Coetzee Part II

One of the first times I went camping as a young child, I went fishing with my father. we caught a few good-sized fish, and I heard my father say he was going to clean them when we got back to camp. I was around four years-old at the time, and had absolutely no idea what that meant. I just thought my dad was really cool for catching the fish. We got back to the campsite, and for a while I meandered around the cabin and the fire, playing with the dogs or roasting a marshmallow. Then I walked into the cabin, and saw exactly what "cleaning" the fish meant. I was completely horrified. Somehow, my four year-old brain had not connected eating the fish with the act of killing them. ". . . of course children all over the world consort quite naturally with animals. They don't see any dividing line. That is something they have to be taught, just as they have to be taught it is alright to kill and eat them." (Anthology 160)

caption says: "Moments of connection between children and animals"

What I find so interesting about this is that most people eat meat in this fashion. They never connect the idea of eating meat with the idea of being the one to kill it. My four-year old state of mind was not far off from any teenager that has never been hunting. Even more interestingly, this did not have much of an affect on my later meat consumption. I was horrified, yes, but I saw my father doing it, and at four-years old everything your father does is perfect (that being said, I would never condemn my father for cleaning a fish). Even that young, I possessed an astounding ability to ignore the cruelty or pain that I did not wish to see. This is not necessarily something that ever changes, unless we will it to. And even then, in regard to animals, most would never extend the same compassion toward a pig that they would to another human. This is evolutionary: caring more for the "in" species than for the "out". It's how we've survived. Furthermore, most people believe, when pressed, that "dying is, for an animal, just something that happens, something against which there may be a revolt of the organism but not a revolt of the soul. . . the old-fashioned way of saying this is that animals do not have immortal souls." (Anthology 161) In short, people have always eaten meat, and probably always will. I don't intend to sound callused, but that's the simple truth, and not necessarily the problem. The problem is the disconnect between what we see at our table and recognizing how it got there. There are many words one could use to describe the meat industry, but none could argue, if knowledgeable, that it is unnecessarily cruel.

How do we alleviate this problem? A few people have given answers, whether improbable, theoretical, or optimistic. But in response to Black bear's most eloquent thoughts, I would say don't give up hope just yet. What we would be asking requires a change of heart in a majority of the population, yes, but this has been done before. What people need is patience, the right situation, and most of all, to be educated. 

When Upton Sinclair wrote the Jungle, on the horrors of the Chicago meat-packing industry, he inspired a wave of legislation for better treatment of animals and meat in slaughter houses. The people reacted so uproariously because they suddenly became aware of what they were eating, how it was getting to their tables. The novel made each individual who read it personally involved, because they all felt personally victimized. They were not asked to sign a petition, nor yelled at by some self-righteous activist whom looked down on them. Someone gave them the information, and they responded. True, it was more about them than the animals, but does it really matter in the end? Of course it would be preferable it it were about animals, and for some it will be, but not all. Put this information out there in a way that it is impossible to ignore. Show them what's being done and what they are putting into their bodies, and they'll respond. A selfish reaction that happens collectively can do much more good than intended.  Will people ever stop eating meat? Probably not. But the idea that we could alter the way people view meat consumption--the type of meat we find it acceptable to eat--  and thereby greatly reduce cruelty in the industry? Not so far out of reach.