Extremely Unsustainable and Incredibly Cruel: Jonathan Safran Foer vs. the Meat Industry
Goat. To be enjoyed, not eaten.
Eating Animals is Jonathan Safran Foer’s third full-length book, his first non-fiction, and the first major ideological risk he has taken. Foer’s purpose is not simply to describe the meat industry in all its nastiness (as has been done well by Eric Schlosser in Fast Food Nation and Michael Pollan in The Omnivore’s Dilemma) – rather, Foer’s purpose is to convince the reader that vegetarianism is the only practical and philosophically satisfying means to influence the cruel, environmentally catastrophic industries of factory meat and dairy, and large-scale fishing. This is risky because only 3.2% of American adults are vegetarian, and even if a bigger percentage of Americans are ambivalent about eating meat, for many it would be uncomfortable to be told that they need to make the step to completely stop eating meat.
Foer does not allow for much intellectual relief without full conversion. Unlike a book on pollution that encourages readers to use less energy, or an article challenging readers to give more money to AIDs relief in Africa, Eating Animals calls for complete action – one cannot read it and be simply be satisfied that he will eat less meat, because Foer does not ask his readers to do more of something positive, he asks them to completely stop doing something negative. And so for omnivores and “flex-itarians”, Eating Animals is a provocation.
Eating Animals, though, was marketed as more than a niche read, and despite (because of?) its provocative nature made it to 20th on the New York Times Non-Fiction Bestseller list for Nov 27, 2009. Without going into what an argument for vegetarianism’s sales success means, it remains a gutsy move for Foer to follow Everything is Illuminated and the 9/11 novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close with a condemning work that should offend or intellectually bother anyone who isn’t already vegetarian.
On to the book itself: where Jonathan Safran Foer is strongest is in showing the disconnect Americans make between our companion animals and the just-as-intelligent, just-as-feeling animals we kill for food. Our rationalizations for eating meat while finding cruelty to companion animals wrong (and even illegal) are weak, and are buoyed by a mental disconnect between what we eat and the life the animal lived (and, indeed, what it is we are actually eating – that is, chemicals, e coli, and a lot of added waste-water). Foer makes a strong philosophical case for vegetarianism, but buffers this with a much more coldly compelling rationale: the meat and dairy industries are the single biggest contributors to global warming worldwide. This, unlike many of the chemicals needed for production and transportation, such as gasoline, is quite unnecessary pollution. In the United States, this is pollution produced so that Americans can get cheap meat in large quantities – amounts consumed per person far above what Americans consumed fifty or one-hundred years ago. So on both philosophical and realistic environmental counts (add to global warming the disastrous ecological consequences of trawling for sea life such as shrimp), Foer puts forward strong, clear arguments that the current factory farming system is profoundly unsustainable.
The decision which must be made at this point, though, is usually whether more ethical ways to produce meat, such as family farms, are a good alternative to vegetarianism. Foodies such as Michael Pollan somewhat poetically view the end of meat as some further tragedy, almost as bad as the cruel factory farming they would like to end. And perhaps highly regulated, small organic farms producing expensive meat could take away some market share from factory farming (especially if they were incentivized by the government). But expensive meat will not affect the majority of consumers if they have the option to eat cheap meat, and unless omnivores are willing to only eat small-farm, organic meat (a very dubious proposition if one ever wants to eat meat at a restaurant), they are part of the problem, not the solution. Why, then, does Foer spend so much space talking to small farmers, organic farmers, ethical farmers? He critiques them even as he says he supports what they are doing; this is a difficult position to be in, as the environmental eaters – small farm, the ethical treatment of animals, and vegetarian crowds – are not huge and splintering the group is not in anyone’s (well, except the meat industry’s) interest. Still, Foer is essentially saying “these farmers are doing their best to change things, but you shouldn’t buy their products.”
One characteristic of Eating Animals which may put off some, but which kept my happily adolescent mind engaged, is Foer’s language (a not-entirely-unrepresentative passage: “To take a step back: shit itself isn’t bad. Shit has long been the farmer’s friend, fertilizer for his fields, from which he grows food for his animals, whose meat goes to people and whose shit goes back to the fields. Shit became a problem only when Americans decided we wanted to eat more meat than any other culture in history and pay historically little for it.” pg 176-177). Some may hold that this language is not befitting a book as serious as Eating Animals; I would tend to argue that for younger (20s and 30s) readers – probably Foer’s prime audience for his previous books – the language, as well as some unorthodox formatting (five pages of the words “Speechlessness/Influence” repeated continuously, one letter for each of the average 21,000 animals each American eats in a lifetime) may be demographic appropriate.
The gist of the book, not surprisingly, is that eating meat is unethical and unsustainable. And Foer, to my mind, convinces. The excuses for eating factory produced meat are almost entirely disconnected from need. No one needs to eat meat. A vegetarian diet is often healthier, and – despite how cheap meat has become – still less expensive. And it isn’t cruel. And it isn’t contributing to global warming. And it isn’t making us fat. A vegetarian diet is, however, inconvenient. Like other inconvenient environmental truths, the unsustainability of factory meat needs to discussed and acted upon. Devour Eating Animals as soon as you can.
In Bill Clinton’s interview with Esquire, he mentions Paul Farmer and his organization Partners in Health. Partners in Health is on the ground in Haiti and doing good work. You can donate here.
And now, the articles:
Inside Bill Clinton’s New Plan for Haiti: Exclusive Q&A interviewed by Mark Warren (Esquire). If it wasn’t for the earthquake just outside of Port Au Prince, we might have forgotten that former President Bill Clinton is the United Nations Special Envoy to Haiti. Good long-term perspective by someone who has a stake in Haiti’s future.
Country Without a Net by Tracy Kidder (New York Times). Kidder wrote Mountains Beyond Mountains, a (great) biography of Paul Farmer, founder and president of Partners in Health. In this Op-Ed he discusses the history of Haiti, specifically how it has been kept poor and underdeveloped – and especially susceptible to natural disasters due to lack of planning and infrastructure.
They Are So Not Ready for Some Football by Josh Levin and Dahlia Lithwick (Slate). This is not (thankfully) not depressing. Unless you equate knowledge of football with patriotism or the ability to be an effective Supreme Court justice, in which case this would be a very depressing article indeed.
The Terrorist Mind: An Update by Sarah Kershaw (New York Times). Now: back to depressing (but fascinating) articles. Psychologists are finding similarities between the thought processes of people attracted to terrorism.
Objects of Desire: Israeli Diamonds are Forever…on Your Conscience by Sean Clinton (Ad-Busters Blog). At this point, it might be worth it to discuss recognizing diamonds as exorbitantly priced, useless except-for-cutting-things rocks that they are and move on to something useful. Like food (coming soon to Notes from the Fault – a review of Eating Animals by Jonathon Safran Foer).
I am currently sitting in a beautiful, crowded cafe in downtown Benton Harbor, Michigan, drinking gourmet, organic coffee.
I don’t know if you could write that in seriousness ten years ago, or even five. The Phoenix is a purveyor of fine food, Intelligensia Coffee, wireless internet, and an urban vibe. It is on Water Street, just across Main from the boarded up State Theatre, the abandoned Mary’s City of David Hotel, a Tabor Hill wine tasting room, and the new Six Degrees Thrift Store. Next door to the Phoenix is OutCenter, a gay and lesbian support center, and from the front door of the Phoenix, and if you yelled loud enough, you could probably be heard on the back nine of Harbor Shores Golf Course, the Jack Nicklaus-designed luxury greens organized as a non-profit to boost the Benton Harbor economy and revive its largely decrepit downtown. As in many downtowns in the process of gentrification, Benton Harbor is home to more than a few paradoxes, from poverty and a chaotic city government to multi-million dollar developments and the hope of economic revival-by-golf course.
Will it work – will luxury condominiums on the lake and cottages above the golf course have a palpable effect on the 39.9 % of Benton Harbor families who live below the poverty level? I don’t know. If businesses can be enticed back into Benton Harbor, they will probably hire at least some Benton Harbor residents and provide opportunities for their families to live more stable lives, have access to education, etc. Or, perhaps, downtown Benton Harbor will be cut off from the rest of the city, as the microbrewery, hummus-and-grilled vegetables, art gallery demographic buys up lofts west of Main Street, and families continue to live in substandard conditions east of Main (the clientele of the Phoenix, the Livery, and Harbor Shores may point to this). Or (one of the best-case scenarios), a bit of both will happen; money will continue to come to downtown Benton Harbor from other communities and Benton Harbor residents will be benefited both by employment and by an enlivened downtown with improved shopping and eating opportunities, and a cultural integration which has perhaps never existed in Benton Harbor and St. Joseph, Michigan.
Whichever direction development goes, though, the Phoenix is not a bad vantage from which to watch Benton Harbor change. Come in for a coffee and to feel the momentum of something else brewing.
124 Water Street
Benton Harbor, MI 49022
(269) 925-8060
Hours:
Mon-Fri. 7:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Sat. 8:00 a.m. – 1:30 p.m.
Note: This blog is shamelessly stolen from Ehren Lichtenwalter’s excellent, but too rarely updated (hint) blog “I’m definitely in Asia.”
By Ehren Lichtenwalter
Seoul, Korea
At roughly 189cm, I am a tall one. Here. There. Anywhere. 189cm–roughly 6′3–is sizable no matter where you are. But in Korea 189cm means something completely different. It is colossal, huge, borderline freakish. On my first day of class I discovered, to my dismay, that my height was not an asset, but an obstacle, an irreversible consequence of Nature, unnerving to even the most confident student. My challenge: I would have to convince my students that I was not Godzilla.
At precisely 6:29am I strode into the classroom, feigning confidence, books tucked under my right arm.
To be fair, everyone is timid on the first day of class; no one ever knows exactly what to expect. This applies to both the teacher and the student. But imagine walking into a classroom, trying your best to exude a blend of confidence and approachability, and hearing a collective gasp escape the open mouths of your students. Terror is not something you want to foment on your first day of class, unless, of course, you are a second grade teacher. But these students–my students–are adults and pay good money for English language instruction. If you intimidate them, or if they feel uncomfortable with you as a teacher, they will switch classes, or will leave the institute altogether. The teacher-student dynamic that takes place in the classroom is actually one of a language institutes best (or worst) forms of PR. Put simply, a good teacher will both keep and attract students, while a poor teacher will drive them away. Word spreads quickly, too. So, ease and approachability have everything to do with the success of this equation. In fact, ease and approachability were what I wanted to establish the moment I entered the classroom on that morning. But, my size. There was no way around it.
Knowing I had some ground to cover, I set my books down and greeted everyone in the warmest tone possible. They were not convinced, and stared back at me–blankly. I asked them how they were doing; they continued to stare. I swear one girl’s mouth remained agape for the larger portion of my introduction. I also discovered that jokes, while theoretically the best ice-breakers, are completely useless, unless your audience can understand them. I was about as funny as Jeff Foxworthy, who, coincidentally, is never funny. Not an ideal situation on my first day of class.
Stumped, I realized that, unless I wanted an empty classroom the following morning, I would have to adapt to the unfortunate situation. Faster than you could say ‘Natural Selection’, I pulled up a chair and sat down. It wasn’t until I did this that my students began to relax. Now eye-to-eye with my students, I opened up the floor to questions. All was quiet until one student slowly raised his hand and asked the inevitable: “How tall are you?” My answer: 189cm. Their collective response: a ‘gasp’ mixed with nervous laughter here and there. The situation repeated itself in each of my six classes.
Physically lowering myself to their level seemed to have had a positive effect on how they perceived me, though; I was no longer threatening, something to be intimidated by. Only then did I notice a change in the atmosphere, as hesitation and intimidation gave way to curiosity.
(You encounter this phenomenon of physically lowering oneself to eye level here, often in nicer restaurants, where the waitress will kneel on the ground, elbows propped on the table, to take an order. Though bizarre at first, you feel less rushed than back in the States, where ‘Flo’ towers over you, shamelessly chews gum, taps her pen against her notepad, glancing around the room, annoyed, as if she wished she were somewhere–anywhere–else)
In this case, I scored big by physically lowering myself down to my students level. I saved face. Seated as I was, they seemed to trust me more and began asking questions that had nothing do with my unusual dimensions; but inquired about my origins, home, university degree, family, interests, and hobbies, among other things. Needless to stay, I stayed in the chair for the rest of the hour. And for the remainder of the day.
Sometime last week I had a student of mine–a middle aged woman–tell me that she selected my class because she heard I was, “very big, but gentle.” When she told me this, I sighed–deeply–relieved that 189cm was not too big to love.
Cheers
Some standouts from the past week. More coverage, I’m sure, will develop around the organ-harvesting story in the next weeks (The New York Times has, thus far, not covered the story).
Muslims say FBI Tactics Sow Anger and Fear by Paul Vitello and Kirk Semple (New York Times). The relationship between mosques and the leaders of Muslim communities in the United States seems to worse than it was during the Bush administration. Set-ups, infiltrators, and stings are becoming a problem.
Tycoon, Contractor, Soldier, Spy by Adam Ciralsky (Vanity Fair). Erik Prince is the king of Blackwater, the military contractor synonymous to many with the violence and overbearing of the Bush years in Iraq. Unfortunately, the extent of Blackwater’s reach, and its close work with the military since Obama has become president is more expansive than previously known. Further reading: Blackwater by Jeremy Scahill.
The Human Grease Murders by Daniel Engber (Slate). Fascinating and funny (if, of course, you find find an ancient Peruvian myth about people being kidnapped, murdered, and drained of their fat for grease interesting).
Israel harvested organs without permission, officials say (CNN). While we’re on the subject of using humans for spare parts: after accusing a Swedish journalist of being an antisemite for calling for an investigation of Israelis harvesting organs from dead Palestinians, officials from the Israeli government have been forced to admit that throughout the 1990s the Abu Kabir forensic institute illegally harvested organs from Israeli soldiers and civilians, as well as from dead Palestinians, and used them to supply hospitals throughout Israel.
Showcase: Asian Crossroads in Africa (a New York Times photo gallery by Paolo Woods). NY Times description of the photo gallery: “As many as 500,000 Chinese have immigrated to Africa, lured by its oil, copper, uranium, wood and other natural resources. Many have thrived, creating large conglomerates. To serve them, other entrepreneurs have opened palatial restaurants. Or karaoke halls. The infusion of a distinctly different culture into African society — again — is turning out to be a critical chapter in the continent’s post-colonial history.”
Appropriate, I think:
“And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.“
Isaiah 58:12, KJV
St. Joseph, MI at night
Articles of Note: Firstly, continue reading posts such as this one from our good friend in Sao Tome, Camden Bowman. Secondly, here are some articles of note (unfortunately from a week ago – but they are still excellent, especially the Bill Clinton interview). Thirdly, do check out “Look Me In the Eyes”.
“Bill Clinton’s World” Interview by Peter Baker and Susan Glasser (Foreign Policy). Great distillation of foreign policy, and a damn good reading list.
“Jailed Palestinian Leader Marwan Barghouti Urges Unity” (BBC News). Some hints that Barghouti may be the next Palestinian Prime Minister, even if he has to run from an Israeli prison. A fellow to watch.
“The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers (Foreign Policy)”. Read this if you have a few hours to kill. Or just scan for people you already liked and feel important.
“The Fanatic, Fraudulent Mother Teresa” By Christopher Hitchens (Slate). This is a bit of a bitter classic, Hitchens’ 2003 diatribe against the beautification of Mother Teresa. Not an article that needs to be agreed with, but perhaps thought about anyway.
“Look Me in the Eyes” (www.lookmeintheeyes.wordpress.com). Not for the faint of heart, this gritty new blog explores travel, existentialism, and the dark corners of America (and may, I’d guess, venture to dark corners beyond).
By Camden Bowman
São Tomé
The equatorial sun blazes hotter and hotter as the sweat drips off my nose, splashing into what has now become a small puddle beneath me. Being chased is not fun, but hiding is worse. I crouch lower into the brush as the footsteps come closer. I can hear the soldiers breathing; They are practically on top of me. Development work is dangerous, they told me, but I had never expected it to come to this. Suddenly, with a terrifying efficiency, my alarm goes off and I wake up. Time to go to work.
A lot of people think that working in development involves loads of bushwhacking, well digging, and rebel-evading adventure. I’m sure all of these things exist somewhere. As for me, working for ADRA (Adventist Development and Relief Agency) involves a lot of proposal writing (kind of like writing a report for school, only it’s pass/fail), organizing documents, and occasionally just looking busy. Now granted, that last element is, at the moment, because my boss is gone and no one else seems to know what to make me do. Regardless of the reason, I’ve spent a good deal of time doing very important tasks like playing pinball on my computer, reading a book, writing e-mails, and writing this article (no offense Andy, it’s just not part of my job description, and not overly important to any ADRA projects). I’m sure that pretty soon I’ll be too busy to think, if the boredom doesn’t kill me first.
There is some level of adventure involved. I am living in one of Africa’s poorest countries, and I do sometimes take trips into the interior to see the small communities in the jungle on former plantations. For the most part, though, it’s office work. Really, that’s the way it should be. ADRA has a policy that foreign workers are not allowed to do any job that a local could do. It’s a good policy, because it means we employ people who know the culture intimately, and who desperately need jobs. What it means for me, however, is no well-digging.
I really can’t complain though. I’m learning a lot of things about the field, and I have gotten to do some work. I have an excellent opportunity, as only a sophomore in college, to experience what I’m studying first hand and decide whether this is what I want to do with the rest of my life. Is this what I want to do with the rest of my life? I’ve wanted to work in development since I was a freshman in high school. I saw people suffering, and I knew that I was in a position to help them. There was nothing else to think about, my mind was made up. I never stopped to ask the question, “does aid help?”
Many economists today are saying that it doesn’t, and after being in São Tomé e Príncipe, I can understand why. More than 80% of the country’s economy is based on foreign aid, and that doesn’t look like it will change any time soon. Despite the efforts of NGOs like ADRA to provide aid in sustainable ways, the majority of aid is channeled through the government. Everyone knows the common saying, “if you give a man a fish, he eats for a day. If you teach him to fish, he eats for a lifetime” but what happens when you give a man a fish every day? He eats for a lifetime and never learns to fish, and you spend a lot of money on those fish. The argument is simple: the best thing for Africa would be if the U.S. and Europe would just leave it alone. Africa can solve Africa’s problems, and the West is just complicating things.
But this answer is still insufficient. What about those cases where aid does help? What about individuals who escape poverty because someone like ADRA provided assistance? Do such people exist? And what about the human cost of ceasing all aid? The questions are more than I could write here. Africa will solve Africa’s problems. We cannot do it for them. The question now is whether or not we can help, and more personally, whether or not I can help. I don’t have an answer for this question yet, and it’s one thing I’ll be thinking about for the duration of my stay here.
Anyway, those are some random thoughts on working here. I really should get back to work; after all, there’s a very important pinball game waiting for me. Maybe I’ll break my high score.
James Joyce and the author, lobby of Farah Hotel
I lived for a month in a room with an open window out to an alley above the loud, hurried streets of Wustel Bellet. Travelers passed through the hostel; from a tight-faced Russian with a Palestinian Keifiya and a burning desire to get back into Iran to a less tight-faced Russian who slept all day and had no idea why he was in Amman or what falafel was, to a Dutch man wearing a Indian/hippie skirt looking for peace festivals in Israel. And I had two long term roommates: Jon, a pre-med student at a college in the Southern United States who had been wearily partying the world on a stipend, and Troy, an Australian who had quit the accounting job that made him miserable, and had set off across Southeast Asia, through India and Pakistan, Iran and Turkey, and was now stuck in Amman. With Jon I would wander out for falafel at midnight, with Troy for tea in the afternoon.
But the majority of the time, when I wasn’t working I was sitting in the lobby of the Farah Hotel waiting for friends to get online and vaguely watching Arabic language sitcoms and soap operas. The window of communication with the United States, I found, was from around four or five in the afternoon until I went to bed at eleven or so. And I tried, mostly, to be occupied at night. Mid afternoon was my designated intercontinental communication period, and it was sacred. It was shared by a Troy or Jon, depending on what else was going on in their lives, a group of friendly, English speaking male receptionists, a middle aged American woman who tutored English in an Iraqi refugee camp and played watching TV in the afternoons, and cats.
The cat most popular with the guests and staff was probably Mish Mish. She was a big, black and white long-haired cat with a sweet personality and was, apparently, a bit of a hooker. She disappeared for a few days at one point, which gave the hostel staff and residents something to talk and worry about, and re-appeared with kittens. Now we all had something else to do. Watching Turkish soap operas became watching Turkish soaps with kittens. Playing Tetris was playing Tetris with kittens. And, if he wasn’t careful, laying out a prayer mat and bowing to Mecca for a hotel staffer could easily become prayer with kittens.
I liked playing with the kittens, being chewed on by them, trying to guess their next move (eating my computer power cord, falling off a couch, getting stepped on by a Saudi man in an enormous white robe), and using them as conversation pieces with cute hostel guests. But kittens do not really have established personalities, and I like my animals to have idiosyncrasies, likes and dislikes. The kittens, cute and entertaining as they were, fell far short of my dandered soul mate: James Joyce.
At the risk of sounding like one of those people that needs their animals to make them feel loved or useful or worthwhile, I will admit that James was more affectionate than most cats I’ve known. Perhaps this is because he had a horrendous flea problem or epidermal parasite and needed constant scratching, but I never saw any evidence of this. James liked sitting on my lap and liked having his head scratched. But his favorite contact with me was to sit on my shoulders and survey the lobby while I tapped on my laptop. His head was usually cocked, and jumping up to my seat reminded me of a drunken racer trying to run hurdles. This is because my cat, James Joyce, only had one eye.
We can only guess as to why James was a Cyclocat. I may like to think he lost his eye in a vicious alley battle for a bodacious she-cat – Mish Mish comes to mind. Other lodgers less inclined to that sort of thing might have imagined him struggling out of an impoverished background, pulling himself up by his furry little bootstraps, and succeeding as a hotel parasite despite an abusive childhood and 2-D vision. How he became an affectionate, one-eyed hostel guest does not matter though; the point is that he survived to maturity and, at last sighting, was happy and strong, if a bit wobbly.
James Joyce disappeared from the Farah Hotel a week or so before I flew back to the United States. I asked if anyone had seen him; no one had. By the time I left, Mish Mish’s kittens were large enough to sit on a shoulder. But they didn’t like it as much. They bit my headphones. Besides, they had no personality – just curiosity and cuteness. And they were popular; every travel that sat for more than a minute was playing with a kitten. James Joyce may not have been beautiful, but the brother had soul. Here’s to the indomitable spirit of the Jordanian street cat, eyeless, staggering, horny. May James Joyce be jumping, cockeyed and tipsy, into a warm lap as I write this, and may he make his mark – the shoulders that mean safety and triumph.
First of all, you should probably read Keiko Andress’ article on this blog, as well as Camden Bowman’s. Then you should follow the links below, then you should write something for Notes from the Fault (email me at andy.m.gerard@gmail.com).
The Big Freak Out by Clay Risen (Foreign Policy). The authors of SuperFreakonomics say they are taking on sacred cows; by taking on the entire scientific community, though, they are taking on a lot of people with tighter methodologies than their own.
Palestinians Call for EU to Back Independence by Ian Black (Guardian UK). File under: Fatah growing spine.
Manhattan Transfer: The Right’s Nonsensical Arguments Against Trying Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in New York by Dahlia Lithwick (Slate). This title speaks for itself. However, let me note to any who have not read Ms. Lithwick’s writing in Slate: Dahlia Lithwick is damn interesting.
Shah Who? by Annie Lowrey (Foreign Policy). “The Obama administration just named a virtual unknown to head the U.S. Agency for International Development. Why — and what does it mean?”
Trains v. Planes v. Automobiles by Jacob Leibenluft (Slate). This is a short, helpful, and seasonally appropriate guide to best environmental practices in traveling home for the holidays.
Barack Obama’s Facebook Feed by Christopher Beam and Chris Wilson (Slate). Levity, brevity, and Joe Biden.
