[Jonathan Safran Foer] Eating Animals(BookFi.org) by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: por
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

My decision not to eat animals is necessary for me, but it is also limited — and personal. It is a

commitment made within the context of my life, not anyone else’s. And until sixty or so years ago,

much of my reasoning wouldn’t have even been intelligible, because the industrial animal

agriculture to which I’m responding hadn’t become dominant. Had I been born in a different

time, I might have reached different conclusions. For me to conclude firmly that I will not eat

animals does not mean I oppose, or even have mixed feelings about, eating animals in general. To

oppose beating a child to “teach a lesson” is not to oppose strong parental discipline. To decide

that I will discipline my child in one way and not another is not necessarily to make a decision I

would impose on other parents. To decide for oneself and one’s family is not to decide for the

nation or the world.

That said, though I see value in all of us sharing our personal reflections and decisions

about eating animals, I didn’t write this book simply to reach a personal conclusion. Farming is

shaped not only by food choices, but by political ones. Choosing a personal diet is insufficient. But

how far am I willing to push my own decisions and my own views about the best alternative

animal agriculture? (I may not eat their products, but my commitment to supporting the kind of

farming Paul and Frank do has steadily deepened.) What do I expect from others? What should

we all expect of one another when it comes to the question of eating animals?

It’s clear enough that factory farming is more than something I just personally dislike,

but it’s not clear what conclusions follow. Does the fact that factory farming is cruel to animals

and ecologically wasteful and polluting mean everyone needs to boycott factory farm products all

the time? Is a partial withdrawal from the system good enough — a sort of preferred purchasing

program for nonfactory food that stops short of a boycott? Is the issue not our personal buying

choices at all, but one that needs to be resolved through legislation and collective political action?

Where should I respectfully disagree with someone and where, for the sake of deeper

values, should I take a stand and ask others to stand with me? Where do agreed-upon facts leave

room for reasonable people to disagree and where do they demand we all act? I’ve not insisted

that meat eating is always wrong for everyone or that the meat industry is irredeemable despite its

present sorry state. What positions on eating animals would I insist are basic to moral decency?

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