No such thing, anti-omnivores say. You can't have meat with ethics.
In a previous post, I talked about "Tomatoland" and how our demand for out-of-season fruits and veggies needs to be examined. but no one examines it. Everyone just tromps right on down to the store and gets bent if their produce they want RIGHT NOW isn't there and pretty.
We can do this. Should we?
Shipping *stuff* from wherever so we can eat it whenever involves a lot of used-up resources. Start with the crap needed for growing the produce. Pesticides galore. Forcing crops to grow in places they are not usually grown, without the nutrients they usually have. (But jobs!!! Giving people jobs!!! Nope. Fail. False.) Skip a few steps and think about the shipping of said product from Florida or California to, say, Ohio. Fuel. Fossil fuel, that is, consumed for what? So you can have your out-of-season stuff. (But... jobs??) Because you deserve it. Let's think about all the packaging. Unnecessary packaging. Of course it is unnecessary, because it is NOT necessary for you to have that tomato just because you want it.
Is this an easy problem to fix? Well, yes and no. Yes because we have the power to do it, no because it would take such a huge shift in consciousness and lifestyle that it surely won't happen any time soon. Do we need to? Yes. Look at where we are heading. We need to change a lot. We need to be local local local and we need to stop taking so much for granted. We need to look at what we do and why, and how we can change that.
You know why cucumbers used to taste SO GOOD to me in the summer? Because I could only have them in the summer. Because I didn't take them for granted. We need to get back to being more like that, or we may as well forget it. Mother Earth does NOT need us. We need her.
I eat in season for the most part, but yes my organic produce is shipped from other places during the colder months. I refuse to eat meat even from ethically-raised animals. I think you can raise an animal ethically, but killing one is unethical in my book. And I don't want to eat something that is flesh, bones and blood. I had a nightmare about this the other night, I read a passage in a book or maybe it was a news headline about a river of blood coming from a slaughterhouse. If 7 billion people on the planet all ate meat, the planet would be doomed and it would be impossible to raise all those animals sustainably and ethically.
ReplyDeleteGood post. I think there is another alternative too, in these modern times: Storage. Actually, some storage methods aren't at all modern. Drying and canning have a long tradition (more so in your country than mine), but we also have the option of freezing veg pretty reliably now. We also heat our houses much more effectively throughout the winters (too much, some would say) which means that if you must have fresh salad leaves in the depths of winter, they can be grown indoors without needing to provide extra heat just for the plants. I do agree with you about the pleasure of eating seasonally, though. I'm just hoping we'll get a season fit for growing tomatoes this year (not enough sunshine last year).
ReplyDeleteMoon Child, I certainly respect your decision and would never preach to you to change. As a sustainable omnivore, I also feel if 7 billion plus people on the planet ate only vegan, we would have lots of problems there, too.
ReplyDeleteRachel - yes, storage. We have the technology and the wherewithal to can and keep and freeze, yet we do that less and less.