Ridiculous

Thanksgiving. If I were to play the game of word associations, what would come to mind first at hearing "Thanksgiving?" Turkey? Probably. So yes, here's my turkey post. I'm assuming it'll likely be laughed at or thought of as ridiculous. But I was reminded again last night of why I won't eat meat: because I cried while watching a documentary about turkeys. There we go. Ridiculous item number one. Yeah, I cried when a turkey was killed off-screen, in a reenactment, by a wild animal.

Nature, the 31-year old PBS TV series, put out an episode in 2011 called My Life as a Turkey. It's about this dude who woke up one morning with some orphaned turkey eggs on his porch and decided he'd help them hatch and then raise them for a while. Turns out this would be a nearly 2-year long commitment with no outside human contact. Just him and his birds. Who would grow to have personalities, a decodable language, needs, feelings and emotions. Just like any other living thing. Just like any human, dog, or cat.

Which is one thing that I find funny in a non-comical way. Caution... time to segue here. I have never understood why dogs and can't aren't eaten. Okay, I guess they're eaten in China, but that's gross. At least to the millions of people who have cats and dogs and think of them as family. To me, a turkey, a chicken, a dog, a pig, a cat, a cow, a guinea pig, a rabbit, a hamster, and a horse are all the same. Ridiculous item number two. When they aren't stuffed into breeding and slaughter houses for the majority of their short lives, they are, in fact, living beings with (cliche, yes) feelings. When they are stuffed into breeding and slaughter houses for the majority of their short lives, they are just animals. Fat, lazy, diseased animals, loaded with antibiotics, corn, and water, sitting on top of themselves, just waiting to be killed for your consumption. Look at substandard shelters filled to the brim with dogs. These are not pleasant animals. These are angry, dirty, and confused animals, who would probably be just as tasty as a pork tenderloin. Look at prison systems in third-world countries filled to the brim with criminal humans. These are not pleasant people. They are angry, dirty, and confused people, and frankly they'd probably taste the same as any other mammal. Ridiculous item number three.

The point is, take a turkey, coddle it and pet it and love it like you love a cat, and you could have, in effect, a cat. Take a pig, put a leash on it and take it for walks, groom it, feed it treats like you do for your dog, and you could have, in effect, a dog. Of course, an undomesticated animal will always be an undomesticated animal. But why does that mean it is more edible than a domesticated one? Why does that mean Sarah McLaughlin can tug at your heartstrings for one-eyed cats and frown-faced dogs, but no one bats an eye at chickens being dipped head-first into electrically charged water to (hopefully) be stunned before having their necks slit by an automated knife down a most disgusting assembly line? Food for thought.

This Thanksgiving, I just want people to be cognizant of what and who they're eating. Remember that he or she was a living being with feelings, just like your cat or dog you love so much. I'm happy to know that over the past 6 years I've saved hundreds of animals just by myself. Assuming I ate just one chicken a week before, that's 312 I alone have spared. I'm thankful for that. Ridiculous item number four.