In the end, Foer’s reflections on George provide the book’s most powerful argument against eating animals. What justification do I have, he asks himself, for eating other animals, but not eating dogs? Yes, dogs are intelligent, feeling beings, but so are pigs, cows and chickens. Properly cooked, dog meat is as healthy and nutritious as any other meat. It is also said to be delicious. In fact, since many people now advocate eating locally produced food and stray dogs are killed in their thousands in most big cities every year, dogs are the ideal local meat. [...more]
With the publication of Jonathan Safran Foer's captivating and powerful book, Eating Animals, much has been said and written about his undercover investigative work, which gives America a view inside the hidden world of factory farms.
What has not been commented on, however, is the disquieting fact that under existing federal and state laws, Mr. Foer's undercover actions -- while clearly an important public service -- are actually illegal, and what's more, they constitute acts of domestic terrorism.
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In the Amazon the cattle sector is the largest driver of rainforest destruction, accounting for 60 to 70 percent of deforestation. To put it in concrete terms: every eighteen seconds on average one hectare of Amazon rainforest is being lost to cattle ranchers. As if the carbon emissions resulting from cattle deforestation were not enough, consider bovine methane emissions (or cow farts, if you want to be less delicate). While much of the debate surrounding global warming has centered upon carbon dioxide--the world’s most abundant greenhouse gas--methane, which has twenty-one times the warming potential of carbon dioxide, is seldom mentioned. [...more]
With a suddenness that has taken us all by surprise, the era of cheap and abundant food appears to be drawing to a close. The good news is that the twinned crises in food and energy are creating a political environment in which real reform of the food system may actually be possible for the first time in a generation. [...more]
The recall of 143 million pounds of beef processed over the past two years is the largest meat recall in the history of the world. The USDA had no choice following an animal group's release of videotape of "downer" cows being dragged across filthy floors and pushed around by a fork lift, before joining their healthier brethren on the hamburger highway. Since we all agree that the primary responsibility of the USDA is food safety, the question is, where were the USDA inspectors? The answer may be that for several years, the top priority at the USDA has not been food safety, but the creation of the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). [...more]
