems hard enough to make the kind of decisions on a personal level, or even for one's family, but then to try and decide to what extent you will share this with others. . . I am definitely of the persuasion that worries about being an asshole. And i don't know, i feel a little uncomfortable imposing my own beliefs on other people, and I admit that in some way, I am going to decide with what I want to hear or believe, and discount opposing thoughts.
I think that I tend to agree with the concessions being granted--that in an ideal world, full respect would be granted, but since its not likely, if somethings can be made better, we should work for that. it's the foot in the door, the "here, taste this cake. You like it? Oh, it's vegan" before you ask people to change things that are so socially and culturally important.
I also really appreciate his ability to admit the cultural and social sacrifices that would be made by changing one's eating habits, or what we culturally might have to let go of. traditions are super important, so what kind of replacement can there be? Can we make the value of doing whats' right" or treating animals well so appealing, so meaningful, that its meaning can replace the deep meaning of centuries old traditions? even of short-term family traditions?
the way he rather seamlessly moves between poultry, hogs, and beef, and fish, without labeling each section that way, is really great, by the way
More on forgetting:
this notion of forgetting, of animals being the receptacle of our forgetting or something, is actually really interesting too. He quotes Michael Pollan on p. 228 as saying "Eating industrial meat takes an almost heroic act of not knowing, or, now, forgetting." I guess it is this willful forgetting, and whenever anyone brings that up, it sits very uncomfortably. Because we all know, and Foer even points out, that as soon as you start talking about meat production, animal welfare, you already know what you will hear. The details may be surprising (and I was indeed shocked and surprised many times throughout reading this book), everyone already knows that you DON"T WANT TO KNOW what's in your hot dog.The power of NOT doing. We could just not. I worry about the questions about getting married -- what kind of ceremony would please my family, would I really have to accept Anh as Jacob's best man? Who would be in the wedding? How do I keep myself from wanting to have a ring or buy an expensive dress, or suddenly start allowing all kinds of things? Or we could just not. and solve all of it. We could fight to fix factory farming and lobby and try our hardest to make meat-eating ethical, or we could just not eat it. Just don't do it at all. We could worry about getting pregnant or disease, or we could just not have sex. The were is immense power in just not doing it. :)
231 he mentions how Temple Grandin notes that people can become sadistic after killing too many animals -- which is interesting because it goes back to this very old argument that the reason to be good to animal is that it promotes goodness towards humans, etc.
Perhaps one of the most awful things I read in this book was a quote from a man who worked on the kill floor, who described how common it was for the slaughtered cows to be carrying calves, which are of course still alive and kicking inside their dead mothers. The worst was a three-year old cow that was walking up to the kill line "having her calf right there" . . . There is really nothing to say about this I guess.
"from the genetics up" 240 -- to reinvent the farming from the genetics up - this is interesting -- that we are not throwing out science all together to return to a pre-technology world that is unreal and historical but that our knowledge of genetics can till hold the key - science can still move us forward,
these animals that are destined to a pre-determined END -- originally I was thinking of animal research, but food production is so obvious as well -- it makes me want to make a hug cow of straw and call it "straw dog" :) well not :), more like :(
"if we are not given the option to live without violence. . . " i suddenly see my desire to touch them, to touch dogs perhaps, as some kind of deep-seated need to apologize. To show, though tactiiity and gentleness and kindness, as best as i can communicate through these things, an apology to all animals that I cannot touch. that it seems so important to me to pet them, because they are the only access point I have . . .
263 - He makes the point that our food choices are usually regarded like lifestyle choices akin to fashion or hairstyle, rather than this hugely moral act that it really is. He says that he has yet to find a truly credible defense for eating meat, and that many activists find it so frustrating that there is such a incredible disconnect between "clear thinking and peoples' food choices." I agree, and I think this goes back to the clear irrationality of "I don't want ot know what's in my hot dog. If I did, I'd have to stop eating it" because that means you already know! I totally understand this as I skipped that section of Peter Singer's book out of knowledge that it would probably make me change my life, and I wasn't ready for that. But it is sort of astonishing, isn't it. Willful ignorance. And this is that one aspect of the holocaust comparison that seems really useful in this discourse.
And in the end there is an interview with him and he says "18% of college students are vegetarian now. There are more vegetarians in college than there are Catholics, and there are more vegetarians than any major, except for business, and it's very close, by about 1 percent." Yup.
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