Disclaimer: I know that vegetarians reading this might disagree at various levels. I do not oppose a vegetarian lifestyle. I am only encouraging carnivores to be more aware of their food.
So – lots of people know that I purchased Danielle’s (an employee of Camp Kidwell when I was director) pigs at the 4-H auction at the Allegan County Fair. And several people think that I’m strange for having a picture of them (Dani and the 2 pigs) hanging in my office. Honestly, I’d love to hang it in the kitchen, but am afraid that that would be a little over the top for some people.
But my history is filled with a farm. I’ve met my meat, and know that the cow turns into the steak that I’m eating. I’ve plucked my own chickens. And, as time goes on, my family and I realize that a happy cow is a tasty cow. The cows that wander around a forty-acre pasture and some woods are better meat than those raised in tight holding pens.
Being in Korea has brought this more in focus. Pretty much everyone there is in touch with their food sources. They meet their fish, their very few chickens, their cows. They understand that meat comes from animals that they (or a close friend/relative) have caught. They don’t hide it behind packaging and processing. The fish in the market have heads (as did the fish that was cooked on my table at one of the best meals I ate while I was there), squids have eyes. I’ve always encouraged people to know about food sources – and have always been open with my classrooms about my history. (My 6th graders in a suburban area couldn’t believe that I’d eat the pig that I had kept like a pet. My response, “But that’s why we had it.”) I feel that I have kept a respect for the life that has been taken. If I get queasy about the thought of killing something for food, then I don’t feel that I have a right to eat the meat.
Which brings us to dogs. Heather and I were talking about them – and how she avoids the dog aisle at the market (which I appreciated). Because I’m pretty sure that I couldn’t look at a dog (or a horse for that matter) and go, “Yum. Lunch.” I’m thinking that I need to avoid eating it. I don’t get queasy knowing about my cows or my pigs, because it’s part of my upbringing. And I’m sure that some of this is also cultural – since plenty of cultures eat both. My eating habits would be different if I had grown up in a different area of the world (or even the US).
I ran across the article on Inuit diets in Discover (October 2004). They talked about all kinds of weird food options that have never been on my radar. But the author and the Inuit woman interviewed both have interesting things to say:
Not often in our industrial society do we hear someone speak so familiarly about “our” food animals. WE don’t talk of “our pig” and “our beef.” We’ve lost that creature feeling, that sense of kinship with food sources. “You’re taught to think in boxes,” says (Inuit) Cochran. “In our culture the connectivity between humans, animals, plants, the land that they live on, and the air that they share is ingrained in us from birth…It’s part, too, of your development as a person. You share food with your community…if we don’t take care of our food, it won’t be there for us in the future.” (Discover, October 2004, 54).
So, I encourage you (if you’re of the meat eating variety) to meet your meat. If you’re going to eat a steak, please look at the bull and say, “Thanks.” If you need a place to do that, come visit. I’m happy to share.
You can read more about Inuit Nutrition and Environment.
Posted by Heather Voss at November 27, 2004 05:57 PMI, too, am a vegetarian, and I agree strongly with what you said. I became a vegetarian for health and taste reasons orginally, but the longer I am one, the more I do it as a moral choice. I do not believe we should be torturing animals before we eat them. I think if more people met their meat, especially meat not produced in the humane manner you and Jane have described, they would oppose the way we treat animals. If more people met their meat, perhaps we would change the way we raise our meat and I could go back to eating it.
Posted by: Hope at November 30, 2004 05:30 PM