Antibiotics should be prescribed by your doctor . . . not your supermarket, right?

If you read my recent post about why animals rock, you will know it is hard for me to transition to the topic of eating animals. I get it that we are higher up on the food chain, I get it that our bodies need protein, but we have moved so far away from how I believe some of the first cultures of the world treated the animals. Even though they killed them, the hunt was honored, and the slaying, almost a religious experience - with celebrations and ceremonial dances that went on for days after the hunt.

Now we have a gazillion chickens trapped in little hot places without so much the room to spread a wing yet alone avoid getting pecked from other chickens who are pissed and have had it with the awful situation. So what do the factory farming guys do? (These are the hired farms of Tyson's and Purdue and the likes.) They CUT THEIR BEAKS OFF so that the chickens don't mutilate each other.

Same with pigs, but it is worse what they do to them, and it is a known fact that pigs are smarter than dogs. If you are a dog owner, you KNOW that your dog feels pain and has emotions. I feel so strongly about this for one reason: they are helpless, and totally at our mercy, and we are dishonoring the Earth by treating them so poorly.

Looking for the Positive Spin

I wish I could add a positive spin to this, but this very one topic I would devote my life to if I had the resources. I would align with people like Temple Grandin (who is this a special woman who wrote Animals in Translation : Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior) and Native Americans who are born with the intrinsic reverie for all things natural, and through presenting alternatives (ie: not through showing gruesome photos - although that his its place as well) we would try to alter this harmful trajectory we are on. Until then, I am presented with chicken as a meal when I go to people's house as a dinner guest because I am a 'vegetarian.' (I usually correct them and say 'actually I am a pescatarian' and we have a good laugh over the fact that Latin is sometimes useful.) Then, if the atmosphere allows, I explain that even though chicken has 'white meat' it certainly isn't clean, and our bodies and environment would be much better served by eating their all-natural beef which is readily available here.

Just the other day I got tears in my eyes as I drove behind a truckload full of chickens that were squashed in boxes, half-dead, zooming down the hot highway with 70 mile winds whipping many of their feathers off. I thought I maybe was a big sap, but then a girlfriend (who isn't moved by much) called me reporting the same shock and horror of having seen this back East. It was a sign'. I am not alone. But as individuals without many options, we are left shedding little private tears.

I feel like I should apologize - to both you and the chicken I occassionally eat. This blog posting isn't very sassy. However in the eyes of pure environmentalism I am irreverent because I still eat the occasional animal - really only because I am very hungry, my body is crying out for protein, and there aren't many alternatives around. (The word 'veggie burger' is a curse word in Montana.)

Our population growth demands that we find more sustainable ways to feed ourselves. We, as a human race, have accomplished some amazing and magnificent things. I ask: 'why can't alternatives to factory farms be made a global mandate?'

If you are new to this blog discussion, or to this topic, I highly recommend an ALMOST comical cartoon presentation of why factory farming is hurtful to people and planet: www.themeatrix.com.

Off to do a little ceremonial dance for the chicken I ate the other night at Arlene's house '

Jen