"Dogs are wonderful, and in many ways unique. But they are remarkably unremarkable in their intellectual and experiential capacities. Pigs are every bit as intelligent and feeling, by any sensible definition of the words. They can't hop into the back of a Volvo, but they can fetch, run and play, be mischievous, and reciprocate affection. So why don't they get to curl up by the fire? Why can't they at least be spared being tossed on the fire?
"Our taboo against dog eating says something about dogs and a great deal about us.
"The French, who love their dogs, sometimes eat their horses.
"The Spanish, who love their horses, sometimes eat their cows.
"The Indians, who love their cows, sometimes eat their dogs.
"While written in a much different context, George Orwell's words (from Animal Farm) apply here: 'All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.' The protective emphasis is not a law of nature; it comes from the stories we tell about nature."
-- Jonathan Safran Foer, Eating Animals.
Well, the problem is, sometimes people love their horses and then eat them, too.
As
Roland points out, humans are omnivores. We succeed in life because like bears, we're capable of eating anything in front of us. We were not designed primarily as vegetarians as our digestive system design shows, and we digest proteins the easiest. Pound for pound, meat gives the most bang for the buck (so to speak). Giving a tough trial in the wilderness, we would not only eat our dogs, cats, rats and horses - any creature within reach, we'd also eat any other creature we'd be able to catch. Though given a lack of a gun or any modern aids, that would be quite difficult.
I've mentioned on BetterMost before that, for a little over a year now, I've been eating a mainly vegetarian diet. I cheat once in a while and on special occasions (like Thanksgiving) I'll still eat meat... I mean I don't consider it an absolute prohibition. But, for instance, I don't think I've purchased meat at the grocery store once this whole year.
A variety of things caused me to do this, but the main thing / motivating factor (in addition to news about animal abuse against stock reported from time to time) that sticks out in my mind was walking through a cow pasture with Lee on the side of Brokenback Mountain during the summer of 08. Seeing those cows and their calves and being so close to them has impacted me more than I can describe or rationalize (I know it's not a logical thing). And, it's not like that was the first time I ever encountered cows before... but this image always stops me in my tracks especially when it comes to consuming beef. I didn't stop eating meat right away after that... but by the fall of 08 I'd stopped.
It seems very hard to me to judge what animals are worthy of not being eaten.
I hear you,
atz. But as you said it's a personal decision. While backpacking in the mountains in Wyoming, my group ran across some cows as well. A friend of mine - a country girl used to cattle - was disgusted. The presence of them ruined the trip over the pass for her. The pass was full of cow pats and cow ticks and she called them stupid...let's just say the sight of them didn't move her to want to eat steaks any less.
Like Ennis and Jack, livestock was just meat on the hoof to her.
However, that being said, I find myself dismayed at the cruelty at which our livestock is killed. I thought for the most part there were laws reinforcing the humaneness of the kill. A man who worked as a cattle butcher told me about the techniques they used. But apparently the laws are not as strict as I thought. Stuff I read from PETA on chickens is horrifying and on another board I went to, when describing the worst jobs we ever had, one guy wrote about his job pig killing. How he had to go into the stockyards and kill all the sick pigs by beating them to death. He talked about the blood and the screams of the pigs and it was just sickening to read. Yet vegetables don't appeal to me that much and a great many of the sweet and starchy ones I shouldn't eat, so a diet heavy in meat suits me a lot better.
To live, something else must die. Plants are just a lesser evil since we can't hear them scream, but botanists can tell you that when you do cut plants, they recoil, so they are experiencing some sort of reflex to being damaged. If we could survive on air and water, we would.
