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I loathe Jonathan Safran Foer's take on vegetarianism. I am not against vegetarianism, I am against his arrogant stance that ignores good animal husbandry, the cultural significance of meat in diet, the importance of meat in indigenous communities. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/21/opinion/coronavirus-meat-vegetarianism.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
Watch this episode of Chef's Table and tell me that the meat served at this Philly restaurant isn't helping change the world. I'd love to know what he sees when he watches it. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8773076/
Foer should be advocating for an end to factory farming. Denying that there is a fairer and healthier relationship to seek out in consuming meat is undermining his argument entirely. For the record, I was a happy vegetarian for about 20 years.
What a scolder he is.
My joyful fantasy is one where factory farming doesn't exist, people grow more of their food and source much more locally, support farms that honor thousands of years of respectful knowledge passed down in practicing good animal husbandry, and eat better and less meat.
Or be a vegetarian if you want to. Another thing to loathe about that essay is Foer takes a hard line while still participating in consumption of dairy and cheese? So his hard line is impossible even for him? It's not a good argument.
Nor is the idea that all people thrive on healthy vegetarian diets. I did and then I did not. I eventually was asked to eat meat by doctors. And it made a difference.
It feels like there is no space for the idea that people are omnivores, and so we could work on being better at being omnivores and that is possibly a best way for us to work with the planet, and nature and our environment.
I honestly read this and was like OMG vegetarians are the worst, and that is not productive for the cause. I don't think they are the worst. I would like more people to be vegetarians, it is good to do. But this is not the argument to get there.
Also, I actually believe that if everyone in the world was a vegetarian there would be very few cows and sheep and who WANTS THAT WORLD? Hundreds of thousands of years of domestication of animals, some incredibly wonderful and beautiful, and for what?
I would be really sad without my one or two parcels of meat that arrive each week from the local farm with a letter about where my food came from.
PS - If you want to know how vegetarian I was I served an entire wedding reception vegetarian. MUCH TO THE CHAGRIN OF JUST ABOUT EVERY PERSON WHO WEIGHS IN ON WEDDINGS WHEN PLANNING THEM. It was very delicious.
Ok. That's all.
Ok. That's all.
PPS - I don't understand why this was published in that paper there.
Ok, one last thing, I don't romanticize farming and buying local can be some kind of pastoral dream and unobtainable. for many. The thing is to measure dietary and environmental impact. And own it.
I also think it is wild that people are so shocked that human beings kill animals to eat them once they "think" about it. Human beings kill other humans not to eat them. It's not a stretch.
