72/365
I recently finished reading Jonathan Safran Foer's Eating Animals. This isn't the first book I've read on the horrors of factory farming/fishing. Which is maybe why it did what it did to me.
There is so much that we Know in life that we never Do. If we put knowledge and change on a linear path of 1. Understanding of The Problem > 2. Knowledge of how to fix The Problem > 3. Acting on this knowledge and changing The Problem, there is a massive chasm between #2 and #3 called Habit (aka Unconscious Living/Fear) that can stop us from ever moving forward. Its power is ridiculous, insidious, clawing.
I have a lot of chasms to build bridges over, but this particular one, well, I've reached a point where I simply can't continue irresponsibly down a path of habit, habit that supports immense animal suffering and that sees me ingesting disease and pain into my own body. For what, the pleasure of "taste", the cheap fulfillment of "protein requirements"? For goodness sake, these are hardly even animals (ie - hardly even "food") anymore - grossly genetically modified, barely able to move, chickens locked in less than 1foot square spaces for the entirety of their lives, growing at mind-boggling abnormal speed, incapable even of reproduction, tortured at the moment of slaughter. These "animals" are nothing but commodities that pad the pockets of corporate giants who are - knowingly, in the name of greed - creating human sickness and environmental disaster. These people feed off our mass unconsciousness, our disconnect from our food/bodies/earth, our demand for Cheap Easy and Immediate. Shame. For utter shame. On us and them.
Often, moving between #2 and #3 requires a long period of attention that slowly brings about change in thinking and in actions. But sometimes, sometimes the chasm is leapt with a snap of the fingers. Or a turn of the page. I no longer have excuses, no longer have the luxury of closing my eyes, plugging my ears and singing "lalala" to drown out the screaming. I'm standing on the other side of the gap with, yes, questions remaining as to "How Now?", but no other choice left than to walk forward, awake, choosing life over death one meal at a time.
There is so much that we Know in life that we never Do. If we put knowledge and change on a linear path of 1. Understanding of The Problem > 2. Knowledge of how to fix The Problem > 3. Acting on this knowledge and changing The Problem, there is a massive chasm between #2 and #3 called Habit (aka Unconscious Living/Fear) that can stop us from ever moving forward. Its power is ridiculous, insidious, clawing.
I have a lot of chasms to build bridges over, but this particular one, well, I've reached a point where I simply can't continue irresponsibly down a path of habit, habit that supports immense animal suffering and that sees me ingesting disease and pain into my own body. For what, the pleasure of "taste", the cheap fulfillment of "protein requirements"? For goodness sake, these are hardly even animals (ie - hardly even "food") anymore - grossly genetically modified, barely able to move, chickens locked in less than 1foot square spaces for the entirety of their lives, growing at mind-boggling abnormal speed, incapable even of reproduction, tortured at the moment of slaughter. These "animals" are nothing but commodities that pad the pockets of corporate giants who are - knowingly, in the name of greed - creating human sickness and environmental disaster. These people feed off our mass unconsciousness, our disconnect from our food/bodies/earth, our demand for Cheap Easy and Immediate. Shame. For utter shame. On us and them.
Often, moving between #2 and #3 requires a long period of attention that slowly brings about change in thinking and in actions. But sometimes, sometimes the chasm is leapt with a snap of the fingers. Or a turn of the page. I no longer have excuses, no longer have the luxury of closing my eyes, plugging my ears and singing "lalala" to drown out the screaming. I'm standing on the other side of the gap with, yes, questions remaining as to "How Now?", but no other choice left than to walk forward, awake, choosing life over death one meal at a time.
posted by traceyj at 2:09 PM
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