The Hunger Games

Anyone who sees this movie or reads these books will probably (hopefully) be appalled by any society that could get to the point where watching children kill each other for adult entertainment is acceptable.  Not only acceptable but part of the cultural norm to the point of tradition looked upon with as much anticipation as we would Thanksgiving or Christmas.

How does any society get to this point?  It isn’t anything new.  You will find similar ‘shows’ in history such as the bloody battles that took place in the Roman Colosseum.   This was all very normal for people to watch one man kill another for entertainment and pleasure.  It was accepted because it was fun to watch and those Romans were bored.  They needed something to do on a Friday night dammit!

Which leads my mind to the very obvious connection of food, pleasure and cultural norms.

No one needs to watch children killing each other for entertainment or to watch one man kill another just because they find it pleasurable.  There are other better forms of entertainment and pleasure.

And so it is with food.  No animal needs to live a life confined from birth to death by humans filled with terror and abuse and have it end in slaughter merely because we find pleasure in eating them.  There is pleasure to be had in other foods. There are other ways to entertain our friends for a dinner party.

There is not much difference between the Hunger Games, the Roman Colosseum and driving through McDonald’s or serving up a meatloaf or chicken breast or bacon at home.  Well, there is just one.  Animals cannot tell you with words how much they are suffering right now.  But I can tell you this – they know.  They feel.  They weep.  They suffer.  They scream and they cry and they moan.  They die a slow horrible death from the moment they are born.  Why?  For our pleasure. . . .

But not for mine.

If you don’t believe me just go on youTube and search animal cruelty.  This is the real deal.  This is where most of our ‘meat’ (I like to call them animals) comes from.  And even when they don’t come from these hells on earth they still suffer.  Torn from their mothers at birth, denied their own mother’s milk, sent to their deaths decades before they would die naturally and even on organic farms these animals when sent to their deaths are piled on death trains in sweltering conditions stuffed in such that they arrive half dead already, bones broken, dehydrated.  They are pulled out as if they are already carcasses and thrown and tossed around like . . meat.  But I am here to tell you that they are no more ‘meat’ than you or I are.  No more than your dog or cat.  They are as intelligent as your dog.  And as loving.  Is this any way for any living thinking breathing feeling loving creature to be treated?

I really do hope anyone would know the answer to that question.

Some would call this bacon. I call it pigs, who if you ever get to know one are so loving and playful and as intelligent as a dog, who are being abused. They have no room and this is the least of their suffering. What do you call these animals?

These are dairy cows. Some call this milk. I call this the worst kind of stealing. Stealing the milk of one species for ourselves and denying every single baby cow its own milk. Did you know that? Well we can’t let the baby cows have it because we want it! I call this a crime. And the abuses suffered by dairy cows are horrific. Look it up. What do you call this?

Happy eating!