Right or Wrong

I have recently watched some disturbing videos on the treatment of animals at the industrial like slaughterhouses.  This is not my first exposure to this type of video.  I have seen many like them before as well as Food Inc., but I cannot bring myself to abandon the meat they give us.  This is not from a heartless perspective as I do love animals and I wish they had the best treatment, but this comes from my religious standpoint.  As a christian I am under the belief that God placed animals in the world for us.  We are given control over the animals to eat them or use them for other purposes such as travel.  I believe we should not treat these animals cruelly, but should respect them while they are raised for us.  I wish we could develop a greater appreciation for the animal such as the Native Americans had.  When they killed a buffalo, they used all of the buffalo without waste.  The buffalo was respected by the Native Americans and was never beaten before hand.  Despite watching these videos depicting cruelty, I was still able to eat a cheese steak sub.  I recognize the meat was a living cow before it was slaughtered and processed, but this is something that I can still eat while knowing.  Like I have said before, I recognize the animal’s sacrifice for our survival.  I do wish the animals would be respected while they are being raised to be killed for our nourishment.  I want the system to change its treatment of its animals but until then I will still eat meat and respect their sacrifice without letting them go to waste.  Some will say I have a right view or a wrong view, but my view should be respected.

The True Socialist Utopia of Produce

A quote in Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma really intrigued me as I read it.  “The true socialist utopia turns out to be a field of F-1 hybrid plants” (Pollan 37).  All the attempts to create a socialist utopia in many countries and the only true socialist utopia is a field of genetically altered plants.  Every corn plant shares the resources equally and every corn stock looks the same.  Is this limited to corn though?  As I’m eating wheat thins, are the wheat, corn, and soybean ingredients all genetically altered?  Is there a wheat socialist utopia or a soybean utopia?  If I grow some F-1 hybrid corn stocks in my backyard, are they going to be exactly the same as the corn stocks in a massive farm’s fields?  Is this the fate of our produce to never be unique?  Will I soon be eating genetically altered apples that don’t differ regardless of where they are grown?  I could keep going on and on with these questions.  I can understand wanting a better product that is a lot more efficiently grown, but won’t this destroy any sense of special “touch” that goes into farming.  Regardless of who is growing it or how they feel about it, is it just going to turn out the same?  There is now the genetic alteration that gives corn its own pesticides to take care of any bugs.  These plants are becoming more and more independent with every mutation.  What is this going to do to brands of produce?  If an apple is genetically altered to be the same no matter what, then will there still be brands?