Eating Animals

Eating Animals - Jonathan Safran Foer

Jonathan Safran Foer spent much of his teenage and college years oscillating between carnivore and vegetarian. As he became a husband and a father, he kept returning to two questions: Why do we eat animals? And would we eat them if we knew how they got on our dinner plates?
Brilliantly synthesizing philosophy, literature, science, and his own undercover detective work, Eating Animals explores the many fictions we use to justify our eating habits-from folklore to pop culture to family traditions and national myth-and how such tales justify a brutal ignorance. Marked by Foer's profound moral ferocity and unvarying generosity, as well as the vibrant style and creativity that made his previous books, Everything is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, huge bestsellers, Eating Animals is a celebration and a reckoning, a story about the stories we've told--and the stories we now need to tell.

 

When this book was published several years ago, I noted it with casual interest...I had flirted with the idea of vegetarianism for many years and it seemed like the type of book I should read.

 

But I never got around to it and truthfully, forgot about it. Then I made a trip to the library and as I randomly browsed the non fiction section...Eating Animals jumped out at me.

 

This was a powerful book. I had pretty much given up the idea of vegetarianism at the time of reading (bacon anyone?) but for a week after...I could not bring myself to eat meat. I was completely heartbroken and sickened by what I read. Even a few months later, any enjoyment in eating meat and meat products have become somewhat tainted and as I live in a place where buying free range meat and eggs are possible...I'm determined to do better at.

 

Eating Animals is not meant as an accusation. It doesn't intend to make omnivores feel bad about their choice to eat animals...but rather to give them an education of what they are putting in their bodies. There are smart ways to eat animals, and there are compliant ways to eat animals and this book encourages people to be smart in their food choices...not only for the humane treatment of animals, but in living in a greener world.